Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering
Malcolm Gladwell
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Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering
Malcolm Gladwell
Twenty-five years after the publication of his groundbreaking first book, Malcolm Gladwell returns with a brand-new volume that reframes the lessons of The Tipping Point in a startling and revealing light. Why is Miami…Miami? What does the heartbreaking fate of the cheetah tell us about the way we raise our children? Why do Ivy League schools care so much about sports? What is the Magic Third, and what does it mean for racial harmony? In this provocative new work, Malcolm Gladwell returns for the first time in twenty-five years to the subject of social epidemics and tipping points, this time with the aim of explaining the dark side of contagious phenomena. Through a series of riveting stories, Gladwell traces the rise of a new and troubling form of social engineering. He takes us to the streets of Los Angeles to meet the world’s most successful bank robbers, rediscovers a forgotten television show from the 1970s that changed the world, visits the site of a historic experiment on a tiny cul-de-sac in northern California, and offers an alternate history of two of the biggest epidemics of our day: COVID and the opioid crisis. Revenge of the Tipping Point is Gladwell’s most personal book yet. With his characteristic mix of storytelling and social science, he offers a guide to making sense of the contagions of modern world. It’s time we took tipping points seriously.
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0'Revenge of the Tipping Point' is excellent.
Granted, it's an update of a 24-year-old book. Instead of calling it 'The Tipping Point, 2 Ed.,' Gladwell uses new examples to illustrate his thesis (One suspects this allows the author to take full credit for fulfilling a contractual obligation.). Further granted, you won't get many new takeaways if you’ve read its predecessor. Finally granted, you may feel a little bit conned for purchasing this book if you read 'The Tipping Point' back in the early 2000s.
But you know what? It doesn't matter. Gladwell is such a good writer, his examples and case studies so compelling, his conclusions so reasonable, that you'll love this book anyway. I tore through it like I would a spy thriller. That's how readable 'Revenge of the Tipping Point' is.
The book, in case you're unfamiliar with its predecessor, investigates the point at which a contagion becomes an epidemic, a niche becomes mainstream, the powerless become powerful, a minority becomes a majority (or a majority hangs on to its majority). Through investigations of a Covid superspreader event, racial mixing in higher education, and America's opioid epidemic, among others; journalist Malcolm Gladwell makes his points with clarity and conviction.
What sets this book apart from any number of interesting 4-star books on social sciences? Frankly, it's Gladwell's writing style. He's so approachable, so interesting, that you feel you're sitting across from the prize guest at the dinner party. This isn't just a fascinating book: it's an entertaining one.
I loved it. I think you will, too.
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