Talk:The Moral Basis of a Backward Society

Untilted
In addition to ending abruptly, this article has no citations, no mention of the book's reception when published, and nothing on its enduring reputation. Why bother to have it at all?

Very much of its time, very little of ours
The volume I read was hardcover but in typescript form, and I expect it was meant initially not as a book to be published but a report to be circulated. I suspect this was commissioned, by people who wanted to know how can we keep Italy from going Communist. The author makes it clear that that is hardly a problem – southern Italians' voting is so capricious that whoever gets into office today will surely be kicked out of it tomorrow.

A couple of intriguing items near the very end of the final chapter, which itself is not like the preceding chapters. One, a footnote observation about Protestants in Brazil. Banfield says they've done good work. I think they still are, if I may sub in the adjective "evangelical." Catholicism in Brazil isn't invisible but it is vacant; the only churches I see anyone in are the Assemblies of God and similar. Might also be true in Italy, though it wouldn't have been at the time: Banfield notes Italy forbade Protestant proselytizing. And two: Montegrano was so backward it didn't even have soccer. Wow. (To use a word you just don't see enough of in encyclopedias.) How could a place, especially a backward one, not have soccer? This one almost did, once. Some boys got up a game. Then the mayor, who like all quality in Montegrano exercised power for the only reason there was – because he could – and the only way he knew how – by showing disapproval - denied the use of the one suitable field in town. Banfield suggests sports might be a way to make people take a wider view of the world.

Well, after much intelligent research and consideration – the writer is sympathetic and never laughs or sneers - he had to come up with some policy ideas. Soccer sounds as good as any. Could the author have simply waited a decade, he might have just said, "Send in the Peace Corps," and "planners" (that's Banfield's word) might have been quite satisfied.

Jahutter (talk) 18:25, 30 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Robert Putnam's solution in 2000 was opera groups as well as soccer. See his Bowling Alone. Bellagio99 (talk) 23:01, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Timely
I have not read it, but the description reminds me of the 1980s socialism in CEE countries: us vs them, family as the most important, low social capital. Carrying over to the 2020s in politics. Zezen (talk) 02:12, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

An American view?
As a non-American reading the book (I have read the entire book), I was struck by the way that Banfield viewed Montegrano from the vantage point of mid-Western America (see Chapter 1, p.1, where the comparison is with St. George in Utah). Banfield seemed to take the view that St. George in Utah represented a useful model community. Against the measuring rod of St. George in Utah, Banfield decided that Montegrano was sadly lacking.

I understand, and I appreciate that for his research purposes it was convenient for Banfield to compare Montegrano with mid-Western America. Nevertheless, there are two points that need to be borne in mind. First, the world is a big place and there really was no reason to compare the situation in Montegrano with a town in America rather than, for example, a town in Brazil or India or China. Second, there is often a tendency for authors and journalists and scholars who are writing about a foreign country to think that "they" would be better off if they were more "like us". Stanley Karnow's book about America in the Philippines captures this neatly in the title of his book -- . There is -- to my eye anyway -- an element of this "In our Image" approach running all the way through The Moral Basis of a Backward Society. Pmccawley (talk) 12:25, 27 September 2020 (UTC)