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BOOK REVIEWS Charles Sokol Bednar. Transforming the Dream: Ecologism and the Shaping of an Alternative American Vision . Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2003. PBK 232 pp. $21.95. ISBN: 0-7914-5716-8. A professor of political science at a US liberal arts college, Charles Sokol Bednar writes from a place of passion and frustration to chal- lenge the very foundations of what is commonly called the American Dream. His belief is that the current “dominant techno-industrial paradigm” has so restricted the vision of the American dream to material accumulation that Americans’ very conversations are dom- inated by the language of consumerism. Freedom is de fi ned as the freedom to consume. Progress is wrapped up in having better “stu ff ” to consume. Economic growth goes unchallenged as “good”; it pro- duces more opportunities for consumption. It has been well docu- mented elsewhere that the American material standard of living is not sustainable, especially if the rest of the world rises to similar levels of hyperconsumption. Other aspects of the dream, beyond material security, go ignored, including the psychic needs for cre- ativity, identity and initiative, as well as social needs such as friendship and understanding. Concerned
Worldviews – Brill
Published: Jan 1, 2006
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