The Secret Lives of Citizens: Pursuing the Promise of American Life - Softcover

Geoghegan, Thomas

4.04

27 ratings by Goodreads

9780226287645: The Secret Lives of Citizens: Pursuing the Promise of American Life

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0226287645 ISBN 13: 9780226287645

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 2000

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In this witty combination of memoir and observation, Thomas Geoghegan addresses the widespread cynicism about our government and explores what it means to be a "national" civil servant and a "local" citizen.

"This is unlike any public-policy book I've ever read: part Catcher in the Rye, part The Road to Wigan Pier, part The Federalist Papers, it is mesmerizing, rueful, painfully honest, and never, ever dull."—Nicholas Lemann, author of The Big Test

"Extraordinary. It has the essential trait of a memorable book, in that after reading it you look at daily life in a lastingly different way." —James Fallows, author of Breaking the News

"[Geoghegan] has written a book that is not only compelling to read but that provokes us to seriously reflect on the choices we make and how we spend our time." —Jonathan Coleman, Washington Post Book World

"Geoghegan's language is playful. . . . Personal reminiscence mixing with historical anecdote, dipping into complex themes . . . shifting from wistful nostalgia to dark comedy." —Robert B. Reich, New York Times Book Review

"A truly strange and wonderful book." — William Finnegan

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Review:

In the post-welfare reform, booming economic era of the 1990s, what's a liberal to do? Thomas Geoghegan offers an answer in The Secret Lives of Citizens, a breathy, confessional, stream of consciousness tale that is part diary, part chronicle of civic involvement at the end of the 20th century. In the book, Geoghegan begins as an intern at The New Republic and an Energy Department functionary in the Carter administration. But he is dissatisfied; he feels disconnected. So he moves to Chicago in search of surviving traces of the New Deal. He contemplates running for office, then becomes involved in Harold Washington's mayoral campaign, then files several lawsuits on behalf of the poor. But he remains discontented--and that, more than anything else, seems to be his theme.

Liberals who feel let-down by Bill Clinton's shift towards ideological centrism may find some solace in The Secret Lives of Citizens. Geoghegan is concerned about the collapse of the labor union movement, the demise of cities, and the rise of state and local government control. He is terrified of the growth in population and stature of the South: "I could go down to the Potomac River, along Ohio Drive, on a hot August night, and hear it growing in the dark." He also hates the West: "The Senate, then and now, overrepresents: 1. Small states; 2. Deserts; 3. Republicans; 4. Babies." (By babies, he does not mean infants, but westerners who whine about Washington interfering with the use of western lands.)

He even decries the unfairness of Chicago's resident parking rules: "As I circle and circle it hits me: Bad enough to lose the New Deal. Bad enough to lose planning. Bad enough that even our mayor lives now in a private complex, and we can't see him. But my God, can't there be a place to park?" Towards the end of the book, he discusses the ever-growing wage gap between rich and poor. "And the key is that our democracy lets it happen," he laments, "people don't vote, they think the government can do nothing about this. But a necessary condition of the American model that we boast about in Europe is that less than half the country votes. No majority rule: that's how we can downsize, etc. That's the new American model." And that is an outrage. --Linda Killian

From the Publisher:

"Thomas Geoghegan approaches the mechanics of government with the sensibility of a Romantic poet; he's the Byron of the bureaucracy and The Secret Lives of Citizens is a brilliant account of a doomed but lovely passion for the American dream."
---Ron Rosenbaum, author of Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil

"In an era in which public discourse is dominated by propagandists and professors, Thomas Geoghegan is a prophet. The Secret Lives of Citizens is an impassioned, witty and wise report on the decrepit state of our Union."
---Michael Lind, author of The Next American Nation : The New Nationalism and the Fourth American Revolution

"A truly strange and wonderful book. Who knew that political autobiography and a restless, dead serious meditation on the meaning of American citizenship could be so funny? Tom Geoghegan attacks the New Federalism, ponders labor economics, compares Chicago and Washington, attends tedious meetings, and talks fiercely to himself---all in a voice like nothing you've heard before: playful, self-effacing, erudite, and breathtakingly earnest. He also dates au pairs from Poland."
----William Finnegan, The New Yorker

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