For decades, social scientists have worked with models that have sought to quantify and explain human behavior. The common foundation for nearly all of these mathematical applications is the assumption of linear progression, equilibrium, and stability. Serpents in the Sand not only argues that political life is fundamentally nonlinear but thoroughly analyzes specific instances of extreme nonlinearity in politics. By so doing, Courtney Brown offers a guide to the reader on how to apply nonlinearity, including chaos theory, to real-world situations.
The author develops his argument by in-depth analysis of four examples covering a broad spectrum of political life. He considers, first, the relationship between individual rationality and the influence of a voter's political milieu. He then turns to look at the dynamics behind the Johnson vs. Goldwater landslide presidential election of 1964. The fall of the Weimar Republic and the rise of Nazi Germany provide a third case study, followed, by an analysis of the relationship between democratic electoral politics and the ecological environment.
Highly original in its finding, Serpents in the Sand resembles no other work on politics. It is the first study of nonlinearity in political behavior to base its argument on specific examples rather than on analogies to physical and ecological systems. Substantively, the book draws provocative conclusions from the test cases, examining for instance the potential for disaster in the oscillatory relationship between the way U.S. presidents are elected and the management of the country's environment. In the end, Serpents in the Sand extends its argument to the philosophy of human existence, showing that human behavior is as nonlinear as all other processes in the universe.
Courtney Brown is Associate Professor of Political Science, Emory University.