Human Scale

by Kirkpatrick Sale

"Big government, big business, big everything - how the crises that imperil modern America are the inevitable result of giantism grown out of control - and what can be done about it. Kirkpatrick Sale examines a nation in the grips of growthmania and presents the ways to shape a more efficient and livable society built to the human scale."--Cover.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics, Economics, Philosophy, Sociology, Nature, Business

558 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1980

Reviews

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Big = American.

Big cars, big business, big government, big problems, big (attempted) solutions, big, big, big.

Tackling the idea of growth and bigness way back in 1980 (sense of scale: Donna Summer, Kenny Rodgers and Pink Floyd were the chart toppers), Sale takes the long view of human history and does an admirable job of tying some of our most vexing problems not to misguided policy, greed, or any other common scapegoat, but just to sheer size.

As Gladwell and others have recently noted, humans seem to work and cooperate best when group size remains within a given range. Sale applied this concept not just to governance -- although that figures centrally in many of the chapters -- but also to energy, transportation, agriculture, civic involvement, education, urban planning, environmental preservation, etc., etc., etc., etc. And etc. Really, this is 500+ pages of Sale pounding on the virtues of going small and local (Question, Mr. Sale: is 560 pages too big?). As impressive as the tome is, the real flash of genius is that he was a couple decades ahead of everyone else on this particular front.

The good news? Sale pegs the upper limit for population of a functional city at about 200,000. Welcome to Spokane.

[Stephen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Human Scale is an ambitious assault on big business, big government -- the very concept of Bigness. Opening with biology, Kirkpatrick Sale first establishes his basic operating principle: for everything, there is a limit to its size beyond which it cannot grow without being compromised. In its opening third, Human Scale addresses the problems inherent in large, complex systems, then follows that with sections on how society, economy, and politics might function more effectively if scaled down. On the hefty side itself, Human Scale impresses with its thoroughness; a kindred spirit to E.F. Schumacher's small is beautiful, the book has largely stood the test of time in putting forth a case for decentralized politics, appropriate technology, organic locally grown agriculture, and cities and buildings built to the human scale. Sale creates a synthesis from topics as varying as demographics and aesthetics.. It is at times dated, at least in its optimistic projections for solar energy efficiency. On the whole, however, it offers insight into government dysfunction and widespread social problems, along with ways people can work to effect change themselves. It is almost an anarchist how-to, a review of ways people can reclaim their lives against the power of centralization, and its enduring relevance is proven in the multitude of authors still advancing its ideas, a number that includes Bill McKibben and Wendell Berry.

[Jennifer]

Half-read. Really good though stats are of course dated. Add to the list of books written long ago that I'm horrified no one listened too.

[Dameon Launert · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was looking forward to this book because I rated two other books by the author, After Eden and Rebels Against the Future, five stars each. This one disappointed, though.

I agree with the general premise for much more decentralization and localism. But the arguments presented were sometimes weak. Ironically, the book is much too big itself. I found my mind wandering often through the thicket of wordiness and repetitiveness.

A couple other points. Sale praises alternative technology, but does he realize that photovoltaics require a massive, complex industrial system? He is advocating, after all, for de-industrialization, though he never quite spells it out. Photovoltaic cells won't be manufactured in such a society. And of course neither solar farms nor wind farms conform to human scale.

Lastly, he used the forum to advocate for other leftist ideals, such as feminism and especially gay rights, the latter of which he mentioned a surprising number of times. Doesn't parochialism mean every society decides for itself what its values are, not to be imposed by leftism or any other ism? And just what rights does he believe gays don't have? The right to indoctrinate children in school and media? The right to dress up as grotesque sex clowns and mock a caricature of women in public? Gay rights is the imposition of a minority interest upon the majority, which would actually seem to be antithetical to the theme. He lost the plot with this example of forced teaming.

I just learned he wrote a revisited version in 2017, which I will probably eventually read.