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I tagged this section as being in likely violation of WP's original research policy, as it appears to be a strung-together list of links and associations that the two editors of this section compiled on their own. [removed per BLP - please do not use this talk page to make accusations regarding other editors or the subject of this article]
WichitaLineman66 ( talk) 05:59, 7 July 2017 (UTC)
I removed the entire section not because it's original research, but because it's UNORIGINAL research. All the Wikipedia pages linked are very clear that these institutions are Koch-funded. Nothing is undisclosed. In case there's any question about it, I have never received any Koch money, either directly or indirectly. RussNelson ( talk) 14:19, 7 July 2017 (UTC)
I kinda liked my addition, where I wrote of the discrimination against Buchanan resulting in a heartfelt appreciation for discrimination against others, which MacLean totally flipped on its head, wondering why Buchanan didn't do that. It's almost as if she didn't read the things she was footnoting. Was there a reason you removed it? It seems typical of the MacLeanisms found elsewhere in her book. RussNelson ( talk) 02:51, 8 July 2017 (UTC)
I think this should be mentioned, in the appropriate section of the page, considering the nature of the attacks contained in the book. Link: https://securegrants.neh.gov/publicquery/main.aspx?f=1&gn=FA-57183-13 Click on "Grant products" in order to see the "final" result that was produced with the help of that particular governmental grant. -- G. L. Talk 18:33, 10 July 2017 (UTC)
Yes, she did take money from the government to write a document defending the government. Whether that is appropriate to include by Wikipedia guidelines or not, it shouldn't be part of the public discussion of this book. First, because we should take the high road where she took the low road. Second, Wikipedia takes funding from all sorts of people. Do you therefore think that Wikipedia articles are in any way affected by the opinions of those donors? No. It's a ridiculous charge for her to make, and it would be a ridiculous charge for us to make about her. RussNelson ( talk) 05:32, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Secondary source that mentions the NEH Grant:
http://www.libertylawsite.org/2017/06/27/six-degrees-of-jim-buchanan/
Quote from the article/review: This notion of the recipient of funding—whether a candidate or a scholar—as a tabula rasa on whom the donor scrawls self-indulgent views is counter to common experience. It is like saying that MacLean had no views, then received a $50,000 government grant to research Buchanan (
she did), and consequently became an apologist for government (in this book, she is). The last two steps in that sequence are correct, but the first is silly. There is nothing in Democracy in Chains, one can safely assume, that differs from what MacLean would have said without a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Nor is there any reason to believe Buchanan’s views would have differed had donors not backed him.
@ RussNelson I don't think anything of what you mentioned above. I just wanted to insert a fact. I didn't put any spinning or interpretations in it. My opinion is the same as the author I've quoted above, that btw mentions the 50.400 dollar grant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by GLOBALIST LIBERTARIAN ( talk • contribs) 17:56, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Another Secondary source that mentions the NEH Grant. https://www.forbes.com/sites/georgeleef/2017/07/03/the-case-for-abolishing-the-national-endowment-for-the-humanities-just-got-stronger/ Quote from the artiicle: The reason why I say that the case for abolishing the NEH, as proposed in President Trump’s budget, just got stronger is that it funded an egregiously political hatchet job of a book that was recently published, namely Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America by Duke University history professor Nancy MacLean. -- G. L. Talk 18:03, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
I think, that 2 secondary sources are enough and we can include, just the fact that the author received a governmental grant for that book. -- G. L. Talk 18:03, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Yet another secondary source that mentions that she received a governmental NEH grant for Democracy in Chains. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/449110/nancy-maclean-james-buchanan-libertarianism-book-shortcuts-expose-evil Quote: You may have missed the story. The short version is that historian Nancy MacLean has written a book, apparently with some government funding,... -- G. L. Talk 18:11, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Good call, Rjensen. Thanks, for illuminating the benighted in their misunderstanding of the Federal reality that finances intellectual progress in the U.S.
Chas. Caltrop ( talk) 17:45, 13 August 2017 (UTC)
Someone has added a paragraph sourced from Dr John Jackson's blog at altrightorigins.com. This is a selfpublished source. See WP:BLOGS "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications.[7] Exercise caution when using such sources: if the information in question is really worth reporting, someone else will probably have published it in independent reliable sources.[9] " All the other quotes we use about democracy in chains have been published in well-known outfits (History News Network, The Atlantic, Guardian, Washington Post, or articles to appear in scholarly journals), usually by established people with their own wikipedia pages. Basically, to be consistent, if we include the positive altrightorigins, there are lots more negative blogposts from people who are better known than Jackson (e.g. Steve Horwitz) we'd have to include if we are to be consitent. I am going to remove the paragraph per WP:UNDUE NPalgan2 ( talk) 20:37, 19 July 2017 (UTC)
"no corresponding effort to enhance the praise of the book" - I have added the Jacobin and Monbiot articles praising MacLean. It's not my fault if the articles praising the book have dried up. Let's agree on criteria for inclusion, then apply them even-handedly. If you can find other notable sources praising the book, add them. If you feel Georg Vanberg, the chairman of Duke's polisci dept, in WashPo criticising the book is UNDUE then how to justify having Carol Haggas (non-notable non-expert) praising it in Kirkus? NPalgan2 ( talk) 05:03, 22 July 2017 (UTC)
Gamaliel I've added three interviews done by MacLean, quoting the brief secondary introductory material at the beginnings. The quotes of praise are generic because the articles were published before the controversy began or ignore it. I feel that the current article is more than fair to MacLean. NPalgan2 ( talk) 15:14, 22 July 2017 (UTC)
Gamaliel I simply don't accept that under 300 words of criticism is "overwhelming" the article - and in any case it'ld be much better to plump up the other sections rather than delete well sourced notable (and highly interesting) material. Wikipedia articles about academics are a brief biographical precis but focus on what is notable about them i.e. their scholarly work. (You have to be a pretty famous academic before secondary sources start writing about your life and loves). We add what secondary sources about the academic's oeuvre until the article grows unwieldy, then we split. Creating a separate Democracy in Chains article would be ridiculous ATM, as it would just be little more than a stub. Look, I feel that your criticism basically boils down to "I wish that fewer notable sources had criticised Democracy in Chains". What negative source is in the article that you feel would be UNDUE if it had *praised* the book instead? NPalgan2 ( talk) 08:14, 23 July 2017 (UTC)
There's a paper relevant to DiC at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3071403. I can't tell its academic status. Oddly, it doesn't like the book William M. Connolley ( talk) 09:25, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
It's come to my attention that whenever I've added updates of positive reviews and/or award nominations, those additions are almost immediately deleted. I have, in good faith, tried to keep the page balanced, and have never deleted any of the elements critical of MacLean, even when they are not related to fair criticism of the book. This is unacceptable. Both negative and positive reviews should be included, as any nominations from major and respectable organizations. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fuqualib ( talk • contribs) 20:50, 3 April 2018 (UTC)
If any material had been removed (if it was, it was an honest mistake), why not simply add that back in? I've been conscientious in noting where criticism is coming from, including calling the positive reviews "sympathetic" authors. I am going to add the information back in, both positive and negative, and will add the "positive" information in the section that describes positive reviews, even leaving the "negative" reviews as the last word. That is more than fair, I think. Fuqualib ( talk) 13:32, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
"Radley Balko argued that public choice theory was a crucial tool in his work investigating the actions of unscrupulous police and prosecutors.[48]" RussNelson ( talk) 12:34, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
Should we include this? "the Koch team of professors who don’t disclose their conflicts of interest and the operatives who work full time for their project to shackle our democracy."
She doesn't name anyone, and thus her claim is impossible to refute. All she need do is say "Oh, I didn't mean *them." I'm not sure this belongs in Wikipedia, being baseless slander of a number of living people. RussNelson ( talk) 12:40, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
I did a substantial reorganization of the section on Democracy in Chains to improve its order and bring it into line with other WP articles on controversial books. In the interest of documenting the changes and rationale, I'm detailing the revision strategy below.
1. The previous version lumped a multitude of appraisals of the book together in a messy and disjointed fashion. To address this I separated the reviews into three subsections: "Appraisals" for positive reviews, "Criticisms" for negative reviews, and "Response" for further replies by the author and discussion of the controversy.
2. Some of the appraisals that were mixed in with the old version were not actually reviews of the book. They were promotional interviews and similar material for the book (e.g. the Rebecca Onion interview for Slate). I dropped these on the grounds that they don't really tell us much about the independent reception of the book by its reviewers. I also added descriptive identifiers to some of the authors and publication venues that were missing.
3. The criticisms section was similarly a mess of dozens of links on vastly different topics. I rearranged them into three thematic paragraphs that cover the main criticisms of Democracy in Chains: (a) its depiction of Buchanan on race and segregation, (b) its claims about Buchanan and the Pinochet dictatorship, and (c) its claims about Buchanan and libertarianism/George Mason University/other George Mason professors. I also trimmed some of the redundant links, specified the claims of criticism, and added cross-links to other articles on WP where suitable.
4. I consolidated the "Response" section to include MacLean's answers to her critics, plus subsequent reviews that have also focused on the controversy around the book. Other than tweaking the language for NPOV and descriptive clarity this section is largely made up of the previous version's paragraphs that were tacked on at the end of the section.
If you think more information is warranted or want to further revise this section please do so, or please discuss below. It should continue to be improved. But simply reverting to the old version is not constructive as that version was a cluttered mess. LiberalReformer ( talk) 17:50, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
This article undermines criticism of her work and does an incredibly poor job of highlighting the reasons for the controversy that likely brings the majority of people to this article. I expect nothing less than liberal bias from wikipedia - let's not even pretend like this website is balanced - but this article is a travesty and purposely elevates her views for the sake of ideological proselytizing. Fix it. 73.42.40.92 ( talk) 20:03, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
The Democracy in Chains subsection has turned into a coatrack of sorts for libertarian activists to demonstrate their skills of prevarication. While that might be interesting to people outside the reality-based community who don’t rely on facts, evidence, and data, back here in the real world, that’s not how we write biographies. I recommend summarizing the content in its most neutral and accurate form and spinning it out into a new article about the book. Viriditas ( talk) 22:18, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
I'm with VM and against V. But, the section is too long and should be cut down (I don't think it should become its own article). Some people like it, some people think it is all lies, but we don't need quite so many words to say so William M. Connolley ( talk) 09:19, 15 December 2021 (UTC)
This article must adhere to the biographies of living persons (BLP) policy, even if it is not a biography, because it contains material about living persons. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately from the article and its talk page, especially if potentially libellous. If such material is repeatedly inserted, or if you have other concerns, please report the issue to this noticeboard.If you are a subject of this article, or acting on behalf of one, and you need help, please see this help page. |
![]() | This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
I tagged this section as being in likely violation of WP's original research policy, as it appears to be a strung-together list of links and associations that the two editors of this section compiled on their own. [removed per BLP - please do not use this talk page to make accusations regarding other editors or the subject of this article]
WichitaLineman66 ( talk) 05:59, 7 July 2017 (UTC)
I removed the entire section not because it's original research, but because it's UNORIGINAL research. All the Wikipedia pages linked are very clear that these institutions are Koch-funded. Nothing is undisclosed. In case there's any question about it, I have never received any Koch money, either directly or indirectly. RussNelson ( talk) 14:19, 7 July 2017 (UTC)
I kinda liked my addition, where I wrote of the discrimination against Buchanan resulting in a heartfelt appreciation for discrimination against others, which MacLean totally flipped on its head, wondering why Buchanan didn't do that. It's almost as if she didn't read the things she was footnoting. Was there a reason you removed it? It seems typical of the MacLeanisms found elsewhere in her book. RussNelson ( talk) 02:51, 8 July 2017 (UTC)
I think this should be mentioned, in the appropriate section of the page, considering the nature of the attacks contained in the book. Link: https://securegrants.neh.gov/publicquery/main.aspx?f=1&gn=FA-57183-13 Click on "Grant products" in order to see the "final" result that was produced with the help of that particular governmental grant. -- G. L. Talk 18:33, 10 July 2017 (UTC)
Yes, she did take money from the government to write a document defending the government. Whether that is appropriate to include by Wikipedia guidelines or not, it shouldn't be part of the public discussion of this book. First, because we should take the high road where she took the low road. Second, Wikipedia takes funding from all sorts of people. Do you therefore think that Wikipedia articles are in any way affected by the opinions of those donors? No. It's a ridiculous charge for her to make, and it would be a ridiculous charge for us to make about her. RussNelson ( talk) 05:32, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Secondary source that mentions the NEH Grant:
http://www.libertylawsite.org/2017/06/27/six-degrees-of-jim-buchanan/
Quote from the article/review: This notion of the recipient of funding—whether a candidate or a scholar—as a tabula rasa on whom the donor scrawls self-indulgent views is counter to common experience. It is like saying that MacLean had no views, then received a $50,000 government grant to research Buchanan (
she did), and consequently became an apologist for government (in this book, she is). The last two steps in that sequence are correct, but the first is silly. There is nothing in Democracy in Chains, one can safely assume, that differs from what MacLean would have said without a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Nor is there any reason to believe Buchanan’s views would have differed had donors not backed him.
@ RussNelson I don't think anything of what you mentioned above. I just wanted to insert a fact. I didn't put any spinning or interpretations in it. My opinion is the same as the author I've quoted above, that btw mentions the 50.400 dollar grant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by GLOBALIST LIBERTARIAN ( talk • contribs) 17:56, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Another Secondary source that mentions the NEH Grant. https://www.forbes.com/sites/georgeleef/2017/07/03/the-case-for-abolishing-the-national-endowment-for-the-humanities-just-got-stronger/ Quote from the artiicle: The reason why I say that the case for abolishing the NEH, as proposed in President Trump’s budget, just got stronger is that it funded an egregiously political hatchet job of a book that was recently published, namely Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America by Duke University history professor Nancy MacLean. -- G. L. Talk 18:03, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
I think, that 2 secondary sources are enough and we can include, just the fact that the author received a governmental grant for that book. -- G. L. Talk 18:03, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Yet another secondary source that mentions that she received a governmental NEH grant for Democracy in Chains. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/449110/nancy-maclean-james-buchanan-libertarianism-book-shortcuts-expose-evil Quote: You may have missed the story. The short version is that historian Nancy MacLean has written a book, apparently with some government funding,... -- G. L. Talk 18:11, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Good call, Rjensen. Thanks, for illuminating the benighted in their misunderstanding of the Federal reality that finances intellectual progress in the U.S.
Chas. Caltrop ( talk) 17:45, 13 August 2017 (UTC)
Someone has added a paragraph sourced from Dr John Jackson's blog at altrightorigins.com. This is a selfpublished source. See WP:BLOGS "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications.[7] Exercise caution when using such sources: if the information in question is really worth reporting, someone else will probably have published it in independent reliable sources.[9] " All the other quotes we use about democracy in chains have been published in well-known outfits (History News Network, The Atlantic, Guardian, Washington Post, or articles to appear in scholarly journals), usually by established people with their own wikipedia pages. Basically, to be consistent, if we include the positive altrightorigins, there are lots more negative blogposts from people who are better known than Jackson (e.g. Steve Horwitz) we'd have to include if we are to be consitent. I am going to remove the paragraph per WP:UNDUE NPalgan2 ( talk) 20:37, 19 July 2017 (UTC)
"no corresponding effort to enhance the praise of the book" - I have added the Jacobin and Monbiot articles praising MacLean. It's not my fault if the articles praising the book have dried up. Let's agree on criteria for inclusion, then apply them even-handedly. If you can find other notable sources praising the book, add them. If you feel Georg Vanberg, the chairman of Duke's polisci dept, in WashPo criticising the book is UNDUE then how to justify having Carol Haggas (non-notable non-expert) praising it in Kirkus? NPalgan2 ( talk) 05:03, 22 July 2017 (UTC)
Gamaliel I've added three interviews done by MacLean, quoting the brief secondary introductory material at the beginnings. The quotes of praise are generic because the articles were published before the controversy began or ignore it. I feel that the current article is more than fair to MacLean. NPalgan2 ( talk) 15:14, 22 July 2017 (UTC)
Gamaliel I simply don't accept that under 300 words of criticism is "overwhelming" the article - and in any case it'ld be much better to plump up the other sections rather than delete well sourced notable (and highly interesting) material. Wikipedia articles about academics are a brief biographical precis but focus on what is notable about them i.e. their scholarly work. (You have to be a pretty famous academic before secondary sources start writing about your life and loves). We add what secondary sources about the academic's oeuvre until the article grows unwieldy, then we split. Creating a separate Democracy in Chains article would be ridiculous ATM, as it would just be little more than a stub. Look, I feel that your criticism basically boils down to "I wish that fewer notable sources had criticised Democracy in Chains". What negative source is in the article that you feel would be UNDUE if it had *praised* the book instead? NPalgan2 ( talk) 08:14, 23 July 2017 (UTC)
There's a paper relevant to DiC at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3071403. I can't tell its academic status. Oddly, it doesn't like the book William M. Connolley ( talk) 09:25, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
It's come to my attention that whenever I've added updates of positive reviews and/or award nominations, those additions are almost immediately deleted. I have, in good faith, tried to keep the page balanced, and have never deleted any of the elements critical of MacLean, even when they are not related to fair criticism of the book. This is unacceptable. Both negative and positive reviews should be included, as any nominations from major and respectable organizations. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fuqualib ( talk • contribs) 20:50, 3 April 2018 (UTC)
If any material had been removed (if it was, it was an honest mistake), why not simply add that back in? I've been conscientious in noting where criticism is coming from, including calling the positive reviews "sympathetic" authors. I am going to add the information back in, both positive and negative, and will add the "positive" information in the section that describes positive reviews, even leaving the "negative" reviews as the last word. That is more than fair, I think. Fuqualib ( talk) 13:32, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
"Radley Balko argued that public choice theory was a crucial tool in his work investigating the actions of unscrupulous police and prosecutors.[48]" RussNelson ( talk) 12:34, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
Should we include this? "the Koch team of professors who don’t disclose their conflicts of interest and the operatives who work full time for their project to shackle our democracy."
She doesn't name anyone, and thus her claim is impossible to refute. All she need do is say "Oh, I didn't mean *them." I'm not sure this belongs in Wikipedia, being baseless slander of a number of living people. RussNelson ( talk) 12:40, 16 April 2018 (UTC)
I did a substantial reorganization of the section on Democracy in Chains to improve its order and bring it into line with other WP articles on controversial books. In the interest of documenting the changes and rationale, I'm detailing the revision strategy below.
1. The previous version lumped a multitude of appraisals of the book together in a messy and disjointed fashion. To address this I separated the reviews into three subsections: "Appraisals" for positive reviews, "Criticisms" for negative reviews, and "Response" for further replies by the author and discussion of the controversy.
2. Some of the appraisals that were mixed in with the old version were not actually reviews of the book. They were promotional interviews and similar material for the book (e.g. the Rebecca Onion interview for Slate). I dropped these on the grounds that they don't really tell us much about the independent reception of the book by its reviewers. I also added descriptive identifiers to some of the authors and publication venues that were missing.
3. The criticisms section was similarly a mess of dozens of links on vastly different topics. I rearranged them into three thematic paragraphs that cover the main criticisms of Democracy in Chains: (a) its depiction of Buchanan on race and segregation, (b) its claims about Buchanan and the Pinochet dictatorship, and (c) its claims about Buchanan and libertarianism/George Mason University/other George Mason professors. I also trimmed some of the redundant links, specified the claims of criticism, and added cross-links to other articles on WP where suitable.
4. I consolidated the "Response" section to include MacLean's answers to her critics, plus subsequent reviews that have also focused on the controversy around the book. Other than tweaking the language for NPOV and descriptive clarity this section is largely made up of the previous version's paragraphs that were tacked on at the end of the section.
If you think more information is warranted or want to further revise this section please do so, or please discuss below. It should continue to be improved. But simply reverting to the old version is not constructive as that version was a cluttered mess. LiberalReformer ( talk) 17:50, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
This article undermines criticism of her work and does an incredibly poor job of highlighting the reasons for the controversy that likely brings the majority of people to this article. I expect nothing less than liberal bias from wikipedia - let's not even pretend like this website is balanced - but this article is a travesty and purposely elevates her views for the sake of ideological proselytizing. Fix it. 73.42.40.92 ( talk) 20:03, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
The Democracy in Chains subsection has turned into a coatrack of sorts for libertarian activists to demonstrate their skills of prevarication. While that might be interesting to people outside the reality-based community who don’t rely on facts, evidence, and data, back here in the real world, that’s not how we write biographies. I recommend summarizing the content in its most neutral and accurate form and spinning it out into a new article about the book. Viriditas ( talk) 22:18, 14 December 2021 (UTC)
I'm with VM and against V. But, the section is too long and should be cut down (I don't think it should become its own article). Some people like it, some people think it is all lies, but we don't need quite so many words to say so William M. Connolley ( talk) 09:19, 15 December 2021 (UTC)