Malcolm Gladwell, the best-selling author ofThe Tipping Point, one of the most important non-fiction books of the 21st century, is back with its dark sequel Revenge of the Tipping Point. While discussing the new book with the Guardian, Gladwell calls out what he calls Harvard’s admission officers’ “bias towards affluent white students”.
Pointing out the disparity between Harvard and an institution with a merit-based admissions process like Caltech compared to Harvard, he writes: “My suspicion is that for many people it’s unconscious, but there must be a point at which [Harvard admissions tutors] are confronting the fact that they have gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure that their campus hasn’t become dominated by Asians and Indians.”
In the book, Gladwell notes that Caltech, a highly competitive university with a merit-based admissions system, saw the proportion of Asian American students rise from 25% to 43% between 1992 and 2013.In contrast, at Harvard, where the admissions process is influenced by factors such as legacy, donor contributions, and athletic scholarships, the percentage of Asian American students has remained consistently between 15-20% during the same period. Indian applicants are even more likely to be excluded by Harvard’s application process.
Gladwell goes on to argue: “Meritocracy is one of the most beautiful inventions of the 20th century – it is a foundation of a free society.”
FILE – Writer Malcolm Gladwell attends the premiere screening of “Faces of America With Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr.” on Feb. 1, 2010 in New York. Gladwell, Kate McKinnon and Eva Mendes will be among the featured speakers this fall at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan, a leading venue for arts events. (AP Photo/Evan Agostini, File)
Here are 10 other key points about Revenge of the Tipping Point and Malcolm Gladwell:
1. Updating “The Tipping Point”: Malcolm Gladwell was initially reluctant to revisit his debut work but ultimately chose to create an entirely new version, one that reflects today’s more anxious world rather than simply updating the original.
2. Core Concept Remains: The foundational idea that social trends behave like epidemics, initially growing slowly before suddenly taking off, still holds true. However, some of Gladwell’s original examples have not aged well.
3. Re-evaluating Broken Windows Policing: Gladwell now finds his earlier chapter on crime “embarrassing,” as he once credited New York City’s crime reduction to ‘broken windows’ policing. He has since acknowledged that this approach led to over-policing in minority neighbourhoods and wasn’t actually responsible for the drop in crime rates.
4. Embracing Mistakes: Gladwell values the process of learning from errors, a trait he respects in his father. He proposes that authors should periodically reassess their original works every 25 years to stay aligned with new insights.
5. “Revenge of the Tipping Point”: The new book is darker and more nuanced than the original. It delves into how a small number of individuals can disproportionately influence significant events, such as the opioid crisis, where a minority of doctors were responsible for nearly half of all prescriptions.
6. Ongoing Influence: While The Tipping Point became a cultural phenomenon, Gladwell’s latest book explores how individuals with substantial influence can shape societal changes, both positively and negatively.
7. Views on American Politics: Gladwell reflects on how male leadership failures over the past eight years make a strong case for female leaders, particularly in the current political climate.
8. Supporting Kamala Harris: Gladwell has expressed his support for Kamala Harris in the upcoming presidential election, noting a personal connection through his mother, who shares Jamaican heritage with Harris’s father.
9. Challenging Misogyny: He argues that recent examples of male leadership failures have made it increasingly difficult to justify misogynistic attitudes and believes that America is ready for a female president.
10. Personal Reflections: Now living with his partner and two young daughters, Gladwell views parenting as a journey of intellectual humility. He continuously adapts his understanding of his children as they grow and sees this phase of his life as a “productivity mechanism” that shapes his evolving perspective.