Product Description

Internationally renowned communitarian leader Amitai Etzioni presents a controversial challenge to the fundamental American belief in personal privacy at all costs

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #644112 in Books
• Published on: 2000-04
• Released on: 2000-04-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

Amazon.com Review
Privacy isn't all it's made out to be, says George Washington University scholar Amitai Etzioni. "Without privacy no society can long remain free," he writes, but our communities also have other goals that sometimes must override the privacy imperative. "Should the FBI be in a position to crack the encrypted messages employed by terrorists before they use them to orchestrate the next Oklahoma City bombing?" he asks. Etzioni's answer is a resounding "yes," and he applies similar logic to a number of areas. He believes, for example, that newborn babies should undergo HIV tests without parental consent because they could benefit from immediate treatment, even though mothers worried about personal revelations might object. He also supports the various sorts of "Megan's laws" that try to protect society against sex offenders.

Etzioni believes the government will use this sort of personal information responsibly; his faith is so complete in this regard that he even supports issuing national ID cards to all Americans. Big business doesn't fare nearly as well in his estimation: he worries that companies will abuse private medical records. Although there is much common sense on these pages, most readers will find areas of disagreement with Etzioni. He nevertheless offers an intelligent challenge to America's libertarian impulses. --John J. Miller

From Library Journal
Sociologist Etzioni's latest will stir debate on issues of privacy. As in previous books (e.g., The New Golden Rule, Basic Bks., 1997), Etzioni espouses the philosophy of communitarianism, which holds that individual rights must be balanced with concern for the common good. He favors HIV testing of infants, opposes encrypted messages, favors national ID cards, and proposes isolating sex offenders in villages akin to leper colonies. The book carefully dissects each issue, offering detailed statistics and addressing opposing viewpoints. At the conclusion of each chapter, Etzioni shows how a balanced analysis leads to a solution. He criticizes the ACLU for its sole emphasis on individual liberties and argues that the Constitution's Fourth Amendment, the right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, does not make privacy a privilege. While not everyone will agree with his conclusions, Etzioni has crafted a compelling argument for compromise between the views of libertarians and government. Recommended for all public libraries.AHarry Charles, Attorney at Law, St. Louis
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From The New England Journal of Medicine
Everyone knows -- patients as well as doctors -- that the confidentiality of medical records has virtually disappeared. Amitai Etzioni, a well-known social scientist, documents the violation of the privacy of medical records that occurs when unauthorized persons gain access to such information in record rooms or on computers -- what worries most people about the easy accessibility of their records. Of greater concern is that "most violations of the privacy of medical records are the result of [the] legally sanctioned... unconcealed, systematic flow of medical information... to non health-care parties including employers, marketers, and the press... the daily, continuous, and very numerous disclosures and uses that are legal but of highly questionable moral standing." Concern about these intrusions has spurred attempts to make medical records more secure. It is important to take advantage of the convenience of computerized information handling without losing the privacy that goes with illegibly scribbled notes stored in a filing cabinet in a private office.

Etzioni acknowledges the need for solutions to the problem of the virtual transparency of medical records. But when our concern with privacy -- our obsession, according to Etzioni -- prevents the use of the results of testing for the human immunodeficiency virus for public health purposes, allows sex offenders to return to the community, prevents law-enforcement agencies (even those with warrants) from deciphering encrypted messages, and denies us the benefits of universal identification cards, then things have gone too far, damaging the common good. Etzioni identifies himself as a communitarian. Communitarianism has arisen in politics, ethics, and philosophy in response to what is seen as the excesses of the increasing individualism that marks this century, especially since World War II. (The entire October 17, 1999, issue of the New York Times Magazine, entitled "The Me Millennium," was devoted to the subject.)

Nobody looking at the contemporary United States (and Europe) can fail to see evidence of the widespread concern with the self that is everywhere (for example, the overemphasis on the autonomy of patients in medicine). For some, it is a selfish "me, myself, and I-ism" that destroys the enduring values of community, whereas for others it is the blossoming of rational, self-determining, highly evolved individuals that is necessary for the progress of democracy. Like all major social changes, this recent surge of individualism takes many forms, produces excesses as well as benefits, and engenders countervailing forces. It cannot be otherwise.

The extreme concern with privacy seems to be one byproduct of this return to individualism. This is not so odd a reaction, since the private life as a respected and hidden domain disappeared in the 1960s. (Remember the slogan of that era announcing its demise: "The personal is the political.") The ease with which private or personal information is made accessible through the universal use of computers feeds people's worry.

Etzioni does a service by raising well-researched questions about privacy on both sides of the problem -- that is, too little privacy as well as too much. It is the solutions he offers that are the issue. For example, no one is happy at the thought that sexual offenders who return anonymously to their communities after completing their sentences may strike again -- the basis of so-called Megan's laws. But I'm not sure many will subscribe to Etzioni's solution: transferring these people after they have completed their prison terms to guarded villages "where they are allowed to lead normal lives aside from the requirement that they stay put." Unfortunately, the author is not even-handed. Unhappy with what he believes is their faulty thinking, he dismisses some who disagree with his positions, particularly liberals and the American Civil Liberties Union, as being merely self-serving and wrong-headed, instead of being clear-thinking, right-minded communitarians of his stripe. He brushes aside, not too politely (quoting, for example, a comment that Justice William O. Douglas's reasoning provoked "not only giggles but guffaws" from Justice Arthur Goldberg's clerks), the constitutional basis for privacy that characterized the famous rulings by the Supreme Court on reproductive choices in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972), and Roe v. Wade (1973).

For Etzioni, privacy is not a right, but "a societal license that exempts a category of acts from... communal, public, and government scrutiny." Privacy also encompasses behavior that is expected, even required, to remain private -- for example, activities that take place in the bathroom or bedroom. Here, also, society defines situations in which privacy is required and when it may be invaded, and such definitions may vary from community to community.

The definition of privacy he advances reflects the thinking of "responsive (or new) communitarianism... [which] seeks to balance individual rights with social responsibility, and individuality with community." Who doesn't seek such a balance? The problem lies in the question of who will define the proper balance. No one likes social excess, whether it comes from radical individualism or an imperious community. In times of social change, it is the very definition of excess that is up for grabs. Why stop at privacy? Why not, for example, curtail freedom of speech because pornography has gone too far in the media and on the Internet and threatens the community's children? There is widespread feeling that social responsibility has been impoverished -- not only by individualism, but also by forces of the marketplace -- and that a sense of common cause is lacking in many contemporary human enterprises, not the least of which is medicine. Is the solution a new, legislating communitarianism? At the end of this book, I remained unconvinced. Or, as I believe, is Etzioni's book itself evidence of the inevitable countervailing forces that always arise when social change has gone too far?

As for restoring the confidentiality of medical records, it is not rampant individualism that requires restraint but, rather, the power of commercially driven interests that prevent adequate protective legislation from being enacted.

Reviewed by Eric J. Cassell, M.D.
Copyright © 2000 Massachusetts Medical Society. All rights reserved. The New England Journal of Medicine is a registered trademark of the MMS.

Customer Reviews

The people don't always know best.
In a recent New York Times column, Bob Herbert alluded to a conversation he had recently with famed author William Manchester. Manchester mentioned that he had learned over the years that the majority is not always right. He cited two examples where he felt they were clearly wrong: 1) during the McCarthy era, only 29% of the public felt McCarthy was acting inappropriately; and 2) despite all evidence to the contrary, 70% of the American people still believe there was a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy.

I mention these comments, because it seems to me that they point up one of the dangers in letting community standards dictate behavior. Certainly most reasonable people today (with the exception of die-hard conservatives like William F. Buckley) would agree that McCarthy's tactics were way out of line, but at the time, they were seen as legit by a 2/3 majority of the American public. This indicates one of the leading flaws in Professor Etzioni's argument: the community can not be counted on to enact laws that will ensure the protection of those who behave differently or who disagree with the majority opinion. I am afraid that Manchester's comments ring true. For that reason, I believe that a logical consequence of communitarianism is retribution towards those who step out of line or depart in any way from "community standards". Behavior may be banned merely because a majority of the people don't like it, not because there is anything intrinsically wrong with it. Look at the ignominious history of sodomy laws in this country. Would Professor Etzioni wish to see these laws extended? If it suited the community, would he like to see prohibitions against gays in the military?

All in all, I would like to see Professor Etzioni address these issues more thoroughly and satisfactorily in his next book.

Takes the Reader Down a Slippery Slope
Under the guise of promoting "civil" dialogue, Etzioni takes the reader down a slippery slope whereby "community standards" are allowed to eclipse the rights of individuals.

This is particularly scary if you are a member, as I am, of a minority. When individual rights are abrogated, then those of us in the minority are subject to "The Tyranny of the Majority" (as the much-reviled Lani Guinier appropriately titled her book). Etzioni doesn't give enough thought to the protections necessary for those who espouse unpopular beliefs or belong to minority groups.

A far better book is Deborah Tannen's "The Argument Culture" which replaces coercion with dialogue.

Etzioni's Privacy Concerns
While The New Golden Rule was aimed strictly at academic audiences, The Limits of Privacy speaks to all who care about the moral, legal and policy issues raised by the tension between personal privacy and the common good, especially public health and safety.

The book explores five currently hot issues:

* Megan's Laws: Etzioni argues that these laws do not do enough to protect children from sex offenders. He outlines a whole new approach to dealing with pedophiles.

* HIV Testing of Infants: The book shows that many infants die unnecessarily because the vast majority of states has not yet adopted a testing procedure which has worked in New York to identify and treat infected newborns.

* Bio-metrics: In very short order your face and hand will become your 100% reliable, unforgible ID card. Anonymity will vanish, but so will most fugitives from the law, illegal immigrants, welfare cheats, and many others who rely on false IDs.

* Hyper-privacy: New encryption programs allow your e-mail to be completely private. But how can we use this technology to protect our communications and transactions, and also be sure that this same hyper-privacy is not afforded to Internet-savvy drug lords, pedophiles, and terrorists? Etzioni shows what might be done.

* Medical privacy: The privacy of your medical records is violated daily when corporations trade that information on the open market. This is a case of Big Bucks, not Big Brother, violating our privacy. What can be done about these Privacy Merchants?

Each of these issues is debated daily in the media, in public meetings, in legislatures, and at home. Etzioni takes a highly original stance on all of them: Rather than decrying the loss of privacy, his first concern is safety and health. The book closes with a call for a whole new legal conception of privacy. One based on the notion of equal concern for the common good (public health and safety) and privacy, rather than according privacy a privileged position.