A Colony in a Nation

January 9, 2017
Hayes (Twilight of the Elites), host of MSNBC’s All In with Chris Hayes, has written a laser-focused, necessary book about U.S. race relations, primarily the black experience, and law and order as they are experienced across the country. Hayes’s main assertion is that the criminal justice system creates two separate Americas with borders drawn along racial lines—the “nation,” or white America, with methods of policing characteristic of a democracy that respects the basic rights of its citizenry, and the “colony,” black America, which is policed like an occupied state, trampling on the civil liberties of its inhabitants. Hayes’s book has a strong through-line comparing the concepts of law and order. Law is defined in the commonly understood sense, while order is explained as a tool used by the state, through the police, to maintain the status quo. The author also ties in the related problem of our status as the most incarcerated nation in the world and why this punitive system is ineffective. This is an important, persuasive book that, if read, can help Americans begin to heal the divide between these two nations.

January 1, 2017
Profound contrasts in policing and incarceration reveal disparate Americas.MSNBC host and editor at large of the Nation, Hayes (Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy, 2013, etc.) expands the investigation of inequality begun in his previous book by focusing on law and order. Offering a persuasive analysis, he distinguishes between the Nation, inhabited by the "affluent, white, elite," and the Colony, largely urban, poor, "overwhelmingly black and brown" but increasingly including working-class whites. The criminal justice system, argues Hayes, is vastly different for each: "One (the Nation) is the kind of policing regime you expect in a democracy; the other (the Colony) is the kind you expect in an occupied land." In the Colony, "real democratic accountability is lacking and police behave like occupying soldiers in restive and dangerous territory." Law enforcement, as noted by law professor Seth Stoughton, takes a "warrior worldview" in which "officers are locked in intermittent and unpredictable combat with unknown but highly lethal enemies." Acknowledging that America has the highest rate of incarceration in the world, Hayes traces the country's history of punishment to the experience of European settlers who, "outnumbered and afraid," responded with violence. Between 1993 and 2014, although the crime rate declined significantly, most Americans feel that crime has increased and therefore support aggressive police action. Furthermore, although most crime occurs intraracially, the Nation believes that the Colony is a constant, insidious threat; unmistakably, "we have moved the object of our concern from crime to criminals, from acts to essences." Among other rich democracies, ours is the only one with the death penalty. Whereas in Europe, humane treatment has been widely instituted, in the U.S., perpetrators are treated as unredeemable. "The American justice system is all about wrath and punishment," the author asserts. Arguing for the erasure of borders between Nation and Colony, Hayes admits, regretfully, that such change might fundamentally alter the comfortable sense of order that he, and other members of the Nation, prizes. A timely and impassioned argument for social justice.

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February 1, 2017
Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, Tamir Ricethese are just three of many young black men whose deaths at the hands of police officers have brought an incendiary confluence of racial profiling and criminal injustice to the forefront of American political discourse. The U.S. is deeply divided on many levels, prompting Emmy Awardwinning MSNBC news anchor and best-selling author Hayes (Twilight of the Elites, 2012) to use the metaphor of a colony within a nation to illustrate the tactics employed throughout our judicial network by police, prosecutors, and politicians who further alienate black and white citizenry from each other. Nations pursue law and order according to principles of democracy, Hayes posits, while colonies are treated like occupied territories, subject to the capricious whims of those in charge. As a journalist and commentator, Hayes has covered the violence that erupted in Baltimore, Ferguson, and Cleveland in the wake of police shootings and analyzed the reasons for and reactions to police aggression and legal indifference. Writing with clarity, intelligence, and compassion, Hayes deftly illuminates the complex state of affairs that has evolved since the 1960s civil rights protests, and resulted in the current backlash. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Popular TV host Hayes will tour the country in concert with a vigorous multimedia marketing and publicity campaign.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

October 1, 2016

The Emmy Award-winning news anchor whose MSNBC-based All in with Chris Hayes attracts more than a million viewers each weeknight, Hayes here wrestles with America's continuing racism. He starts by pointing out that measures such as wealth, employment, and school segregation show racial equality stalled in the late 1960s, then argues that our society is essentially split in two. Rule of law prevails in the Nation, but in the Colony order is what matters, with civil rights compromised by fearfulness and heavy-duty policing leading to the shock of Ferguson. From the author of the New York Times best-selling Twilight of the Elites; with an 11-city tour.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from February 1, 2017

In his latest work, MSNBC commentator, Nation journalist, and best-selling author (Twilight of the Elites) Hayes uses personal experience, historical research, and field work to explore America's continuing racism. Specifically, he examines how throughout history majority populations have come to see minorities as a problem to be solved, and how fear is used to justify attacks on civil rights. Hayes's thesis is that contemporary America, in light of recent events in Ferguson, MO, and Baltimore, exemplifies its racial past. The United States may have emerged from a former British colony to a country that has finally achieved superpower status, but this nation still has a colony within its midst; for example, African American ghettos. In essence, these comprise a "third world" entity. Hayes maintains that the source of these colonies is "white fear." Aggressive policing puts the nation in the same place as former Colonial authorities, and current incarceration rates exacerbate the issue. VERDICT This readable and thoughtful work will appeal to readers interested in civil rights and criminal justice, and is especially insightful when considering why Colonists originally rebelled in 1776.--William D. Pederson, Louisiana State Univ., Shreveport

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2017

In his latest work, MSNBC commentator, Nation journalist, and best-selling author (Twilight of the Elites) Hayes uses personal experience, historical research, and field work to explore America's continuing racism. Specifically, he examines how throughout history majority populations have come to see minorities as a problem to be solved, and how fear is used to justify attacks on civil rights. Hayes's thesis is that contemporary America, in light of recent events in Ferguson, MO, and Baltimore, exemplifies its racial past. The United States may have emerged from a former British colony to a country that has finally achieved superpower status, but this nation still has a colony within its midst; for example, African American ghettos. In essence, these comprise a "third world" entity. Hayes maintains that the source of these colonies is "white fear." Aggressive policing puts the nation in the same place as former Colonial authorities, and current incarceration rates exacerbate the issue. VERDICT This readable and thoughtful work will appeal to readers interested in civil rights and criminal justice, and is especially insightful when considering why Colonists originally rebelled in 1776.--William D. Pederson, Louisiana State Univ., Shreveport

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.