For the last
two years I have been working on writing a book about my experience as a first
generation (Dutch) immigrant to the United States. After multiple edits, with
the help of some of the best minds I have encountered during my journey through
life, I have sent my manuscript off to CreateSpace, an Amazon company, to do
the formatting and publishing. I expect the book to be released late July,
early August of 2014.
The book is
titled NEITHER HERE NOR THERE and sub-titled A First Generation Immigrant in
Search of American Exceptionalism.
I wrote the
book, because I like to write and I had freed up my time by retiring from the
corporate world where I had spent all of my professional career. But there is
more to this story. For the more than 30 years that I have been working and
living in the United States, I have kept wondering if I had made the right
decision when, in 1983, I turned from being a Dutch expatriate living in the
U.S. to an immigrant. I never quit looking for a validation of that decision.
And, because of that mind-set, I became a keen observer of American lifestyles
and politics.
I knew that
America had been exceptional at the time of the creation of the Republic, in
the struggle to hold the Republic together through the War Between the States,
and in the conquering of fascism first and then communism. I was looking for
evidence that America had the capacity and vitality to remain exceptional at
times that it was not seriously challenged by contenders.
In my book,
I lean upon not only my own observations, but substantially also on the
writings of other analysts of the great American experiment. The book is
different from other social and political commentary in that it deals not just
with specific individual shortcomings but, comprehensively, with all the major
flaws in the American system as it operates today and in that it actually
offers solutions for the many predicaments the nation is facing. It is also different
in that it is written from the perspective of someone, not born in this
country, but who made a conscious choice to make America his country and now
wants to validate that decision.
NEITHER HERE
NOR THERE delivers five key messages:
- I made a
deliberate decision, in the early eighties, to transplant my family from
the Netherlands to the USA, based on my evaluation—at the time—of the
future of America versus the future of Western Europe. It seemed an easy
choice. But the world has changed dramatically in the intervening 30 years
and it seems appropriate to revalidate that choice.
- There is a
broad consensus that the generation now growing up in America may be the
first since the Second World War to be worse off than their parents and
grandparents. If that is indeed the case, then we need to get at the cause
of that decline. And come up with ways to turn it around.
- A huge gap
exists in America between the performances of the public sector versus the
private sector. The private sector embraces change and accelerates the
pace of change by constant innovation, driven by competition and a passion
for continuous improvement and breakthrough technology. None of this
exists in the public domain.
- America has
too many people standing at the sidelines rather than playing the field.
Nations are successful when they engage the whole population—with hardly
anybody left out—behind a clearly articulated vision for the future place
of the nation in the global environment.
- A vision is
merely that—a fata morgana—if it is not accompanied by a solid strategy
outlining how to reach the desired outcome. America is lacking a national
strategy. American governance has no tradition or statute for the creation
of a binding strategic plan that is built on broad consensus and
transcends the succession of White House occupants and the shifting
balance of power between the Republican and Democratic parties. That may
have to change.
My intent with the book is to create a
badly needed discourse about what’s ailing America and what cures should be
considered to bring it back to optimum health.
Follow me on
Twitter @FransJager1 for updates on the publication of NEITHER HERE NOR THERE.
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