The Power Makers: Steam, Electricity, and the Men Who Invented Modern America byMAURY KLEINReview by: WALTER RUSSELL MEADForeign Affairs, Vol. 87, No. 6 (November/December 2008), p. 165Published by: Council on Foreign RelationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20699399 .

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Recent Booh

societies, yet American historians have

only rarely and intermittently addressed this great subject. Burks Old World,

New World is more than a good book; it

points toward a new kind of history that is much needed. Nonetheless, the book is uneven; the sections on diplomatic his

tory are often strong, sometimes brilliant, whereas the treatments of cultural and

intellectual history generally disappoint. No matter; what Burk does well is important, and as she and others explore this great

subject, they will produce a body of work that will both sharpen Americans' under

standing of the nations past and illuminate the challenges currently being faced.

humane treatment that existed under

slavery disappeared under this system; the conditions were worse, and the mortality rate was higher in many convict encamp

ments than among pre-Civil War slaves.

Blackmon does an extraordinary job of

re-creating this system for the reader and

using old court records and other sources

to tell the story of individuals caught up in this chamber of horrors. Jim Crow was

much more than discrimination; it was a

system of oppression, and its legacy is in some ways more corrosive than that of

slavery. This book will help readers begin to grasp the horror of an evil that persisted into living memory.

The Power Makers: Steam, Electricity, and

the Men Who Invented Modern America.

by maury klein. Bloomsbury Press,

2008, 560 pp. $29.99. Conventional histories of the Industrial Revolution focus primarily on the tech

nological and financial history of produc tive industries such as textiles and steel;

Klein, professor emeritus at the University of Rhode Island, fills an important gap with a thorough and engaging study of the technological and financial history of the production and distribution of

power itself. The development of steam

and electric power shaped the horizons

of transport, heavy industry, and the

rising metropolises of the industrial era.

Klein s book illuminates the interplay of scientific theory, technological progress, and the development of the new business

models and corporate structures that

each of these power revolutions entailed.

Readers will come away from this important and well-argued book with a significantly enhanced understanding of the rise and

development of modern America.

Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans

From the Civil War to World War II. BY DOUGLAS A. BLACKMON.

Doubleday, 2008, 480 pp. $29.95. This harrowing book by the Atlanta bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal reviews a vital but little-studied aspect of southern life in the 75 years following the American Civil War: the systematic abuse of the court system to hold hundreds of thousands

of African Americans in slavery. Convicted

of minor misdemeanors on trumped-up

charges, black defendants unable to pay

judgments and fines were forced to sign labor contracts with any whites who chose

to pay their fines. The labor contracts gave the contract owners the right to discipline their workers with whips and chains and could be extended indefinitely, essentially at the whims of the contract holders. Leasing convicts was big business, providing more than ten percent of the state of Alabamas

income in some years, and convicts toiled

not only on plantations but also in factories

and mines. Moreover, the incentives for

FOREIGN AFFAIRS - November/December2008 [ 165]

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