10/21/2024

Journalist Gladwell befuddles with this convoluted revisiting of his bestseller The Tipping Point. Aiming to reveal abuses of the tipping point phenomenon by the powerful, Gladwell’s primary example is Purdue Pharma’s peddling of opioids. To build his case he grafts two new metaphors onto the tipping point concept. One is “overstories”—overarching social ideas which, like the top layer of canopy in a forest, affect the behavior of everything below. The other is a suite of epidemiology metaphors drawn from the Covid pandemic, most notably the concept of superspreaders, which, to be fair, is a great example of “The Law of the Few,” an idea Gladwell wrote about in The Tipping Point that states that a big demographic problem is often actually caused by only a few people. In the end, while he connects Purdue’s misdeeds to both “overstories” (Purdue targeted states without strong preexisting narcotics regulations) and superspreaders (Purdue focused its efforts on prescription-happy doctors), Gladwell never really lands the tipping point angle. He writes that Purdue’s switch to a less easily snortable version of the drug “tipped” OxyContin users into heroin users, which seems, like so much else in the book, to bring the definition of a tipping point right up to its own tipping point into oblivion. As he climbs the rungs of his argument, Gladwell entertains with his deep cache of anecdotes. But it’s a ladder to nowhere. (Oct.)

In Revenge of the Tipping Point, splashy theories abound, as they do in Gladwell’s podcast, Revisionist History… He turns the conceit [of The Tipping Point]on its head, examining the forces that drive negative epidemics, which to him felt more attuned to our present moment.”—Emma Goldberg, New York Times

“Rigorously researched—but always with a witty flair—it’s a must-read for longtime Gladwell fans or readers simply curious about the quiet, surprising origin stories of the crises and questions that define contemporary life.”
 —Francesca Billington, Oprah Daily

“Brimming with fun and insightful anecdotes…Revenge of the Tipping Point will leave you pondering Gladwell’s theories and asking more questions…The book explores how individuals can use power and influence to shape…the collective narratives we tell ourselves as groups or as a society — and in so doing steward policies and perspectives.”—Alex Tapscott, New York Post

"To his adept synthesis of academic research he adds journalistic curiosity, a crisp prose style and a mastery of counter-intuitive juxtapositions. Often beginning with a conundrum, he seeks out case studies and concepts that illuminate it, altering (slightly or radically) our understanding of the world."
 —Julia M. Klein, Los Angeles Times

“Gladwell gives us a sort of interactive nonfiction, not unlike a detective story…Revenge of the Tipping Point essentially asks why we were all so ready to think anything that spreads like a virus could be good for us. In the first book we had connectors, mavens and salesmen. Now we have overstories, superspreaders and social engineering…The match that so elegantly graced the cover of The Tipping Point is now on fire.”—Frank Rose, Wall Street Journal

“The long-awaited follow-up to The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell’s groundbreaking 2000 debut, explores the watershed moments that define this new age of societal upheaval…with curiosity and humor.”—Shannon Carlin, TIME Magazine

“Gladwell is a great storyteller and writes with a contagious sense of curiosity, with each revelation seeming as exciting to him as it is to readers…Revenge of the Tipping Point provides an opportunity to assess his success and his critics’ arguments.”—Economist

“An astute and bracing appraisal of how cultures succeed or fail...Gladwell deftly demonstrates how attention to statistics and data points can shape a business, school, or community."—Booklist

“Thoughtful, carefully written...Refining and deepening his and our understanding of the spread of customs, mores, and practices, Gladwell emphasizes those overstories, illustrating them with twisting and turning tales.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred)

★ 2024-07-24
A quarter-century on, Gladwell revisits his best-known book and examines some of its assumptions and conclusions.

RereadingThe Tipping Point, Gladwell writes, made him realize “that I still do not understand many things about social epidemics.” Thetip point of real estate parlance—it refers to things such as the ethnic composition of a neighborhood when, once a percentage in the growth of racex is reached, members of racey will move up, on, or otherwise out—explains only so much. Often, he writes, “social contagions,” a metaphor used to describe how ideas spread like viruses, can be traced back to just a handful of innovators (or viral superspreaders, for that matter): What matters thereafter is how the ideas (or viral loads) are received and dealt with. For example, why does Illinois have a low rate of opioid abuse relative to Indiana? Because Indiana, like many states, doesn’t require monitoring, which explains why swarms of Big Pharma salespeople descended on those states to push OxyContin and other drugs to epidemic levels. Illinois, by contrast, is one of the states that require triplicate prescriptions: one copy goes to the pharmacist, one to the patient’s records, one to a regulatory agency. That three-tiered pharmaceutical pad, Gladwell writes, “evolves into an overstory,” or governing idea, “a narrative that says opioids are different, spurring the physician to pause and think before prescribing them.” Refining and deepening his and our understanding of the spread of customs, mores, and practices, Gladwell emphasizes those overstories, illustrating them with twisting and turning tales of, for example, how the wordholocaust came into general usage (surprisingly, via TV), how the idea of gay marriage gained acceptability, and how widespread social engineering "has quietly become one of the central activities of the American establishment.”

Fans of the original will learn much from Gladwell’s thoughtful, carefully written reconsideration.