Not only was PJ 'right,' he was Right From the Beginning. (dad pun)
Imagine that you are a U.S. immigration officer, handing out green cards to the would-be Americans of the world. You have before you two applicants who look almost completely the same; for some arcane, unspecified bureaucratic reason, you can only approve one of them. They’re both well-educated by American standards, both bringing identical families, both passed their background checks.
The major difference is their nation of origin. One is from a nation with a strong tradition of rule of law, free markets, and democratic pluralism. The other is from a country where kleptocracy, autocracy, and socialism are standard. The difference, in other words, is the character of the society that your two would-be immigrants come from. The question is: Should this difference matter?
The basic argument of The Culture Transplant, the new book from George Mason University professor Garett Jones, is that at least in the aggregate, the answer to this question is "yes." The marginal immigrant, to be sure, may not matter. But Jones shows, through an engaging and digestible tour of the academic literature, that people bring their national character with them when they migrate; that those values persist for up to several generations; and that some values really are better for societal flourishing than others, so the values immigrants bring matters a great deal....
Pat Buchanan made the same point, but cut to the real chase: religion makes the difference. He contended that the US' immigration policy should favor people coming from Judaeo-Christian cultures. That's largely European, but does not exclude people from the Southern Hemisphere. To Buchanan, 'cultural compatibility' is the key.
There are a number of assertions from Jones (described in the review) which are questionable, such as stating that the Chinese and Japanese are 'innovators' rather than the skilled copy-cats they really are. But his general point--that culture is critical--is spot-on.
Just remember this: "culture" is derived from "cult." Were Jones to have that, his book could have been shorter.
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