It was quite a long time ago. What troubles me about 12 years a slave that as you know the free northerner from new york state who was kidnapped and taken for 12 years he argues that the cruelty is mainly the fault of the system, that you are bound to have people who will exploit civil slaves terribly if you have a system like this. He is arguing the system is very uneconomical and if you take solomon northrops views on free labor versus slave labor, he will not be able to explain why slavery in the south was so immensely productive even though they were using so much to drive the slaves on and on. That raises an interesting question. The other part of your question was about zionism. Zionism of blacks and jewish. Were you thinking of that . There is a new article in the israeli leftwing magazine which draws a distinct parallel between the treatment of palestinians today and the israelis and black slavery in the world. The author again and again draws a complete parallel and it meds there are few circumstances between the treatment of palestinians and the treatment of the black slaves. It doesnt stand up as all that a convincing case. But then we had all kinds of efforts to compare Human Trafficking of various sorts and other kinds of oppression today with racial slavery from the past and i guess thats very controversial. Professor davis six or seven years ago in london you were the keynote speaker at a conference of historians sponsored by the Templeton Foundation on the subject, is there meaning in history. Is there what . Meaning in history and it was a somewhat controversial subject to some professional historians who ducked the question and they were from penn Oxford Cambridge and elsewhere and you were the keynote speaker and you deferred answering a question until the final part of your presentation and you said well i dont know that i can answer that is jen. Its not my day job or something to that effect but i have a hard time explaining how within a short period of 60, 70, 80, 90 years the world pond on its head head turned on its head its attitude towards slavery. I can explain it are some and in light of your most recent work which you care to amend or extend your remarks . Im afraid i dont remember this at all whatever it was they i said they are. I think my trilogy of attempts to explain as well as i can how there was this revolutionary what i call moral perception so that from the 1780s when well 1777 vermont adopts the constitution outlawing slavery and the gradual emancipation of slaves in pennsylvania and three years later the olmeda mob is founded with london and pennsylvania and so on. In the 1780s you have organizations beginning to rise up and by 1888 even though in 1776 slavery was legal and thriving from canada to argentina and chile in 1888 when brazil finally outlaws slavery in the space of 100 years we have outslugged slavery throughout the entire hemisphere and i think this is a very remarkable event which i really conclude the book by saying we need not forget that moral progress is possible. How this century that brought into the new world that, that century depended on all kinds events along the way. And i said then. If my friends and i were suddenly stripped of our 20th century conditioning and plummeted back to mis1860, we would take for granted our rural over slaves. And human nature i a many saying in effect is not changed. So a historic achievement like the century that i mentioned really matters and the outlawing of slavery in the new world and represents a crucial landmark of the moral progress that we should never forget. That is the way that i end the book. [applause] youre watching book tv nonfixtion authors and books on cspan 2. Amy chua jed rubenfeld. What is the triple package. Where do i get it . The triple package refers to three qualities. Three elements in combination. Only in combination will propel individuals and certain groups to disproportionate success did he finded in a certain way the three element of the triple package are first, a sense of exempttionality and you can get it from a lot of different sources. But a feeling that you are defendant initialed for special thing and the second element is almost seemingly the opposite. That is a dash insecurity. To offset that excepttionality and the feeling that you have not quite done enough yet. You are not good enough yet and the third el is impulse control. Or self discipline and the ability persevere and resist temptation this. Is the inner play with the first two qualities that i think is the crux of the book. How does somebody feel insecure and superior. We think that, that is what precisely again rates drive in the feeling like i food ed to show the world. I need to show other people and i need to prove myself. Then what is the third impulse control contribution. That allows to you be able to do thank you know. So you can have all of the drive and the hung longing to rise but arent trained or if you do not have the ability to kind of hang in there. And to persist. Even driven people ten to give up. Is there is a precise volume reading of each of that hes. You use the word dash a second ago. Sense of inferiority. Were they equally balanced is there a great way here. The great question here though is that what we do think from our research is if you pylon too much with any one of the elements that produces bad results this. Is what we have discussed when they talk about the triple package to bring with it. So yes it seems that you will need a type of balance. But bow boy we have not figured out how to measure their yet. It is interesting and an original hypothesis. I this i that it has enormous powers for the group thats happen to be doing well right now. And actually for the individuals you know. You think of people that are very very driven and of course. It is not we have not been able to test it in the lab. So we do not have we do not know how do this exactly. That is the point of the book. We offer this as a new way think success in is a dark side and psychological unpinnings and we have a whole chapter on pathology for having too much of one. Or the. It doesnt work and bad things happen. And even when they are all working together as a engine of achievement that has its own pathology. Talking about what kinds of success you see coming out of the triple package. Sure. First of all. Just to try to relay a possible misunderstand, we do not define the success as material weather. I mean the definition of success as far as i am concerned is the success achieving goals. Whatever they are. We will focus on certain conventional metrix of the success like income. Educational achievement and the first six chapters of the book and the reason for that is well. It is a important goal for many people. And second this is the type of thing to measure. We do see however last few chapters that the type of success is narrow. And two we think that the triple package elements actually can assist people in power them to achieve any type of success. Not the purely Material Type of fact as the individual thats have the qualities will grow up in america they ten to have a kind of not resting and Creative Destruction relationship. Between their culture and American Culture. Such the Second Generation and immigrant communities will start very tip i canly he to look back at their parents and grandparents generations and saying you know what . We do not want to do success the way that we told you to instead they make their own decisions to be a stand up comic. Artist or Something Like that and what we have found is at operationly. At least. The same quality will help them to do that. And achieve a very different kind of goals. Lets talk about the part of the book that i think has been most coming verseial where people are talking about the most. Which is the your identification for groups. Being the embodyment of a triple package. Which groups have you identified and how the purple package will manifest itself in their success. Okay. So this is the snap shot. You know. That is apart of the problem. This is people that are saying. 8 groups are better. Of course. If you are looking at the title this is all about the rise and the fall cultural groups. So the groups that are very very driven and successful. They change dramatically over time. There was different groups ten years ago. There different groups ten years from now. We actually tried to be very systematic and we relied on census data and cal greated our own income figures had Research Assistance with working and were transparent and going down ancestry tables so the sense us will not identify people by religion that is not allowed anymore and we explain which groups that we exclude for example there is an english americans category. That is like 50 Million People in it. We are not sure what it was capturing and also we exkhalid clueded groups that have the triple package latvian americans and south african americans. And because they were under a 100,000. We did not want to do with at group that 50 people. You know. I thought that we were pretty system atic. Went straight down. Looked at the groups most strikingly disproportionly successful according to the conventional metrix. So income. And professional attainment. Educational attain men. We chose the metrix. They are available it. Is very difficult measure success. Though in the second shonl on the jews most of the folk suspect on artistic. And different. If i could talk to you for a second the way groups are not identified by religion. So sticking with the groups mormon on and jews are not. So so those we looked at at the alternative measures and places like the Pew Foundation and in inresearchers that put together income data. And they you know. We essential dates that do not match up and we try to be system atic and transparent in the case of the mormonons as we have discussed they actually do not have that disproportionly high median household income. They for one thing. They are when you look about households. They are a larger percentage of with em that do not work. In double. That women are you know. Described as housewives. So that is one thing. We chose that group as we described. I this i that it is the most upwardly mobile group in america. That is to be compare. Rates. Statistics. 30 years ago. You could barely find a mormon on on wall street. You know. We lay out all of the different acts of achievement right now. In business schools. Law schools professional schools and this is what they are. Different categories. So they are good. We end up looking at mormon onlys and jews religious groups. Nonimmigrant groups. And going down the Indian Americans and very very high. Income levels. Lebanese and iranian americans unanother. Chinese americans. Lets see. Oh. Then also we will look at nigerian americans. And cubanamericans. And we also he can plainled. They are just extreme outlines for population groups and also very high rates of the upper mobility. And very very strong educational performances. As we say. We could have looked at the japanese americans and could have gone further down the list. You know. But we for space limitations looked at eight groups. Pick one of the groups. A Favorite Group. What is your Favorite Group . We can talk about the mormon only . What is, how do we see a trim will pack in action with the mormon onlys in particular . So the starting point of the group was this remarkable fact that many sense and we documented it. There are several groups in terms of income and education achievements. They went through the ones that we focused on. And we identified independently. As rigorously as we could and we started to look at the groups. Wondering about come onality. Before i get to the more moms why explain the success. Hopefully we can talk about the alternative explanations but in a nutshell. If you are looking at Asian American. Academic success. You are insubstantially struck if you do your homework in research by the Third Generation abe an americans are not out performing the rest of the count rechlt and second and third. Asian americans overall. Scored higher on sats than the rest of the count rechlt and they dont. This disproving the idea that biological. Interrupting the whole minority. Good discourse and stereotype. Showing there is something cultural going on in the groups. Families. The thought. That really are an alternative explan ages going on in the cultures. Sure enough we found. We did not expect to. Startling come onality. And we have this chosen narrative here. And borrowed really from the jewish experience. They have their moses and exodus. Also inheritance from the americas pure tans this. Is an interesting combination of the two had histories. So joseph smith. He thinks that he discovered a new religion and followers believed that they had been send to earth to redeem the Christian Church and man kind. And more over today they actually believe that their way of life is morally superior. Words used in one of the leading discussions of more monday cult surf the sea of decay. So they have this strong sense of chosenness. Superiority complex. And insecurity. Fascinating. Deeply feel a sense of rejection. A sejs not being looked upon as fully american. They know they have been looked at as a fringe group and from a hundred years ago they were vilified from the practice of polygamy and when announced replying meal. A hundred years ago. For decades they felt on the outside and. You know. Fact that they would have to hear mitt romneys sons to be described as creepy, they were so clean cut. That is am example they will talk about another and tell you about that. So they feel. This will be their words that you can see this described in sociology. And history of persecution. Yeah. Thats right much actually hunted down and chased all over the country. So they will tell themselves the whole story of their insecurity. That is both the matter of peril and being looked down upon. So they will say words like. We feel a chip on the shoulder we have to prf ourselves show the rest of the country that we can succeed as americans and they seem to be motivated. By that combination of this exempttionality and living in the society where they have this outside persecuted relationship. And finally. The impulse control. Though is a fascinating thing it. Will strike you in the face. They practice. Practice practice habits of impulse control that are very different. They are wellknown. They smoke. They do not drink. They do not drink caffeine or soda. They start to do this with kids. And this turned out to be relevant to our findings. They do not just start this when you know. You are an adult but habits. With kids from preschool and they give moral piggy banks and whatever they have to put 0 away. Start on practices of having to sit still. And kids do not smoke as much. Or premarital sex. And all three of the elements. In term of income or success. What is the outcome. That you can see. And the upper mobilety. Certain kinlz of data in the case. Just so striking about it. You know. I worked on wall street. I remember very well this. Is confirmed by so many other account too. It was difficult to fine a mormon on on wall story. They were not there. And you did not find them. In the last 30 years now today, they are a powerhouse in some of the america eat best hunt man and many, others. Jetblue. The list goes on. So we. Three traits we are talking about. An extra sudden record success. And then of course a cause hypothesis. Motivation and the drive. Our account will deliver. No other alternative account success we are aware of can. Talk a little bit about you talk about excluding other explanations from the people that have criticize. I am sure that you rope them back in. But this is an immigrant what have you identified is the characteristic driving of immigrants. In the generation. In the struggle. You will see self selected. And ambitious and hard working and anybody that makes the journey that hard of course be having that in them. They will convey much of that to their children. Talk about why the triple package is not just immigration . Actually. That part of it. We are them they the i can to it. We are kind of. I think most accounts of success. Whether you are talking about individual success or group accounts. What they miss is drive. You know. So if you have class. You are born wealthy. Of course people were born wealthy. They have allege up. We agree with that. And you know. The explanations are that you came here. And you the children of educated immigrants. That is a big part of the book. Of course it will give you an advantage. What is missing from the accounts is motivation. You normal. The belief was the most educated group. They had the most networks. And we rnl the first people to say. You know. 40s. 50s and 60s not only did they lack the drive but it was a little bit goesh to be striving within the hunger. So to answer your questions there. Are two types of self selection hypothesis when it comes to just immigrants and puting aside the two most important cases. Jews and mormons the idea that only immigrants that are succeeding right now. Are the ones that will come over well education. With the skills. Than you fortunately is just not true. This is the politically correct explan which is we do not have to look into cultures. It will all come from who your parents are. It is a big deal with the groups. Indian americans and cube americans. But this is not for example true with Chinese Americans. This is a findings replicated not just in the united states. L. A. And also toronto and umkc over and over studies that the children of the totally uneducated chinese, korean, vietnamese. Immigrants. They are the people that have parents some illity rat. Factory and restaurant workers and taxi cab drivers. They are rising at academically faster than privileged white counter parts and also hiting it out of the park with the test scores. That is the part that has been hard to get traction. On. Of course. Acknowledge that if you are the child of a Software Engineer you will have allege up. There is another piece of it that is really fascinating and when you are talking about cubanamericans. They came over with action. A third of the wave so 2 3 did not. What is mean from the account is the mechanism. Generation of immigrants saying. The country. That i live in a crowded place and i have no job. So i will work as a fruit picker. How will that drive or education whatever you want to call it. Fed transmitted and. Most immigrants that come here. And refugees have the trip pack. Next generation that is where the drive comes in. There is no reason to think that there would not be people in poverty and in india that are laz