The Economy
Health Care
The Rest of the Welfare State
Crime
More Broadly
Education and the Higher Pursuits
The Environment
Civil Society
Nationalism
Religion and Science
Assimilation
Lumping and Splitting
A Meeting of the Twain?
Separated at Birth?
The Post Facto State
How the West Was One
Acorn and Oak

There is much heated rhetoric about the widening gulf between Europe and America. But are they so different? Peter Baldwin thinks not, and in this bracing and remarkably informed polemic, he lays out how similar the two regions really are. Drawing on the latest evidence from sources such as the United Nations, the World Bank, and the IMF, Baldwin offers a fascinating comparison of the United States and Europe, looking at the latest statistics on the economy, crime, health care, education, religion, the environment, and much more. It is a book filled with surprising revelations. For most categories of crime, for instance, America is safe by European standards. But the biggest surprise is that, though there are many differences between America and Europe, in almost all cases, the gaps are no greater than the differences among European nations. Europe and the US are, in fact, part of a common, big-tent grouping. America is not Sweden, for sure. But nor is Italy Sweden, nor France, nor even Germany. And who says that Sweden is Europe? Anymore than Vermont is America? Peter Baldwin is Professor of History at UCLA. He is the author of "Disease and Democracy", "Contagion and the State in Europe, 1830 - 1930", and "The Politics of Social Solidarity"