Reading Journal 2023: Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World

Reading Journal 2023: Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World
Author: Malcolm Harris

Heavy on information and academically detailed, Harris’ massive book on Palo Alto proves to be Silicon Valley’s definitive history. And subsequently, given the nature of this history, a commentary on the development of American capitalism from its western roots to its global impact.

The book begins by affording the reader a deeply personal portrait of the areas indigenous roots. No matter how sprawlilng the history becomes, this is the beating heart of Harris’ vision. Somehwere behind the plasiticity of the areas symbolic position as a bastion of progress and American idealism, is a note of humanity, however buried it has become.

Its not that Palo Alto’s identity was completey foreign to me. What I did not expect, and did not know, is how its modern iteration sits indebted to the patterns of its past. I mentioned this in my review of a recent book I read on the development of the Mississippi river, but if that history captures America’s movement from the ideological vision of the East to the eventual evolution of its westward push, this book traces the countries formation from its westward development back East. Whereever the vision begins on those Eastern shores, what happens in the West reshapes the narrative with its own ambitions. Harris does a masterful job of explaining how palo alto’s reimagining of the agricultural system, the creation of the Hollywood system, its role in the railroad, the implementation of monetary sytems and trade, the creation of class systems and its relationship to development and immigration, this all places Palo Alto at the forefront what would become the emergence of American capitalism and its distinct libertarian vision. What makes this more troubling is the impact this would have on the global front. And the closer the history gets to the present, the more we see that reversing its trajectory as it takes hold of the American system with an illuminating force.

Given the breadth of detail in the book and scope of its history, Harris smartly organizes the book according to major sections each with a series of sub-sections. This allows one to track with where we are on the timeline, what subject we are exploring, and where to locate it in the bigger picture. It makes it easy to move back and forth too, if something in one section seems to be recalling something from a previous one. I will say that this does affect the pacing a bit, particularly when it comes to tracking with the arc. The arc is there, but its easy to lose sight of when you are in the thick of certain portions, and many of those portions end up necessarily hyper focused on its particular point in history. That means some of this will certainly be a bit of a slog. But there are enough sections that exhibit a natural excitement and sense of intrigue (the space settlers for example). And without a doubt, the closer the history gets to our present day, the easier it is to connect to.

It seems strange, perhaps, to say that a history book like this just might be one of the more important books of 2023, and yet I feel like the relevance of this history reaches far and wide in our present context. As I suggested, the narrative cohesion here with the movement West provides a fascinating point of perspective when it comes to the larger development of the American ethos. We can see how the seeds take root and become a living, breathing potentiality. One that either consumes itself or proves able and capable of learning important lessons. History seems to suggesst that capitalism is destined to be the former. It is in digging underneath, perhaps, and finding the human face that a book like this can present a hopeful contrast. Whether this is heard and considered amidst the noise is another question.