The need identified is a fundamental truth to be embraced: Hawaii must be able to function in the New Economy.

A central premise of the book is sound: that, in the new millennium, knowledge and communications are the primary engines of growth.

The author's Blue Wave Millennium strategy (BWM)is that Hawaii be "a center for specific types of R&D and technology related business." While this concept has appeal and prospect, the book does not credibly present BWM as a plan for sustainable economic development.

The "traditional vision" is defined as reliant on a tourism industry that has stalled and is self-limiting. The author provides a clear synopsis of Hawaii's excessive reliance on a non-sustainable visitor industry and asserts, "Tourism won't be, can't be, and shouldn't be the main source of our economy's growth."

It is stated that agriculture "will never again have the strength that sugar once had" - mistakenly equating the fate of Hawaii agriculture with the fate of sugar. Sugar has lost, forever, its position as king of the island economy, but Hawaii agriculture is in resurgence. In 1980's and 1990's, the sugar industry declined due to reasons the author articulates well. During this same period the value of diversified agriculture increased by 200%.

The author faintly acknowledges the merit of agriculture contributing to Hawaii's economy via import substitution. The actuality of this taking place and the potential of a larger contribution is disregarded. Such disregard is unfortunate in the context of a discussion of high-tech, since agriculture in the new millennium is utilizing high-tech and will continue to do so at an increasing rate.

As the author points out, coffee, macadamia nuts, and exotic tropical fruits are all grown elsewhere, so that Hawaii is one of many competitors. This is also true for computer technology - it is produced elsewhere and any new entrants into this market will be one of many competitors.

In critiquing components of the Hawaii economy, the military sector is not mentioned. An informed analysis of Hawaii's economy, as it exists today and in the near- to mid-future, requires including the impact of the military.

The high-tech successes of Ireland and Bangalore, India in the 1990's are given as examples for Hawaii to follow.

Contrary to what is implied, Ireland being an island does not make it analogous to Hawaii. That Ireland is further from the US than Hawaii fails to prove that Hawaii's remote location is not an impediment to establishment of a high-tech economy in the islands. Ireland is close to, part of, and has special market access to, the European Union, a large market.

Bangalore does not, as the author claims, prove "that the Blue Wave Millennium is achievable." The author praises policies that made Bangalore a high-tech economic success, particularly the Indian government's approach to getting high-tech parks built. Would industry development policy from Bangalore be suitable in Hawaii? A notorious case of industry development in India was the location of the worst chemical disaster in history: the 1984 gas leak at a chemical plant in Bhopal, India. Does Hawaii want to use as a role model, industry development policies that resulted in such a catastrophe?

There is a fundamental economic reason that emulating Ireland's and Bangalore's leadership in the high-tech boom of the 1990's is unlikely to replicate their successes in Hawaii. An entrepreneur, company, or community contemplating investment must recognize that early innovators capture high returns and followers compete to sustain lower returns. Being a follower will not result in Hawaii having sustainable prosperity in the twenty-first century.

BWM would have Hawaii become "a place where high-tech gets done." Perhaps, instead, Hawaii should be a place where high-tech gets used. High-tech (computer technology), properly utilized, reduces the cost of activities. This cost reduction comes from two sources: gains in efficiency realized by those who use high-tech, and, in the year 2002 and beyond, a declining price for computer technology. It is preferable to pay a low price for and then use cost-saving technology, instead of investing in an industry that produces low priced technology.

The steps to BWM include improved quality of education; private sector alliances; partnership between government, industry and academia; competitive government; financial incentives; tax reform; support from large corporations, entrepreneurs, and the public; and venture capital. All of these steps represent good ideas. None are new ideas and none are unique to high-tech.

The BWM selling point is that "Hawaii has unique advantages in lifestyle, telecommunications facilities, existing expertise, and time zone." These advantages, properly exploited, can make Hawaii more attractive for business investment. However, they are not so unique as the author implies.

The author alludes to biotech, but emphasizes computer technology. More elaboration on what biotech has to offer Hawaii would have been good.

It is imperative that knowledge become the engine for Hawaii's economy. The challenge for Hawaii is not to duplicate a model that has been successful for another place, at another time, with another set of circumstances. The challenge for Hawaii is to create and use knowledge, including high-tech and biotech, as an economic engine to do what no one else has done. This would be the way for Hawaii to create a sustainable social and economic future in which the health of the natural environment is constantly improved.

This reads like poorly researched graduate-school blathering (which I expect it is).

Mr Lock appears to have approached his sources with his thesis already formed and to have avoided all contact with anything that might force him to reconsider. Check out his footnote admitting that his use of Ellington's song title is totally inappropriate to what he's trying to make it mean, yet he decided to use it anyway!

His comparison of Sun Ra's mythological musings and autobiographical confessions with slave narratives is ridiculous in that it reveals a thorough lack of knowledge of comparative religion. The author acts as though the experience of death and rebirth or of choosing a new name to reflect a new station in life were phenomena unique to (and invented by) African-Americans. He clearly didn't research this topic thoroughly.

This is a really shoddy work and not worth your time, much less your money.

Lock examines the common musical heritage of his subjects, showing how their visionary thoughts become manifest in their music, often amidst the crippling misconceptions perpetuated by the press. He delves deeply into the actual interviews and writings of Ra, Ellington, and Braxton, establishing connections between their work and a larger spectrum of academic, religious, and political thought. Particularly interesting is the section on Anthony Braxton, which is a welcome addition to the author's previous work "Forces in Motion." Lock examines Braxton's operas, including even those that have not yet been made available to the public. His discussion of Braxton's use of "text" is an illuminating contribution, and one that is much needed in contemporary scholarship on Braxton.

In short, Lock shows how the art and thought of Braxton, Ellington, and Ra provide those who experience their work with not only the opportunity to view the world with an alternative paradigm, but how in many ways we, as collective humanity, should forget about "history" (which has failed) and start believing in "mystery." The mystery is real--and it is true--and I can think of no better preface to read before embarking on Sun Ra's trips to space--or Braxton's forays into affinity dynamics and meta-reality--than Lock's "Blutopia." It is a masterpiece.

Thanks in advance.

The authors spend a great deal of time in the first chapters of the book explaining their view of chaos theory and complex systems theory. This examination includes an interesting look at the history of not only chaos and complexity, but the deterministic scientific theories which, they say, have led to the decay of many of our world's current societal, educational, and environmental beliefs. Building upon this foundation, proposals are offered for re-thinking the way problems within these decaying systems are examined. Examples include viewing unemployment as a natural state of one's working life, an educational system shaped by the shrinking time-space compression of today's technological environment, and the possibility that 'advances' realized by today's information driven countries may, in fact, be in declines and not advances.

In terms of education, which is my focus, the implications for using chaotics to address the monumental changes required of this aging and inefficient system may be significant. That our educational systems may be pushed towards more effective and efficient methods of operations by orchestrating changes within it, using chaotics, is certainly intriguing. That our educational systems need to undergo radical change if we are going to attempt to educate our children is not in question. Inserting chaotics into our education al change strategies is neither 'new fangled' nor 're-done', and could have a dramatic impact upon how we begin turning the bow of this monstrous ship we call education in America (for real).

A bit of a tough read, Chaotics is certainly worth a close examination by anyone new to chaos or complexity theories. The ideas put forth in this book are worthy of consideration and will minimally alter the reader's perspective of change, happenstance and decay within complex systems.

First I suggest reading Andre de Toth's amazing autobiography, FRAGMENTS - Portraits from the Inside (Faber and Faber, 1994).

Having known de Toth since 1972, I can certify that he had a great deal of respect for the book's interviewer/editor Anthony Slide, or he wouldn't have given him his most prized possession, time.

Slide did his homework and spent enough time with de Toth to cover de Toth's films in detail. This was an amazing achievement since de Toth rarely wanted to discuss past, being a "now" and "future" man.

The "Herr future director" references throughout were to the READER, the aspiring director to whom the book was largely aimed.

When one reads BOTH books, one gets a huge impression of this amazing man's life, and the world as he experienced it.

My only dissatisfaction with both books is the relative paucity of photos. De Toth was a director of IMAGES, and there aren't enough.

Otherwise, between these books, you'll have an experience few film-maker books have ever delivered.

I object to authors who write to impress their peers rather than write to explain their topic areas in such a way so that a student coming from another field can begin to understand what is going on fairly soon after reading the textbook, or parts of the textbook. I really do not care if the audience the authors/author are trying to reach are college students or graduate students, if the writing is such that the material does not make sense without total explanations from the teacher, then something is wrong. Most of the fifty some odd people in both classes who I talked to about it agreed that both the book and the classes were boring, unstimulating, and that they were having a difficult time comprehending the material presented. Since most of these people were and are teachers or those who work in educational research, it obviously wasn't me or them. I think the idea is supposed to be to make curricula accessible to all students. Since I am a Deaf person, and have had my fill of professors who definitely did not try to make their classes accessible, I tend to hold the writers of textbooks up to a high standard. None of the students in the class were 'learning-disabled' but this book did an awfully good job of making feel as if we were. All of us tried to sell this book back rather than keep it in our shelves which at a graduate level is unusual, but because they are bring a new edition out the books were unresaleable. I am looking for a more coherent text for my own personal use on education assessment...it won't be this one. Karen Sadler, Science Education, University of Pittsburgh

The book's premise is straightforward: Jesus Christ is both Creator and King, and therefore all of life, both private and public, is subject to the author's interpretation. That is, the authors are pretending to be god. The implications of this should be obvious, but alas are not: today 1/2 of the U.S. Senate would sleep soundly at if the reigns of goverment were turned over to Pat Robertson- or, e.g., if John Ashcroft were to become attorney general.

Every ideology is inherently hubris, since it inevitably makes assumptions concerning creation and the nature of reality and the source and meaning of right and wrong.

Hopefully Americans will learn of the diabolical nature of these Reconstructionist theocrats before it's too late.

The book's premise is straightforward: Jesus Christ is both Creator and King, and therefore all of life, both private and public, is subject to His rule. The implications of this should be obvious, but alas are not: modern society becomes hysterical at the very thought of anything which might, in modern terms, "mix politics with religion." Of course this hysteria is nonsense. Every ideology is inherently religious, since it inevitably makes assumptions concerning creation and the nature of reality and the source and meaning of right and wrong. But the Christian religion and its trappings are out of vogue in this century, while the cults of the all-powerful state and the relativistic individual reign supreme, and it should surprise no one that the acolytes of the modern polytheism should seek to silence the ancient monotheism at every opportunity.

So just what are the implications of a consistently Christian political theory? Perhaps it is best first to understand what the implications are not. While the authors call for a Constitutional amendment recognizing Jesus Christ as Lord and as the Source of its life, liberty and law -- much the same as almost every other Western nation has -- they emphatically do not call for what moderns refer to as a "theocracy". "Theocracy," which is to say, rule by God, already exists: Christ's kingdom is "not of this world", and He rules the affairs of men no matter what they do or say. Rather, the authors believe a consistently Biblical social theory requires a separation of church and state, that the two institutions, along with the family, are ordained by God and meant to operate in very different spheres. They do not call for the submission of government to the church, or any earthly clergy: what they want is conformity of civil life, and indeed of civilization, to the teachings of Christ.

In practice, this means that the authors do not favor a change in the form of American government; they favor a change in its character and beliefs. It is an ideological and spiritual revolution they seek, not a revolution of the modern sort, and it is entirely based on principles familiar. The authors stake the claim of Jesus Christ's rights as King, but do not call for an Earthly king to rule in His stead; instead, they call for repentance and conversion on the part of those who do rule on Earth -- the electorate -- and for the election of leaders who will faithfully discharge their Constitutional duties not as faithful humanists or faithful Marxists but as faithful Christians.

And what does leadership as a faithful Christian mean, aside from not committing adultery, not breaking campaign promises, and not selling secrets to the Chinese? Well, actually, it means a change in worldviews, just as did the shift from the old order to New Deal statism in the 1930s. The authors take time to explore the Christian foundations of liberty in the modern world, noting correctly that of all the ideologies in history, only Christianity produced modern political and economic freedom. They detail the depravity which results (and which has resulted) from an abandonment of absolute right and wrong, and show why no adequate legal standard -- and certainly no truly free one -- can be built apart from the standard of Scripture. They trace the free market's roots in Biblical law and show why government must be both very small and very unintrusive. They offer a completely new paradigm for education, and call for reason over "sentimentalism." In short, they address, and address well, most of the vital issues of the day.

One cannot come away from Explicitly Christian Politics without a deepened realization of the religious nature of the "isms" of our time and the abysmally bad politics that flows from them; likewise, one cannot read this volume without an appreciation for the fact that these Christians have devised a better model. Quibble with the details all you like: Explicitly Christian Politics is nothing short of the rebirth of a vital Christian social theory, far beyond the "me-too" pluralism of the Christian Right to date. There's something special here. it is very clearly not going away.

Copyright: Rod D. Martin, 8 May 1998.