This book review was originally published in Romanian in “Cultura” magazine on January 2022. https://revistacultura.ro/rusia-este-pentru-america-fantoma-craciunurilor-viitoare/
Book Review: Fiona Hill, There Is Nothing For You Here. Finding Opportunity In The 21st Century (Mariner Books: 2021, New York).
“There is nothing for you here” – these words belong to Fiona Hill’s father, and marked her pathway in life from Bishop Auckland, a declining town in the North East of England, to the heart of the world’s capital Washington DC, literally, not just metaphorically, from the “coal house” to the “White House”.
This apparently blunt yet powerful “reality check” set the line of demarcation between what was predictable and what became possible in the journey of the “improbable” Fiona Hill. But these words might as well belong to any parents who saw their children leaving home in search of a better life and opportunities otherwise unavailable.
Opportunity, or better said “infrastructure of opportunity” is, in fact, a central concept of the book, as the author’s trifold experience – in UK, Russia and the US – allows her to provide an eye-opening radiography of opportunity or the lack thereof, and its consequences. In her own words, “the decline of industry, the crisis of opportunity, and the rise of populist politics across the decades” (p.10) accompanied Fiona Hill’s life experience and professional career.
The Romanian public probably knows Fiona Hill in her capacity of Senior Director for European and Russian Affairs, on the National Security Council, where Romania was under her portfolio, between 2017-2019. The American public may remember Fiona Hill from the first impeachment trial against former US president Donald Trump, when her powerful presence and testimony in Congress was an extraordinary demonstration of how professionalism and integrity in public service look at the highest level.
The readers will find captivating, yet alarming, episodes about the author’s experience in working at the White House during the Trump administration or recalls of Fiona Hill’s encounters with Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin. Yet, the book is not a typical Washington tell-all memoir or a mere inside look into the corners of political institutions. It combines in a unique and exquisite manner storytelling and personal confessions with reflections on the most relevant political, economic and social challenges today and throughout decades, historical accounts with policy proposals, and insights into the functioning of democratic institutions. The author does not shy away from addressing issues like discrimination and racism, the threats of populism and democratic backsliding, as well as calling out the unworkability of a “parallel foreign policy” or the “privatization of national security” in the United States under Donald Trump. (p 253)
Fiona Hill’s book reveals many stories and life lessons in one, bound together by discovering how the infrastructure of opportunity works, where it is missing and what is needed to enforce it.
It is the story of immigrants struggling to emerge out of poverty through education and hard work in the face of no agreement and resistance, it is the story of women confronting ongoing inherent and inherited gender-based barriers to their leadership and finding the determination to break through. It is the story of professionals who still face a myriad of intrinsic, explicit, or covert types of discrimination, despite their merits. Fiona Hills recalls episodes of mockery and mistaken identity throughout her entire career, because of her social background from a working-class family, her accent from North East England or her gender. Being taken for a secretary, a note taker, a tea lady and even a “decorative prop” despite her credentials, expertise or even official accountability describes a familiar experience for many women.
But underneath, on a deeper level, the book is about democracy. It begins with a stark warning about the democratic backsliding, and it concludes with the antidote. “The example of modern Russia offers a cautionary tale for the United States…Russia is America’s Ghost of Christmas Future, a harbinger for things to come if we can’t adjust course and heal our political polarization.” (p. 10) This is a warning rather than a prediction, and it neither comes from, nor is the product of partisan politics. Fiona Hill speaks with the voice of the well-respected professional whose personal experience in both UK and the US, as well as expertise on Russia enabled her to uncover dangerous patterns of similarities between the three countries and explain the lure of populism for “forgotten” people and places, in the absence of opportunity.
“In the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, and every other country, the obstacles to opportunity – to accessing an education, finding a job, earning sufficient money to thrive, not just survive – no matter what form they come in, contribute to economic hardship.” (p.136) And it is this very network of circumstances that has provided fertile ground to populism.
The parallel between UK, US and Russia is an original feature of the book, as the narrative consistently comes back to it throughout the pages. Such parallel goes back to the economic challenges of the post-industrial era, and continues up to the events that led to the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol in Washington DC. “Watching Trump’s disorganized but deadly serious attempt at a coup unfold over the course of 2020, the clearest and most unmistakable parallels were with Russia”. (p 277)
Against this background, addressing the threats to democracy starts with the infrastructure of opportunity. This encompasses all the “ingredients” that would allow someone to go beyond inherited disadvantages, birth conditions, social background, limitations imposed by income, race, gender, and it includes education, access to housing and resources, building social networks. All this offers not just a way out of poverty and the prospects of a new future where one can seize and create opportunities, but mostly “an antidote to populism”.
In this sense, education is the key element, as Fiona Hill unequivocally argues: “Focusing collective action on education is an important aspect in countering the national security crisis of polarization and fragmentation. Lack of education – in the sense of acquiring the critical thinking skills…- breeds suspicion of government, skepticism toward science and expert knowledge and resistance to the very idea that there are things like basic facts and objective information.” (p. 310)
As the warnings against authoritarianism and the arguments around the infrastructure of opportunity as an antidote to populism are generally valid, this might as well be a cautionary tale for Romania. Romanian political leaders, policy makers, specialists and not only could tailor such conclusions to Romania’s current challenges. To stop or at least limit the “brain drain” Romania would need to build an infrastructure of opportunity on long term. To combat disinformation and the spread of conspiracy theories Romania needs another approach to education, and cannot underestimate the danger of populism or take democracy for granted. Todays’ threats to democracy emanate more from words than weapons, they are harder to pinpoint and they come from the inside as much as from the outside.
Beyond the multiple angles covered in the book and its complexity, “There Is Nothing For You Here” appeals to everyone. Fiona Hill’s book ends with a set of practical actions every individual can generate to create opportunities today, besides what governments, institutions and large organizations can undertake.
