Book Reviews and Notices : The World's Best Hope. By FRANCIS B. BIDDLE. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1949. Pp. xiv, 175. $3.50.)

• Author: Albert C.F. Westphal
• Date: 01 March 1951
• Published date: 01 March 1951
• DOI: 10.1177/106591295100400128
• Subject Matter: Articles

149
difficult to accept the author’s assertion that its de facto power is severely
curtailed by &dquo;increasing mass-activity and [the] conviction of the masses
[that they are] having their own say.&dquo; Regarding the central control of
all the media of information and education, Dr. Schlesinger flatly asserts
that such control is merely part of the Soviet Union’s &dquo;struggle for sur-
vival&dquo; and that he sees no reason why independent centers of opinion
should not exist in the socialist state. This is perhaps not an unreasonable
assertion if it is clearly limited to the &dquo;abstract model&dquo; of the socialist
state, but the facility with which Dr. Schlesinger interchanges &dquo;USSR&dquo; and
the &dquo;abstract model of the socialist state&dquo; constitutes a gross violation of
the very canons of methodology set up by him in another part of
the book.
ALFRED DIAMANT.
University of Florida.
The World’s Best Hope. By FRANCIS B. BIDDLE. (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press. 1949. Pp. xiv, 175. $3.50.)
The former Attorney General of the United States has been deeply
impressed by the American response to Europe’s difficulties. In this
volume, he observes that the creation of the European Recovery Plan was
a policy to assist in the preservation of democratic institutions abroad,
and he is disturbed by the persistent popular confusion that equates
socialism with communism in the fulfillment of the plan. &dquo;Can the
system of free enterprise of the United States be made to work in harmony
with the Socialist or semi-Socialist governments of western Europe in an
effort to rebuild the economy and sustain the free political and social
cultures of those countries?&dquo;
It is neither easy nor fair to summarize the discursive arguments
of the author. The body of the book is given over to a brisk analysis of
the prevailing concepts of democracy, socialism, and communism. The
author develops three basic theses: (1) socialism is not communism;
(2) for the...