The Sack of Detroit: General Motors and the End of American Enterprise by Kenneth Whyte (review)

Reviewed by: The Sack of Detroit: General Motors and the End of American Enterprise by Kenneth Whyte Daniel Clark The Sack of Detroit: General Motors and the End of American Enterprise By Kenneth Whyte (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2021. Pp. 432. Notes, selected bibliography, index. Clothbound, 30. 00; e-book, 30. 00. ) Kenneth Whyte's The Sack of Detroit is a lively, engaging book that identifies the campaign for improved car safety in the 1960s as responsible for the decline of the domestic auto industry. In this telling, "Detroit" serves as a stand-in for the auto industry, with General Motors representing the Big Three auto manufacturers. The Sack of Detroit offers a persuasive argument that efforts to force auto manufacturers to produce cars that could protect passengers from injury were misguided. There was indeed carnage on American roads, with some 40, 000 to 50, 000 deaths each year. However, long before the 1960s automakers had attempted to address the problem by advocating the Triple E consensus of public education, engineering improvements, and stricter law enforcement. Whyte argues that continued efforts on those fronts, without government meddling in the design of automobiles, would have been the better path, especially since most American drivers did not want to wear seatbelts and too many of them drove while intoxicated. Whyte's main antagonist is Ralph Nader, who became famous as a consumer advocate with Unsafe at Any Speed. This 1965 book was highly critical of the Chevrolet Corvair, a 1960s General Motors entry in the emerging small-car market. Nader latched on to second-collision theory, which showed that most injuries and deaths from car crashes were caused by bodies flying inside cars or being ejected from vehicles after smash-ups. Whyte portrays Nader negatively: as a latecomer to auto safety activism willing to fudge data to suit his needs, and as someone who unethically posed as an independent expert when testifying about legislation that he helped write. Whyte also casts Nader as a man with no apparent vices, except his "quasi-religious commitment to his ideas and beliefs, to a higher calling, which seemed from his journalism to involve purging his countrymen of their reckless commercialism in favor of less wasteful, less exploitative, more public-spirited lifestyles" (p. 118). Democratic Party operative Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Democratic senator Abraham Ribicoff, and Robert F. Kennedy also draw Whyte's ire for taking on GM in highly publicized hearings with little regard for larger contexts or competing perspectives on the best way to reduce road casualties. Whyte supports his argument with solid research, including the use of transcripts from U. S. Senate committee hearings and contemporary newspapers. He indeed demonstrates that research and improvements promoting End Page 179 automobile safety long predated Unsafe at Any Speed. He also argues convincingly that the Chevrolet Corvair was never found to have an unsafe design. General Motors, however, fueled suspicion of the Corvair, and of the corporation itself, by ordering a private investigation of Nader in hopes of discrediting his efforts. When that investigation became public, GM lost much of its credibility. Whyte is less convincing in claiming that Nader's efforts resulted in a regulatory regime that sapped the competitiveness and growth of GM and the larger American economy. There are certainly other contending causal factors for the decline of the domestic auto industry and the end of the post-World War II boom. Ultimately, Whyte hopes that The Sack of Detroit will contribute to his larger argument that economic growth is the greatest good, and that any inhibitors to economic growth, especially regulations, should be viewed critically. Whyte also takes aim at tort law and lawyers, who in his view file specious suits about supposedly defective products, something that happened with the Corvair. It might be enough, however, to conclude that popular memories of eras or movements can be misleading and often obscure important contributors. Daniel Clark Oakland University Copyright © 2024 Trustees of Indiana University