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comment on Project camelot
carter pate (CPATE@UTCVM.BITNET)
Tue, 24 Jan 1995 14:22:32 EST
It was several years ago when I read Horowitz' of the Project Camelot fiasco.
But several recent comments suggest that their athors are drawing from other
wells of information. I read Horwitz because of curiosity about the flap
resounding in professional associations, and because a sociologist I had known,
Rex Hopper, had been listed as involved. I suspect that although anthro-
pologists may have been involved, the approach reflected as much or more
sociology and political science, and included more people from that field.
Also, as I remember Horowitz, he placed as much responsibility upon over-
reactive Chilean journalists, as upon rather naive planning by the USAians.
I believe he describes an intention to be ready, bwefore any fact, to
observe, rather than intervene--worthy of Eric Wolfe's after-the-fact analysis
in Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Century. It's a real issue, but there's a pos
sibility that even some professional associations in that time and place over-
reacted. Wasn't Horowitz inquiry an effort to set facts straight(rather
than merely condemn, and also to warn any social scientists of the danger of
government involvement, even if they had the most ethical plans and goals?
cpate
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