“Paul Sabin has written a fascinating account of the forgotten history of public interest liberalism. He offers a powerful reminder that the attack on big government didn’t just come from the right but the left as well. In demanding that the government be held accountable, this generation of reformers undermined the confidence of many Americans in what our government institutions were capable of doing.”

“[Sabin’s] cogent history is timely and likely to be enduring. An insightful and squirm-inducing account of how the good guys won and then lost.”

“This book could not be more timely. As progressives celebrate the return of confidence in ‘big government,’ expertise, regulation, and science, they must not forget the lessons of the 1960s and 1970s. Paul Sabin powerfully demonstrates that the liberal postwar order was not only undercut by the rise of the right, but also by an activist left that for good reason decried government’s deafness to citizens’ needs and participation. How best to serve the public interest is the greatest challenge of our time, and we could have no better guide through the historical thicket than Sabin.”

“Long before the ‘Reagan Revolution,’ an army of citizen activists launched a searing attack on liberalism, big government, and the administrative state—and helped pave the way for market-oriented conservatism. Paul Sabin’s timely, provocative, and deeply ironic account should be required reading for everyone interested in environmentalism, consumerism, political economy, and the 1970s.”

“Astute and nuanced, Paul Sabin uses Ralph Nader and the public interest movement he helped spawn to tell a fascinating story of American governance and the limits of markets, regulation, and citizen action.”

“Paul Sabin’s history of America’s 1960s and 70s is directly relevant to the country’s civic, political, and ethical choices in the decades ahead. This is a surprising, insightful, and lastingly useful book.”

“Elegantly argued and meticulously documented… Sabin makes his case intelligently and forcefully.”

“Sabin crafts a coherent historical narrative out of the alphabet soup of government agencies and public interest groups, and sheds light on major developments in American politics. This deep dive delivers plenty of rewards.”

“A great new book”

“Beautifully written, non-partisan, and filled with surprising insights, The Bet is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand modern environmental politics.”

“In his new book, The Bet, Paul Sabin has managed to write a work of serious historical scholarship about a vexing political issue — and make it read like a character-driven novel.”

“The Bet provides an important contribution to canonical works in environmental history and environmental studies. It is a remarkable story of a critical moment in the environmental movement, and Sabin has told it expertly.”

“I found this book informative, charming, and highly readable.”

“Carefully researched and engaging … Highly recommended.”

“Paul Sabin vividly and creatively explores the half century battle over environmental policy by telling the story of the clash—and famous “bet”—between Paul Ehrlich, the prophet of population doom, and Julian Simon, the advocate of technology and markets.”

“A wonderful new book … a fantastic introduction to population resource debates of the late-twentieth century.  It will be the required first reading on this topic in my future courses.”

“In telling the story of Ehrlich and Simon’s bet, Paul Sabin offers a compelling analysis of two very different, but equally important, ways of understanding the future of humans and the environment that still shape the world of environmental politics today.”

“Paul Sabin’s The Bet is wonderfully conceived, sharply focused and entertainingly executed. In the story of a famous bet between two men of large egos, he manages to touch on the most basic problems we face in trying to come to terms with our current environmental crisis.”

“A brilliant idea for a book.  In The Bet, Paul Sabin has produced an absorbing narrative of how two people’s ‘clashing insights’ unleashed on the world polarised views of the environmental and resource threats we face in the 21st century.

“A joy to read; Sabin weaves a vivid historical narrative rich with classic characters … The Bet is both a cautionary tale and a call to order.”

“Provides surprising insights for anyone involved in addressing the world’s ‘wicked problems.’… I recommend The Bet to anyone wanting to understand the history of the divisive discussions we have today, especially the stalemate over climate change.”

“An illuminating, judicious and engaging examination of the conflict between environmentalists and their critics over the past five decades.”

“A refreshingly readable and consistently insightful portrait of the ferocious American politics of global population and resources since the 1960s – and of two implacable enemies who strangely resembled one another.”

“[A] gem of a book”

“Valuable … Mr. Sabin shares Mr. Ehrlich’s devotion to environmentalism.  Yet this affinity doesn’t prevent Mr. Sabin from being clear-eyed.”

“For Europeans like me who find the partisan politics of environmental issues in the US puzzling, Paul Sabin’s book provides a handy catch-up course explaining how this came to be.” Sabin “gives a balanced view of this conflict of extreme views and explains very clearly how it influenced politics.”

“Effectively hammers home the point that there is no such thing as a “free” market. . . . To oppose a current policy choice, such as one related to energy or transportation, on the grounds that people should let the market decide is evidence of historical ignorance, ideological blindness, or some combination of both.”

“To a much greater degree than most Americans usually appreciate, the central story of the past century was the story of oil. Paul Sabin’s Crude Politics is a pioneering effort to trace for a single key state — California — the evolving web of relationships needed to sustain the production, distribution, and consumption of a critical resource on which virtually every aspect of modern life now depends. As we contemplate the waning future of that resource in the twenty-first century, we would do well to heed the insights about its twentieth-century past offered by this important book.”

“Getting energy prices right is key to addressing our global climate crisis. With graceful prose and forceful argument, Paul Sabin shows how petroleum prices today are a product of more than a century of fierce political struggle over oil supply and demand. Anyone who wants to understand the political and economic factors that have created our present dependence on cheap oil should read this book.”

“Paul Sabin has written a brilliant case study of how legal and political choices construct ‘free markets’. He shows how battles over property rights, regulation, taxes, and highway and environmental policy shaped the oil market and with it the future of California’s cities, roads, coastline and public finance. Clear-headed, meticulous, and filled with the drama of momentous conflicts between public and private interests, Crude Politics is legal-economic history at its best.”

“Crude Politics establishes the crucial importance of state-level political forces in directing the development of California oil. It stands as an exemplary work of business, legal, and environmental history.”

“Sabin presents readers with an intensely researched narrative that reveals the evolution of oil politics in California over the first forty years of the twentieth century. In addition to telling a new story in great detail and emphasizing the federalist and state influences in the politics of oil, Sabin contributes a new and enlightening analysis of the effects of the gasoline tax on policymaking.”

“A model of systematic, data-rich analysis with much to say to both historians and policy makers. . . .  Sabin’s work offers far-reaching insights into the political economy of oil in the twentieth century. The analytical framework constructed by Sabin from legal, political, and economic history should prove flexible enough to apply to events both earlier and later in history, as well as events in other parts of the world.”

Joseph A. Pratt, Reviews in American History

“Sabin … writes in the tradition of legal historian James Willard Hurst. He argues that the price of oil is not simply the result of supply and demand curves alone. Rather, the market for oil resulted from the combined effects of political, legal, and economic history. No truly free market in oil ever existed. Instead, Sabin focuses on the visible hand of the government—the various public decisions regarding property, regulation, and taxation—that created the market structure for this all-important resource.”