Power Lines
Two Years on South Africa's Borders
by Jason Carter


(Click for Amazon book review)

OnTheIssues.org BOOK REVIEW:

Jason Carter is the grandson of President Jimmy Carter and the son of Jack Carter. Jack ran for Senate in Nevada in 2006, and Jason is running for Governor of Georgia in 2014, after serving as State Senator since 2010. But this book isn't about politics; it's about Jason's service in the Peace Corps in the Republic of South Africa in 1997-1999.

You might recall that Miz Lillian, Jimmy Carter's mother and Jason Carter's great-grandmother, served in the Peace Corps in India in 1966. Jason compares his own service to hers often; mostly, he focuses on how she resided in an inaccessible community, while he was always only a short distance from the First World. Jason's inaccessibility was because he resided in a black South African "township", whose Third World residents were physically close to the First World of South Africa's white cities, but were culturally isolated. Jason's task in the Peace Corps was to help dismantle that cultural isolation, which was caused by decades of apartheid, the official racism of white-ruled South Africa.

Apartheid ended in 1994, when Nelson Mandela was freed from prison and elected as South Africa's first black president. But the legacy of apartheid continued for many years because everything in South Africa was structurally set up to keep the two races separate. The title of the book refers to that structural set up: Jason's town had power lines running through it to service the nearby white city, but the township itself had no electricity (with several citations and a picture following p. 136). The roadways, too, were part of the structural set up of separateness: Jason often hitchhiked on the main highway near his town, with whites, who could not see the township from the highway (by intentional setup) and never thought about it anyway.

This book is a fascinating look at post-apartheid South Africa; I could not put it down. But I read it because Jason is running for Governor of Georgia, and I hoped to find some issue stances here. Alas, there are very few (we excerpt anything even hinting at an issue stance!). It is Jason's only published book, so it will have to do. He is running against incumbent Republican Governor Nathan Deal, and it looks to be a close and exciting race. If Jason wins, which means the Carter family will then have established a family legacy, this book will become much more important, and will presumably become Jason's first book of many political books.

-- Jesse Gordon, editor-in-chief, OnTheIssues.org, August 2014

OnTheIssues.org excerpts:  (click on issues for details)

Civil Rights     Jason Carter: Living as minority in black Africa showed what racism meant.

Crime     Jason Carter: Most Americans only know Africa for crime and AIDS.     Jason Carter: When robbed: perhaps my things will feed a poor family.

Education     Jason Carter: 1998: Peace Corps educator in South Africa.     Jason Carter: Worked with rural African teachers on new curriculum.     Jason Carter: Third World schooling presents extraordinary challenges.     Jason Carter: Teachers are means to vanquish South African apartheid.

Foreign Policy     Jason Carter: 1997: Monitored Liberian elections with Carter Center.     Jason Carter: Africa is the story of self-respect in the face of hardship.     Jason Carter: American culture causes Third World cultural destruction.     Jimmy Carter: Gap between rich & poor is widening globally.

Government Reform     Jason Carter: Americans don't vote because we take democracy for granted.     Jason Carter: Young don't vote because those issues don't affect them.     Jason Carter: Make election day a national holiday to celebrate democracy.

Health Care     Jason Carter: Many Africans die of AIDS, but none talk about it.

Principles & Values     Jason Carter: All people, regardless of accomplishments, are still people.     Jimmy Carter: His mother and grandson both served in Peace Corps.

Technology     Jason Carter: Taught computer literacy to South African teens & teachers.

Welfare & Poverty     Jimmy Carter: Being "rich" means decent home, education, & health.

Click for quotations from other sources by: Jason Carter Jimmy Carter