has caused a publishing furore in America. Chinese-American Tiger Mother Amy Chua and her Jewish husband Jed Rubenfeld investigated why certain cultural and ethnic groups in the US are more successful than others.
Both authors are law professors at Yale. It’s all very politically correct, but when they say Asian-Americans it usually means those of Chinese origin. This group does spectacularly well, making up about 5 per cent of the US college-age population, and 19 per cent of Harvard undergraduates, 16 per cent at Yale and 19 per cent at Princeton. And at the California Institute of Technology, which admits students by test results only, a massive 40 per cent are Asian-American.
Predictably, even though Chua is Chinese and her husband is Jewish, asking the questions triggered a torrent of accusations of racism before the book was even printed. It was branded a “a despicable new theory” of “racial superiority” by Salon, as espousing a “racist argument” by and accused of harbouring “uncomfortable racist overtones” by magazine.
These guys can say things other writers would baulk at, such as: “Asians are now so overrepresented at Ivy League schools that they are being called the ‘new Jews’.” They are taking slight advantage of the situation: an ethnic outsider could hardly be so bold.
Chua wrote the bestseller about strict Chinese parenting styles. This new book widens the net to consider Chinese, Mormons, Cubans, Nigerians, Jews, Indians, Lebanese and Iranians – groups who all do disproportionately well.
