"In a sweeping yet remarkably accessible book, Mr. Putnam and Ms. Garrett provide a crucial missing ingredient in contemporary social commentary: They lay out a sociology of success that, drawing on our history, can help us think concretely about how to enable a revival of American life."

"A remarkable new book. . . [and] a careful work of social science. . . .Today we need a political change, so we don’t have a leader who shreds the nation from the top. But the great missing pieces are in the civic and cultural spheres: a moral vision that inspires the rising generation, a new national narrative that unites a diverse people, actual organizations where people work on local problems. As in 1870, it’s the work of a generation.

"The Upswing, Robert Putnam and Shaylyn Romney Garrett’s ambitious new study of American Progressivism found and lost . . . .serves as a call to the generations who have succeeded the baby-boomers to imagine a better future for the American project, and to pursue it. . . .[A] magnificent and visionary book."

"In this good-hearted and sweeping book, the political scientist Robert D. Putnam (with Shaylyn Romney Garrett) offers some hope in bleak times. The Upswing is well worth reading for its cornucopia of data and insightful social history."

“A top-notch addition to the why-America-is-in-such-a-mess genre. . . . A tour de force exploration of why America got better and then went into reverse.”

“America’s deep-seated divisions were healed in the past and can be again, argues this sweeping and persuasive study. . . . This fresh, ambitious take on America’s fraying social fabric will provoke much discussion.”

"An impeccably sourced review of the last century’s economic divide....this will engage serious readers who are curious about the big picture of twentieth-century social economics, and who are in search of a worthy guide to lead them through the data. For those deeply inquisitive individuals, Putnam and Garrett will not disappoint."

"[The Upswing] will be the basis of endless papers, dissertations and argument for years to come. It is as important a book as I have read on American society."

"The Upswing is a revelation—tailor-made for this polarized age and destined to be a central reference point for urgent debates and determined activism. . . . Squarely facing race and gender inequity, Putnam and Garrett shed new light on the moral awakening and collective action that a diverse group of Americans sparked more than a century ago—and show how we can build on their example, but also learn from their blind spots, today.”

“Remarkable. . . .every shred of data in The Upswing reverberates with the same exhortation: We came together once, and we can do it again. The authors emphasize the role that bold reformers played in imagining a better, more inclusive nation during the 20th century’s long upswing. Their book is an extended call for a new generation to take up the fight.”

". . .masterfully re-casts the history of our country from the Gilded Age to the present. . . . The Upswing is a singularly illuminating book and a clarion call to action.”

"The Upswing is [a] masterpiece; it weaves seemingly unrelated stories into a grand master narrative of the last hundred years. A triumph.”

“Americans who feel we are now living in the worst of times will see their spirits lifted and their hopes raised after reading The Upswing. . . .[A] must-read for those who wonder how we can once again reclaim our nation’s promise.”

"One of the most in-depth and mesmerizing critiques of the American economic system, with its inherent implications for virtually every aspect of modern society and culture that has ever been produced. . . .One of the more remarkable features of the book is Putnam and Garrett’s ability to translate highly quantitative concepts into language that is accessible to the general reader. . . .[T]he conclusions reached by these two intrepid researchers are difficult to refute, such is the persuasiveness of the evidence presented"