Power couple Amy Chua and Jed Rubenfeld have a new book out called The Triple Package, about how the success of certain groups in America has to do with their culture. Here’s how a NYT feature describes the book:

Due out Feb. 4, the book is a work of Gladwellian sociology that enters the same cultural minefield as “Battle Hymn.” Looking at minorities like Mormons, Nigerian immigrants, Asian-Americans and Jews, among others, Chua and Rubenfeld contend that successful groups share three traits: a superiority complex, feelings of insecurity and impulse control. America, they conclude, used to be a “triple-package culture” before it succumbed to “instant-gratification disorder.”

Sounds fascinating. From the publisher’s description of the book. The quote is from the book itself:

“That certain groups do much better in America than others—as measured by income, occupational status, test scores, and so on—is difficult to talk about. In large part this is because the topic feels racially charged. The irony is that the facts actually debunk racial stereotypes. There are black and Hispanic subgroups in the United States far outperforming many white and Asian subgroups. Moreover, there’s a demonstrable arc to group success—in immigrant groups, it typically dissipates by the third generation—puncturing the notion of innate group differences and undermining the whole concept of ‘model minorities.'”

Mormons have recently risen to astonishing business success. Cubans in Miami climbed from poverty to prosperity in a generation. Nigerians earn doctorates at stunningly high rates. Indian and Chinese Americans have much higher incomes than other Americans; Jews may have the highest of all.

Why do some groups rise? Drawing on groundbreaking original research and startling statistics, The Triple Package uncovers the secret to their success. A superiority complex, insecurity, impulse control—these are the elements of the Triple Package, the rare and potent cultural constellation that drives disproportionate group success. The Triple Package is open to anyone. America itself was once a Triple Package culture. It’s been losing that edge for a long time now. Even as headlines proclaim the death of upward mobility in America, the truth is that the old fashioned American Dream is very much alive—but some groups have a cultural edge, which enables them to take advantage of opportunity far more than others.

• Americans are taught that everyone is equal, that no group is superior to another. But remarkably, all of America’s most successful groups believe (even if they don’t say so aloud) that they’re exceptional, chosen, superior in some way.
• Americans are taught that self-esteem—feeling good about yourself—is the key to a successful life. But in all of America’s most successful groups, people tend to feel insecure, inadequate, that they have to prove themselves.
• America today spreads a message of immediate gratification, living for the moment. But all of America’s most successful groups cultivate heightened discipline and impulse control.

But the Triple Package has a dark underside too. Each of its elements carries distinctive pathologies; when taken to an extreme, they can have truly toxic effects. Should people strive for the Triple Package? Should America? Ultimately, the authors conclude that the Triple Package is a ladder that should be climbed and then kicked away, drawing on its power but breaking free from its constraints.

OK, so let’s see what we know about this book. It claims that a) success in America has a lot to do with the cultural mindset one adopts; b) these cultural values are held by subgroups within all races, meaning they have nothing to do with race; c) assimilation to the American mainstream causes the competitive advantage granted by culture to dissipate, and d) this driven culture takes a psychological toll on those who grow up in it.

Ideas worth talking about! Not so, says a Time magazine Ideas essayist, who bellows, “Racism! Racism! Racism, racism, racism!” Which is such rot. For one thing, Mormons are a race? Really? For another, I’ve spent some time recently interviewing members of a successful African-American family about their clan’s history, and their intergenerational triumph over the forces of poverty and racism. It’s all about that family’s internal culture. I can’t say more about this now, but it has been a powerful lesson to me.

In a New Yorker Talk Of The Town piece (gated) profiling Chua and Rubenfeld’s daughter, a Harvard undergraduate, one of the daughter’s sorority sisters, a Mexican-American observes that yes, this stuff is hard to talk about, but that her immigrant parents do talk about how it is that among Latino groups in this country, the Cubans do so much better than everybody else. My guess is that The Triple Package will be widely condemned by right-thinkers in the media, but ordinary people will know that Chua and Rubenfeld are onto something.