The chapters are of very different lengths. The techiques used differe from chapter to chapter, spanning the range from a case study to compilations of statistical data. The prose varies from chatty to academic cum footnotes. The reason for this dismaying but unavoidable variety is that I am trying to describe an entire elephant of an issue, and the parts of an elephant are very different from each other. Feet require less space to discuss than do heart and brain.
Genes require electronmicrosopy whereas tusks require tape measures.
Similar treatment is appropriate for similar subjects - 20 similar chapters on 20 sopranos or skyscrapers or insurrections. But similar treatment does not work for very different dimensions of a single phenomenon like an elephant. I hope that each chapter is long enough to reach the ground, and no longer. Many of the examples of news stories and public events used here are not recent. I have been collecting material for this book, and writing these essays, for most of two decades, and the examples date from when I was thinking about a particular topic.