Book Review: Alcoholics Anonymous as a Mutual-Help Movement: A Study in Eight Societies

Alcoholics Anonymous as a Mutual-Help Movement: A Study in Eight Societies, by Klaus Makela et al. (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1996), 297 pp. plus personal name and subject indices, cloth $46.00, paper $14.95. Many, loud and long are the complaints of those who peruse the scholarly literature on Alcoholics Anonymous. In general, those critiques are also valid. Whether friends or critics of the A.A. fellowship and its program, even non-avid students of that literature find in the available studies far more flaws than fruitful aids to understanding. The criticisms, though varied in their details, ultimately come down to one core issue: it is the partiality of the studies that most pinches. "Not the A.A. that I know" runs the claim of many who examine others' analyses. Much as the term "real A.A." may grate on the nerves of committed A.A. members, it is on the nature of "real A.A." that such discussions actually hinge. The reality of Alcoholics Anonymous precludes anything resembling double-blind study. Treatment-center and court-mandated attendees obviously do not meet the first criterion for participants in a voluntary association. The exigencies of study funding rarely allow for the kind of multi-- annual longitudinal study that an entity proposing itself as a "way of life" requires. And valid random sampling seems impossible in a worldwide organization of people committed to anonymity, an organization that cuts diversely across just about any race- or gender- or class- or sexual-preference-- based line imaginable. In the recent scholarly literature, those most familiar with Alcoholics Anonymous find the most accurate representations to be those offered by sociologists, anthropologists, and students of literature and rhetoric. Although much of this treasure trove is finely focused and so remains on the unpublished dissertation level, the work of such as Mary Catherine Taylor, Annette Smith, Hazel Cameron Johnson, and, more recently, Christine Vourakis and Kathleen Flynn have somewhat penetrated the world of scholarship through direct and indirect reference. Other such efforts-for example, work by Katherine Ann Chavigny, Kelley Chrouser, Michael deTemple, Marilyn Maracle, Emily McNally, George Nagel, Jr., Gail Nelson, Kathleen O'Connor, Jeff Schrenzel, Ann Waterman Scott, and Michael Wyatt-will eventually enter the scholarly literature on Alcoholics Anonymous, likely in the same way. Taken together, these studies increase respect for the descriptive writings of Norman Denzin and David Rudy, two scholars whose collected writings on A.A. offer the most accurate overall social scientific picture of that fellowship until now. Despite all this work, however, it remains true that no one can come to an understanding of Alcoholics Anonymous by reading a book, or even many books. But if someone were inclined to attempt that feat, Alcoholics Anonymous as a Mutual-Help Movement is the one book to read. As that title hints, here is a book that is true to the actuality of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is so often erroneously referred to by careless scholars as a "self-help group." Most members respond to that designation with "No, we tried that, and it didn't work." The simple use of the term mutual suggests a sensitivity too often absent in those who study Alcoholics Anonymous, a sensitivity more sociologically than psychologically attuned. Despite that precision of title, the bookstore browser might easily-and unfortunately-be put off by the cover, which by listing the names of the 18 scholars involved in this study suggests that the work is probably the all-too-usual collection of barely connected separate essays. Open the book; look past its cover. Although based on the research on the scholars named, Alcoholics Anonymous as a Mutual-Help Movement is written in one voice-the consistently balanced, coordinating articulation of the organizer of the project from which the book derives, Finnish sociologist Klaus Makela. …