Catherine Rampell for using the word "autarky" in her column in the Washington Post.
She gets a C- however in her article for straining its meaning. It almost seemed to read like an essay written by somebody who just learned a neat word and felt compelled to use it, no matter what.
Autarky, for those who might not know, and that would be most people, is an economic theory based upon national self sufficiency. A country that uses autarky for an economic theory, and Rampell is correct in putting North Korea in this category, operates in such a manner as to produce all goods, or attempt to, within its own borders.
Where Rampell falls of the train is in comparing national movements or Brexit to autarky, or claiming that they represent autaraky. They don't. Just because approximately half of the British electorate wants to depart the European Union doesn't mean that the UK is turning to autarky or anything close to it. The example is extremely strained.
I should be frank that I don't really like Rampell's writing. The 2007 Princeton graduate's writings strike me the way a lot of the writing by the very young crop of writers that are now on the scene. They lack sufficient worldly experience to actually be commenting on anything and they trend towards being snots. That doesn't mean that all her writing is that way, or even most of it. But at least a little is.
That's another topic, of course, but it is interesting how the concept hat a writer had to experience real writing before being a columnist has vanished. Instead, much like with the law, an Ive League education is substituting for actual experience, and that's not a good thing.
But it does, at any rate, apparently expose a person to a word like autarky.
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