, GOOD THINGS The Divining Hand, Christopher Bird, 1979, $24.95 from: E.P. Dutton 2 Park Avenue New York, NY 10016 I first bumped into the phenomenon of dowsing some eight years ago while researching the ancient Chinese art off engsh ui which was used to align homes, communities, temples and graves with the flows of "energy" in nature. During that research I met a Catholic priest from St. Johns Abbey in Minnesota who taught me how to dowse for water and also showed me his abilities in medical dowsing and map • dowsing for minerals and oil. Cris Bird, • who co-authored Secrets of the Great Pyramid, has put together an absorbing account of the history of dowsing in finding oil and water; its use by U.S. Marines to locate underground tunnels in Vietnam, early attempts to explain the phenomenon, apd current research that is zeroing in on how and why this mysterious phenomenon operates. ~Tom Bender ------ ----- ----- WORK Workplace Democracy, Daniel Zwerdling, 1978, $5.95 from: Harper&Row 10 E. •53rd Street New York, NY 10022 One of the most painful obstacles to·organizations trying to implement more democratic and people-centered ways to work is having to grapple in isolation wi~h the problems already tackled by,others. Zwerdling has assembled a sourcebook on existing projects-succ·essful ones and failures, shams set up by corporations to give· workers rhe illusion of partidpation to goad them to extra effort, and genuine workerowned, -controlled and -centered workplaces. No firm answe_rs here, but a status report on a spectrum of efforts in the everchanging attempt to find more viab1e alternative ways to work. A heartening but sober report. -Tom Bender The North Will Rise Again: Pensions, .Politics and Power in the 1980's, Jeremy Rifkin and Randy Barber, 1978, $4.95 from:- Beacon Press 25 Beacon St. Boston, MA 02108 Employee pension funds now represent the largest pool of private capital in the world-owning already 20-25 percent of the stock of companies on the New York and American Exchanges, and growing at 10 percent per year. The actual control of these funds has traditionally been left to the "professional skills" of investment bankers. These investment oankers have it turns out, used the funds for their own profit, to take losses from firms they cop- . trolled, and to make ir;ivestments that eventually cost the employees their jobs. The result? A lower return on the funds than a totally random investment would provide, a drive for unions and public employees to take control of their own funds and invest May 1980 RAIN them in ways to control runaway plants, investment redlining and union-breaking practices . A good primer on the problems faced by unions and the public sector and the potentials for using pension funds in ways to help resolve them. - Tom Bender Community Jo.bs, monthly, 6 mo. for • $5.95, from: Community Jobs 1704 R Street N.W. Washington, DC 20009 A newsletter of job opportunitie_s available in institutions and alternative organizations wor½ing for social change. Nationwide listings of openings for organizers, editors, fund raisers, lawyers, counselors, lobbyists and people with or without other skills. A valuable publication for any organization that is constantly asked, "I want to do something useful, but where do I start?" - Tom Bender
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