Product Description
A brilliant and devastating examination and indictment of the cattle culture that has come to shape and warp our world. Rifkin shows how the love affair with beef has led to increased hunger, disease, and environmental devastation. This persuasive book should be an urgent warning to everyone who cares about the fate of the earth.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.0 based on 13 reviews)

Beyond Beef, Rifkin.

This was an important book in the early 1990s, and although the thesis demands our attention now more than ever, it is still generally ignored, perhaps in small part because Rifkin's book is not at all perfect. The first third is the author's 'abridged' version of the entire human-bovine history, and the critical reader will have ample cause to question many broad assertions in Rifkin's sweeping saga, especially in the early chapters. I must agree with an earlier reviewer who rightly describes Rifkin's 'historical' generalizations and selected references as being "a mile wide and an inch deep." It is unfortunate, but this stylized yarn-weaving detracts somewhat from critical assent when Rifkin finally approaches the 'meat' of the thesis in chapter 15.
There are many excellent points made when Rifkin finally makes room for them (parts 3-6), but the quality of his reference sources continues to be dubious in some, though certainly not all, instances. The book finally hits its stride and makes its import observations in parts 4 (Feeding Cattle and Starving People) and 5 (Cattle and the Global Environmental Crisis). If the information here doesn't direct the reader toward a vegetarian lifestyle (or at least to rethinking the centrality of meat in his/her diet), he or she may be a pretty hardened case of wanton self-indulgence and thoughtless hedonism. We must hope that sometime soon, western consumers might become as interested in the welfare of human beings and of our entire planetary home, as they are in self-pleasuring. In fact, the reader may want to read this portion of the book only (chapters 22-32) before moving on to a better book -- MAD COWBOY: Plain Truth from the Cattle Rancher Who Won't Eat Meat, by Howard F. Lyman.
Depending on the crop, plants can provide 5 to 26 times as much protein per any given unit of land, than can beef. In 1984, when thousands of people were dying for lack of food in famine-ravaged Ethiopia, feed crops produced there were being shipped to livestock producers in Europe! The affluent 'first world' continues to orchestrate, in large part, the starvation of hundreds of millions of the worlds poorest people, and does so in a way not only embarrassingly decadent, but demonstrably stupid: "In 1917 the Allied Powers threw a naval blockade around the German-occupied territories of northern Europe. The Danish people were particularly hard hit by the blockade. With its normal food supply routes cut, the Danish government was forced to enact a rationing program based on increasing the intake of potatoes and barley and virtually eliminating meat. Overnight, some three million Danes were turned into vegetarians, with some interesting results. During the year of rationing, the death rate from disease fell by 34 percent." p170. This was cited in the journal of the AMA.

Interesting stuff, but read Lyman's book instead.
March 26, 2007

It sealed the deal on being a vegetarian

This book was so amazing! I had become a vegetarian several months before reading it, but after reading it, there was no question in my mind- I'm never touching meat again!
Its an eye opening look into the facts and world of the beef industry. I highly recommend it if you are on the fence about red meat.
August 07, 2006

Better Books out there

The problem I have with this book, as well as a lot of other Rifkin's books, it's not the message that is being conveyed, it's how it's being conveyed. Rifkin's research style is a mile wide and an inch deep. I pined to have some of the chapters be at least a couple pages longer so there was more substance. He makes wide, sweeping generalizations with the minimum of hard data to back it up.

That, in addition to this book now being well over a decade old, makes me very reluctant to recommend. There are better, newer books that have the same point of view that are better written. And this is coming from a reviewer who has not eaten beef since 1997.
August 01, 2006

As timely as ever regarding out of control corn and animal fat

Important book outlining the culture of animal consumption (beef), it's devastating effect of the environment and natural resources, as well as afflicting human health.
Book sets stage for understanding what kinds of transformations
are needed for humans to sustainably survive as population and appetites continue to grow voraciously. Imagine the land resources, food resources, and the improvement in quality of life possible if corn and beef were removed from the landscape.
February 22, 2006

Great book

There's not much to add to what's already been said. I just want to echo the praise... It's a formidable book - scholarly and persuasive; it's a fascinating history. It's also a very easy book to read, one you won't regret reading: it's eye-opening.
February 27, 2004

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