(2009-05-15) Gladwell Underdogs

Malcolm Gladwell on the tactics of successful Under Dog-s. Asymmetric Warfare, etc. Arreguin-Toft found the same puzzling pattern. When an underdog fought like David, he usually won. But most of the time underdogs didn't fight like David. Of the two hundred and two lopsided conflicts in Arreguin Toft's database, the underdog chose to go toe to toe with Goliath the conventional way a hundred and fifty-two times--and lost a hundred and nineteen times... We tell ourselves that skill is the precious resource and effort is the commodity. It's the other way around. Effort can trump ability--legs, in Saxe's formulation, can overpower arms--because relentless effort is in fact something rarer than the ability to engage in some finely tuned act of motor coordination... This is the second half of the insurgent's creed. Insurgents work harder than Goliath. But their other advantage is that they will do what is "socially horrifying"--they will challenge the conventions about how battles are supposed to be fought.