Prospects for Social Security Reform (Pension Research Council Publications)

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Excellent Overview.......2000-02-28

While the book provides an excellent background and a good assessment of likely options, it glossed over some considered politically unfeasible but which might be popular among the voters - for example, removing the cap on Social Security wages. It is clear the financial markets are dying to get their hands on the money. At the same time, most in the investment community don't want to create another board like CalPERS, which is active in corporate governance. Spinning out a portion to something like a defined contribution plan seems almost inevitable but is likely to result in higher administrative costs.

Innocent Targets: When Terrorism Comes to School

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dealing with potential terrorism at schools

Innocent Targets: When Terrorism Comes to School
Michael Dorn , and Chris Dorn
Manufacturer: Safe Havens International, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Terrorism | Current Events | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 097412401X

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Innocent Targets When Terrorism Comes to School provides an informed and rational examination of this difficult subject, starting with the 1970 murder of nine Israeli school children and three adults in a brutal attack that left nineteen others crippled for life. Tracing the history of school related terrorist attacks in twelve countries to Beslan and its aftermath, the renowned father and son co-authoring team invoke the counsel of other top experts in evaluating this timely, emotional and critical subject.

Customer Reviews:

dealing with potential terrorism at schools.......2005-07-06

Michael Dorn is an internationally-recognized expert of school safety and anti-terrorist measures who has worked with government agencies, foreign law-enforcement departments, among other organizations. He is also associated with the leading defense and intelligence agency Jane's. After analyzing a few notorious incidents from around the world where terrorists took school children hostage for the reasons for the success or failure of government authorities in dealing with them, Dorn--with his co-author his son, also a recognized authority by government agencies and the media--discusses general principles which can prevent a terrorist incident, be prepared for one if it does occur, and if so minimize the number of school children and teachers taken hostage and the potential loss of life. The timely, authoritative manual addresses the natural concern over the safety of children with a realistic perspective on the probability of a terrorist attack on any particular school. The recommendations put forward follow the guideline of being pertinent and responsible without being excessively costly to school systems and governments at different levels.

World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms

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Mr. Pogge is Clueless
Highly recommended- (ALL ROYALTIES GO TO OXFAM!)
Interesting argument, but too "Ivory Tower" for practicality

World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms
Thomas Pogge
Manufacturer: Polity Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0745629954

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The poorest 46 percent of humankind have 1.2 percent of global income.Their purchasing power per person per day is less than that of $2.15 inthe US in 1993; 826 million of them do not have enough to eat. One-thirdof all human deaths are from poverty-related causes: 18 millionannually, including 12 million children under five.At the other end, the 15 percent of humankind in the 'high-incomeeconomies' have 80 percent of global income. Shifting 1 or 2 percent ofour share toward poverty eradication seems morally compelling. Yet theprosperous 1990s have in fact brought a large shift toward greaterglobal inequality, as most of the affluent believe that they have nosuch responsibility.Thomas Pogge's book seeks to explain how this belief is sustained. Heanalyses how our moral and economic theorizing and our global economicorder have adapted to make us appear disconnected from massive povertyabroad. Dispelling the illusion, he also offers a modest, widelysharable standard of global economic justice and makes detailed,realistic proposals toward fulfilling it.

Customer Reviews:

Mr. Pogge is Clueless.......2007-08-27

Mr. Pogge seems to know as little about economics as he does about politics or the law of unintended consequences. The key to prosperity is economic freedom. Those countries with the greatest economic freedom have the least amount of poverty and the highest standards of living. He doesn't seem to realize that if you take money from the rich, you are also taking it from the people whom the rich buy from. He seems to be under the impression that if you have a million dollars, and give it to the poor, you are somehow reducing poverty more than if you hired those same poor people to build you a million dollar house. Poor people aren't poor because rich people are rich.

Highly recommended- (ALL ROYALTIES GO TO OXFAM!).......2005-08-06

This is an excellent collection of essays by one of the most important intellectual figures in the international human rights arena. An engaging combination of philosophical, political, and economic analysis, World Poverty and Human Rights offers a fresh perspective on the problems facing our world as well as constructive steps we all can (and indeed have an obligation to) take to mitigate and one day end global poverty and social injustice. Pogge has a very impressive background in philosophy (he received his PhD under Rawls from Harvard) and his writings reflect the clarity of thought and cogent argumentation his subject matter deserve. And if that isn't incentive enough, remember that all proceeds go to support Oxfam UK.

Interesting argument, but too "Ivory Tower" for practicality.......2005-02-12

In a collection of essays on so broad a scope as Pogge's World Poverty and Human Rights it's difficult to narrow topics of possible discussion down to effectively address all aspects of Pogge's presented philosophy. I found Pogge's text extremely helpful in that it brought with it a wholly unique approach to looking at the issues we're faced unique aspect presented is the strong use of illustrative examples in the text, not in the fashion of Farmer's narratives of suffering and injustices in a world thought by many to be beyond that but realized by a few of us to still have a long way to go. This is also somewhat in contrast to Sen (Development as Freedom) who relied largely on definitions, but between the two I found Pogge's examples facts and figures to be much more moving as a call to action than was Sen's, if for shock value alone if nothing else.
Being that my primary interest is world hunger and social justice which ties in directly to Pogge's arguments and pleas, I found this to be an especially appropriate text for building a basis upon which arguments may be launched and supported. In reviewing the facts of Pogge's book, some are now outdated, but the figures are large enough even in their datedness that they should scare the reader into a realization of sorts that if 800 million people in the world still go hungry, we have a long way yet to go in our efforts to enact plans such as that put forth by Schweickart (After Capitalism), and to a lesser extent, Rawls (A Theory of Justice), and that differences can in fact be made that will influence the world to the degree need to enact change. In keeping with this notion I was especially impressed with the straightforward nature with which Pogge identifies what is perhaps the single most pervasive problem in combating both poverty and the associated hunger: the fact that the affluent (or relatively so) simply don't see it for simple ignorance and lack of exposure outside a purely academic and/or missionary setting, and secondly, that when we are exposed to poverty and hunger we have a difficulty identifying with the problem and it therefore becomes less problematic to us.
Pogge's second major point is that despite all of the facts and figures he presents demonstrating the dire straights the world is experiencing in terms of hunger and poverty, we are able to put a stop to it, not with advances that would take years to develop, but with resources available to us now. We have the means. The financial costs to end hunger are relatively slight in comparison to the spending committed to aspects of world culture and policy such as the arms race and preparing for wars that further indebt countries and produce more and more individuals who become destitute and malnourished. The United Nations Development Program estimates that the basic health and nutrition needs of the world's poorest people could be met for an additional $13 billion a year; what is not so frequently discussed is that fact that animal lovers in the United States and Europe spend more than that on pet food each year and will in all likelihood continue to do so for the reasons above; either they aren't exposed to the problem or the problem is far enough removed to them so as not to constitute a problem in their eyes.
Pogge does a fantastic job of illustrating these and other related points, but a complaint would be that much in the manner of humanitarian aid that is provided to poor countries by the United States, our own suffering citizens seem to be ignored for the benefit of those suffering elsewhere in the world, who may be equally in need, but should not be said to be more so simply as a matter of fact. It's true that in developing countries, 6 million children die each year, mostly from hunger-related causes, but it must be remembered that at the same time in the United States, 13 million children live in households where people have to skip meals or eat less to make ends meet. That means one in ten households in the U.S. are living with hunger or are at risk of hunger and yet little aid is given stateside in comparison to the amounts that are donated abroad, seemingly largely due to the intensive amount of attention paid to those suffering in underdeveloped or undeveloped countries as opposed to our own.
Despite the Malthusian type arguments presented and to some level dealt with through Pogge's own examples and persuasive arguments, I feel that there are too many possibilities left open in Pogge's theory and that it will take a much more profound overall statement of purpose to convince those in power to simply give up their current standards and practices in favor of Pogge's more pleading approach to addressing the problems at hand. People will not be convinced (though clearly the perhaps should be) to adopt new modes of operation and policy based merely on the suggestions of someone they will ultimately view as an ivory tower academic with little or no contact in the areas he discusses so vividly, and perhaps this is the correct view. With Pogge's call to action appealing mainly to those with the same limited ability to directly influence and thereby limited to speculative involvement alone, little is likely to come out of what would otherwise be an incredibly persuasive and pervasive work of scholarship on what I personally feel is the single most important issue at stake in economic and societal politics in general today.

Beyond Garrison: Antislavery and Social Reform

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Beyond Garrison: Antislavery and Social Reform
Bruce Laurie
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521605172

Book Description

Why was Massachusetts one of the few Northern states to grant African-American males the right to vote? Why did it pass personal liberty laws, which helped protect fugitive slaves from federal authorities in the two decades immediately preceding the Civil War? Beyond Garrison finds answers to these important questions in unfamiliar and surprising places. Its protagonists are not the noble supporters of American abolitionism grouped around William Lloyd Garrison, but, rather, ordinary men and women in country towns and villages, encouraged by African-American activists throughout the state. Bruce Laurie's approach focuses on the politics of such antislavery advocates and demonstrates their leanings toward third-party politics. Bruce Laurie is currently Professor of History, University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is a member of the Organization of American Historians and the American Historical Association. His articles and reviews have appeared in numerous collections of essays and in Labor History, Journal of Social History and Journal of American History. He is co-editor, with Milton Cantor, of Class, Sex and the Woman Worker (Greenwood Press, 1979) and co-editor with Eric Arnesen and Julie Greene of Labor Histories: Class, Politics, and the Working-Class Experience (University of Illinois Press, 1998). He is also the author of Working People of Philadelphia, 1800-1850 (Temple University Press, 1980), and Artisans into Workers: Labor in Nineteenth Century America (Hill & Wang, 1989).

Race and Policing in America: Conflict and Reform (Cambridge Studies in Criminology)

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Race and Policing in America: Conflict and Reform (Cambridge Studies in Criminology)
Ronald Weitzer , and Steven A. Tuch
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521616913

Book Description

Race and Policing in America is about relations between police and citizens, with a focus on racial differences. It utilizes both the authors’ own research and other studies to examine Americans' opinions, preferences, and personal experiences regarding the police. Guided by group-position theory and using both existing studies and the authors’ own quantitative and qualitative data (from a nationally representative survey of whites, blacks, and Hispanics), this book examines the roles of personal experience, knowledge of others' experiences (vicarious experience), mass media reporting on the police, and neighborhood conditions (including crime and socioeconomic disadvantage) in structuring citizen views in four major areas: overall satisfaction with police in one's city and neighborhood, perceptions of several types of police misconduct, perceptions of police racial bias and discrimination, and evaluations of and support for a large number of reforms in policing.

"Do Everything" Reform: The Oratory of Frances E. Willard (Great American Orators)

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"Do Everything" Reform: The Oratory of Frances E. Willard (Great American Orators)
Richard W. Leeman
Manufacturer: Greenwood Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0313274878

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This is the first study of the reform oratory of the "silver-tongued" temperance leader, Frances Willard. It provides a critical analysis of the speaking style of this influential late nineteenth century suffragette, prohibitionist, and leader of women. This work also provides texts of representative speeches, a chronology of important speeches, and a bibliography of primary and secondary sources. The critical analysis points first to Frances Willard's belief in evolutionary Christianity and the equal treatment of women as the basis for her oratory. The study then examines how women's broadening concerns for reform were justified as a response to women's needs to protect their homes. Her campaigns for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and "the woman question" and her speeches calling for changes on behalf of labor and to overcome poverty also figure prominently in the analysis. The eloquent speaking style which conveyed her passionate interest in these issues is then exemplified by the texts of six speeches made between 1874 and 1897. As part of Greenwood's Great American Orators Series, this study is intended for students and professionals in rhetoric and communications, women's studies, and history focusing on American reform movements.

Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the Unfulfilled Hopes for Racial Reform

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Stimulating Read
As always Derrick Bell is thought provoking
Thinking about Brown v. Board of Ed--not honoring it
The Conspiracy to Disenfranchise Blacks
mixed feelings about this one....

Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the Unfulfilled Hopes for Racial Reform
Derrick Bell
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0195172728

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When the landmark Supreme Court case of Brown vs. Board of Education was handed down in 1954, many civil rights advocates believed that the decision finding public school segregation unconstitutional could become the Holy Grail of racial justice. Fifty years later, despite its legal irrelevance and the racially separate and educationally ineffective state of public schooling for most black children, Brown is still viewed by many as the perfect precedent. Derrick Bell here shatters this shining image of one of the Court's most celebrated rulings. He notes that, despite the onerous burdens of segregation, many black schools functioned well and racial bigotry had not rendered blacks a damaged race. Brown's recognition of racial injustice, without more, left racial barriers intact. Given what we now know about the pervasive nature of racism, the Court should have determined--for the first time--to rigorously enforce the "equal" component of the "separate but equal" standard. By striking it down, the Court intended both to improve the Nation's international image during the Cold War and offer blacks recognition that segregation was wrong. Instead, the Brown decision actually enraged and energized its opponents. It stirred confusion and conflict into the always vexing question of race in a society that, despite denials and a frustratingly flexible amnesia, owes much of its growth, development, and success, to the ability of those who dominate the society to use race to both control and exploit most people, black and white. Racial policy, Bell maintains, is made through silent covenants--unspoken convergences of interest and involuntary sacrifices of rights--that ensure that policies conform to priorities set by policy-makers. Blacks and whites are the fortuitous winners or losers in these unspoken agreements. The experience with Brown, Bell urges, should teach us that meaningful progress in the quest for racial justice requires more than the assertion of harms. Strategies must recognize and utilize the interest-convergence factors that strongly influence racial policy decisions. In Silent Covenants, Bell condenses more than four decades of thought and action into a powerful and eye-opening book.

Customer Reviews:

Stimulating Read.......2005-12-06

This is a book that I think anyone interested in the Civil Rights movement should read. It will make you think about the Brown v. Board decision in a different way. The book puts the decision into the context of the times, while shocking you with Bell's main argument. While I found Bell's argument interesting, and parts of it compelling, I could not bring myself to endorse it full heartedly. I still side with the likes of Thurgood Marshall on this one!

As always Derrick Bell is thought provoking.......2005-09-11

Excellent, Derrick Bell gives a deeper meaning to the Brown decision.

Thinking about Brown v. Board of Ed--not honoring it.......2004-12-19

Read this book. It makes you think critically, challenge your assumptions, and argue with the author. What more can you ask of a book?

Bell has the honesty to look at Brown from the perspective of its fiftieth anniversary, and ask the question, "What did it all mean?" Bell has the standing to ask this question, having devoted much of his life to litigation seeking to enforce the promise of Brown--often at not inconsiderable risk to his own life. Bell has the intelligence to bring to bear facts coupled with a historical perspective.

His conclusion: Brown was a step in the right direction, but had far more effect as a symbol than as a legal decision. Factually, virtually no child (Black or White) received an education in an integrated classroom as a result of any court order enforcing Brown. What little integration occurred (and the number of children (Black and White) who attend effectively segregated schools today--50 years after Brown--is staggering) resulted from legislative action (the civil rights acts of 1964/65 and the school finding acts of the same period).

Bell's analysis of Brown as a legal precedent is persuasive. It is more of a symbol than a living legal precedent. However, I disagree that Brown's symbolic power should be discounted. The reason that there have been so few cases citing Brown is that Brown so effectively ended legalized segregation.

I would argue that without Brown, the civil rights movement of the late 50's and early 60's (sit ins, voter registration, and other direct action) would not have been possible. For example, James Meredith survived his attempt to integrate the University of Mississippi by using his personal defiance to leverage the power of the United States government to battle the Klan. Without Brown, Meredith's struggle simply would have died (perhaps most literally).

Behind every successful mass movement was the protection (however ephemeral it may have been in all too many cases) of federal law enforcement. That presence would not have occurred without the mandate (and symbol) of Brown.

As Atlas said, give me a lever and I can move the world. Brown did not move the world; did not eliminate racism, and did not end segregated schools. It did, however, provide a fulcrum. The mass movements and direct actions which followed were the lever. And the world did, indeed, move.

Is racism gone? No. Are some people worse off than they were before Brown? Yes. Did Brown reach the issues of poverty generally or the impoverishment of Blacks in particular? No. Bot so what? No legal case or series of legal decisions can change a society. What they can do is point the way, and provide a base for struggle. And that is what Brown did. What more can you ask of a legal decision?

The Conspiracy to Disenfranchise Blacks.......2004-09-04

Bell condemns the past 50 years of legal and cultural struggle against segregation as a conspiracy of whites to disenfranchise and dupe Black folks and their leaders because that struggle missed the point. The point is that if you don't outlaw racism then racist will conspire together and coop your movement to the benefit of whites. Bell is eloquent, as always, but far less compelling than in his earlier works. Here, Bell's strident argument against integration versus segregation will make you think hard about the quality of civil rights progress over the past 50 years. But, since the book offers only a "what if" Brown v. Board of Ed. had been decided differently idea, and no real vision for an alternative progressive movement, it becomes a must read and a must shelve book in the same instance.

mixed feelings about this one...........2004-07-08

In this book, Bell makes the argument that racial reform will never happen in the United States. He explains his belief that every policy implemented by whites, even though it may seem to be in the interest of black advancement, is in all actuality an attempt to further white interests. One can see this in the correlation between Brown v. Board and the United States' attempts to put an end to communism. Brown v. Board took place during the Cold War and when communism was at its peak. America was fighting to put an end to communism, and other countries were looking at the U.S. and seeing the segregated facilities and thinking "why are they trying to instigate democracy when they don't even have a democratic government'" and thoughts similar to these. With the ruling of Brown, other countries looked at the U.S. more favorably and it justified our attempts to end communism. He also makes this very interesting argument that blacks have no right to complain about certain policies, because although a policy may have been enacted which benefited blacks, that policy wasn't geared toward blacks, it was geared towards whites. So in essence, whites are the only ones who have the right to complain (thus making whites look like prejudice pigs). Blacks are merely "fortuitous beneficiaries" of white policy.

Book Description

How did the debate on health reform turn into the most concerted attack on government in recent American history? In this incisive account, a prize-winning social scientist offers deep insights into the changing terrain of U.S. politics and public policy. Because of far-reaching changes in the Reagan era, Theda Skocpol shows, the Clinton Health Security bill became a perfect foil for antigovernment mobilization. Thus its defeat provides a unique window into the new political landscape.

Customer Reviews:

Skocpol does it again.......2000-12-03

Theda Skocpol's "Boomerang" is nearly as interesting and sharp as her opinions. It's another winner.

Boomerang falls short........2000-05-02

Boomerang by Theda Skocpol, a professor of government and sociology at Harvard University is subtitled, "Clinton's Health Security Effort and the Turn Against Government in U.S. Politics." And indeed, this book is about politics, not about the reality of what went on in those crucial years. One comes out with the impression that the book was written to bring the author to the attention of the Clinton administration.

For example, she writes that Hillary and President Clinton had found an ideal "middle way" for health care reform, but that unfortunately, their plan was sabotaged by the conservatives in 1994 following the lead of Bill Kristol, former chief aide to Vice President Dan Quayle. She laments that the Democrats were not able to marshall their forces at a critical time to pass what she obviously considers the "good" legislation of the Health Security Act.

While she gives Bill Kristol considerable, unflattering credit, she fails to even mention the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), whose landmark lawsuit, AAPS v. Clinton, against the secret Health Care Task Force, derailed to a significant extent the Health Security Act of 1993. Neither AAPS nor the lawsuit appears in the text or index. The book is therefore quite incomplete. In just one chapter of his book, The Seduction of Hillary Rodham, author David Brock gives by far a more accurate portrayal.

The book is an apologia for the ill-fated Health Security Act which carried with it a significant transfer of control of health care delivery from the private sector to the government bureaucrats and an assortment of central planners in the various levels of the bureaucracy, such as the Purchasing Cooperatives, the National Health Board, HHS, and numerous other alphabet soup government or quasi-government agencies that were to be established. The American people were correct in rejecting socialized medicine and the Clinton plan.

A fine, scholarly work on an important event.......2000-02-07

This book promises to explain to the reader why the Clinton health care plan failed. The author does this rather well, pointing out how flaws in Clinton's "selling" of the program along with the disunity of sympathetic interest groups could not match the unity and purpose of Republican opponents. It is important to remember that Ms. Skocpol is a scholar, which can be good and bad. Her work is scholarly so it is well-proven (like a scholar) but also very narrow in scope (also, sadly, like a scholar). If you want an analysis of what went on behind closed doors in the 1993-94 fight or want a real discussion on the merits of health care reform, go elsewhere. But if you want an analysis solely on "why Clinton failed," this book does a very good job.

U.S. Immigration Policy and the Undocumented: Ambivalent Laws, Furtive Lives

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U.S. Immigration Policy and the Undocumented: Ambivalent Laws, Furtive Lives
Helene Hayes
Manufacturer: Praeger Paperback
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Beyond Smoke and Mirrors: Mexican Immigration in an Era of Economic Integration

ASIN: 0275954110

Book Description

Hayes analyzes the situation of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. and what happens to them in the aftermath of implementation of two key provisions of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) legalization and employer sanctions. Referred to by legislators as a generous and compassionate bill that would legalize much of the undocumented population in our midst, it resulted instead in placing a highly vulnerable silent subclass in deeper jeopardy. Hayes traces the history of undocumented immigration, Congressional debate and implementation of IRCA and provides direct access to the "faces" of the undocumented through original empirical research on the social and economic impact of IRCA on specific groups of undocumented Haitian, Irish, and Salvadoran immigrants. The general theme is America's ambivalence towards its historic lifeline, new immigrants whether legal or undocumented, and how the two central provisions of IRCA uniquely embodied within the same piece of legislation contradictory and ambivalent attitudes toward immigrants which became the seeds of its implementation difficulties. Hayes looks at the issue of undocumented immigration from a legislative, policy, human rights, and implementation perspective, but she also points beyond national strategies to "push factors" emanating from the home countries of the undocumented and makes the case that undocumented immigration is a global social problem that needs global solutions. The book is of particular interest to policy makers, scholars, and other researchers and students involved with social policy and welfare, immigration law, and ethnic studies.

The Evolving Pension System: Trends, Effects, and Proposals for Reform

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The Evolving Pension System: Trends, Effects, and Proposals for Reform
William Gale
Manufacturer: Brookings Institution Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0815731175

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When the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) was passed in 1974, the world of pensions was very different from today. Then, most pensions were packaged as defined benefit plans--the employer guaranteed a certain level of income to the employee on retirement. But from the 1980s on, in part because of ERISAs regulatory structure, but also because of job mobility and other factors, pension coverage increasingly meant defined contribution plans, with the burden of investment and outcome placed on the worker. For the most part, however, pension coverage has remained stagnant since the early 1980s, many low-wage workers have no pensions, and many small employers do not provide such retirement options. The Evolving Pension System, divided into three parts, examines the foundations and the future of Americas private pension system. It provides a broad overview of the underlying characteristics and economic effects of existing pension policy, as well as alternative views on how public policy toward pensions should evolve in the future. Part one examines the goals, features, and the effects of legislation affecting pensions, including the dramatic shift from defined benefit to defined contribution plans. Part two discusses how pensions affect the economic picture, and part three offers some prescriptions for broad-based pension reform.

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