Social classes Books

Book SynopsisChrystia Freeland is the managing editor and director of consumer news at Thompson Reuters, following years of service at the Financial Times both in New York and London. She was the deputy editor of Canada's The Globe and Mail and has reported for the Financial Times, The Economist, and The Washington Post. Freeland is also the author of Sale of a Century: The Inside Story of the Second Russian Revolution. She lives in New York City.blogs.reuters.com/chrystia-freeland@cafreeland

Read more less

Book SynopsisTrade Reviewsuperb ... Wooldridge, the political editor of The Economist, quite brilliantly evokes the values and manners of the pluto-meritocrats at the top of society ... They would do well to read Wooldridge's erudite, thoughtful and magnificently entertaining book. They will find many uncomfortable truths in it. -- James Marriott * The Times *Adrian Wooldridge's extraordinary and irresistible history of meritocracy, The Aristocracy of Talent, describes the repeated efforts over the centuries to persuade peoples all over the world to accept the principle and compel society to organize itself on lines where merit alone, not bloodlines or bank balances, decides who rules and gets top dollar. ... Throughout, Wooldridge never loses faith in the principle of meritocracy as the key driver of modernity ... The Aristocracy of Talent is a serious treat from first to last. Not the least of its pleasures are the possibilities of disagreement that it provokes. -- Ferdinand Mount * Times Literary Supplement *This is a blistering and provocative defence of meritocracy - the single word almost all democratic politicians swear by, but never debate. Wooldridge, the Economist's political editor, provides an erudite survey of many cultures over several centuries to remind us how meritocracy's core idea - that your place in society should be a reflect of talent and effort, not determined by birth - is both revolutionary and recent. He sees meritocracy as an organising ideal rather than something that has been satisfactorily achieved, and rails against the ability of the privileged to purchase educational advantage for their children. He deplores too, outbursts of arrogance from meritocracy's winners. -- Books of the Year * New Statesman *The Aristocracy of Talent is finely constructed: fluent insights include the importance of Plato's distrust of democracy, on the grounds that it tended to lead to tyranny, and his insistence on the need for a leadership of experts. -- John Lloyd * Financial Times *In The Aristocracy of Talent, the Economist writer Adrian Wooldridge defends the meritocratic ideal. The book offers a sweeping account of the history of meritocracy, from the elaborate exams required to join the Chinese civil service to the problems with our dysfunctional present version of meritocracy, which Wooldridge says might be better called "pluto-meritocracy". Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand one of the important problems facing rich nations. -- James Marriott * The Times Book of the Year *This masterly book offers a robust defence of meritocracy. -- Lord Willetts * Economist *hugely stimulating ... a spirited defence ... of meritocracy itself, made with cogent arguments ... a valuable, thought-provoking book -- Noel Malcolm * Daily Telegraph *a timely book that is a reminder that meritocracy, for all its flaws, may well be, like the democracy it has sometimes served, better than the alternatives ... told with a wealth of erudition in brisk and readable prose -- Darrin M McMahon * Literary Review *There are few terms whose origins are more misunderstood than "meritocracy". So Adrian Wooldridge has performed a public service with his latest book, The Aristocracy of Talent. -- Dominic Lawson * Sunday Times *Adrian Wooldridge sees meritocracy as a revolutionary idea worth improving, not abandoning. He ranges across two and a half thousand years of history, surveying many societies and cultures, to remind us that until relatively recently the talented were almost always a matter of no interest to the rulers - not only unrewarded but undiscovered ... [a] rich stew of a book. Alongside the philosophers are innumerable politicians, theologians, scientists, academics, authors and campaigners. He has dug up a priceless array of quotes from all perspectives on how to define the best people, how to seek them out, how to educate them, how to test them, how to give them power, even how they should behave. -- Mark Damazer * New Statesman *In this elegant historical and philosophical defence of the notion that people should advance according to talent rather than birth, Wooldridge argues that the idea that ruled the world by the late 20th century has become corrupted. This "golden ticket to prosperity" needs restoring in order to revive social mobility. -- Andrew Hill * Financial Times * an omniscient and impassioned polemic ... Some of us have been waiting a long time for someone to do what Wooldridge has done: nail the lie that there is something shameful about success honestly earned -- Daniel Johnson * The Critic *The Aristocracy of Talent is both an exhaustively researched history of an idea and a many-sided examination of the impacts of its imperfect execution. -- Mike Jakeman * Strategy + Business *A worthy successor to the 1958 classic The Rise of the Meritocracy, this sparkling study shows how much less meritocratic our society has become since then -- Vernon Bogdanor * Daily Telegraph Books of the Year *Wooldridge has written one of the great books of the decade. Here, meticulously researched and in arresting prose, are definitive accounts of Plato's authoritarian philosophy and the way later generations interpreted it, of China's mandarinate, of the rise of IQ tests and much else. -- Lord Hannan * Conservative Home *with its remorseless erudition ... in his new book, Adrian Wooldridge tries to salvage meritocracy from the ossified over-class that Aldous Huxley foresaw. -- Janan Ganesh * Financial Times *Adrian Wooldridge relabels the system "pluto-meritocracy" to expose its sham ideology -- Philip Aldrick * The Times *readable and wide-ranging...Wooldridge maintains that meritocracy is revolutionary and egalitarian -- Peter Mandler * BBC History Magazine *Every page, there's an intriguing nugget of information. -- Robbie Millenkudos to Adrian Wooldridge... for producing a full-throated defence of the principle -- Toby Young * Spectator *An elegant defence of talent. * The Week *

Read more less

Book SynopsisElites have a disproportionate impact on development outcomes. While a country''s endowments constitute the deep determinates of growth, the trajectory they follow is shaped by the actions of elites. But what factors affect whether elites use their influence for individual gain or national welfare? To what extent do they see poverty as a problem? And are their actions today constrained by institutions and norms established in the past? This volume looks at case studies from South Africa to China to seek a better understanding of the dynamics behind how elites decide to engage with economic development. Approaches include economic modelling, social surveys, theoretical analysis, and program evaluation. These different methods explore the relationship between elites and development outcomes from five angles: the participation and reaction of elites to institutional creation and change, how economic changes affect elite formation and circulation, elite perceptions of national welfare, theTable of ContentsPART I: THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS ; PART II: THE FORMATION AND CIRCULATION OF ELITES ; PART III: THE PREFERENCES OF ELITES ; PART IV: ELITES AND STATE CAPACTIY ; PART V: GRASSROOTS RESPONSES TO ELITES

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis text presents Nels Anderson's ethnographic work of a world of homeless men - a study conducted on Madison street in Chicago - and includes Anderson's later work on the juvenile and the tramp, the unattached migrant, and the family.Table of ContentsIntroduction The Hobos 1: Introduction to the Phoenix Edition of The Hobo 2: Hobohemia Defined 3: The Jungles: The Homeless Man Abroad 4: The Lodging House: The Homeless Man at Home 5: The Hobo and the Tramp 6: Summary of Findings and Recommendations 7: Summary of a Study of Four Hundred Tramps, Summer 1921 8: How and the Hobos: Character Sketch of J.E. How, "Millionaire Hobo" 9: The Slum: A Project for Study 10: The Juvenile and the Tramp 11: An Old Problem in New Form 12: The Unattached Migrant 13: Migrancy and the Labor Market 14: A Family in the Hobomania Era 15: The Sort of Jobs the Hobo Brought Urban Context: Work, and Leisure 16: Some Dimensions of Time 17: The Trend of Urban Sociology 18: Urbanism as a Way of Life Selected Bibliography Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe German Democratic Republic has become the subject of novels, memoirs and films, and the backdrop for general debates over the power of intellectuals in contemporary media and society. This collection considers the demise of the GDR and its impact on the place of intellectuals.

Read more less

Book SynopsisRoger V. Gould argues that human conflict is more likely to occur in symmetrical relationships - among friends or social equals - than in hierarchical ones, wherein the difference of social rank between two individuals is already established.

Read more less

Book SynopsisDrawing on remarkably frank, in-depth interviews with 160 successful men in the United States and France, Michèle Lamont provides a rare and revealing collective portrait of the upper-middle classthe managers, professionals, entrepreneurs, and experts at the center of power in society. Her book is a subtle, textured description of how these men define the values and attitudes they consider essential in separating themselvesand their classfrom everyone else. Money, Morals, and Manners is an ambitious and sophisticated attempt to illuminate the nature of social class in modern society. For all those who downplay the importance of unequal social groups, it will be a revelation. A powerful, cogent study that will provide an elevated basis for debates in the sociology of culture for years to come.David Gartman, American Journal of SociologyA major accomplishment! Combining cultural analysis and comparative approach with a splendid literary style, this book significantly broadens the under

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book examines experiences and implications of 'against-the-grain' school choices, where white middle class families choose ordinary and 'low performing' secondary schools for their children. It offers a unique view of identity formation, taking in matters like family history, locality and whiteness.Trade ReviewSociety for Education Studies Book Prize 2012 Winner - Runner-up 'The production of this beautifully crafted and important book adds to what we know of education policy in practice and brings complex and fresh evidence to the setting of school choice, class and lived social identity. This work will be a major reference point for sociological theory and policy in practice for some time to come.' - Meg Maguire, Journal of Education Policy 'This book focuses on the persepctives of white middle-class parents who make 'against'-the-grain school choices for their children in urban England. It provides key insights into the dynamics of class practising that are played out in these choices and the multiple narratives and contexts that influence them.' - Dympna Devine, British Journal of Sociology of Education 'This magnificent book...will command widespread interest.' - Mike Savage, British Journal of Sociology of Education 'This book will be of interest to education and social policy researchers, sociologists, education professionals and indeed left-leaning white middle class parents.' - Nicola Ingram, British Journal of Sociology of Education 'A thoughtful and very interesting analysis by a talented group of researchers.' - Professor Annette Lareau, University of Pennsylvania, USA 'White Middle Class Identities and Urban Schooling is a very important book. Looking at class practices and habitus as linked to family and schooling, the authors unpack the ways in which choice of secondary school is increasingly linked to the forging of social structure. In so doing, they bring the ability of the middle class to erect boundaries both symbolically and geographically into a new era of social class construction, while instantiating increasingly widespread choice of secondary school for one's children as a key and pivotal site for class formation and contestation. This is a 'must read' for anyone interested in contemporary class formation.' Professor Lois Weis, Graduate School of Education, University at Buffalo, USATable of ContentsAcknowledgements 1. Introduction: The White Middle Classes in the Twenty-First Century – Identities Under Siege? 2. White Middle Class Identity Formation: Theory and Practice 3. Family History, Class Practices and Habitus 4. Habitus as a Sense of Place 5. Against-the-Grain School Choice in Neoliberal Times 6. A Darker Shade of Pale: Whiteness as Integral to Middle Class Identity 7. The Psychosocial: Ambivalences and Anxieties of Privilege 8. Young People and the Urban Comprehensive: Remaking Cosmopolitan Citizens or Reproducing Hegemonic White Middle Class 9. 9. Values? Reinvigorating Democracy: Middle Class Moralities in Neoliberal Times Conclusion: Appendix 1: Methods and Methodology Appendix 2: Parental Occupations and Sector Appendix 3: The Sample Families in Terms of ACORN Categories References

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn the years since Hurricane Katrina, modern-day bohemians have flocked to New Orleans but often find themselves skirting poverty. Down and Out in New Orleans follows the lives of those on the fringes as they carve out unique paths in a resilient city. Peter J. Marina provides an original glimpse into the subcultures of a city in rapid change.Trade ReviewPeter J. Marina provides an outstanding introduction to the sociology of transgression through his fascinating portrayal of life on the edge in post-Katrina New Orleans. His sociological insight, ethnographic ability, and love of the city uniquely position him to write about the sociology of living 'down and out' in the Crescent City. -- David Gladstone, University of New Orleans Following where Orwell went, Marina takes us on a fascinating odyssey into the pulsating heart of New Orleans. From among the city's weird and outlandish nomadic fringe, we are invited to witness how life in NOLA is lived and negotiated, its culture produced and consumed by its most creative denizens. This is immersive ethnography at its best: moving, engaging, and challenging. Read it. -- Simon Hallsworth, University of Suffolk Marina's Down and Out in New Orleans takes us on a sweet, sweaty shamble through what some might call the 'underbelly' of New Orleans. Reading Marina's beautifully attentive account, though, you realize that 'underbelly' is the wrong corporeal metaphor-because in reality the down-and-out quarters of New Orleans are its hard-beating heart, around which hangs the dangerous dead weight of gentrification, privilege, boredom, and security. -- Jeff Ferrell, author of Tearing Down the Streets and Empire of Scrounge Down and Out in New Orleans offers a vivid portrait of that city, especially its artistic characters, their neighborhoods, and the down-and-out jobs they take. The author, whose fierce love for his hometown glows on every page, brings New Orleans culture into focus and provides an illuminating perspective on its future. -- Elijah Anderson, Yale University Marina takes readers on a tour of the New Orleans you won't see on postcards or in tourism commercials. His New Orleans is a lived-in, off-the-beaten-path place ... occupied by a mix of dropouts, dreamers, and those who simply choose to march to the beat of their own drum. The result is a work that will equally serve sociologists, anthropologists and those who are simply interested in seeing another side of one of the country's most fascinating cities. -- Mike Scott The Times-PicayuneTable of ContentsForeword, by David Brotherton Acknowledgments 1. New Orleans: Romancing the City of Sin and Resistance 2. The Hard and Soft City: A Portrait of New Orleans Neighborhoods and Their Characters 3. Living Down and Out in New Orleans 4. Buskers, Hustlers, and Street Performers 5. The Informal Nocturnal Economy of Frenchmen Street 6. City Squatting and Urban Camping 7. Occultists and Satanists 8. Gentrification and Violent Cultural Resistance 9. Hipster Wonderland 10. Brass Bands and Second Lines Conclusion: The Fogs of New Orleans and the Future of the Crescent City Notes Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisTHE 40TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION OF 40TH MIKE LEIGH''S CLASSIC PLAY - WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION FROM THE PLAYWRITE.Forty years on from its first performance at the Hampstead Theatre and original screening on BBC1 soon after, Mike Leigh''s Abigail''s Party - telling of two marriages spectacularly unravelling at an awkward neighbourhood drinks party - remains a pinnacle of British theatre.Here is the original script, complete with a new introduction by Mike Leigh describing the play''s unlikely genesis, how it came to be made and where he believes it fits within his oeuvre as one of the country''s leading writers and directors.''The play came from my intuitive sense of the spirit and the flavour of the times, and from a growing personal fear of, and frustration with the suburban existence'' Mike Leigh, from his new introduction''Leigh''s play isn''t simply about marriage and Essex, but also about the unhappy state of the realm'' GuardianTrade ReviewA deep, dark, moving and beautifully-observed period piece. * Guardian *

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn Peruvian Lives across Borders, M. Cristina Alcalde examines the evolution of belonging and the making of home among middle- and upper-class Peruvians in Peru, the United States, Canada, and Germany. Alcalde draws on interviews, surveys, participant observation, and textual analysis to argue that to belong is to exclude. To that end, transnational Peruvians engage in both subtle and direct policing along the borders of belonging. These acts allow them to claim and maintain the social status they enjoyed in their homeland even as they profess their openness and tolerance. Alcalde details these processes and their origins in Peru's gender, racial, and class hierarchies. As she shows, the idea of returnwhether desired or rejected, imagined or physicalspurs constructions of Peruvianness, belonging, and home. Deeply researched and theoretically daring, Peruvian Lives across Borders answers fascinating questions about an understudied group of migrants.Trade Review"Recommended." --Choice"Impressive and highly engaging. Hits all the right notes as it takes up transnational migration, a shifting sense of home, and what Cristina Alcalde persuasively calls exclusionary cosmopolitanism among middle class Peruvians."--Florence E. Babb, author of The Tourism Encounter: Fashioning Latin American Nations and Histories"A compelling ethnographic case study of middle- and upper-class Peruvian migration to the United States, Canada, and Germany. Alcalde offers her readers a unique analysis of the gendered and sexuality-driven intricacies of return."--Ulla Berg, author of Mobile Selves: Migration, Race, and Belonging in Peru and the US

Read more less

Book SynopsisNATIONAL BESTSELLERA timely, in-depth, and vital exploration of the American labor movement and its critical place in our society and politics today, from acclaimed labor reporter Hamilton Nolan.   Inequality is America’s biggest problem. Unions are the single strongest tool that working people have to fix it. Organized labor has been in decline for decades. Yet it sits today at a moment of enormous opportunity. In the wake of the pandemic, a highly visible wave of strikes and new organizing campaigns have driven the popularity of unions to historic highs. The simmering battle inside of the labor movement over how to tap into its revolutionary potential—or allow it to be squandered—will determine the economic and social course of American life for years to come. In chapters that span the country, Nolan shows readers the actual places where labor and politics meld. He highlights how organized labor can and does wield power effectively: a union that dominates Las Vegas and is trying to scale nationally; a successful decades-long campaign to organize California's child care workers; the human face of a surprising strike of factory workers trying to preserve their pathway to the middle class. Throughout, Nolan follows Sara Nelson, the fiery and charismatic head of the flight attendants’ union, as she struggles with how (and whether) to assert herself as a national leader, to try to fix what is broken. The Hammer draws the line from forgotten workplaces in rural West Virginia to Washington’s halls of power, and shows how labor solidarity can utterly transform American politics—if it can first transform itself. A labor journalist for more than a decade, Nolan helped  unionize his own industry. The Hammer is a urgent on-the-ground excavation of the past, present, and future of the American labor movement.

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn football-obsessed Steubenville, Ohio, on a summer night in 2012, an incapacitated sixteen-year-old girl was repeatedly assaulted by members of the Big Red high school football team. They took turns documenting the crime and sharing on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. The victim, Jane Doe, learned the details via social media at a time when teens didn''t yet understand the lasting trail of their digital breadcrumbs. Crime blogger Alexandria Goddard, along with hacker collective Anonymous, exposed the photos, Tweets, and videos, making this the first rape case ever to go viral and catapulting Steubenville onto the national stage.Filmmaker Nancy Schwartzman spent four years embedded in the town, documenting the case and its reverberations. Ten years after the assault, Roll Red Roll is the culmination of that research, weaving in new interviews and personal reflections to take readers beyond Steubenville to examine rape culture in everything from sports to teen dynamics. Roll

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Superclass - politicians, military leaders, finance gurus, energy barons, media moguls and thought leaders - is the small group that currently plays the greatest role in shaping the progress of globalization and perhaps the group most changed by that phenomenon, so much so that they have more in common with one another than they do with their own countrymen. And because this group frequently operates outside all national and international regulation, they are often in conflict with the elite in their own countries. Rothkopf offers a provocative and trenchant examination of the overlapping international power clusters. He reveals who is a member of this global Superclass and who is likely to be joining it and transforming it in the years ahead. And he will explore how the aggressive pursuit of self-interest by some in this class helped to create a world in which inequity is greater than ever - something that may well threaten international stability in our lifetimes.Trade Review** 'An entertaining and well researched taxonomy of the rich and powerful who shape foreign policy and business in our globalized world. Rothkopf gives us the story behind Davos Man * Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel Prize Winner in Economics and author of MAKING GLOBALIZATION WORK and GLOBALIZATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS *** 'This is a wide-ranging, hard-hitting book about all our lives * WATERSTONES BOOKS QUARTERLY *** 'Penned by a former advisor to Bill Clinton, this engaging study of the elite power mongers . . . who run the world is more than a mere power list * GQ *

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book explores the innovative, sociological approach adopted by Harriet Martineau in her efforts to develop a scientific' approach to understanding social and societal change. With attention to her focus on the key social structures and societal issues of her day the economy, education, the condition of women and the evils of slavery the authors highlight her creation and application of what we now recognise as sociological methodology, fieldwork and analysis. Through an examination in each chapter of the writings that best illustrate Martineau's sociological perspective, Reintroducing Harriet Martineau discusses her enduring contribution to sociology. As such, it will appeal to scholars and students of sociology with interests in the history of the discipline and questions of methodology.Table of ContentsChapter 1: Introducing Harriet MartineauChapter 2: Sociological Analysis and MethodologyChapter 3: The Condition of WomenChapter 4: Educational PerspectivesChapter 5: Fighting SlaveryChapter 6: Health Care and HospitalsChapter 7: Environmentalism and ExperimentationChapter 8: Journey to SecularismChapter 9: Experience of Disability to Sociology of DisabilityChapter 10: Harriet Martineau’s Sociological LegacyBibliography: selected works of Harriet MartineauBibliography: secondary sources

Read more less

Book SynopsisHailed as the beneficiary, driving force and result of globalisation, Indiaâs middle-class is puzzling in its diversity, as a multitude of traditions, social formations and political constellations manifest contribute to this project. This book looks at Indian middle-class lifestyles through a number of case studies, ranging from a historical account detailing the making of a savvy middle-class consumer in the late colonial period, to saving clubs among women in Delhiâs upmarket colonies and the dilemmas of entrepreneurial families in Tamil Naduâs industrial towns.The book pays tribute to the diversity of regional, caste, rural and urban origins that shape middle- class lifestyles in contemporary India and highlights common themes, such as the quest for upward mobility, common consumption practices, the importance of family values, gender relations and educational trajectories. It unpacks the notion that the Indian middle-class can be understood in terms of public performanceTable of Contents1. Introduction Henrike Donner 2. Masculinity, advertising and the reproduction of the middle-class family in Western India, 1918-1940 Douglas E. Haynes 3. Gendered bodies, domestic work and perfect families: new regimes of gender and food in Bengali middle-class lifestyles Henrike Donner 4. ‘Keeping it in the family’: Work, education and gender hierarchies among Tiruppur’s industrial capitalists Geert De Neve 5. Cultural contractions and intergenerational relations: the construction of selfhood among middle class youth in Baroda Margit van Wessel 6. Globalisation, neoliberalism, and middle-class cultural politics in Kolkata Timothy J. Scrase and Ruchira Ganguly-Scrase 7. The social transformation of the medical profession in urban Kerala: doctors, social mobility and the middle classes Caroline Wilson 8. Kitty-parties and middle-class femininity in New Delhi Anne Waldrop 9. Zara hatke (‘Somewhat different’): the new middle classes and the changing forms of Hindi cinema Rachel Dwyer

Read more less

Book SynopsisTaking a career break is a conflicted and risky decision for high-achieving professional women. Yet many do so, usually planning, even as they quit, to return to work eventually. But can they? And if so, how? In Opting Back In, Pamela Stone and Meg Lovejoy revisit women first interviewed a decade earlier in Stone's book Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home to answer these questions. In frank and intimate accounts, women lay bare the dilemmas they face upon reentry. Most succeed but not by returning to their former high-paying, still family-inhospitable jobs. Instead, women strike out in new directions, finding personally gratifying but lower-paid jobs in the gig economy or predominantly female nonprofit sector. Opting Back In uncovers a paradox of privilege by which the very women best positioned to achieve leadership and close gender gaps use strategies to resume their careers that inadvertently reinforce gender inequality. The authors advocate gender equitable poliTrade Review"Provides vital insights into the processes and consequences of career interruption for professional women who take time out for motherhood." * Gender and Society *"This book is richly descriptive and analytically subtle as it illuminates the social class dynamics among the privileged women interviewed." * American Journal of Sociology *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Great Expectations 2. The Siren Call of Privileged Domesticity 3. Putting Family First: The Slow Return 4. Career Relaunch: Heeding the Call 5. Questing and Reinvention 6. The Big Picture 7. The Paradox of Privilege and Beyond Appendix. Study Methodology Notes References Index

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisHow class is structured in the call-centres, office blocks and fast-food chains of modern Britain.Trade Review'A sophisticated answer to impoverished sociologies and cheap media cliches ... A sharp and deeply necessary book' -- Richard Seymour, author of Corbyn: The Strange Rebirth of Radical Politics (Verso, 2017).'Charles Umney presents a powerful and nuanced alternative narrative driven by Marxist political economy. With a keen eye for irony, paradox, and the absurd, he analyses work, politics, and technology in capitalist societies. This is a witty and wise antidote to the mainstream diagnoses of our times' -- Professor Ian Greer, Cornell University'By reinstating the importance of Marxist analysis for understanding the relationship between class and social inequality in 21st century Britain, Charles Umney has written a highly cogent and perspicacious account of the formation of contemporary inequality and exploitation... a vital source' -- Professor Paul Stewart, former editor of Work, Employment and Society'A highly accessible presentation of the transformation of the British economy over the last four decades and the problems facing Britain today. Umney vividly demonstrates the acute relevance of Marxist class analysis for understanding work, government, economics and politics in 21st century capitalism' -- Dr Matt Vidal, Loughborough University LondonTable of ContentsList of Figures List of Tables Acknowledgements Introduction The Rest of the Book 1. The ‘Economy that Works for Everyone’ Platitudes Class Since the Financial Crisis Class and Classification in Academia 2. Alien Powers: Class in Marxist Thought Conflict in the Workplace Dependency and Discipline Subordination of the Individual Alien Powers and Loss of Control Beyond Production 3. Changing Class Dynamics in Britain Introduction Inequality and the Balance of Class Power in Britain Financialisation, Capital and Class Discipline Labour Discipline and ‘Precarity’ Conclusion 4. Jobs Workplace Control Conflict, Resistance and Class Power 5. Government Adequate Forms and Alien Powers Public Services and Capital Blood Sacrifices to Alien Powers 6. Class and Equality Class, ‘Identity Politics’ and Cosmopolitans Marxism and Feminism Equality and Capital Capital and Immigration 7. Technology The Means of Evaluation Capitalism and the Wasting of Resources 8. Media and Ideology Common Sense The News Media Marxist Views on Ideology 9. Conclusion Summary Capital and the Future Final Thoughts: Britain after the 2017 General Election Notes Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe modern state, law, and constitution result from a legal canon that (re)produces the abyssal lines dividing the world that is validated from the world whose humanity and epistemological validity are denied. This book aims to contribute to a post-abyssal reflection on law and constitutionalism by considering the structural axes of power that are constitutive of modern law capitalism, colonialism, and heteropatriarchy alongside the legal plurality of the world. Is it possible to decolonize, decommodify, and depatriarchalize the constitution? The authors speak from multiple geographies, raise different questions, resort to differentiated theoretical approaches, and reveal varying levels of optimism about the possibilities of transforming constitutions. The readers are confronted with critical perspectives on the Eurocentric legal canon, as well as with the recognition of anti-capitalist, anti-colonial, and anti-patriarchal legal experiences. The horizon of this publication is the exTrade ReviewThis is an important edited volume framed by the groundbreaking theoretical work of Professor Boaventura de Sousa Santos. This scholarship has set aside a singular focus on the Eurocentric view of the law and developed in its place an 'epistemology of the South,' based upon the knowledges of those excluded, appropriated, and subject to the violence of the state. The goal of this project is to expand our political imagination to allow for the emergence of alternative forms of politics in oppressed communities. The book makes available the important findings of a collaborative research project on struggles for social justice in the global South. It is based upon a cutting-edge theoretical framework which explores the potential for constitutional change outside of a state-centric approach. The volume provides essential reading for those working in the area of comparative constitutionalism and will stimulate new research and thinking for the next generation of scholars in the field. – Kristin Bumiller, Amherst CollegeThis is an important and very useful contribution to the connected subjects of democracies, social justice and political activism, human rights, law and legal orders, and power and economies across societies. It moves beyond the surface of introduction and explanation of abyssal thinking to a range of post-abyssal possibilities and applications across multiple geographies and peoples with different questions. All the authors take up the challenges of decolonization, decommodification, and ‘depatriarchalization’, and all of the authors ground their writing in the experiences and realities of peoples around the globe. Abyssal thinking proves to be a critical lens in the subject instances of each chapter, and the reader will be able to see how abyssal thinking may be extrapolated to other issues and circumstances. I think this is an outstanding book and I am excited by its publication and availability. – Val Napoleon, University of British ColumbiaStudying constitutions (and other topics) from the perspective of the global South is important and the Epistemologies of the South have been ignored for too long. Its discussion of indigenous voices, especially indigenous women, and indigenous justice is one of the most important contributions of the book. This book adds a vitally important, yet often ignored, dimension to scholarship. It is not only timely but long overdue. – Sumudu Atapattu, University of WisconsinTable of ContentsTable of Contents: Boaventura de Sousa Santos; Sara Araújo; Orlando Aragón Andrade Preface Boaventura de Sousa Santos; Sara Araújo; Orlando Aragón Andrade Introduction Part 1. The vast landscape of constitutionalisms 1. Issa G. Shivji Do Constitutions Matter? The dilemma of a radical lawyer 2. Asifa Quraishi-Landes Healing a wounded Islamic constitutionalism: Sharia, legal pluralism, and unlearning the nation-State paradigm 3. Upendra Baxi Nihilisms, contradictions and anomie in new constitutionalisms: a view from India 4. Rosalva Aída Hernandez Towards a New Transformative Constitutionalism Arising from Indigenous Women? 5. Sara Araújo Modern Constitutionalism, Legal Pluralism and the Waste of Experience Part 2. Post-colonial Transitions: the case of South Africa 6. Heinz Klug Legacies and Latitudes: Past, present and future in South Africa’s post-colonial legal order 7. Albie Sachs Superior courts and the need of transformative jurisprudence. Shared experiences from a South African judge 8. Tshepo Madlingozi On Settler Colonialism and Post-Conquest Constitutionness: The Decolonising Constitutional Vision of African Nationalists of Azania/South Africa Part 3. The return of the abyssally excluded?: The indigenous constitutional struggles in Latin America 9. Salvador Schavelzon Can silence be a constituent? A reading on the indigenous-communitarian constitutionalism of Bolivia 10. Raúl Llasag Fernández Plurinational Constitutionalism: Plurinationality from Above and Plurinationality from Below 11. Nina Pacari Transformational constitutionalism, interculturality and the reform of the state: looking through the eyes of the originary peoples 12. Agustin Grijalva Participation and Presidentialism in the Ecuadorian Constitution of 2008 13. Orlando Aragón Andrade Transforming Transformative Constitutionalism. Lessons from the Political-Legal Experience of Cherán, Mexico 14. Boaventura de Sousa Santos The Law of the Excluded: Indigenous Justice, Plurinationality, and Interculturality in Bolivia and Ecuador Boaventura de Sousa Santos; Sara Araújo, Orlando Aragón Andrade Conclusion

Read more less

Book SynopsisOriginally published in 1985, Anthea Holme focuses her study on Bethnal Green in East London and Wanstead and Woodford in outer East London, the areas covered by Michael Young and Peter Willmott in their celebrated books Family and Kinship in East London and Family and Class in a London Suburb. Her aim was to discover how things had changed in the twenty-five years or so since the publication of these classic studies. She makes a four-way comparison, between then and now and between two neighbourhoods of the present, a relatively prosperous outer London suburb and a London East End district carrying its full quota of inner-city problems.The book takes as its starting point a crucial event in a family's history the birth of the first child. Housing may contribute to the happiness or the stress of the family at this time. The author looks at the present housing and the housing history of families who have just had their first child and discusses their satisfactioTable of ContentsForeword by Michael Young. Acknowledgements. Notes on Names, Places and Terms. Introduction. 1. The Neighbourhoods 2. The Families 3. Housing History 4. Family Building and Housing 5. The Homes 6. Ways of Life 7. Housing Aspirations 8. The Main Issues Discussed. Appendices. Notes and References. Index.

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn earlier studies, Peter Willmott and other investigators had documented the social problems of new housing estates the loneliness, the tensions, the disruption of family and neighbourhood ties. But how far are such troubles transitory? What kind of life would develop in communities like these when time had rubbed off the newness?Originally published in 1963, in search of an answer, Peter Willmott went to Dagenham in Essex, where forty years before the London County Council began to build a giant estate to rehouse people from the East End of London. His study of a new estate that had now become an old one throws light on the long-term effects of this kind of migration. He found at Dagenham, most strikingly, that a way of life very similar to a traditional' working-class community had grown up. In this book he discusses the similarities and differences, and shows the influences which had worked for and against this development. After a sketch of the estate's history, he trTable of ContentsIntroduction 1. The Estate and its Beginning 2. People and their Jobs 3. Stability and the Place of Relatives 4. Pressures on the Second Generation 5. The Voluntary Emigrants 6. Friends and Neighbours 7. Variations in Sociability 8. Public and Private Living 9. Affluence, Status and Class 10. In Conclusion – the Working-Class Community. Appendices: Methods of Research; Additional Tables; London County Council’s House-Room Standards; List of References. Index.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisExplores the changing nature of digital labour and work both before and during the Covid-19 pandemic

Read more less

Book SynopsisContributing to debates on the unpredictability of middle-class attitudes and their changing relations with the welfare states in Europe, this book identifies key trends in the literature and considers the impact of recent welfare reforms on the middle class.Table of ContentsIntroduction Chapter 1: The Radicalisation of Middle-Class Activism: A Theoretical Overview Chapter 2: A Long-Lasting Transition Chapter 3: The Rise of a New ‘Middle Mass’ Chapter 4: The Shifting Relations With the Welfare State Chapter 5: A Welfare for a Highly Individualised Society Conclusions: The ‘Worlds’ of Welfare and the Divided Middle Class

Read more less

Book SynopsisFor decades, the outside world mostly knew Myanmar as the site of a valiant human rights struggle against an oppressive military regime, predominantly through the figure of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi. And yet, a closer look at Burmese grassroots sentiments reveals a significant schism between elite human rights cosmopolitans and subaltern Burmese subjects maneuvering under brutal and negligent governance. While elites have endorsed human rights logics, subalterns are ambivalent, often going so far as to refuse rights themselves, seeing in them no more than empty promises. Such alternative perspectives became apparent during Burma's much-lauded decade-long "transition" from military rule that began in 2011, a period of massive change that saw an explosion of political and social activism. How then do people conduct politics when they lack the legally and symbolically stabilizing force of "rights" to guarantee their incursions against injustice? In this book, Elliott Prasse-Freeman documents grassroots political activists who advocate for workers and peasants across Burma, covering not only the so-called "democratic transition" from 2011-2021, but also the February 2021 military coup that ended that experiment and the ongoing mass uprising against it. Taking the reader from protest camps, to flop houses, to prisons, and presenting practices as varied as courtroom immolation, occult cursing ceremonies, and land reoccupations, Rights Refused shows how Burmese subaltern politics compel us to reconsider how rights frameworks operate everywhere.Trade Review"A combination analytical breadth, sparkling playfulness, ethnographic granularity, and deep sympathy for the heroic resistance of the Burmese democratic movement. Take a deep breath and dive in at the deep end; you'll be glad you did."—James C. Scott, Yale University"In this thoughtful exploration of the brutal political realities of present-day Myanmar, Elliott Prasse-Freeman unpacks the various understandings of human rights that both direct and bedevil attempts to instigate democratic reform. Noting that external observers have repeatedly misread Burmese conceptions of the very concept of rights, he offers an incisive corrective to such cultural tone-deafness with his nuanced analysis of Burmese activism and its often surprisingly diverse goals. His argument is a valuable lesson for all those who blithely assume that all meanings and values are inherently universal and thereby run the risk, in Prasse-Freeman's telling phrase, of "mocking the miserable.""—Michael Herzfeld, Harvard University"Rights Refused is a theoretically ambitious and ethnographically rich study of social activism, refusal and resistance in Myanmar. Prasse-Freeman lucidly captures how activists in specific local contexts reconfigure human rights discourses to challenge oppressive state power, and his insightful analysis reshapes our understanding of rights are operating in the contemporary world."—Shannon Speed, University of California, Los Angeles"Rights Refused transcends the confines of a mere book; it serves as a vital expedition, inviting readers to engage in a profound journey of empathy and introspection. Prasse-Freeman's humanisation of the activists and individuals at the heart of the struggle invites readers to step into their shoes and comprehend the immense challenges they face."—Thanapat Chatinakrob, London School of Economics Review of BooksTable of ContentsIntroduction 1. Variegated Violence 2. Living Refusal 3. Plow Protests 4. Cartoons, Curses, and the Corpus 5. Taking Rights, Seriously 6. Rights in Desperation Conclusion: Rights Erosion and Refusal beyond Burma

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe concept of Afropessimism does not refer to Black people, but rather to the likelihood of white society overcoming its own negrophobia, and to a radical distrust in white narratives of inclusivity. What if the ideas and reforms we regard as progressive were just the new and shiny face of racism? In the time of Black Lives Matter, the unswerving dehumanization and killing of Black people form the bedrock of our civilization. But a vast anti-Black collective feeling also manifests itself as a more insidious shared unconscious, hidden from view by the doctrines we deem as emancipatory. This book challenges the simplistic and pacifying aspects of current African American thought. It puts forward alternatives to intersectionality, poststructuralism, and radical democracy, which are often prioritized in the Black analysis of race, gender, and class. Accessible, historically informed, and politically alert, this book offers a critical analysis of the groundbreaking theories and strategies that radically reimagine the future of Black lives throughout the world.Trade Review“Norman Ajari’s Darkening Blackness is a masterful defense of Afro-American pessimism and Black Male Studies against the misguided view that ‘pessimism’ means hopelessness and eternal defeat. Instead, pessimism is treated as meaning the rejection of fantasies, especially the fantasy that says one more revision will alter insidious white racialized civil society and intrinsically unjust Euro/American institutions. Step into Ajari’s theoretical world and step out unburdened by fantasy.”Leonard Harris, Purdue University“For those who still do not understand that the pessimism in Afropessimism is not an emotional dispensation but a meta-critique of the first principles of Western thought, Norman Ajari’s Darkening Blackness is required reading. His analysis of Black Male Studies will have as many people nodding their heads as shaking their heads, which is the first step toward rigorous and honest debate.”Frank B. Wilderson III, Chancellor’s Professor of African American Studies, University of California, IrvineTable of ContentsIntroduction Chapter 1 The Sources of the Afropessimist Paradigm Chapter 2 Theoretical Origins of Afropessimism Chapter 3 From the Black Man as Problem to the Study of Black Men Chapter 4 A Politics of Antagonisms Postface By Tommy Curry Notes Index

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisNamed one of the Best Summer Books in Economics by the Financial TimesA groundbreaking look at the hidden role of bankruptcy in perpetuating inequality in America, from an expert in the field“Unjust Debts throws open the doors and windows to the bankruptcy system so readers can see for themselves how this law works and doesn’t work for the real people it so profoundly affects.” —Beth Macy, New York Times bestselling author of Dopesick and Raising LazarusBankruptcy is the busiest federal court in America. In theory, bankruptcy in America exists to cancel or restructure debts for people and companies that have way too many—a safety valve designed to provide a mechanism for restarting lives and businesses when things go wrong financially. &

Read more less

Book SynopsisFarewell to Work? presents the large process of capital's productive restructuring, triggered in the 1970s—a process with tendencies to both intellectualize labour power and increase the levels of the working class' precariousness on a global scale.This book hypothesizes that instead of work's loss of centrality in contemporary capitalism, when the world of production is analysed in its global dimension, including countries in the North and South, a substantial process of growing heterogeneity, complexity, and fragmentation is observed. The resulting configuration is a new morphology of the working class. Therefore, as new mechanisms are created to generate surplus labour, there is, simultaneously, an increment in casualisation and unemployment, pushed by the ongoing corrosion of labour rights in countries all across the globe.Table of ContentsForewordPreface to the English editionAcknowledgementsList of TablesIntroductionpart 1Heterogeneity and Fragmentation of the Working Class1  Fordism, Toyotism and Flexible Accumulation2  Metamorphoses in the World of Work3  Dimensions of the Trade Unionism’s Contemporary Crisis Dilemmas and Challenges4  Which Crisis of Labour Society? 1 First Thesis 2 Second Thesis 3 Third Thesis 4 Fourth Thesis 5 Fifth Thesispart 2Labour’s New Morphology5  The Explosion of the New Services Proletariat of the Digital Age 1 The End of the Myth 2 Service Work and Marx’s Fundamental Clues 3 Can Immaterial Labour Generate Surplus Value? 4 Middle Class, Precariat or the New Service Proletariat?6  Freeze-Dried Flexibility A New Morphology of Labour: Casualisation and Value 1 Introduction 2 Brazil in the New International Division of Labour 3 The New Forms of Labour and Value: Tangibility and Intangibility 4 The Design of the New Morphology of Labour7  The Working Class Today The New Form of Being of the Class-that-lives-from-Labour8  The Crisis Seen Globally Robert Kurz and the Collapse of Modernization 1 An Explosive Book 2 And Its Main Gaps9  The International Working Class in 1864 and Today 1 Introduction 2 The New Morphology of Labour: Informality, Casualisation, Infoproletariat, and Value 3 ConclusionMaster ReferencesIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is the first comprehensive historical perspective on the relationship between Black workers and the changing patterns of Britain's labour needs. It places in an historical context the development of a small black presence in sixteenth-century Britain into the disadvantaged black working class of the 1980s.The book deals with the colonial labour institutions (slavery, indentureship and trade unionism) and the ideology underlying them and also considers the previously neglected role of the nineteenth-century Black radicals in British working-class struggles.Finally, the book examines the emergence of a Black radical ideology that has underpinned the twentieth-century struggles against unemployment, racial attacks and workplace grievances, among them employer and trade union racism.Trade ReviewWell written and presented with admirable clarity... scrupulously documented and written with dynamic flair... with almost every turn of the page the book breaks new ground. -- Caryl Phillips * City Limits *This is a pioneering and valuable work of scholarship and interpretation. * New Society *A major work of research that is certain to be thumbed through by scholars in the future. * West Indian News *An important and timely contribution to British historiography. * Caribbean Times *Ramdin's contribution is unique. * Times Higher Education Supplement *

Read more less

Book SynopsisAt a time of almost unimaginable inequality, the mainstream still tries to ignore class. Radical Chains: Why Class Matters argues that denial of class is no coincidence but in fact central to the system’s survival. Exploring largely ignored histories of struggle and challenging the many myths about class today, Radical Chains puts forward the case that it is time to place class once again at the centre of emancipatory politics.

Read more less

Book SynopsisOPEN ACCESS To read the PDF of Gentility in Early Modern Wales: The Salesbury Family, 1450–1720 for free, follow the link below Gentility in Early Modern Wales: The Salesbury Family, 1450–1720 (uwp.co.uk) This book is freely available on a Creative Commons licence thanks to the kind sponsorship of the libraries participating in the Jisc Open Access Community Framework OpenUP initiative. Early modern Wales was a place of opportunity for the gentry. The Acts of Union with England granted them powers to govern their local communities, the Reformation enabled them to add former monastic lands to their estates, and burgeoning global expansion encouraged them to seek fortunes abroad. Early modern Wales was also a place in transition. The gentry navigated a complex relationship with their English neighbours and found themselves cultivating a new identity as Cambro-Britons. This book is an exciting new study of how one Welsh gentry family, the Salesburys of Rhug and Bachymbyd, negotiated the changing expectations of gentility in early modern Wales. From this in-depth analysis, the book finds that the Welsh gentry were status-conscious and opportunistic, but Welshness remained fundamental to their sense of self. This is further enhanced by considering the early modern Welsh gentry within a wider global context for the first time.Table of ContentsAcknowledgements A note on spelling List of abbreviations Maps Genealogical tables Introduction 1. The Salesbury family 2. Territorial legitimacy 3. Networks of power 4. Culture, scholarship and religion 5. The wider world Epilogue Bibliography

Read more less

Book SynopsisTHE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER'There was nothing extraordinary about my childhood or background. And yet I looked in vain for any aspect of my family's story when I went to university to read history, and continued to search fruitlessly for it throughout the next decade. Eventually I realised I would have to write this history myself.' What was it really like to live through the twentieth century? In 1910 three-quarters of the population were working class, but their story has been ignored until now. Based on the first-person accounts of servants, factory workers, miners and housewives, award-winning historian Selina Todd reveals an unexpected Britain where cinema audiences shook their fists at footage of Winston Churchill, communities supported strikers, and where pools winners (like Viv Nicholson) refused to become respectable. Charting the rise of the working class, through two world wars to their fall in Thatcher's Britain and today, Todd tells their story for the first time, in their own words. Uncovering a huge hidden swathe of Britain's past, The People is the vivid history of a revolutionary century and the people who really made Britain great.Trade ReviewI am delighted to see social class storm its way back into our contemporary history * Guardian *The most interesting academic work on British politics this year * Independent Books of the Year *Todd's account distinguishes itself in several respects, making copious use of oral histories . . . and giving more attention to domestic servants, who are usually overlooked in favour of industrial workers. Building to quite a polemical finish, Todd makes much of her own working-class background, which helps her sift nuggets of truth from myth, nostalgia and received wisdom * Herald *What an excellent book this is . . . The final chapters are its best, providing an analysis of what we have all lived through. Ms Todd's great ability as an academic is to avoid writing like one, so her book is accessible and entertaining. Even for those not engrossed by politics, the tales of the ordinary lives are compelling * Alistair Dawber, Independent *What differentiates Selina Todd's book from existing literature on this subject is the way her narrative actually documents the voices of working-class people. Through their words we come to a better understanding of how lives flourished or faltered, as various government policies were introduced, or taken away . . . Brilliant and well-researched * New Internationalist *Straightforward and useful * Juliet Gardiner, Daily Telegraph *The landscape is fascinating, and the distance travelled enormous . . . It is a colour tale too, taking in working class culture, music and dance crazes, and the move from a world of clerks, secretaries and manual workers to DIY superstores, Sunday working and the demise of trade union power . . . The scope and range of Todd's study is impressive * Scotsman *Todd is excellent in describing the effects that the Great War had on society and her use of servants as barometers of social change brings a fresh voice to this history * Alan Johnson, The Spectator *Selina Todd does not lack in courage and ambition. Her book, based on more than 10 years' research, is wide-ranging in its scope and packed with detail. Through her own extensive interviews in Coventry and Liverpool she provides new insights into the lives of working-class families, while she puts particular emphasis on the role of women, a theme often neglected in previous studies. She is good at contradicting some of the conventional wisdom about this period * Daily Express *The timing is apt for Selina Todd's examination of what she calls 'the rise and fall' of the working class . . . The People is a book we badly need . . . [It] offers a clear, compelling, broadly persuasive narrative of a century of British history as seen through working-class eyes and from a working-class perspective. Todd avoids hectoring, but by the end one is left suitably angry: the people have been screwed . . . She is a subtle as well as powerful historian. Retrospective oral testimony can be a problematic type of source, but she uses it with a dexterity and intelligence comparable to Orlando Figes in his masterly The Whisperers; weaving through her account the rollercoaster life story of the celebrated pools-winner Vivian Nicholson works beautifully; above all, she has an enviably assured grasp of the realities at any one time of working-class life . . . The underlying truth of the story - ultimately a tragic as well as a shocking story - that Todd tells remains essentially valid. And she tells it in a way that is, as Henry James might have said, the real thing * David Kynaston, Observer *Todd is insightful on servants . . . The bitterness of women forced back into domestic service is also captured well . . . [The People] is at its best when destabilising cliched narratives. Todd is strong on the 50s * Guardian *Why has revolution never broken out in Britain, because God knows there has been enough provocation. My feelings, after reading Selina Todd's great book, is that a little salutary use of the guillotine wouldn't go amiss . . . A brief century ago, if you weren't a toff, you lived in overcrowded slums, with neither drains nor electricity, 'grim rooms and surly faces', to use Todd's evocative phrase. Livelihoods were in constant peril. Welfare provision was scant. This book - all the more powerful for being written in a cool, seemingly neutral and factual fashion: Todd is a history don at the University of Oxford - recounts the hard and heroic slog, as ordinary men and women sought basic protection and regulation, decent homes, adequate remuneration, and compensation for horrifying injuries in factories . . . If this rousing book has an overriding theme, it is that such a (feudal) mentality accounts for the reluctance of the British to rise up and rebel - and it is why as of 2010, according to Todd, 'we are the most economically unequal country in the European Union', with Old Etonians and plutocratic villains as ever fully in charge and the likes of myself and everyone else I know, metaphorically if not literally, dining on cold baked beans in the cafeteria of Morrison's (Strood branch) * Roger Lewis, The Times *An impressively researched and passionately argued chronicle of hopes dashed. Todd's argument is interwoven with interviews and autobiographical extracts to demonstrate how lives changes - and also how they did not . . . Very good * Lucy Lethbridge, Financial Times *Selina Todd's impassioned, comprehensive history is a much-needed contribution to the revival of thinking about class in Cameron's Britain * New Statesman *Polemical and engaging * Times Higher Education *Writing the experiences of these forgotten groups into the history of class is overdue. Not only does Todd bust a few myths in the process . . . but she opens up new vistas on the social history of modern Britain * History Today *

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe literature of chivalry and of courtly love has left an indelible impression on western ideas. What is less clear is how far the contemporary warrior aristocracy took this literature to heart and how far its ideals had influence in practice, especially in war. These are questions that Maurice Keen is uniquely qualified to answer. This book is a collection of Maurice Keen's articles and deals with both the ideas of chivalry and the reality of warfare. He discusses brotherhood-in-arms, courtly love, crusades, heraldry, knighthood, the law of arms, tournaments and the nature of nobility, as well as describing the actual brutality of medieval warfare and the lure of plunder. While the standards set by chivalric codes undoubtedly had a real, if intangible, influence on the behaviour of contemporaries, chivalry's idealisation of the knight errant also enhanced the attraction of war, endorsing its horrors with a veneer of acceptability.

Read more less

Book SynopsisDefiant, humorous, empathetic and insightful, 'Not Quite Right For Us' pierces through the hierarchical mechanics of class, race, gender. A celebration of outsiderness and an ode to otherness, 'Not Quite Right For Us' is a singular collection of stories, essays and poems by a dynamic mix of established and surging voices alike, edited by Sharmilla Beezmohun and including Linton Kwesi Johnson, Aminatta Forna, Xiaolu Guo, Johny Pitts, Rishi Dastidar, Tim Wells and Rafeef Ziadah. This remarkable anthology marks the tenth anniversary of the live-literature organisation co-founded by Sharmilla, Speaking Volumes. Part cri du coeur, part warning shot, part affirmation, this is the book we need now.Trade Review'An important anthology that spans generations, circles the globe, and embraces all forms of imaginative writing. Uplifting and inspiring.' - Caryl Phillips; 'A rich and varied feast of wonderful writing about culture, creativity and opportunity.' - Bernardine Evaristo; 'Speaking Volumes has always had a knack for choosing talented writers and providing them with support, coaching and agency. In this anthology, you can see the stars of the future standing back-to-back with the stars of today.' - Roger Robinson

Read more less

Book SynopsisHow do you solve a problem like understanding Iraq? For Hanna Batatu, the solution to this conundrum lay in generating alternative possibilities that effectively side-stepped the conventional wisdom of the time. Historians had long held that Iraq – like other artificial creations of ex-colonial European powers, who drew lines onto the world map that ignored longstanding tribal, ethnic and religious ties – was best understood by delving into its political and religious history. Batatu used the problem solving skills of asking productive questions and generating alternative possibilities to argue that Iraq’s history was better understood through the lens of a Marxist analysis focused on socio-economic history.The Old Social Classes concludes that the divisions present in Iraq – and exposed by the revolutionary movements of the 1950s – are those characterized by the struggle for control over property and the means of production. Additionally, Batatu sought to establish that the most important political movements of the time, notably the nationalist Ba'athists and the pan-Arab Free Officers Movement, had their origins in a homegrown communist ideology inspired by local conditions and local inequality. By posing new questions – and by undertaking a vast amount of research in primary sources, a rarity in the history of this region – Batatu was able to produce a strong, new solution to a longstanding historiographical puzzle.Table of ContentsWays in to the Text Who was Hanna Batatu? What does The Old Social Classes And The Revolutionary Movements Of Iraq Say? Why does The Old Social Classes Matter? Section 1: Influences Module 1: The Author and the Historical Context Module 2: Academic Context Module 3: The Problem Module 4: The Author's Contribution Section 2: Ideas Module 5: Main Ideas Module 6: Secondary Ideas Module 7: Achievement Module 8: Place in the Author's Work Section 3: Impact Module 9: The First Responses Module 10: The Evolving Debate Module 11: Impact and Influence Today Module 12: Where Next? Glossary of Terms People Mentioned in the Text Works Cited

Read more less

Book SynopsisPeabody Award–winning journalist Michele Norris offers a transformative dialogue on race and identity in America, unearthed through her decade-long work at The Race Card Project.The prompt seemed simple: Race. Your Thoughts. Six Words. Please Send. The answers, though, have been challenging and complicated. In the twelve years since award-winning journalist Michele Norris first posed that question, over half a million people have submitted their stories to The Race Card Project inbox. The stories are shocking in their depth and candor, spanning the full spectrum of race, ethnicity, identity, and class. Even at just six words, the micro-essays can pack quite a punch, revealing, fear, pain, triumph, and sometimes humor. Responses such as: You’re Pretty for a Black girl. White privilege, enjoy it, earned it. Lady, I don’t want your purse. My ancestors massacred Indians near here. Urban living has made me racist. I’m only Asian when it’s convenient. Many go even further than just six words, submitting backstories, photos, and heirlooms: a collection much like a scrapbook of American candor you rarely get to see. Our Hidden Conversations is a unique compilation of stories, richly reported essays, and photographs providing a window into America during a tumultuous era. This powerful book offers an honest, if sometimes uncomfortable, conversation about race and identity, permitting us to eavesdrop on deep-seated thoughts, private discussions, and long submerged memories. The breadth of this work came as a surprise to Norris. For most of the twelve years she has collected these stories, many were submitted by white respondents. This unexpected panorama provides a rare 360-degree view of how Americans see themselves and one another. Our Hidden Conversations reminds us that even during times of great division, honesty, grace, and a willing ear can provide a bridge toward empathy and maybe even understanding.Trade Review“A remarkable book. By letting Americans of every walk of life share their deepest, most personal—and sometimes contradictory—attitudes on race, it takes us past the usual polarizing debates and points us toward the possibility of greater understanding." — Barack Obama, on X “A testament to that journey. Featuring photos and stories on race from people all over America, it highlights the truths of the American experience — and shares everything, even the messy bits. It's an incredible read." — Michelle Obama, on Instagram “A stunning book and a gift to our nation. Anchored by more than a decade of research and engagement with Americans across the country, Michele Norris takes us on a journey into the heart of this country’s painful, complex and unrelenting battle with the salience and significance of race in our lives.” — Sherrilyn Ifill, Howard Law School, and former President & Director-Counsel NAACP Legal Defense Fund “An important, compelling work. In an extremely unique way, Norris captures private, poignant and instructive stories that are a guide to racial knowledge that can lead to the understanding and healing we so desperately need. Ultimately, she shows that we need not fear the issues we must all confront.” — Eric H. Holder, Jr., 82nd Attorney General of the United States and author of Our Unfinished March “When ordinary people, talk, extraordinary truths are revealed. Michele Norris has an extraordinary gift – she is able to coax people into revealing their profound beliefs about race. This book is a safe space where difficult conversations become healing exchanges.” — Tayari Jones, New York Times bestselling author of An American Marriage "The brilliant Michele Norris has spent fourteen years getting people to open up about race — starting with six words. The result of her noble project is this beautiful and inspiring book. It can help us all cultivate communities of bridge builders so that we can talk about race with both candor and love.” — Walter Isaacson, New York Times bestselling author of The Code Breaker “Candid, unsettling and brilliant, the Race Card Project is a rare window into the enigma of race and the ways in which people make sense of it. In Our Hidden Conversations, Michele Norris has brought together a vista of personal truths that are as indelible as the issue they’re responding to.” — Jelani Cobb, Dean, Columbia Journalism School "Michele Norris is one of our most important chroniclers of American life. The stories captured in this book reveal the complexity, nuance, and dynamism of race in America. It is an indispensable resource for all of us.” — Clint Smith, New York Times bestselling Author of How The Word is Passed “As an immigrant, I always dreamed of an America where all are welcome. I still do. That dream is powerful, but we know it’s not the whole story. Michele Norris has the rare courage, understanding and grace to tell the American stories we prefer to keep silent — and the ones we should be proud of telling." — José Andrés, chef and humanitarian “Our Hidden Conversations is a unique, troubling, tough and beautiful book, a study of people sharing their thoughts and stories about racism. It sometimes broke my heart, other times surprised me, always challenged me, and ultimately left me uplifted, and with hope, because truth heals." — Anne Lamott, author of Bird by Bird“Notable… Norris offers crucial insight into how Americans think about race, combining the painful with the inspiring.” — Kirkus Reviews "This is an eye-opening read and an affecting examination of how race affects our lives.” — Booklist Review

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisSmashing It celebrates the exceptional works and words of 31 leading working-class artists in Britain. Featuring writing, lyrics and images by Wiley, Maxine Peake, Malorie Blackman, Riz Ahmed and many more, it also includes reflections from artists on how class has impacted their working lives. Come behind the scenes to find out how they overcame obstacles - from the financial to the philosophical - to forge careers in the arts and get inspiration to launch your own project. Smashing It empowers those who will be a part of tomorrow's bigger picture. Contributors: Riz Ahmed, Sabeena Akhtar, Travis Alabanza, Anthony Anaxagorou, Raymond Antrobus, Malorie Blackman, Michaela Coel, Emma Dennis-Edwards, Maureen Duffy, Jenni Fagan, Marvell Fayose, Salena Godden, Hassan Hajjaj, Omar Hamdi, Kerry Hudson, Rabiah Hussain, Fran Lock, David Loumgair, Lisa Luxx, Paul McVeigh, Bridget Minamore, Courttia Newland, Aakash Odedra, Maxine Peake, Rebecca Strickson, Chimene Suleyman, Joelle Taylor, Monsay Whitney, Wiley, Madani YounisTrade Review`An inspiring book full of fight, fire and light. Absolutely necessary for anyone interested in the arts to devour these pages to learn, create, laugh and, obviously, smash it.' Kate Tempest `Empowering ... the bible for the next generation of artists from marginalised backgrounds.' Nikesh Shukla `Incredible; warmth and wit radiate through these pages. It offers urgent inspiration for those from working class backgrounds and a revealing read for those who aren't. A must-read.' Yomi AdegokeTable of ContentsIntroduction by Sabrina Mahfouz Ten Crack Commandments, Madani Younis Little Rass & Coming in from the Cold, Raymond Antrobus Resolutions for the Common, Black, Queer, Young Kid (and anyone else who may need it) Travis Alabanza Strength Thy Name is a Working-Class Woman, Maxine Peake That's How It Was (an extract), Maureen Duffy Diversity vs. Representation, Riz Ahmed My Rockstars, Hassan Hajjaj Spun: Making a Debut Hit Play, Rabiah Hussain Stories Not Stats, Kerry Hudson gutter girls, Joelle Taylor Playing the Part, Michaela Coel Am I Working-Class or Am I Just Black?, Emma Dennis-Edwards Cohort, Fran Lock In the Boot of a Car, Chimene Suleyman Pluripotent, Jenni Fagan London Underground, Courttia Newland Lyrics to Light the Way, Wiley Family Question Time, Omar Hamdi Dear British Theatre, David Loumgair Box Clever, Monsay Whitney Money Money Money, Bridget Minamore A Tailor's Son, Marvell Fayose All Eyes on Me, Paul McVeigh Entry Points, Sabeena Akhtar Jeremy Corbyn At the Doctor's Surgery and Separation Has Its Own Economy, Anthony Anaxagorou Q&A with Novelist, Malorie Blackman You Wretched Men, Rebecca Strickson Broken Biscuits, Salena Godden I Move, I Tell, Aakash Odedra The Economy of Sisterhood, Lisa Luxx Smashing the Class Ceiling, Joelle Taylor Applying for Arts Funding: A Guide, Sabrina Mahfouz

Read more less

Book SynopsisA powerful reminder that service and other low-wage workers are complex and inspiring in their dogged efforts to remain afloat. This book features stories that serve as a chance to humanize debates about work, race, and immigration.Trade Review"An interesting look at a puzzling society-ours-from the point of view of a sympathetic but not uncritical outsider." Kirkus Reviews "With careful candor and clarity, [Deepak Singh] shows the challenges facing new immigrants and the effort it takes to surmount them." BooklistTable of ContentsForeword by Holly Donahue Singh Acknowledgments 1. Answering Machine 2. Lucknow 3. Transit 4. My American Wife 5. Job Application 6. Hired 7. First Day 8. One Month’s Notice 9. English 10. Colleagues 11. Olive Skin 12. Camera King 13. Don’t Buy It 14. Foreigner 15. My Name Is Deepak 16. I’m Straight Today 17. Holly and I 18. All Hands on Deck 19. Long Two Years 20. The Golden Quarter 21. Two Americas 22. Paula 23. Cameron 24. Don’t Sue Me! 25. Post-Christmas Blues 26. A Handful of Dimes 27. India Visit

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe making of a culture of Black male respectability at Morehouse that underlines conservative notions of gender and classby a former Spelman student who was once Miss Morehouse. How does it feel to be groomed as the solution to a national Black male problem? This is the guiding paradox of Respectable,an in-depth examination of graduates of Morehouse College, the nation's only historically Black college for men. While Black male collegians are often culturally fetishized for beating the odds, the image of Black male success that Morehouse assiduously promotes and celebrates is belied by many of the realities that challenge the students on this campus. Saida Grundy offers a unique insider perspective: a graduate of Spelman college and a former Miss Morehouse, Grundy crafts an incisive feminist and sociological account informed by her personal insights and scholarly expertise. Respectablegathers the experiences of former students and others connected to Morehouse to illustrate the narrow, conservative vision of masculinity molded at a competitive Black institution. The thirty-two men interviewed unveil a culture that forges confining ideas of respectable Black manhood within a context of relentless peer competition and sexual violence, measured against unattainable archetypes of idealized racial leadership. Grundy underlines the high costs of making these menthe experiences of low-income students who navigate class issues at Morehouse, the widespread homophobia laced throughout the college's notions of Black male respectability, and the crushingly conformist expectations of a college that sees itself as making good Black men. As Morehouse's problems continue to pour out into national newsfeeds, this book contextualizes these issues not as a defect of Black masculinity, but as a critique of what happens when an institution services an imagination of what Black men should be, at the expense of more fully understanding the many ways these young people see themselves.Trade Review"Today, I am honored to introduce @saigrundy, the Assistant Director of Narrative @AntiracismCtr. I've long admired her candor, her scholarship, her encyclopedic knowledge, and her deft ability to translate her scholarship and knowledge to everyday people.” * Saida Grundy Instagram *"Respectable is sure to attract scholars who study masculinities and racialized institutions. . . .a great addition to courses that aim to give students a contemporary example of the theoretical promise of the sociology of culture." * Sociology of Race and Ethnicity *"Respectable uses the specific to deeply explore the intersection of racism, sexism, and class inequality in ways that should enrich any study of contemporary social inequality." * Social Forces *Table of ContentsContents Preface Introduction 1 The Masculine Arc of Uplift 2 Branding the Man 3 Of Our Sexual Strivings 4 Who among You Will Lead? Conclusion: The Journey Back Acknowledgments Appendix A: Respondent Demographics Appendix B: Participant Screening Questionnaire Appendix C: Informed Consent Contract Notes Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisManagement & Workplace Culture Book of the Year,2020 Porchlight Business Book AwardsAPublishers WeeklyFall 2020 Big Indie BookThe dark side of the gig economy (Uber, Airbnb, etc.) and how to make it equitable for the users and workers most exploited. When the sharing economy launched a decade ago, proponents claimed that it would transform the experience of workgiving earners flexibility, autonomy, and a decent income. It was touted as a cure for social isolation and rampant ecological degradation. But this novel form of work soon sprouted a dark side: exploited Uber drivers, neighborhoods ruined by Airbnb, racial discrimination, and rising carbon emissions. Several of the most prominent platforms are now faced with existential crises as they prioritize growth over fairness and long-term viability. Nevertheless, the basic modela peer-to-peer structure augmented by digital techholds the potential to meet its original promises. Based on nearly a decade of pioneering research, After tTrade Review"Eye-opening as it deconstructs the promises, and downfalls, of the sharing economy." * Foreword Reviews *“Punctures the hype surrounding the ‘sharing economy’ in this lucid and deeply researched study. . . . Schor backs her claims with detailed evidence, and identifies specific, actionable reforms. This incisive account makes a perplexing subject easier to grasp.” * Publishers Weekly *“The author, a nimble writer, concludes that ‘social technology’ has to match technology itself, the foremost need being ‘learning how to share.’ The gig economy is a failure, Schor sharply chronicles—but not one that can’t be redeemed by ‘cooperation and helping.’” * Kirkus Reviews *“Schor’s case studies skillfully represent the full spectrum of optimism and disenchantment—those previously bullish on being their own boss, who have since been dragged into despair. . . . The takeaway from this book is that a complete reimagining of city governance is required if the sharing economy is ever going to work for the people.”
 * Financial Times *"Using an engaging writing style that is accessible to a non-academic audience and to those unfamiliar with the topic, the author brings the reader on a journey along the evolution of the sharing economy, from its roots in the California counterculture through its affirmation in the global capitalist system, to a possible alternative future." * IRL *"Juliet Schor’s After the Gig: How the Sharing Economy Got Hijacked and How to Win It Back tells this story with much flair and nuance, based on her team’s groundbreaking and extensive research." * American Journal of Sociology *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Note: This Book Has Been Coproduced Introduction: The Problem of Work 1 From the Counterculture to “We Are the Uber of X” 2 Earning on the Platforms 3 Shared, but Unequal 4 “The Shared Economy Is a Lie” 5 Swapping with Snobs 6 Co-ops, Commons, and Democratic Sharing Appendix A Appendix B Appendix C Appendix D Notes References Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisTechnological advancements, expanding education, and unfettered capitalism have encouraged many around the world to aspire to better lives, even as declines in employment and widening inequality are pushing more and more people into insecurity and hardship. In Egypt, a generation of young men desire fulfilling employment, meaningful relationships, and secure family life, yet find few paths to achieve this. The Labor of Hope follows these educated but underemployed men as they struggle to establish careers and build satisfying lives. In so doing, this book reveals the lived contradiction at the heart of capitalist systems—the expansive dreams they encourage and the precarious lives they produce. Harry Pettit follows young men as they engage a booming training, recruitment, and entrepreneurship industry that sells the cruel meritocratic promise that a good life is realizable for all. He considers the various ways individuals cultivate distraction and hope for future mobility: education, migration, consumption, and prayer. These hope-filled practices are a form of emotional labor for young men, placing responsibility on the individual rather than structural issues in Egypt's economy. Illuminating this emotional labor, Pettit shows how the capitalist economy continues to capture the attention of the very people harmed by it.Trade Review"There is no doubt that Harry Pettit has the gift of ethnographic presentation. The Labor of Hope is an important, original, and truly laudable addition to the emerging literature on contemporary labor in Egypt."—Nefissa Naguib, University of Oslo, author of Nurturing Masculinities"The Labor of Hope is an amazing ethnography of capitalist dreams that motivate Egyptians of modest means to strive for success—a success largely denied by inequalities that push people towards precarious service work. Harry Pettit reveals what happens when you're inspired to be the next Steve Jobs, but the labor market wants you for the call center."—Samuli Schielke, Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient,author ofMigrant Dreams"The Labor of Hope brings into sharp focus the emotive work undertaken by slipping middle classes as they endure the many indignities and compromised life-trajectories of a polarized labor market. Harry Pettit offers a penetrating analysis of the affective labor that underpins contemporary capitalism marked by steepening inequalities."—Bruce O'Neill, Saint Louis University, author of The Space of Boredom"There is no doubt that Harry Pettit has the gift of ethnographic presentation. The Labor of Hope is an important, original, and truly laudable addition to the emerging literature on contemporary labor in Egypt."—Nefissa Naguib, University of Oslo, author of Nurturing Masculinities"The Labor of Hope is an amazing ethnography of capitalist dreams that motivate Egyptians of modest means to strive for success—a success largely denied by inequalities that push people towards precarious service work. Harry Pettit reveals what happens when you're inspired to be the next Steve Jobs, but the labor market wants you for the call center."—Samuli Schielke, Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient,author ofMigrant Dreams"The Labor of Hope brings into sharp focus the emotive work undertaken by slipping middle classes as they endure the many indignities and compromised life-trajectories of a polarized labor market. Harry Pettit offers a penetrating analysis of the affective labor that underpins contemporary capitalism marked by steepening inequalities."—Bruce O'Neill, Saint Louis University, author of The Space of BoredomTable of ContentsIntroduction 1. Selling Hope 2. The Drugs of Life 3. Without Hope There Is No Life 4. The Labor of Love 5. The Migration of Hope Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

Read more less

Book Synopsis#1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER • A “fantastic” (Mark Ruffalo), fiercely argued takedown of neoliberalism that not only defines this slippery concept but connects it to the climate crisis, poverty, and fascism—and shows us how to fight back.“Incisive, illuminating, eye-opening—an unsparing anatomy of the great ideological beast stalking our times, often whispered about and yet never so clearly in view.”—David Wallace-Wells, author of The Uninhabitable EarthNeoliberalism is the dominant ideology of our time. It shapes us in countless ways, yet most of us struggle to articulate what it is. Worse, we have been persuaded to accept this extreme creed as a kind of natural law. In Invisible Doctrine, journalist George Monbiot and filmmaker Peter Hutchison shatter this myth. They show how a fringe philosophy in the 1930s—championing competition as the defining feature of humankind—was systematically hijacked by a group of wealthy elites, determined to guard their fortunes and power. Think tanks, corporations, the media, university departments and politicians were all deployed to promote the idea that people are consumers, rather than citizens.One of the most pernicious effects has been to make our various crises—from climate disasters to economic crashes, from the degradation of public services to rampant child poverty—seem unrelated. In fact, they have all been exacerbated by the “invisible doctrine,” which subordinates democracy to the power of money. Monbiot and Hutchison connect the dots—and trace a direct line from neoliberalism to fascism, which preys on people’s hopelessness and desperation.Speaking out against the fairy tale of capitalism and populist conspiracy theories, Monbiot and Hutchison lay the groundwork for a new politics, one based on truly participatory democracy and “private sufficiency, public luxury”: an inspiring vision that could help bring the neoliberal era to an end.

Read more less

Book SynopsisUsing a novel technique - tracking family names over generations to measure social mobility across countries and periods, this book reveals that mobility rates are lower than conventionally estimated, do not vary across societies, and are resistant to social policies.Trade ReviewWinner of 2015 Gyorgy Ranki Prize, Economic History Association Honorable Mention for the 2015 PROSE Award in Economics, Association of American Publishers One of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2014 One of Vox's "Best Books We Read in 2014" "The Son Also Rises ... suggests that dramatic social mobility has always been the exception rather than the rule. Clark examines a host of societies over the past seven hundred years and finds that the makeup of a given country's economic elite has remained surprisingly stable."--James Surowiecki, New Yorker "An epic feat of data crunching and collaborative grind... Mr. Clark has just disrupted our complacent idea of a socially mobile, democratically fluid society."--Trevor Butterworth, Wall Street Journal "Audacious."--Barbara Kiser, Nature "[A]n important book, and anybody at all interested in inequality and the kind of society we have should read it."--Diane Coyle, Enlightened Economist "The Son Also Rises... That is the new Greg Clark book and yes it is an event and yes you should buy it."--Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution "Startling... Clark proposes a new way to measure mobility across nations and over time. He tracks the persistence of rare surnames at different points on the socio-economic scale. The information he gathers is absorbing in its own right, quite aside from its implications."--Clive Crook, Bloomberg View "Clark casts his net wider. He looks at mobility not across one or two generations, but across many. And he shows by focusing on surnames--last names--how families overrepresented in elite institutions remain that way, though to diminishing degrees, not just for a few generations but over centuries."--Michael Barone, Washington Examiner "Deeply challenging."--Margaret Wente, Globe & Mail "Who should you marry if you want to win at the game of life? Gregory Clark ... offers some answers in his fascinating new book, The Son Also Rises."--Eric Kaufmann, Literary Review "This intriguing book measures social mobility in a novel way, by tracing unusual surnames over several generations in nine different countries, focusing on intergenerational changes in education, wealth, and social status as indicated by occupation."--Foreign Affairs "No doubt this book will be as controversial as its thesis is thought-provoking."--Library Journal "Gregory Clark's analysis of intergenerational mobility signals a marked shift in the way economists think about social mobility."--Andrew Leigh, Sydney Morning Herald "The thesis of The Son Also Rises is, fundamentally, that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Ingeniously, Clark and his team of researchers look at the persistence of socioeconomic status through the lens of surnames in more than 20 societies."--Tim Sullivan, Harvard Business Review "Clark has a predilection for investigating interesting questions, as well as for literary puns... [J]ust as Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century, calls into question the role of capitalism in wealth creation, Clark calls into question the role of capitalism in social mobility."--Theodore Kinni, Strategy+Business.com "Clark's book is not merely intellectually clever, it's profoundly challenging. Especially for Americans, it calls into question of ourselves as individuals, as well as our long-standing image of our society. Let's hope he's wrong."--Benjamin M. Friedman, The Atlantic "Adopting an innovative approach to using surnames to measure social mobility, The Son Also Rises engages the reader by presenting data that comes to life as it is anchored by names we see in our daily life... A book with valuable insights derived from a well-designed research, it is strongly recommended to all serious readers interested in building strong democracies, for high social mobility is at the heart of a vibrant democracy. Policy makers will gain the benefits of counter-intuitive conclusions that this book throws up with its multi-generational study. Academicians interested in social justice and social activists engaged in promoting social mobility too will have a lot to chew on."--BusinessWorld "Clark continues the project begun in his A Farewell to Alms. Here, he offers a controversial challenge to standard ideas that social mobility wipes out class advantages over a few generations... An important, challenging book."--Choice "[T]his is a well written and thought-provoking book... I look forward to his next book--and his next Hemingway pun!"--Edward Dutton, Quarterly Review "Clark's book begins a fascinating and important conversation about social mobility... Clark's findings are important to engage with, and they will factor into discussions about social mobility for years to come."--Laura Salisbury, EH.Net "[I]t's one of those rare, invigorating arguments which, if correct, totally upends your understanding of the way the world works. Right or wrong, I've thought about it more than anything else I read in 2014."--Dylan Matthews, a Vox "Best Books We Read in 2014" selection "[A] provocative book."--Richard Lampard, European Journal of Cultural and Political Sociology "The Son Also Rises makes for stimulating reading, and I recommend it."--Chris Minns, Investigaciones de Historia EconomicaTable of ContentsPreface ix 1 Introduction: Of Ruling Classes and Underclasses: The Laws of Social Mobility 1 PART I Social Mobility by Time and Place 2 Sweden: Mobility Achieved? 19 3 The United States: Land of Opportunity 45 4 Medieval England: Mobility in the Feudal Age 70 5 Modern England: The Deep Roots of the Present 88 6 A Law of Social Mobility 107 7 Nature versus Nurture 126 PART II Testing the Laws of Mobility 8 India: Caste, Endogamy, and Mobility 143 9 China and Taiwan: Mobility after Mao 167 10 Japan and Korea: Social Homogeneity and Mobility 182 11 Chile: Mobility among the Oligarchs 199 12 The Law of Social Mobility and Family Dynamics 212 13 Protestants, Jews, Gypsies, Muslims, and Copts: Exceptions to the Law of Mobility? 228 14 Mobility Anomalies 253 PART III The Good Society 15 Is Mobility Too Low? Mobility versus Inequality 261 16 Escaping Downward Social Mobility 279 Appendix 1: Measuring Social Mobility 287 Appendix 2: Deriving Mobility Rates from Surname Frequencies 296 Appendix 3: Discovering the Status of Your Surname Lineage 301 Data Sources for Figures and Tables 319 References 333 Index 349

Read more less