Polygamy, forced marriage, female genital mutilation, punishing women for being raped, differential access for men and women to health care and education, unequal rights of ownership, assembly, and political participation, unequal vulnerability to violence. These practices and conditions are standard in some parts of the world. Do demands for multiculturalism--and certain minority group rights in particular--make them more likely to continue and to spread to liberal democracies? Are there fundamental conflicts between our commitment to gender equity and our increasing desire to respect the...
Polygamy, forced marriage, female genital mutilation, punishing women for being raped, differential access for men and women to health care and edu...
The problem of justifying legal punishment has been at the heart of legal and social philosophy from the very earliest recorded philosophical texts. However, despite several hundred years of debate, philosophers have not reached agreement about how legal punishment can be morally justified. That is the central issue addressed by the contributors to this volume. All of the essays collected here have been published in the highly respected journal Philosophy & Public Affairs. Taken together, they offer not only significant proposals for improving established theories of punishment and...
The problem of justifying legal punishment has been at the heart of legal and social philosophy from the very earliest recorded philosophical texts...
After decades of hand-wringing and well-intentioned efforts to improve inner cities, ghettos remain places of degrading poverty with few jobs, much crime, failing schools, and dilapidated housing. Stepping around fruitless arguments over whether or not ghettos are dysfunctional communities that exacerbate poverty, and beyond modest proposals to ameliorate their problems, one of America's leading experts on civil rights gives us a stunning but commonsensical solution: give residents the means to leave.
Inner cities, writes Owen Fiss, are structures of subordination. The only way...
After decades of hand-wringing and well-intentioned efforts to improve inner cities, ghettos remain places of degrading poverty with few jobs, much...
Khaled Abou El Fadl, a prominent critic of Islamic puritanism, leads off this lively debate by arguing that Islam is a deeply tolerant religion. Injunctions to violence against nonbelievers stem from misreadings of the Qur'an, he claims, and even jihad, or so-called holy war, has no basis in Qur'anic text or Muslim theology but instead grew out of social and political conflict. Many of Abou El Fadl's respondents think differently. Some contend that his brand of Islam will only appeal to Westerners and students in "liberal divinity schools" and that serious religious dialogue in the Muslim...
Khaled Abou El Fadl, a prominent critic of Islamic puritanism, leads off this lively debate by arguing that Islam is a deeply tolerant religion. Injun...
Juliet Schor breaks a taboo by exposing Americans' shopping habits to moral society. Schor disapproves of unfettered private consumption, not only because we already use up so much, but also because overspending to bolster a sense of self does not lead to happiness. Along with her critique, Schor suggests intriguing ideas for making 'status' goods accessible for all--for example, imposing high taxes on expensive items to subsidize lines of affordable 'luxury' goods. A firestorm of responses follow from economist Robert Frank and others. The New Democracy Forum is a series of short...
Juliet Schor breaks a taboo by exposing Americans' shopping habits to moral society. Schor disapproves of unfettered private consumption, not only bec...
In this election year, health care again proves to be one of our nation's most urgent issues. Daniels, Kennedy, and Kawachi shift the focus of the debate, forcing us to take a closer look at how our health is affected by social injustice and inequality. Arguing that it isn't enough to increase access to doctors, they call for improving social conditions-such as poverty, lack of education and affordable housing, and harmful work environments-that damage our health. By urging us to work toward equality of opportunity for all, the authors situate health care reform among the larger social...
In this election year, health care again proves to be one of our nation's most urgent issues. Daniels, Kennedy, and Kawachi shift the focus of the deb...
'Elaine Scarry's consistently radical way of posing essential questions redirects inquiry in the most valuable ways, a tribute to a disciplined and erudite imagination put almost exclusively at the service of democratic citizenship in American society.' -Richard Falk Through a minute-by-minute analysis of the phone calls, official reports, responses, and reported actions of passengers on two hijacked flights, United Airlines 93 (which crashed in Pennsylvania) and American Airlines 77 (which crashed into the Pentagon), Elaine Scarry offers a dramatic retelling of their fate and some startling...
'Elaine Scarry's consistently radical way of posing essential questions redirects inquiry in the most valuable ways, a tribute to a disciplined and er...
Tracey Meares and Dan Kahan have performed a great public service.... They have] opened up a major debate on a promising idea about how to keep streets safe without throwing out essential legal safeguards. If you live where I live, you know that's a life-and-death issue. --The Reverend Eugene F. Rivers, 3d, from the Foreword Through a searching examination of the constitutional and moral issues of community policing, Tracey Meares and Dan Kahan challenge us to reconsider our ideas about how to fight urban crime and about the role of rights in a democracy. Activists and legal...
Tracey Meares and Dan Kahan have performed a great public service.... They have] opened up a major debate on a promising idea about how to keep street...
Our politicians insist that we live in a time of unprecedented prosperity, yet more and more Americans are pointing out that the richest 1% of our society holds more wealth than the bottom 90% put together. In this timely book, economist Philippe Van Parijs has a simple plan for addressing not only
Our politicians insist that we live in a time of unprecedented prosperity, yet more and more Americans are pointing out that the richest 1% of our soc...
A collection of recent essays by today's most innovative social thinkers addressing a wide variety of moral concerns regarding slavery as an institutionalized social practice.
A collection of recent essays by today's most innovative social thinkers addressing a wide variety of moral concerns regarding slavery as an instituti...
