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Juvenile Delinquency: Theory, Practice, and Law (with CD-ROM and InfoTrac®)
Larry J. Siegel ,
Brandon C. Welsh , and
Joseph J. Senna
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Study Guide for Siegel/Welsh/Senna's Juvenile Delinquency: Theory, Practice, and Law, 9th
ASIN: 0534645666 |
Book Description
This comprehensive, best-selling text provides an in-depth analysis of the theories of delinquency, environmental issues, juvenile justice issues, and the juvenile justice system. Renowned for its exhaustive research base, this book presents cutting-edge, seminal research, as well as up-to-the-minute policy and newsworthy examples. Offering objective, up-to-the-minute presentation of juvenile delinquency theory and juvenile justice policy issues, the authors examine opposing sides of controversial aspects of delinquency and delinquency programs in a balanced, unbiased way. Rewritten for greater clarity and impact, this new edition addresses the latest hot topics and provides students with a gateway to online and multimedia resources that capture the immediacy of the field through CNN® videos, a CD-ROM, and the Internet. With its many updates and greater array of supplements, the Ninth Edition of JUVENILE DELINQUENCY: THEORY, PRACTICE, AND LAW presents a powerful and exciting set of teaching resources and learning tools for instructors and students alike.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent Book.......2007-10-08
I used this book as a student and now use it when teaching my own class in juvenile delinquency. This book gives a thorough account of juvenile history and laws. I can't recommend this book highly enough.
Juvenile Delinquency: Theory, Practice, and Law .......2007-03-19
An excellent, balanced and well researched textbook .. with the CD-ROM component, a pleasure to use as a teaching tool! The best choice available textbook on the present state of juvenile delinquency.
Juvenile Delinquency Theory, Practice & Law.......2006-01-19
Very fascinating book, it's easy to read and very interesting. There are great pictures and interesting stories which made it difficult to put down!
Book Description
Since it appeared in 1971, John Rawls's A Theory of Justice has become a classic. The author has now revised the original edition to clear up a number of difficulties he and others have found in the original book.
Rawls aims to express an essential part of the common core of the democratic tradition--justice as fairness--and to provide an alternative to utilitarianism, which had dominated the Anglo-Saxon tradition of political thought since the nineteenth century. Rawls substitutes the ideal of the social contract as a more satisfactory account of the basic rights and liberties of citizens as free and equal persons. "Each person," writes Rawls, "possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override." Advancing the ideas of Rousseau, Kant, Emerson, and Lincoln, Rawls's theory is as powerful today as it was when first published.
Customer Reviews:
very fine about justice in no justice world ...........2007-01-11
This is not for me (also I'm lawyer), is for my daughter who study philosophy at University of Buenos Aires and will learn the book when we arrive home next Jan 22.
Accessible and important development in liberal thought.......2006-10-14
A Theory of Justice is surprisingly accessible, even to those of us without extensive training in philosophy. Rawls briefly examines two of the most influential Western liberal philosophers (Locke and Mill), and then proceeds to construct his own Theory which builds on Locke and Mill while solving for some of the deficiences in each.
As Rawls admitted, the gist of his Theory can be gleaned from the first part of the book, though the book reads easily enough that one should be able to get through the whole thing fairly quickly.
I highly recommend this book to those who think of philosophy as convoluted jargon written long ago by men in powdered wigs and robes, as well as to those who are unsure of the philosophical basis for much modern liberal political thought. A remarkably accessible and important development in liberal thought.
The Impossible Attempt of Reconciling the Ideal with the Realistic.......2006-09-07
The amount of praise given to this work does not surprise me given that there is a widespread, yet subtle, socialist movement in America as well as in Europe. Despite this, the book is a failed attempt at reconciling the ideal with reality. Rawls commits one of the many age-old flaws of collectivism, attempting to force morality on immoral beings. Rawls' entire work is fundamentally flawed in that the hypothetical situation from which the entire theory relies, selectively allows certain knowledge, assumptions, etc. while conveniently eliminating others. For instance, empirical evidence that shows capitalism outperforms other economic systems cannot be known in the original position. This is profound when one considers that we live in a hostile world that requires nations to invest in security of which economic power is imperative. Thus, capitalism may be a necessary injustice in order to safeguard liberal democracy. If we compare the human condition prior to capitalism, one can see that perhaps a collectivist system that may contribute to capitalism's downfall is immoral, if it leads us back in this direction. Consequentalism perhaps? Despite this, the people in the original position cannot have this knowledge. Therefore, information that is direly relevant to the construction of a social system in a hostile world cannot be used in determining its structure. Somehow though, the people do understand the important of the right to vote, equality, etc. This is absurd and impractical. Rationale beings need to analyze as much information as is available and pertinent to any decisions they make. Rawls continuously attempts to explain his "tweaks" as rationale but it is obvious that they are all implemented in order to discount human nature and proceed in theoretical terms. On a side note, Rawls' first principle calls for the right to vote, what would his state do if citizens began to vote for a more capitalistic system that defied his "justice"? Iron fist? Nevertheless, it is quite obvious what Rawls is attempting here. In a hypothetical situation where we all have to fear being born without intelligence, strength, status etc. we will take the safe route and ensure ourselves the highest index of goods. This may be true, or it may not (human nature seems to embrace risk taking) however this situation is irrelevant because of its exclusion of relevant information. Hobbes for instance accepted human nature and the potential for a wide array of circumstances in his hypothetical Natural Condition. While Rawls may have some strong arguments in declaring that his two principles are the epitome absolute justice, this does not mean they are practical in a hostile world. Essentially, what Rawls is saying is that none of us deserved to be born intelligent, responsible, hard working, but that we were simply lucky in the natural lottery. Because of this arbitrary distribution, he believes that we all must compensate for those unfortunate souls that were born unintelligent, lazy, and perhaps even immoral! I'd admonish Rawls not to attempt applying his insane reasoning to the criminal justice system (Poor, unfortunate murderer). If Rawls believes that the laziest, dumbest, and most immoral person still deserves a living wage despite not working, he has contradicted himself in that this justifies slavery, forcing individuals to work for other individuals without compensation. This simply cannot be justice as "fairness". Nevertheless, I'd recommend it to all free market advocates simply to strengthen their positions. As a warning however, be prepared for a work that lacks brevity, organization, coherence, and most importantly, reality.
Comic reviews.......2006-03-27
I suppose one of the great attributes of the internet is that it allows the juxtaposition of the good, the bad and the ugly. Where else could one find reviews of one of the twentieth century's towering works that variously describe it as a recipe for a police state, an incitement to theft, or as written by someone with no understanding of philosophy (my personal favourite - thanks Adrian!)
Essential.......2006-03-21
Rawls clearly sucks in great chunks of political thought - Kantianism, Utilitarianism, free market capitalism, utopian socialism, the Enlightenment idea of human progress in this capacious work. At the crux of his thought is the difference principle - the notion that inequalities can only be justified if they benefit the least well off.
Whatever you make of his theory, it can't be ignored. Anyone even remotely interested in 20th Century Liberal thought must consult A Theory of Justice, as it is the precursor to so much that has been written in the last 35 years. Check out any political journal and there will still be several articles anually which assess some part of Rawls' legacy.
In the 1970s, when Rawls' book came out, many people thought he had cracked liberal thought. Since then OPEC crises, divisions over the welfare state, the problem of benefit traps, pension funding shortfalls and a whole menangerie of other problems have beset contemporary liberalism. But to go back to a brave, well throught out articulation of one great thinker's view of liberal equality, seek out Rawls.
Book Description
The threat of continued warfare to the future of humanity has become dire. "The Great Turning explores that threat in detail and provides an equally detailed plan for meeting -- and overcoming -- it. Written in the author's trademark clear, compelling style, this timely book uncovers the roots of Empire in ancient Athens and charts the long transition from the institutions of monarchy to those of the global economy as the favored instruments of imperialism. Korten then discusses the promise of early America as a democracy dedicated to spreading liberty and freedom -- and the failure of the "American experiment" through the contemporary takeover of the U.S. government by corporate plutocrats, religious theocrats, and neoconservative militarists in pursuit of naked imperial ambition. Korten draws on sources as varied as evolution, developmental psychology, and the wisdom of religious mystics to make the case for "Earth Community" -- a people-centered, community-based future that is both possible and necessary.
Customer Reviews:
Hope Restored.......2007-08-07
David Korten has restored my hope that humanity can and will survive the upcoming collision with our own short sighted Hubris. Some, perhaps many of us will make it through and will have restored to us in the process a great deal more of our own compassionate humanity. Well researched, well written. A seminal work! Thank you David!
The Great Turning.......2007-06-12
This book should be read by anyone thinking about how to move toward a fair, just society. Korten talks about levels of maturity leading to understanding that enough people and groups have reached a level where a society based on the principle of community rather than that of domination is within reach. It undercuts struggling with all the forms injustice takes in our present society and considers joining with like-minded groups all over the world to form a bottom-up society concerned with the good of all rather than just looking out for what's good for the most powerful among us.
The Ideal of the Bodhisattva.......2007-05-13
The Great Turning masterfully traces the concept of Empire from pre-history to the present and states that the current world situtation has been shaped by the concentration of power and wealth in the hands of the few. The motivating actions of governments are to preserve their control over the forces of money and power. The democracies of the Western world are not true democracies as they maintain their control over the many by giving prevledge to the few. Korten goes on to relate various pardighms that our culture buys into and which perpetuate the rule of Empire. one of these views is related in the "Imperial Secular Meaning Story."
"Matter is the only reality. the whole of the cosmos is a product of the orderly playing out of physical forces amenable to description and prediction by mathematical equations. Life is the accidental outcome of material complexity. Consciousness and free will are illusions, nothing more. Because life has no intrinsic meaning, the only rational couse of the intelligent individual is to seek material gratification through the accumulation of wealth and power.
The evolution of the living species occurs through a competitive struggle in which the fittest survive and the less fit perish. Mammalian species, naturally organize themselves into heirarchies of dominance for mutual protection and breeding success.
Human progress likewise depends on competitive struggle in which the most fit triumph and those of second rank serve the most fit. the winners prove their superior worth and therby their contribution to the betterment of the whole by virute of their victory. They have a natural right to the rewards of their victory as their just due. Their is no reason for guilt or for concern for those whom the struggle destroys or leaves behind, as their loss is itself proof that they are the less fit. For the betterment of the whole, we must all accept that this their proper fate."
What makes the Great Turning a landmark book is that it exposes these myths for what they are-propaganda for maintaining control with power and wealth. The actions of governments rather than being for the well being of the people are for the maintaining of the myths which concentrate power and wealth in the hands of the few. Korten goes on to forge the strategy for removal of these myths and replacing them with the reality of a sustainable Earth Community.
The human and Divine potential of the sage, writer, artist, scientist cannot be fully realized without the move away from empire to Earth Community. The Bodhisattva's vow while at the threshold of enlightenment takes on the meaning for all of us to work out our daily lives in harmony with the forces that are attempting to bring about an Earth Community.
A "Must Read" for Every Lover of Democracy.......2007-03-08
This is the most important book I have read in years! There is hope. The people can take back America and truly make it a land of freedom, liberty and justice for all.
A MUST-READ.......2007-02-20
This book has changed the way I think about the world and the challenge we face in avoiding "the great unraveling." After reading it, I want to stand up and start making a difference.
Amazon.com
Few philosophers have made as much of a splash with a single book as John Rawls did with the 1971 publication of A Theory of Justice. Thirty years later, Justice as Fairness rearticulates the main themes of his earlier work and defends it against the swarm of criticisms it has attracted. Throughout the book, Rawls continues to defend his well-known thought experiment in which an "original position"--a sort of prenatal perspective ignorant of our race, class, and gender--provides the basis for formulating ethical principles that result in a harmonious liberal state. In addition, he supplies carefully worked-out responses and, in some cases, reformulations of his theory. Those coming to Rawls for the first time will find a lucid portrayal of his position; those embroiled in the ongoing debate will encounter a closely argued and subtle rejoinder to his adversaries. Readers will be pleased that the daunting volumes of Rawls's previous work have been distilled to a digestible 214 pages. --Eric de Place
Book Description
This book originated as lectures for a course on political philosophy that Rawls taught regularly at Harvard in the 1980s. In time the lectures became a restatement of his theory of justice as fairness, revised in light of his more recent papers and his treatise Political Liberalism (1993). As Rawls writes in the preface, the restatement presents "in one place an account of justice as fairness as I now see it, drawing on all [my previous] works." He offers a broad overview of his main lines of thought and also explores specific issues never before addressed in any of his writings.
Rawls is well aware that since the publication of A Theory of Justice in 1971, American society has moved farther away from the idea of justice as fairness. Yet his ideas retain their power and relevance to debates in a pluralistic society about the meaning and theoretical viability of liberalism. This book demonstrates that moral clarity can be achieved even when a collective commitment to justice is uncertain.
Customer Reviews:
A great work of political philosophy.......2003-07-30
Rawls has done a marvelous job condensing the theory first presented in his massive A Theory of Justice into 200 lucid, succint, beautifully-argued pages.
Since the work is essentially a restatement, any review must take into account the effectiveness of that which was restated. For this, I would like to mention one area that Rawls ammended; subsequently, I would like to comment on how this change provided a complete new hermeneutical framework for the book.
At its core, the theory proposed by Rawls is based on a Kantian understanding of human persons and human freedom. Any familiar with Kant's political philosophy will remember the concept of the 'transcendental self', the self that is so completely free of human encumberances and entanglements that he is actually and literally free. This person literally has an autonomous free will and consequently has the capacity to be completely self-legislating. This is, of course, necessary if a person is to abide by the categorical imperative. Kant believes that a person cannot be free unless his will--his capacity to choose--is grounded in something pre-empirical. Rawls seems to believe this too. However, he understands that the idea of the 'trascendental self' is so shrouded in the obscurity of German Idealism as to be unhelpful for the average person. So, he sets out to bring the self to the earth and give it an imaginable, even a empirical, basis. And this is the function of the original position: to bring Kant's 'transcendental self' to the earth and provide a basis for it. This should be kept in mind throughout the reading.
While I enoyed the book thoroughly, I have a number of issues. First, Rawls himself says that the work can be read independent of any prior knowledge, and I take this to be true. Nonetheless, reading Justice as Fairness without preliminary familiarity with A Theory of Justice is bound to make the reading considerably more difficult. The reasons for this are many, the most notable being that Justice as Fairness is a restatement of a theory presented in an earlier work. Its job, essentially, is to fill gaps, answer arguments, and provide clarification that lacked in the original version (not to be confused with the 'original position'). While Rawls alludes to the problems he intends to fix, it's almost impossible to fully grasp without a cursory understanding of A Theory of Justice.
In sum, the work is an excellent piece of analytical philosophy, one that is sure to be around for a while. Nonetheless, I would encourage anyone ready to dig into it to to read--or at least become familiar with--A Theory of Justice.
Adam Glover
Culmination of a half century's work on political philosophy.......2001-08-04
Whether one agrees or disagrees with Rawls' theory of justice, almost all contemporary moral and political philosophy takes place in its shadow. If not for A Theory of Justice, generations of grad students would still indulge in tired debates over the meaning of Kant's categorical imperative and whether analytic philosophy merely defines the words we use to talk about philosophy. Luckily, this was not the case and we now have this book that expresses the most refined exposition of Rawls' views on justice to date. Attempting to address the criticisms leveled by Sandel, Walzer, Habermas, and others at his initial theory, Justice as Fairness integrates the concepts of "reasonable pluralism" and "stability for the right reasons" (the core concerns of Political Liberalism, although not in those words) articulated in articles scattered throughout journals over a span of three decades with the comprehensive philosophical doctrine in A Theory of Justice. Whether he succeeds in fully rebutting their objections is certainly up for debate, but Justice as Fairness should be essential reading for anybody interested in the philosophical underpinnings of a liberal, property-owning democracy.
That said, I would agree with the previous reviewer that a reader should at least be conversant in Rawls' ethical theory as described in A Theory of Justice to get the most out of this book. However, to those uninterested in the evolution of his thought and how its shortcomings have been repaired, Justice as Fairness is still a momentous work and will probably be used in introduction to ethics or political philosophy classes everywhere.
An obligatory note, since another reviewer is certain to mention Nozick: Nozick eventually became convinced that the Lockean proviso of justice in acquisitional holdings did not possess the requisite stability that would ensure that liberties owed to free and equal persons would be preserved and recanted some of the conclusions in Anarchy, Utopia, and State. As for Hayek's brilliant works, nobody seriously disagrees with his thesis that central economic planning leads inevitably to abuses as state oversteps individual liberties and that the mechanism of prices in a free market is the best aggregator and distributor of preferences. I just don't see what this has to do with libertarianism. Hayek is too fine a thinker to be shoehorned into such a confining box.
Profound.......2001-08-01
Rawls set himself the difficult task of accomplishing for political philosophy what Kant attempted for moral philosophy; developing a systematic logical rationale for an intuitively attactive body of thought that raises this body of thought to new levels. Kant attempted to find a rational basis for the Pietist Christian ethics that he grew up with; Rawls attempts to find a rational basis for modern democratic polities. Both Kant and Rawls struggle not merely to rationalize existing arrangements and beliefs but to extract the best features of these intuitively attractive systems, to place these features on coherent and rational foundations, and to logically derive important new features of these systems from the described foundations. Rawls made this project his life's work. His output includes his magisterial 1971 book, A Theory of Justice, which set out most of the basis of his theory, the subsequent Political Liberalism, which introduced important qualifications into his scheme, and a large number of essays. Justice as Fairness is an attempt to summarize his views at the end of his remarkably productive career. This book is the best way available to enter Rawls's work in its final state. Having said that, I have to acknowledge some substantial drawbacks of Justice as Fairness. Rawls is not a gifted writer and this book derives to a large extent from lecture notes from one of his courses. Rawls has apparently been ill in recent years and this book was not completed by him. This is doubly unfortunate because Rawls's extended thoughts on some the issues discussed would be worth reading. The last couple of sections of the book are relatively sketchy, reflecting his inability to flesh them out. Since this book is an effort to abstract thousands of pages of prior writing, it is still rather dense. Still, because of the importance of Rawls's ideas, this book is very welcome and the reading public owes a debt of gratitude to Erin Kelly, the editor of this book.
Rawls espouses an ingenious social contract theory, an intellectual device in which we are asked to imagine the basis for government behind a "veil of ignorance". This "original position' prevents us from knowing what our position would be in the new regime or even from knowing what our native endowments (intelligence, heatlth, etc.) would be. In this situation, Rawls proposes that we would rationally proceed to developing a society where certain civil and property rights are guaranteed and have priority, where basic institutions are constructed to permit equal opportunity and certain minimum guarantees for education, health care, and economic support. Rawls construes his system as requiring the development of a "property owning democracy" in which basic institutions are constructed to prevent the development of large concentrations of wealth and political power. Rawls' system does not ban inequality but he insists on the existence of the difference principle, a rule that structural inequalities are permitted only if they rebound in some way to the advantage of the less advantages. An important modification of A Theory of Justice that Rawls introduced in Political Liberalism is the emphasis on pluralism and a reduction in some ways of the scope of his system. Rawls points out that modern democracies are pluralistic and contain many who legitimately disagree about the ends of society. Since Rawls original conception of political society can be construed as sponsoring a complete moral system (one of its attractions fo many of his followers, Rawls modified his ideas to insist that his scheme is restricted to political issues. This is a stronger scheme in many ways because it allows Rawls to argue that by restricting the scope of his system, it actually enfranchises citizens to pursue their own diverse ideas of ultimate good.
Rawls' ideas have been and will be debated vigorously. Many will object that despite his effort to narrow the scope of his system to political ideas, it still has important aspects of a complete moral doctrine. For example, in this book, Rawls himself points out that his system has signficant impact on the organization of family life. The difference principle has always been controversial and will continue to be so. Rawls himself points out one problem. He argues that it would not greatly impair economic efficiency but this may not be true. Indeed, I suspect that a property owning democracy, even if tenable, would be less efficient than a modern capitalist welfare state and consequently such a state can arise only after the development of capitalist welfare states. I suspect that one of the reason's Rawls wanted to produce this book is that he hoped a more accessible version of his ideas would spur the development what he regards as a more just world.
Second time around.......2001-07-18
Exactly a year later and after a second reading, I'm happy to revise my two star signal that this book might not stand alone. I'm now happy to give it the full praise it deserves. Rawls is a rigorous, systematic thinker who demands a focused and patient reader with a copious memory. Nevertheless, this restatement of pathbreaking earlier work sets a model for generous consideration and cogent response to the best objections raised over three decades by the most competent critics any author could desire. If you only have time to read one book by the foremost political philosopher of our time, read this one several times.
Amazon.com
It's become clear by now the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of communism in most places around the globe hasn't ushered in an unequivocal flowering of capitalism in the developing and postcommunist world. Western thinkers have blamed this on everything from these countries' lack of sellable assets to their inherently non-entrepreneurial "mindset." In this book, the renowned Peruvian economist and adviser to presidents and prime ministers Hernando de Soto proposes and argues another reason: it's not that poor, postcommunist countries don't have the assets to make capitalism flourish. As de Soto points out by way of example, in Egypt, the wealth the poor have accumulated is worth 55 times as much as the sum of all direct foreign investment ever recorded there, including that spent on building the Suez Canal and the Aswan Dam.
No, the real problem is that such countries have yet to establish and normalize the invisible network of laws that turns assets from "dead" into "liquid" capital. In the West, standardized laws allow us to mortgage a house to raise money for a new venture, permit the worth of a company to be broken up into so many publicly tradable stocks, and make it possible to govern and appraise property with agreed-upon rules that hold across neighborhoods, towns, or regions. This invisible infrastructure of "asset management"--so taken for granted in the West, even though it has only fully existed in the United States for the past 100 years--is the missing ingredient to success with capitalism, insists de Soto. But even though that link is primarily a legal one, he argues that the process of making it a normalized component of a society is more a political--or attitude-changing--challenge than anything else.
With a fleet of researchers, de Soto has sought out detailed evidence from struggling economies around the world to back up his claims. The result is a fascinating and solidly supported look at the one component that's holding much of the world back from developing healthy free markets. --Timothy Murphy
Book Description
From the most important economist in the Third World, a revolutionary and practical plan for transforming underperforming economies-based on the forgotten history of how wealth was created in the West.
"The hour of capitalism's greatest triumph," writes Hernando de Soto, "is, in the eyes of four-fifths of humanity, its hour of crisis." In The Mystery of Capital, the world-famous Peruvian economist takes up the question that, more than any other, is central to one of the most crucial problems the world faces today: Why do some countries succeed at capitalism while others fail?
In strong opposition to the popular view that success is determined by cultural differences, de Soto finds that it actually has to do with the legal structure of property and property rights. Every developed nation in the world at one time went through the transformation from predominantly informal, extralegal ownership to a formal, unified legal property system, but in the West we've forgotten that creating this system is also what allowed people everywhere to leverage property into wealth. This persuasive book will revolutionize our understanding of capital and point the way to a major transformation of the world economy.
Customer Reviews:
Insightful.......2007-09-26
I thought this was a fantistic book. The author compares the sorry state of property rights in the third world today with identical problems in earlier periods of US history.
Rich countries are frequently blamed for the problems in poor countries but this book shows why that blame is misplaced. This book also shows why billions of dollars in foreign aid have not and can not eliminate third world poverty.
Clear, Precise, Cogent and Important Thoughts.......2007-09-12
Although De Soto is trumpeted in the halls of the Chicago School as a person directly in line with his ideological primogeniteurs, it is clear that De Soto is not an ideologue.
His main thesis is that property rights are one of the fundamental underpinnings of western capitalism. Property rights allow the smooth functioning of capital accumulation without the diversion of too many supernumerary laws and institutions, and form the base impedements that allow capital markets, lending institutions and wealth creation mechanisms to function smoothly. If property rights are not highly developed then the "friction" this creates in the movement of capital impedes growth. As a concrete example, people in Africa and much of Latin America and Asia live in hovels that do represent accumulations of capital, but because these hovels, many owned by squatters cannot be leveraged to create capital or cannot be lent against. They in effect at dead capital because their ownership is in limbo. Advanced societies have smooth functioning property laws and markets that allow the process of wealth creation.
All of this is simple and De Soto does chronicle, as well as he can the underlying condition of dead capital formation, historical development of property rights and solid policies for implementing more legal property controls in the third world.
De Soto is also profoundly motivated to move backward societies forward and feels the poverty profoundly. In this sense he is very much a thinking man's economist and not an ideologue.
The one thing I would state is that the concepts De Soto is propounding are simple in nature and scope. As such I think that De Soto does repeat himself from time to time. Also the historical developments of property rights in the US is a good example of how a country with essentially third-world property rights, emerged to relatively advanced property rights. But I do think that his historical scholarship suffers a little as an Economist outside of his area of interest.
The writing style, though good, is not so exciting at times and would do better with a bit more details on specific human examples. But that should not detract from its scholarship.
Important work.......2007-07-23
This book is a very important work in the area of the economics of property rights. De Soto emphasizes the importance of property rights for the development of developing countries.
Capitalism Triumphs in "Market" and Fails EveryWhere Else.......2007-07-04
Most reader comments on the "political" and "Policy" side of the book. They applause by embracing the idea of less government intervention, better legal protection, better property right and so on. But I will comment the Economic side of the book. The most important point in this book is that there is a lot of "dead capital" in under developing countries. My wonder to this point is that which mechanism generate so huge amount of "dead capital". From the content of De Soto book, it is sure that all these "dead capital" comes from "black/underground Market" or "Illegal Free Market". The "Illegal Free Market" generate 9.3 trillion dollar. Actually I think De Soto is still highly under estimate the value since De Soto does not include all the human capital estimation. I think De Soto agree Free Market is the real source of economic growth.
Also in De Soto analysis, capital is the fuel for economy growth while the Keynesian believe that both individual and government spending the fuel for economy growth. De Soto book does not directly compare this 2 different ways to go. But De Soto clearly show that Foreign loan or aid does no help since it only simulate spending only. From my understanding, De Soto recommends to use Market to replace the government to release the "dead capital". Government is only require to provide minimum effect to ensure that the contract is fulfilled.
Spot on!.......2007-06-24
It's been a while since I read the book. As a citizen and resident of a third world country I can vouch that what de Soto says is the absolute truth. I have also had a business in the USA and the difference is just staggering. The longest procedure in the USA for setting up my business was getting the sales tax permit and that took about two hours. A similar procedure in my country can take months.
I'm a bit amazed that some reviewers are commenting about the book being badly written. I don't have that recollection but then, it's been a while since I read it and I enjoyed it very, very much.
Book Description
Richard A. Posner is probably the leading scholar in the rapidly growing field of the economics of law; he is also an extremely lucid writer. In this book, he applies economic theory to four areas of interest to students of social and legal institutions: the theory of justice, primitive and ancient social and legal institutions, the law and economics of privacy and reputation, and the law and economics of racial discrimination.
The book is designed to display the power of economics to organize and illuminate diverse fields in the study of nonmarket behavior and institutions. A central theme is the importance of uncertainty to an understanding of social and legal institutions. Another major theme is that the logic of the law, in many ways but not all, appears to be an economic one: that judges, for example, in interpreting the common law, act as if they were trying to maximize economic welfare.
Part I examines the deficiencies of utilitarianism as both a positive and a normative basis of understanding law, ethics, and social institutions, and suggests in its place the economist's concept of "wealth maximization." Part II, an examination of the social and legal institutions of archaic societies, notably that of ancient Greece and primitive societies, argues that economic analysis holds the key to understanding such diverse features of these societies as reciprocal gift-giving, blood guilt, marriage customs, liability rules, and the prestige accorded to generosity. Many topics relevant to modern social and philosophical debate, including the origin of the state and the retributive theory of punishment, are addressed. Parts III and IV deal with more contemporary social and jurisprudential questions. Part III is an economic analysis of privacy and the statutory and common law rules that protect privacy and related interests-rules that include the tort law of privacy, assault and battery, and defamation. Finally, Part IV examines, again from an economic standpoint, the controversial areas of racial and sexual discrimination, with special reference to affirmative action. Both Part III and Part IV develop as a subtheme the issue of proper standards of constitutional adjudication by the Supreme Court.
Customer Reviews:
Wealth Maximization. Holy cow!!!.......2002-06-20
Although denied by the author in his book 'Problems of Jurisprudence,' Richard Posner was an integral early pioneer in the movement known as 'Economics and Law.' Picking up where George Stigler and Gary Becker left off, Posner argues that not only human behavior, but law can be understood by the theory of wealth-maximization. This is the philosophy that individuals act in a way that will maximize their benefit (the results of their action) while minimizing cost (energy, time etc. expended in action.) While my review is necessarily simplified, Posners audience is in for a well-made case.
After his case is made, he moves on to offer a hypothesis of how law may have developed in primitive societies against this backdrop of wealth-maximization. I've read several authors attempts to 'create' a state (Rousseau, Locke, Nozick) and to my eyes, Posners is the most convincing. Let's see what you think!
The third section applies wealth-maximization to privacy and discrimination laws. It is here that Posner is the most likely to disturb. For example, he distinguishes between privacy as seclusion and privacy as secrecy. Privacy as secrecy, Posner argues, is not only inconsistent with constitutional text but is not much more than the right to be able to distort information (whether by omission or declaration) to present and future transactors. This, in turn, distorts the 'market-place' of information and is inconsistent (a slippery slope) with the wealth-maximization of society.
Whether you agree or disagree with Posner, his intellect is undeniable, his thesis, original and his writing, first rate. Should be read by anyone interested in jurisprudence, politics, economics and psychology.
Philosophy and Economics.......1999-02-04
Posner's "Economics of Justice" is still a fascinating read, almost two decades after its first publication. In particular, the first half of the book, which attempts (I think quite successfully) to carve out a middle ground of "ethical wealth maximization" between the 'poles' of Kantian ethics and utilitarian thought, is quite good. I am not always convinced that wealth maximization as a juridical norm in fact escapes the strictures and failures of utilitatarian thought, but Posner's philosophy and economics approach to the law demonstrates quite conclusively that economic thought has much to say about issues of justice. More broadly, Posner's lucid arguments dispel some of the many myths and critiques (some by people who do not understand economics) which contend that economics either oversimplifies or commodifies too much of human experience. What is needed is an update to this work, and more generally, a stronger outpouring of philosophical explanation from other economics-minded scholars such as Posner, to respond to the many socio-cultural legal critiques of law and economics. Overall, though, an excellent read; and although one need not agree with all of Posner's conclusions, the ideas are well worth examining.
Book Description
This book challenges the prevailing philosophical reduction of social justice to distributive justice. It critically analyzes basic concepts underlying most theories of justice, including impartiality, formal equality, and the unitary moral subjectivity. Starting from claims of excluded groups about decision making, cultural expression, and division of labor, Iris Young defines concepts of domination and oppression to cover issues eluding the distributive model. Democratic theorists, according to Young do not adequately address the problem of an inclusive participatory framework. By assuming a homogeneous public, they fail to consider institutional arrangements for including people not culturally identified with white European male norms of reason and respectability. Young urges that normative theory and public policy should undermine group-based oppression by affirming rather than suppressing social group difference. Basing her vision of the good society on the differentiated, culturally plural network of contemporary urban life, she argues for a principle of group representation in democratic publics and for group-differentiated policies. "This is an innovative work, an important contribution to feminist theory and political thought, and one of the most impressive statements of the relationship between postmodernist critiques of universalism and concrete thinking.... Iris Young makes the most convincing case I know of for the emancipatory implications of postmodernism." --Seyla Benhabib, State University of New York at Stony Brook
Customer Reviews:
A Groundbreaking Work.......2006-05-16
Ignore the silly reviews (here on Amazon) that attempt to pigeon-hole this work as somehow relevant ONLY if one believes the principles of radical feminism. Yes, Young is a feminist. But this book is about much, much more than that. It asks a question that has long needed answering: Do classical conceptions of justice (i.e. distributive justice) adequately account for the diverse experiences of differently situated actors? And if not, how are some groups and individuals marginalized by the dominant philosophical conceptions of justice which have become part of the background understanding of Western civilization? It is Young's wonderful journey seeking an answer to this question that we find in "Justice and the Politics of Difference," and the journey is worth taking with her.
Don't bother.......2002-03-04
If you love feminist philosophy, and you don't mind all the impractical ideas and flawed logic, then this is your book. I cannot stand these things, so I found this book to be a waste of trees.
Victimization by the numbers........2001-10-11
It's tempting to write an essay detailing exactly how politics as a rationale for a system of justice must fail, and indeed should fail, but I don't want to waste my time or yours because this book isn't worth it. To make a long story short, Young's thesis is that in order for justice to be met in our patriarchal, racist, classist society guilt and punishment should be measured by the relative "power" of the people involved. Thus a white man should be punished more than a white woman for the same crime. Not only that, but if a white man were to murder, for example, another white man his punishment should be lighter than if he murdered a black man. Is this justice or an attempt to apply notions of group justice to what must be a system that addresses guilt or innocence on an individual basis? Young actually creates criteria to define exactly how oppressed you are so that through her system you can get what's coming to you.
Perhaps the most ironic part of her diatribe is that she uses her criteria and argues that women are historically more oppressed than blacks. This one example destroys her argument for justice based on politics. As a feminist "philosopher" she deconstructs her argument by tipping the scales to suit her needs, thus oppressing blacks still more.
I've written more than I wanted to, but there you have it in a nutshell. If you think justice is best served through politics then buy this book. If you believe, as I do, in justice as a set of principles to be applied fairly to each person as is their due, then run, don't walk, away from this book.
(Since I wrote this review I came to realize that anybody looking for a book such as this would probably not have the qualms I do regarding misplaced social justice. Nonetheless, if this book jibes with your worldview, so be it. You're welcome to it.)
This is the conversation we need to have.......2000-12-26
Young's clasic book is most often read in seminars on social criticism and/or feminist studies. This is as it should be, for Young's work brilliantly illuminates the direction debates about justice and oppressed groups must go. However, I read the book from the point of view of the work of Warnke, Habermas, and Gadamer, more along the lines of hermeneutics and ideology critique. What I found was an absolutely riviting account of how we define the groups to which we belong, how we believe those groups interact with each other, and the way that the competing demands of these groups are met and dealt with. As Warnke does, Young realigns the concept of justice along a communitarian axis rather than an individualistic axis, proposing that we look at justice in terms of communitites than individuals. Only in this way will the individuals within those communities be able to come to the table with their respective concerns. Like Habermas, she investigates the rhetoric of power that underlies old ways of discussing justice in terms of distribution, denying that justice is a finite commodity that must be rationed. And like Gadamer, Young stresses the need for an understanding of presuppositions in developing theories of history and interpretation. After all, how we define "our" group in great part determines how we define "others".
I found her turn from a rural to an urban paradigm of community to be nothing short of revolutionary. She develops an idea of community-oriented justice that revolves not around the model of self-suffient hamlets, but around the interlocking and often messy communities that exist side-by-side (though often in isolation from each other) in cities. Showing that the idea of self-sufficiency is unworkable in the curent context, Young holds out hope that these interconnected yet distinct communities will show us the way to not only survive but flourish in the postmodern world. Justice does not compete with difference; it grows out of it.
An excellent study, it should be read by any and all, though the jargon cannot help but be technical at times. I agree with the previous reviewer, a good second-year book for students of social work, religion, philosophy, education, or politics, and a great any-time book for anyone concerned with issues of justice in the world today.
conceptual building blocks for a better world.......1997-08-20
Iris Young makes us think about justice not as a set of debts we owe other individuals but as a set of relations between social groups. In a just society, no group is oppressed. Her chapter "Five Faces of Oppression" is a classic. She brings new insights to debates about welfare, affirmative action, and disability. This book also offers a thought-provoking discussion of community. Young argues that we have based our idea of community on the rural life of an earlier age and that city life is where we should look for ideas about how community thrives in diversity.
Young tries to write for a general audience as well as for scholars. Sometimes, she succeeds, although the parts of the book that address particular groups and their predicaments or particular social policies are more accessible than the parts in which she critiques other theories. I would recommend this book for second-year students in college and up. It marks a turning point in social and political thought.
Customer Reviews:
Predictable, Boring, and Subversive of Good Education.......2007-08-27
I recently read this book. It was, one might say, a long and hard slog. It is unfortunately in many places a standard assigned textbook. The book has three main defects. First, it is written in the most predictable, turgid, and jargon-filled academic-ese I've ever seen. Instead of saying something was important it had "ontological reality," knowledge became "epistemological units," etc. Sentences were long, with far too many modifiers, and otherwise filled with classic academic writing errata. Nearly everyone who contributed to this collection should attend serious writing workshops. I realize some of them are not capable of writing well, but it couldn't hurt. Second, the entire work assumes the conclusion. It is taken for granted that education is not chiefly about giving young people the tools to think critically, criticize and advocate for their own values, and otherwise become effective and self-guiding participants in a democracy. Instead, 100% of the authors assume that the society is basically corrupt and that social justice means, in effect, the advance of politically correct values: indifference to homosexuality, suspicion of merit, suspicion of the traditional family, and undermining the traditional power structure of the western world. And, secondly, 100% of the authors take for granted that education's job is to raise the consciousness of students in so doing. That is to say, it is assumed that there is one right answer to contentious social issues, that "consciousness raising" is the answer to the problems, that families and other authorities that disagree with this view are malevolent obstructionists, that if necessary these groups should be misled about wat will be pursued in the classroom (since they'd resist otherwise), and that education should essentially brainwash young and impressionable kids into compliant liberals before they've acquired effective critical thinking skills. Finally, the book does not grapple with developments in genetics and psychometrics that raise serious questions about the now increasingly discredited mantra that "parental socioeconomic status matters more than IQ/Test Scores, etc." Obviously, Hernnstein and Murray's "Bell Curve" is worth reading on this score, but also Arthur Jensen's "G Factor." Minority failure is a troubling part of the educational scene; unfortunately, the prescription offered here is the same old ineffective program of spending more, defining deviancy down, and passing the buck that remains onto mysterious "institutional racists."
Book Description
A liberal society seeks not to impose a single way of life, but to leave its citizens as free as possible to choose their own values and ends. It therefore must govern by principles of justice that do not presuppose any particular vision of the good life. But can any such principles be found? And if not, what are the consequences for justice as a moral and political ideal? These are the questions Michael Sandel takes up in this penetrating critique of contemporary liberalism. This new edition includes a new introduction and a new final chapter in which Professor Sandel responds to the later work of John Rawls.
Average customer rating:
- The best book on justice in 25 years
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The State and Justice: An Essay in Political Theory
Milton Fisk
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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Political
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ASIN: 0521389666 |
Book Description
Offering a new political theory combining elements from the Marxist and liberal traditions, this book presents a disturbing view of the contemporary state at war with itself. This internal conflict stems from the state's having the double task of spurring on the economy and protecting the welfare and rights of all its citizens. Such conflict does not end at national boundaries but extends through the system of any imperial state. This perspective illuminates the fractures and instability within the imperial system.
Customer Reviews:
The best book on justice in 25 years.......2007-05-06
The best book on justice in 25 years, May 6, 2007
Milton Fisk, emeritus prof of philosophy at the Univ. of Indiana, had written a genuinely profound and imaginative rethinking of the political theory of justice, perhaps the single most original and important contribution to the subject since Rawls and Nozick. This is not an exaggeration. Unlike much political philosophy since Rawls, Fisk is not content to either rehash or fine-tune Rawls; he is -- to my mind correctly -- dismissive of Rawls as offering an unrealizable "ideal justice" that fails to make contact with social and political reality. Writing from the left, he has as little tolerance for Nozick with his "fall from the sky" natural rights that offer defenses of the indefenisble. Instead, Fisk develops a socially grounded account of justice as a compromise between what the ruling groups can impose and what the ruled will put up with. Since this is variable there is no one correct theory of justice. Moreover Fisk envisages a radical justice, the compromise that would be imposed if the ruled were the ruling groups, and discusses how the impulse towards justice can help bring such a state of affairs about. Unlike a lot of academic philosophers, Fisk writes clear, unpretentious, accessible prose with lively examples. This book is in my mind abolsutely crucial for anyone seriously interested in justice as a topic. -- Andie Nachgeborenen, law professor in Chicago; Ph.D. (philosophy) Michigan.
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