Civil Rights: Rhetoric or Reality

Book Description

It is now more than three decades since the historic Supreme Court decision on desegregation, Brown v. Board of Education. Thomas Sowell takes a tough, factual look at what has actually happened over these decades -- as distinguished from the hopes with which they began or the rhetoric with which they continue, Who has gained and who has lost? Which of the assumptions behind the civil rights revolution have stood the test of time and which have proven to be mistaken or even catastrophic to those who were supposed to be helped?

Customer Reviews:

As If It Were Written Last Week.......2007-07-14

This work was written over twenty years ago yet it remains as relevant as ever, which is either a testament to Sowell's genius or it's a sad indicator of how little we've moved towards becoming a color-blind society.

The Civil Rights movement is arguably the most important social movement in the history of the U.S. Sowell's mission is to examine its vision, question its assumptions and assess its results. In his typical iconoclastic fashion Sowell parses through the conjecture dispelling myths, shedding light on why many of the promises of the movement have yet come to fruition.

One of Sowell's main points is that discrimination is not the sole explanation for differences between groups. In addition Sowell explains how the movement ran into problems when it shifted its focus from fighting for equal opportunity to equality of results.

Sowell jam packs wisdom and head hurting logic in this slim volume. This work is highly recommended for anyone who not only wants to understand the major events and ideas of this social movement, but also wants a perspective free from the usual dogma and colorful rhetoric.

still true.......2007-06-06

Written over 20 years ago, still true. Very well researched, highly recommended.

If you just read one book by Thomas Sowell.......2006-08-31

If you just read one book by Thomas Sowell, then read this. It is a short 140 pages, but still sustains the case that "There is neither evidence nor pretense of evidence for the proposition that all groups are prepared to make the same sacrifices to achieve the same ends." In other words: culture matters.

Sowell begins by documenting the differences in outcomes between cultural groups. Chinese only make up five percent of the population of Malaysia, but they are about twice as wealthy as Malaysians (page 20). Furthermore, Chinese have achieved this despite being the victims of institutional discrimination that is actually written into the Malaysian Constitution. The Malaysian government also has an affirmative action program comparable to what we have in America. But after a decade there has been no effect; Chinese still are about twice as wealthy (page 111). You cannot attribute this to under enforcement since Malays make up the vast majority of the population and the Chinese are only a small minority.

The success of the Chinese is no accident. They work hard. In the lower classes, Chinese did most of the work in mining and industrial occupations. They were later imported to South Africa to do similar work, but were then expelled because white workers could not compete. Most rickshaw pullers in Siam were Chinese because the Siamese would not stoop to doing that work. In Bangkok the Chinese were known for waking the earliest and working the longest hours. In the United States, Chinese workers did much of the railroad construction; it is rough, physical work that Whites typically refused (page 27). At the higher socioeconomic classes, Chinese are disproportionately likely to engage in fields with rigorous mathematical demands such as engineering and the hard sciences. Chinese outnumber Malays eight to one in science and fifteen to one in engineering. Similar patterns are found in the United States.

This pattern is not unique to the Chinese. Jews have outperformed the native populations just about everywhere. This is also true of Armenians in the Middle East and Africa, and Italians in Argentina (page 20), and German farmers in the United States (page 47). (In Race and Culture: A World View Sowell provides many other examples such as the Gujaratis from India).

Sowell then concentrates on the role of blacks in the United States. The "equality of opportunity" civil rights movement (not to be confused with "equality of outcomes" movement that employees income redistribution) has been meaningful and profound. For example, college educated black males with six years of work experience have seen their earnings rise from 75% of whites to 98% of whites (page 52). In 1969, the economist Richard Freeman examined black and white homes with comparable rates of library cards and magazines, as well as for comparable schooling, and found no difference in earnings (page 80). This was before programs like affirmative action were put into place. In 1984, blacks of West Indian descent earn 94% of what whites make, compared to 62% for blacks as a whole (page 77). This is hard to reconcile with racism; a racist does not care about the about the cultural background of someone with dark skin. In a similar vein, married, two-income black couples make slightly more than comparable white couples (page 52). College educated black males with six years of work experience make 98% of what comparable whites make.

The "equality of outcomes" civil rights movement has not been effective. From 1969 to 1984, earnings for Puerto-Ricans, Mexicans-Americans, and blacks all slightly declined (page 51).

Another section of the book focuses on civil rights for women. At the time the book's publishing in 1984, women only made 59% of what men made. But that pay gap does not withstand scrutiny. Never-married women made 91% of what comparable never-married men made (page 92). And the remaining nine percent difference should not be put on discrimination because at higher levels of education women are less likely to pursue high paying technical careers in engineering and the sciences. At lower levels women are less likely to pursue (or be physically suited to) high paying work in construction, mining, and other physically demanding fields. Finally, single women who become mothers will have to make tradeoffs at work that will affect their earnings. This is shown by the fact that even in 1971, women who stayed single into their 30's and worked continuously had higher incomes than comparable men (page 93). The conclusion is that marriage allows men to work hard because their wives take on a disproportionate share of the housework and childrearing. But marriage and childrearing causes women to work less. Even when women reenter the workforce, their skills have become partially obsolete, and thus they receive lower pay.

Finally, it should be noted that racism without institutional oppression is self-defeating. Racist attitudes in the early 20th century caused Japanese to get lower pay than whites. But as it became clear that the Japanese worked harder, that trend actually reversed and Japanese became more highly paid than whites (page 114). Paying whites more money put farmers with white workers at a competitive disadvantage. It was either hire Japanese, or go out of business. The biding war for Japanese labor stopped when Japanese were paid their fair wage - more than whites. When profits collide with racism, profits usually win. This is why racists usually seek to put their attitudes into law. That way you can stop people from backsliding and paying Japanese more money to lure them away from their current job. The same principle applies to discrimination against women. Hiring men would nearly double the cost of labor. Someone who is either less sexist (or more profit-driven) could make a killing by hiring women at almost half the price. Paying men above and beyond their market rate is the fast track to bankruptcy.

Another book that I would recommend is The Marriage Problem: How Our Culture Has Weakened Families by James Q. Wilson. It directly tackles the research showing the primary cause of poverty is the breakdown of marriage.

Eye opener.......2004-09-14

This book gives a good look into the misconceptions that many people have about the Civil Rights movement. Sowell keeps his examples simple and easy to follow. Anyone who reads this book will come away with a better understanding of what the Civil Rights movement was all about. What makes this book even better is the reader will come away with a better understanding of how the topic of Civil Rights is often manipulated for political gain.

Jesse Jackson's nightmare.......2004-05-12

Although written 20 years ago, Thomas Sowell's book about the Civil Rights Movement reads like it was penned last month. Unlike many academics that simply take social policy at face value and support any policy that sets out to help, Economist Dr. Sowell measures the success of initiatives against their purported intentions. This is a great formula for honest education, but it doesn't win many friends in academia.

Sowell demonstrates how discrimination alone does not result in poverty. He points out the success of the Chinese minority in many Asian countries where discrimination against the Chinese is written into the constitution. He also points out the many hardships put towards Jews in history and their accumulation of wealth despite the hardships.

He shows some curiosity in how striving for equal opportunity in America eventually became affirmative action. He has the same curiosity about how de-segregation became busing. He then takes a hard look at the special cases of women and blacks.

Since the book was set at the 30th anniversary of Brown v. The Board of Education and the 20th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Sowell examines the conditions of education and economics before and after those important dates. He finds just the kinds of facts that will be detested by the Civil Rights industry.

Dr. Sowell concludes that Civil Rights have become an easy way to gain favor with whatever new initiative someone might design. Now everything is a Civil Right and every new plague known to man is not usually the result of a denial of Civil Rights.

The question no one but Sowell asks is how can we expect an equal outcome in the world when humans all have different experiences and abilities? His conclusion is that the Civil Rights movement was important when Jim Crow insured unfair treatment, but now the term Civil Rights has been perverted to mean anything that gains some group or another power. In essence, the current reality of Civil Rights is, in fact, rhetoric.

Amazon.com

David Brower, elder statesman of the ecology movement, reflects on his half-century of controversial environmental activism as former Sierra Club executive director and founder of Friends of the Earth and Earth Island Institute. Sparing no sacred cows - himself least of all - Brower outlines his plan to save our planet. Recalling past glories and stinging defeats - Glen Canyon Dam chief among them - Brower outlines his modest yet thoroughly plausible plan to rescue Mother Earth for the next generation. An intellectually moving and emotionally stirring book, Brower challenges readers to change their ways because, as he says, it's not too late to administer CPR for an ailing planet if we all work together to win the crucial battles for the Earth.

Book Description

Credited with galvanizing an entire generation of environmentalists in the 60's, David Brower, the highly respected "archdruid" of the modern environmental movement, recalls with wit and wisdom his 50 years of controversial activism and offers an inspired strategy for the next generation of "those who would save the Earth."

In this intelligent and engaging chronicle of his years as an agitator for the planet, Brower points out the irony that since the first Earth Day 25 years ago, we've lost one-seventh of the world's productive land to pollution, clearcutting, and pavement-and our population has doubled! From the politics of preserving the environment and how to use New York-style PR to save tigers and dolphins, to reengineering cities, the future of hypercars, and his vision for the Earth Corps, Brower takes us on a sweeping journey of what has been and what could be if we apply CPR (Conservation, Preservation, Restoration) to our wounded world.

Customer Reviews:

Fabulous Book!.......2002-04-28

This novel was great. It was innovative and original. Unlike a lot of environmental books, this one wasn't dull or scientific. Instead, it reached out at you with it's practicality and simplicity. Brower uses real life examples to make his ideas tangible to the reader. This book was well written and is a modern Must Read. Get Inspired!... Read this book.

The archdruid at his best.......2001-01-31

The Late David Brower takes us through the journey that was his life. With explicit detail, david brower shows us the world in his eyes. His deep passion to inspire everyone with CPR ( conservation preservation restoration) and respect for the environment in which we live in is truly written with heartfelt words, and continues to move me. Founder of Friends of the Earth and Earth Island Insitute, Browers Legacy will indeed never be forgotten. Being so involved in some of the most important national monuments to be made such as dinosaur national park, his spirit and love will forever shine through in his life work to both serve and protect mother nature in all of her natural glory. Told by Brower he takes you on the path of his life, both past and to the present, giving such details of an exciting and meaningful life, such as his times with the wonderfully talented photographer the late ansel adams, work with JFK, and much more! From start to finish this book is indeed a classic, and a wonderful tribute to the late archdruid himself.

A Minor Fault--Attention Publisher.......2000-11-28

I'm about 180 pages through the book and have been marking it up extensively for future reference. Brower does an excellent job of summarizing a lot of current and older but useful thinking on environmentalism. Each time I go back to my reading, I keep wanting to refer to earlier passages, so I look for an index. In fact that's why I'm writing this brief review. I hope that the publisher sees it and actually produces one for a future edition or printing. It would be very helpful, since I'm sure I'll want to come back to the book.

Over the last several months, I've hit upon the topic of saving the earth from another author, Daniel Quinn, the author of Ishmael. The goal is the same, but Quinn offers an alternative way of thinking that I find quite interesting. I'd like to ask both Brower and Quinn what they think of one anothers approaches, but, of course, that is now impossible in the case of Brower. If anyone knows whether they have ever met or read about one another, I'd be interested in knowing their reactions to the other's work. Since Quinn's approach is not an environmentalist's approach, I doubt that they have knowledge of one another. However, Quinn is pretty savy on all aspects of saving the earth.

I don't know if I specified it was OK to show my e-mail address, but here it is if someone wants to respond: mtn_view@sirius.com.

Outstanding.......1999-05-20

Although this is somewhat irrelevant to the book itself, I'm amazed that David Brower was able to write such an articulate, evocative ecological eye-opener at the age of 82...which is not to say I applied a lower set of standards to the judging of "Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers run". Such a bias wouldn't be necessary for the book to be praised and revered by all environmentally-conscious readers who happen upon it; in this, the era of unfettered desecration and destruction of the Earth, the former president of the Sierra Club provides a much needed argument on behalf of all those who enjoy nature and, also, all those who merely want their descendants to be able to breathe . In the gentlemanly prose he maintains throughout the book, Brower explains the necessity of wildlife preservation, what the restoration of the planet would entail, and the political factors involved in the environmentalist movement; he recounts pass successes of the Sierra Club and other environmental groups, encounters with prominent individuals such as FDR and John Muir, and, when he was a boy, describing the beauty of the pristine bay area locale he grew up in to his blind mother. Aside from issuing an eloquent "call to arms to those who would save the Earth", Brower also seems to attempt to convert those who have not yet recognized how nature can enrich their lives tenfold; from dramatic descriptions of his mountaineering exploits to waxing poetic about

Book Description

How to Save a River presents in a concise and readable format the wisdom gained from years of river protection campaigns across the United States. The book begins by defining general principles of action, including getting organized, planning a campaign, building public support, and putting a plan into action. It provides detailed explanations of how to:

form an organization and raise money
develop coalitions with other groups
plan a campaign and build public support
cultivate the media and other powerful allies
develop credible alternatives to damaging projects

How to Save a River provides an important overview of the resource issues involved in river protection, and suggests sources for further investigation. Countless examples of successful river protection campaigns prove that ordinary citizens do have the power to create change when they know how to organize themselves.

River Stops Here: How One Man's Battle to, The: Save His Valley Changed the Fate of California

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River Stops Here: How One Man's Battle to, The: Save His Valley Changed the Fate of California
Ted Simon
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Real Estate | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Conservation | Environment | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books

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Riding High

ASIN: 0679428224
Release Date: 1994-09-06

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"... the book transcends the specific issues of the fight [over the Dos Rios Dam] to become a meditation on the larger issues of growth and conservation in America....a triumph---well-conceived, elegantly arranged, and eminently fair." --Audubon

Cass Save the River!/Take Care of Earth (Pair-It Books)

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Cass Save the River!/Take Care of Earth (Pair-It Books)

Manufacturer: Steck Vaughn
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0817273875

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Cheyenne Bottoms: Wetland in Jeopardy
John L. Zimmerman
Manufacturer: University Press of Kansas
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books

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Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (Cambridge Studies in Ecology)

ASIN: 0700607129

Book Description

Our wetlands are endangered. Half the acreage in the United States has disappeared since European settlers arrived a century ago.

Among the wetlands that remain, a few are outstanding for their size, location, and role in feeding and sheltering vast numbers of birds and other wildlife. Cheyenne Bottoms, way station for hundreds of thousands of migrating shorebirds, songbirds, and waterfowl, is one of the most important wetlands in North America.

Located in central Kansas, on the main migration highway between wintering grounds in South America and breeding territory in Canada, the 41,000 acre marsh called Cheyenne Bottoms is a critical refueling stop for migrating birds. It hosts 90% of the populations of five species of shorebirds as well as most of the remaining population of the endangered Whooping Crane and several other threatened and endangered species. Because of its critical role, it has been designated by treaty as a Wetland of International Importance.

Ecologist/ornithologist John Zimmerman provides an introduction to the Bottoms that is at once personal, impassioned, and technically accurate. Narrating the history of the Bottoms from its formation 100,000 years ago to the present, he describes the rich variety of birds, mammals, and reptiles that depend on it and the intricate web of interactions among them that preserves the Cheyenne Bottoms ecosystem.

But recently, Zimmerman notes, the fate of Cheyenne Bottoms has been determined by human history, not natural history. He describes the impact humans have had on the Bottoms and the complex problems created by irrigation, water rights disputes, and politics. He also chronicles the grassroots effort to save the Bottoms--a campaign that brought together conservation groups, garden clubs, grade school and high school students, and the state government. The struggle to preserve Cheyenne Bottoms, according to Zimmerman, is part of a global environmental battle that must be fought in our lifetime. "It has become the arena of confrontation," he writes, " between our desires to exploit the earth for our own short-term benefit and the altruism that will be required if we are to maintain the diversity and life-support systems of our planet. Cheyenne Bottoms is a focal point, a bridge at Concord, in the environmental revolution."

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Entering the Watershed: A New Approach To Save America's River Ecosystems
Robert Doppelt , Mary Scurlock , Chris Frissell , and James R. Karr
Manufacturer: Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Real Estate | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
Environmental Science | Earth Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
Rivers | Earth Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
Water Supply & Land Use | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 1559632755

Book Description

Entering the Watershed is the product of a two-year project established by the Pacific Rivers Council to develop new federal riverine protection and restoration policy alternatives. It recommends a comprehensive new approach to river protection based on principles of watershed dynamics, ecosystem function, and conservation biology - a nationwide, strategic community- and ecosystem-based watershed restoration initiative. The book:

describes in detail the existing level of damage to rivers and species
analyzes flaws and gaps in existing policy
provides the framework necessary to develop new policies
outlines the scientific underpinnings and management strategies needed in new policy
makes specific policy proposals

The Fight of the Salmon People: Blending Tribal Tradition with Modern Science to Save Sacred Fish

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The Fight of the Salmon People: Blending Tribal Tradition with Modern Science to Save Sacred Fish
Douglas W. Dompier
Manufacturer: Xlibris Corporation
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Fish & Aquariums | Animal Care & Pets | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 1413492967

Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run: A Call to Save the Earth

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Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run: A Call to Save the Earth
David Brower
Manufacturer: Sierra Club Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals

ASIN: 157805138X

Book Description

As executive director of the Sierra Club through the 1950s and '60s, Brower spearheaded its landmark campaigns, launched its publishing program, and, in Jerry Mander's words, "essentially vaulted the ecology movement into a major international force." Above all, as Amory Lovins observes, Brower was the movement's charismatic pied piper, inspiring countless young people--Lovins included--"to give up safe, conventional . . . unrewarding career tracks . . . to save the world."
This small but incendiary and vastly entertaining volume, now back in print after a few years' absence, is vintage Brower, recounting events from his life and times as preludes to his siren songs on behalf of the Earth. His voice is, as always, erudite but never pedantic, beautifully cadenced, infuriatingly opinionated, and spiced with dry humor. And his insights are uncannily prescient, with projects he called for in the early 1990s now coming to pass: the adoption of hybrid cars, urban core infilling, wildlife corridors, and more. We also get telling glimpses of Brower's other sides: as a leading mountaineer and officer in the famed 10th Mountain Division during World War II and as an innovative and discerning editor.
It is wholly typical of the man that his tale begins at a Grateful Dead concert, where he is composing a speech in his head, puzzling out how to move the young audience to as much passion for conservation as they express for their music. With this delightful book available once again, still more young (and not-so-young) people can be moved by Brower's words.

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