Women, the State, and Welfare is the first collection of essays specifically about women and welfare in the United States. As an introduction to the effects of welfare programs, it is intended for general readers as well as specialists in sociology, history, political science, social work, and women’s studies. The book begins with a review essay by Linda Gordon that outlines current scholarship about women and welfare. The chapters that follow explore discrimination against women inherent in many welfare programs; the (...) ways in which welfare programs reinforce basic gender programs in society; the contribution of organized, activist women to the development of welfare programs; and differences of race and class in the welfare system. By giving readers access to a number of perspectives about women and welfare, this book helps position gender at the center of welfare scholarship and policy making and places welfare issues at the forefront of feminist thinking and action. (shrink)

Unruly Practices brings together a series of widely discussed essays in feminism and social theory. Read together, they constitute a sustained critical encounter with leading European and American approaches to social theory. In addition, Nancy Fraser develops a new and original socialist-feminist critical theory that overcomes many of the limitations of current alternatives. First, in a series of critical essays, she deploys philosophical and literary techniques to assess the work of Michael Foucault, the French deconstructionists, Richard Rorty, and Jürgen Habermas. (...) Then, in a group of constructive essays, she incorporates their respective strengths in a new critical theory of late-capitalist political culture. Fraser breaks new ground methodologically by integrating the previously divergent insights of poststructuralism, critical social theory, feminist theory, and pragmatism. Thematically, she deals with varied forms of dominance and subordination in modern, industrial, late-capitalist societies. These themes are integrated in an original theory of 'the politics of need interpretation.' This concept becomes the linchpin of the socialist-feminist critical theory. (shrink)

Writing for a wide audience, Harvey here tells the political-economic story of where neoliberalization came from and how it proliferated on the world stage. He constructs a framework, not only for analyzing the political and economic dangers that now surround us, but also for assessing the prospects for more socially just alternatives.