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There Was a Little Girl (Matthew Hope #11)
by Ed McbainThe first bullet hit Matthew Hope in the shoulder. The second one hit him in the chest. A story about carnivals, midgets, sex, infidelity and crime.
There Was and There Was Not: A Journey Through Hate and Possibility in Turkey, Armenia, and Beyond
by Meline ToumaniA young Armenian-American goes to Turkey in a "love thine enemy" experiment that becomes a transformative reflection on how we use—and abuse—our personal historiesMeline Toumani grew up in a close-knit Armenian community in New Jersey where Turkish restaurants were shunned and products made in Turkey were boycotted. The source of this enmity was the Armenian genocide of 1915 at the hands of the Ottoman Turkish government, and Turkey's refusal to acknowledge it. A century onward, Armenian and Turkish lobbies spend hundreds of millions of dollars to convince governments, courts and scholars of their clashing versions of history.Frustrated by her community's all-consuming campaigns for genocide recognition, Toumani leaves a promising job at The New York Times and moves to Istanbul. Instead of demonizing Turks, she sets out to understand them, and in a series of extraordinary encounters over the course of four years, she tries to talk about the Armenian issue, finding her way into conversations that are taboo and sometimes illegal. Along the way, we get a snapshot of Turkish society in the throes of change, and an intimate portrait of a writer coming to terms with the issues that drove her halfway across the world.In this far-reaching quest, told with eloquence and power, Toumani probes universal questions: how to belong to a community without conforming to it, how to acknowledge a tragedy without exploiting it, and most importantly how to remember a genocide without perpetuating the kind of hatred that gave rise to it in the first place.
There's No Such Thing As "Business" Ethics: There's Only One Rule for Making Decisions
by John C. MaxwellBestselling author and expert on leadership John C. Maxwell shares the only rule that matters in business and in life. How does a person judge what is ethical? Sometimes it's clear. In the past year or two, ethical lapses in corporate America have been well documented. But is it always easy to see where the line is in life? What's the standard? And can it work in all situations? John C. Maxwell thinks it can. In THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS BUSINESS ETHICS, Maxwell shows how people can live with integrity by using the Golden Rule as their standard--regardless of religion, culture, or circumstances. Along the way, he delves into the desires of the human heart, reveals the five most common pitfalls that throw people off the ethical track, and teaches how to develop the Midas touch when it comes to personal integrity.
These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace: The Struggle for Property and Power in Early New Jersey
by Brendan McConvilleDuring the century preceding the American Revolution, bitter conflicts raged in New Jersey over control of the land tenure system. This book examines how the struggle between yeoman farmers and landed gentry shaped public life in the colony. At once a cultural, political, and social history, it carefully delineates the beliefs of rioters and upholders of order, both of whom wanted control over land. Brendan J. McConville describes how changes in provincial society--affecting politics and government, religious life, economic conditions, gender relations, and ethnic composition--led farmers to resort to violence as a means of settling property disputes. He examines the disagreements in light of competing conceptions of property held by separate landowning classes, differences in the legal and political traditions of British and Dutch colonists, and local conditions unique to New Jersey. He also considers the ways in which the lack of a shared perception of deference among Puritan, Dutch, and multi-ethnic farmers helped foster insurrection. According to McConville, the social transformations brought into sharp focus by the agrarian unrest ultimately undermined imperial control and encouraged the creation of a new American identity. His book--the recipient of the Driscoll Prize from the New Jersey Historical Commission prior to its publication--is an eagerly awaited account of a colony that has seldom been seriously examined by colonial historians and a challenge to those scholars to rethink commonly accepted arguments about the development of the United States.
These People Have Always Been a Republic: Indigenous Electorates in the U. S. -Mexico Borderlands, 1598-1912 (The David J. Weber Series in the New Borderlands History)
by Maurice S. CrandallSpanning three hundred years and the colonial regimes of Spain, Mexico, and the United States, Maurice S. Crandall's sweeping history of Native American political rights in what is now New Mexico, Arizona, and Sonora demonstrates how Indigenous communities implemented, subverted, rejected, and indigenized colonial ideologies of democracy, both to accommodate and to oppose colonial power. <p><p> Focusing on four groups--Pueblos in New Mexico, Hopis in northern Arizona, and Tohono O'odhams and Yaquis in Arizona/Sonora--Crandall reveals the ways Indigenous peoples absorbed and adapted colonially imposed forms of politics to exercise sovereignty based on localized political, economic, and social needs. Using sources that include oral histories and multinational archives, this book allows us to compare Spanish, Mexican, and American conceptions of Indian citizenship, and adds to our understanding of the centuries-long struggle of Indigenous groups to assert their sovereignty in the face of settler colonial rule.
A Thesis Resource Guide for Criminology and Criminal Justice
by Marilyn D. McShane Frank P. Williams IIIThis handbook is a comprehensive guide to developing and writing graduate level research. It takes the reader on a step-by-step journey through the entire thesis process from initial ideas to a completed product or even a published article. Examples from actual student theses provide concrete illustrations of each step and function as a starting point for one's own project. Tips for organizing tasks and completing them on time help orient readers to the research process and give them confidence to achieve their own research goals. Unique step-by-step guide for successfully completing the thesis projectfrom development through defense. Examples from theses done by students provide concrete illustrations and a starting point for ideas and discussion. Broad range of quantitative and qualitative thesis methodologies gives readers an overview of the basic tools of the research process. Tips for organizing tasks and completing the project on time. Those looking for assistance with writing a thesis.
They Came for the Schools: One Town's Fight Over Race and Identity, and the New War for America's Classrooms
by Mike HixenbaughThe urgent, revelatory story of how a school board win for the conservative right in one Texas suburb inspired a Christian nationalist campaign now threatening to undermine public education in America—from an NBC investigative reporter and co-creator of the Peabody Award–winning and Pulitzer Prize finalist Southlake podcast. Award-winning journalist Mike Hixenbaugh delivers the immersive and eye-opening story of Southlake, Texas, a district that seemed to offer everything parents would want for their children—small classes, dedicated teachers, financial resources, a track record of academic success, and school spirit in abundance. All this, until a series of racist incidents became public, a plan to promote inclusiveness was proposed in response—and a coordinated, well-funded conservative backlash erupted, lighting the fire of a national movement on the verge of changing the face of public schools across the country.They Came for the Schools pulls back the curtain on the powerful forces driving this crusade to ban books, rewrite curricula, limit rights for minority and LGBTQ students—and, most importantly, to win what Hixenbaugh’s deeply informed reporting convinces is the holy grail among those seeking to impose biblical values on American society: school privatization, one school board and one legal battle at a time.They Came for the Schools delivers an essential take on Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis, as they demean public schools and teachers and boost the Christian right’s vision. Hixenbaugh brings to light fascinating connections between this political and cultural moment and past fundamentalist campaigns to censor classroom lessons. Finally, They Came for the Schools traces the rise of a new resistance movement led by a diverse coalition of student activists, fed-up educators, and parents who are beginning to win select battles of their own: a blueprint, they hope, for gaining inclusive and civil schools for all.
"They Can Live in the Desert but Nowhere Else": A History of the Armenian Genocide
by Ronald Grigor SunyStarting in early 1915, the Ottoman Turks began deporting and killing hundreds of thousands of Armenians in the first major genocide of the twentieth century. By the end of the First World War, the number of Armenians in what would become Turkey had been reduced by ninety percent--more than a million people. A century later, the Armenian Genocide remains controversial but relatively unknown, overshadowed by later slaughters and the chasm separating Turkish and Armenian versions of events. In this definitive narrative history, Ronald Suny cuts through nationalist myths, propaganda, and denial to provide an unmatched account of when, how, and why the atrocities of 1915-16 were committed.As it lost territory during the war, the Ottoman Empire was becoming a more homogenous Turkic-Muslim state, but it still contained large non-Muslim communities, including the Christian Armenians. The Young Turk leaders of the empire believed that the Armenians were internal enemies secretly allied to Russia and plotting to win an independent state. Suny shows that the great majority of Armenians were in truth loyal subjects who wanted to remain in the empire. But the Young Turks, steeped in imperial anxiety and anti-Armenian bias, became convinced that the survival of the state depended on the elimination of the Armenians. Suny is the first to explore the psychological factors as well as the international and domestic events that helped lead to genocide.Drawing on archival documents and eyewitness accounts, this is an unforgettable chronicle of a cataclysm that set a tragic pattern for a century of genocide and crimes against humanity.
They Don't Represent Us: Reclaiming Our Democracy
by Lawrence Lessig“An impassioned call to all Americans to fight for equal representation.” — Kirkus Reviews“This bracing report on the state of American politics offers valuable insights for the 2020 elections.” — Publishers Weekly“A thoughtful, illuminating, nonpartisan, and pragmatic analysis of the changes needed to restore power to the public… In this bold and compelling book, Lessig both scrutinizes the laws and forces that led us to this point and guides us towards visionary changes that can reset and restore our faith in our democracy. Given the complexities of the tasks at hand, this a must-read and a much-needed wake up call.” — Booklist“Lessig tells it with skill, citing a plethora of studies and historical examples to make a persuasive case about the unrepresentativeness of America’s political institutions.” — New York Time Book Review“Lessig paints a searing portrait of a defective political system that is nonetheless full of hope, community spirit, self-empowered individuals, and ways to fix what is broken.” — Foreign Affairs “Lessig is right that a representative American democracy, desirable in itself, would also solve most of the problems that now seem insoluble. It is hard to imagine a more thoughtful and appealing companion in the hard work to move our system to where it ought to be: in our own hands.” — Timothy Snyder, bestselling author of On Tyranny and The Road to Unfreedom“Lessig, a leading proponent of campaign finance reform, now aims at something even bigger: fixing our broken system of representative democracy. This book is brimming with promising and provocative proposals to fix campaign finance, gerrymandering, the electoral college, the filibuster, and the mind-numbing effects of cable news and social media. It is a bold and bracing repair manual for government of, by, and for the people.” — Michael J. Sandel, bestselling author of What Money Can’t Buy“Lessig is a modern-day Paul Revere with a warning we must heed: Our representative democracy no longer represents us. The change we need is deep and serious. And it can’t be fixed with by one election, party, or politician. This urgent book offers not only a clear-eyed explanation of the forces that broke our politics, but a thoughtful and, yes, patriotic vision of how we create a government that’s truly by and for the people. We ignore his alarm at our own peril.” — David Daley, bestselling author of Ratf**ked and Unrigged“Everything Lessig writes should be carefully read. Read it, consider it, and most important, act on it. Our democracy is at stake.” — Nancy MacLean, bestselling author of Democracy in Chains“The American experiment in representative government is on life support. In his brilliant book, Lessig provides the medical record and a recommended course of care to save the patient. Every American should read it ... stat!” — Roger McNamee bestselling author of Zucked“Full of original, provocative insights and surprising stories, this book is for all who seek to create effective democracy in America.” — Frances Moore Lappé, bestselling author of Diet for a Small Planet and coauthor with Adam Eichen of Daring Democracy“Lessig proposes the making of a nonpartisan politics to breathe life into the corpse of America’s dysfunctional democracy. He does so with fierce and plainspoken clarity. A challenging work of the political imagination, unsweetened with pious cant.” — Lewis H. Lapham, editor and founder of Lapham’s Quarterly“Lessig is the thinking man’s popular
They Know Everything About You: How Data-Collecting Corporations and Snooping Government Agencies Are Destroying Democracy
by Robert Scheer Sara BeladiThey Know Everything About You is a groundbreaking exposé of how government agencies and tech corporations monitor virtually every aspect of our lives, and a fierce defense of privacy and democracy. The revelation that the government has access to a vast trove of personal online data demonstrates that we already live in a surveillance society. But the erosion of privacy rights extends far beyond big government. Intelligence agencies such as the NSA and CIA are using Silicon Valley corporate partners as their data spies. Seemingly progressive tech companies are joining forces with snooping government agencies to create a brave new world of wired tyranny. Life in the digital age poses an unprecedented challenge to our constitutional liberties, which guarantee a wall of privacy between the individual and the government. The basic assumption of democracy requires the ability of the individual to experiment with ideas and associations within a protected zone, as secured by the Constitution. The unobserved moment embodies the most basic of human rights, yet it is being squandered in the name of national security and consumer convenience. Robert Scheer argues that the information revolution, while a source of public enlightenment, contains the seeds of freedom’s destruction in the form of a surveillance state that exceeds the wildest dream of the most ingenious dictator. The technology of surveillance, unless vigorously resisted, represents an existential threat to the liberation of the human spirit.
They Must Be Monsters: A Modern-Day Witch Hunt - The Untold Story of the Mcmartin Phenomenon: The Longest, Most Expensive Criminal Case in U. S. History
by Matthew LeRoy Deric HaddadIt began on August 12, 1983, when a disturbed woman's bizarre accusation ignited hysteria across the small Southern California community of Manhattan Beach. Driven by over-zealous investigators and sensational news media, the legend of The McMartin Preschool became the "case of the century"-the longest, most expensive criminal trial in United States history. <p><p>Four years later, in the spring of 1988, in the midst of the ongoing frenzy, authors Matthew LeRoy and Deric Haddad, students at San Diego State University, left school to follow the case, a path that led them to Manhattan Beach, an upscale community where a vortex of suspicion left most residents leery of outsiders. In this instance, however, where the inquisitors were two unassuming college students, many opened their doors . . . and they had so much to say. <p><p>Through the summer of 1990, the authors conducted over one hundred interviews, as they bonded with key players on both sides of the conflict. No other journalists or network reporters were able to obtain such a diverse range of sources. Now, thirty years later, this extraordinary event comes to life. Written in a creative non-fiction format, They Must Be Monsters is told through the eyes of the "mother who started it all." Using exclusive content - her volume of lost archives-the depth of her paranoia is unveiled; the portrait of a schizophrenic woman whose dark visions became a microcosm of the community around her. These authentic, never-before-seen documents finally bring an end to the mystery behind her fateful accusations. <p><p>The events of Manhattan Beach are true, an untold story, the calamity of an upscale seaside town gripped by fear, where friends turned on neighbors in a frantic campaign of misguided retribution-a devastating crucible that afflicted a generation of innocent people, an event eerily similar to the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. It's a tale of horror, rage, superstition, and faith; a shameful moment in American folklore that's been erroneously ignored by historians - a great injustice that should've never taken place-but, as history tends to repeat itself, most tragically did.
"They Take Our Jobs!": and 20 Other Myths about Immigration, Expanded Edition
by Aviva ChomskyRevised and expanded edition of the groundbreaking book which demystifies twenty-one of the most widespread myths and beliefs about immigrants and immigrations.Aviva Chomsky dismantles twenty-one of the most widespread and pernicious myths and beliefs about immigrants and immigration in this incisive book. "They Take Our Jobs!" challenges the underlying assumptions that fuel misinformed claims about immigrants, radically altering our notions of citizenship, discrimination, and US history. With fresh material including a new introduction, revised timeline, and updated terminology section, this expanded edition is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how these myths are used to promote aggressive anti-immigrant policies.
"They Take Our Jobs!" And 20 Other Myths About Immigration: And 20 Other Myths about Immigration (Myths Made in America)
by Aviva ChomskyIn the spirit of her famous father, Chomsky (Latin American studies, Salem State College, Massachusetts) has been active in Latin American solidarity and immigrant rights issues for over a quarter of a century. Among the myths she dispels are that immigrants send most of what they earn out of the country, they threaten the national culture by refusing to assimilate, that countries need to control who goes in and out, and that the American public opposes immigration. She has not indexed her work. Annotation ©2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
They Wished They Were Honest: The Knapp Commission and New York City Police Corruption
by Michael ArmstrongIn fifty years of prosecuting and defending criminal cases in New York City and elsewhere,Michael F. Armstrong has often dealt with cops. For a single two-year span, as chief counsel to the Knapp Commission, he was charged with investigating them. Based on Armstrong's vivid recollections of this watershed moment in law enforcement accountability—prompted by the New York Times's report on whistleblower cop Frank Serpico—They Wished They Were Honest recreates the dramatic struggles and significance of the Commission and explores the factors that led to its success and the restoration of the NYPD's public image.Serpico's charges against the NYPD encouraged Mayor John Lindsay to appoint prominent attorney Whitman Knapp to chair a Citizen's Commission on police graft. Overcoming a number of organizational, budgetary, and political hurdles, Chief Counsel Armstrong cobbled together an investigative group of a half-dozen lawyers and a dozen agents. Just when funding was about to run out, the "blue wall of silence" collapsed. A flamboyant "Madame," a corrupt lawyer, and a weasely informant led to a "super thief" cop, who was trapped and "turned" by the Commission. This led to sensational and revelatory hearings, which publicly refuted the notion that departmental corruption was limited to only a "few rotten apples."In the course of his narrative, Armstrong illuminates police investigative strategy; governmental and departmental political maneuvering; ethical and philosophical issues in law enforcement; the efficacy (or lack thereof) of the police's anticorruption efforts; the effectiveness of the training of police officers; the psychological and emotional pressures that lead to corruption; and the effects of police criminality on individuals and society. He concludes with the effects, in today's world, of Knapp and succeeding investigations into police corruption and the value of permanent outside monitoring bodies, such as the special prosecutor's office, formed in response to the Commission's recommendation, as well as the current monitoring commission, of which Armstrong is chairman.
They Would Never Hurt a Fly
by Slavenka Drakulic"Who were they? Ordinary people like you or me—or monsters?” asks internationally acclaimed author Slavenka Drakulic as she sets out to understand the people behind the horrific crimes committed during the war that tore apart Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Drawing on firsthand observations of the trials, as well as on other sources, Drakulic portrays some of the individuals accused of murder, rape, torture, ordering executions, and more during one of the most brutal conflicts in Europe in the twentieth century, including former Serbian president Slobodan Miloševic; Radislav Krstic, the first to be sentenced for genocide; Biljana Plavšic, the only woman accused of war crimes; and Ratko Mladic, now in hiding. With clarity and emotion, Drakulic paints a wrenching portrait of a country needlessly torn apart. .
They Wouldn't Let Us Die: The Prisoners of War Tell Their Story
by Stephen A. RowanInterviews with American POWs illuminate their captivity in Vietnamese camps and the emotional and physical horrors that they experienced. <p><p> Immediately after their release from captivity in Vietnam, veteran broadcast journalist Rowan set out to discover how the POWs were able to survive their long years of physical and mental torture. In this classic, he presents twelve gripping interviews with the true heroes of that era: Navy Lieutenant Commander John S. McCain, Marine Corps pilot Ernest Brace, and Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Robert L. Stirm, among them.
Thick: Personal Autonomy in Ethics and Bioethics (Philosophical Studies Series #146)
by James F. Childress Michael QuanteThis book explores, in rich and rigorous ways, the possibilities and limitations of “thick” (concepts of) autonomy in light of contemporary debates in philosophy, ethics, and bioethics. Many standard ethical theories and practices, particularly in domains such as biomedical ethics, incorporate minimal, formal, procedural concepts of personal autonomy and autonomous decisions and actions. Over the last three decades, concerns about the problems and limitations of these “thin” concepts have led to the formulation of “thick” concepts that highlight the mental, corporeal, biographical and social conditions of what it means to be a human person and that enrich concepts of autonomy, with direct implications for the ethical requirement to respect autonomy. The chapters in this book offer a wide range of perspectives on both the elements of and the relations (both positive and negative) between “thin” and “thick” concepts of autonomy as well as their relative roles and importance in ethics and bioethics. This book offers valuable and illuminating examinations of autonomy and respect for autonomy, relevant for audiences in philosophy, ethics, and bioethics.
Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen Our Country and Its Time to Take It Back
by Jim HightowerIn Thieves in High Places, Jim Hightower takes on the Kleptocrats, Wobblycrats, and Bushites with hilarious results. Digging up behind-the-scenes dirt on stories the corporate news media overlooks (and don’t get him started on them!), Hightower reveals the real stories behind BushCo’s "Friday Night Massacres," what’s happened to our food, and the Bush plan for empire. With grassroots solutions, drawing on Hightower’s national Rolling Thunder Down- Home Democracy Tour—a traveling festival of rebellion against every tentacle of the corporate-politico power grab—Hightower is tapping into the activist network that is thriving at kitchen tables all over America. This is the real America the rest of the world doesn’t get to see, delivered with Hightower’s own hilarious brand of wit and outrage.
Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security
by Sarah ChayesA former adviser to the Joint Chiefs of Staff explains how government's oldest problem is its greatest destabilizing force. The world is blowing up. Every day a new blaze seems to ignite: the bloody implosion of Iraq and Syria; the East-West standoff in Ukraine; abducted schoolgirls in northern Nigeria. Is there some thread tying these frightening international security crises together? In a riveting account that weaves history with fast-moving reportage and insider accounts from the Afghanistan war, Sarah Chayes identifies the unexpected link: corruption. Since the late 1990s, corruption has reached such an extent that some governments resemble glorified criminal gangs, bent solely on their own enrichment. These kleptocrats drive indignant populations to extremes--ranging from revolution to militant puritanical religion. Chayes plunges readers into some of the most venal environments on earth and examines what emerges: Afghans returning to the Taliban, Egyptians overthrowing the Mubarak government (but also redesigning Al-Qaeda), and Nigerians embracing both radical evangelical Christianity and the Islamist terror group Boko Haram. In many such places, rigid moral codes are put forth as an antidote to the collapse of public integrity. The pattern, moreover, pervades history. Through deep archival research, Chayes reveals that canonical political thinkers such as John Locke and Machiavelli, as well as the great medieval Islamic statesman Nizam al-Mulk, all named corruption as a threat to the realm. In a thrilling argument connecting the Protestant Reformation to the Arab Spring, Thieves of State presents a powerful new way to understand global extremism. And it makes a compelling case that we must confront corruption, for it is a cause--not a result--of global instability.
Thieves of Virtue: When Bioethics Stole Medicine (Basic Bioethics)
by Tom KochAn argument against the “lifeboat ethic” of contemporary bioethics that views medicine as a commodity rather than a tradition of care and caring.Bioethics emerged in the 1960s from a conviction that physicians and researchers needed the guidance of philosophers in handling the issues raised by technological advances in medicine. It blossomed as a response to the perceived doctor-knows-best paternalism of the traditional medical ethic and today plays a critical role in health policies and treatment decisions. Bioethics claimed to offer a set of generally applicable, universally accepted guidelines that would simplify complex situations. In Thieves of Virtue, Tom Koch contends that bioethics has failed to deliver on its promises. Instead, he argues, bioethics has promoted a view of medicine as a commodity whose delivery is predicated not on care but on economic efficiency.At the heart of bioethics, Koch writes, is a “lifeboat ethic” that assumes “scarcity” of medical resources is a natural condition rather than the result of prior economic, political, and social choices. The idea of natural scarcity requiring ethical triage signaled a shift in ethical emphasis from patient care and the physician's responsibility for it to neoliberal accountancies and the promotion of research as the preeminent good. The solution to the failure of bioethics is not a new set of simplistic principles. Koch points the way to a transformed medical ethics that is humanist, responsible, and defensible.
Thieves of Virtue
by Tom KochBioethics emerged in the 1960s from a conviction that physicians and researchers needed the guidance of philosophers in handling the issues raised by technological advances in medicine. It blossomed as a response to the perceived doctor-knows-best paternalism of the traditional medical ethic and today plays a critical role in health policies and treatment decisions. Bioethics claimed to offer a set of generally applicable, universally accepted guidelines that would simplify complex situations. In Thieves of Virtue, Tom Koch argues that bioethics has failed to deliver on its promises. Instead, he argues, bioethics has promoted a view of medicine as a commodity whose delivery is predicated not on care but on economic efficiency. Koch questions the "founding myths" of bioethics by which moral philosophers became practical ethicists who served as adjudicators of medical practice and planning. High philosophy, he argues, does not provide a guide to the practical dilemmas that arise at the bedside of sick patients. Nobody, he writes, carries Kant to a clinical consult. At the heart of bioethics, Koch writes, is a "lifeboat ethic" that assumes "scarcity" of medical resources is a natural condition rather than the result of prior economic, political, and social choices. The idea of natural scarcity requiring ethical triage signaled a shift in ethical emphasis from patient care and the physician's responsibility for it to neoliberal accountancies and the promotion of research as the preeminent good. The solution to the failure of bioethics is not a new set of simplistic principles. Koch points the way to a transformed medical ethics that is humanist, responsible, and defensible.
Thin Blue Lie: The Failure of High-Tech Policing
by Matt StroudA wide-ranging investigation of how supposedly transformative technologies adopted by law enforcement have actually made policing worse—lazier, more reckless, and more discriminatoryAmerican law enforcement is a system in crisis. After explosive protests responding to police brutality and discrimination in Baltimore, Ferguson, and a long list of other cities, the vexing question of how to reform the police and curb misconduct stokes tempers and fears on both the right and left. In the midst of this fierce debate, however, most of us have taken for granted that innovative new technologies can only help. During the early 90s, in the wake of the infamous Rodney King beating, police leaders began looking to corporations and new technologies for help. In the decades since, these technologies have—in theory—given police powerful, previously unthinkable faculties: the ability to incapacitate a suspect without firing a bullet (Tasers); the capacity to more efficiently assign officers to high-crime areas using computers (Compstat); and, with body cameras, a means of defending against accusations of misconduct.But in this vivid, deeply-reported book, Matt Stroud shows that these tools are overhyped and, in many cases, ineffective. Instead of wrestling with tough fundamental questions about their work, police leaders have looked to technology as a silver bullet and stood by as corporate interests have insinuated themselves ever deeper into the public institution of law enforcement. With a sweeping history of these changes, Thin Blue Lie is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand how policing became what it is today.
Thin Sympathy: A Strategy to Thicken Transitional Justice (Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights)
by Joanna R. QuinnTransitional justice, commonly defined as the process of confronting the legacies of past human rights abuses and atrocities, often does not produce the kinds of results that are imagined. In multiethnic, divided societies like Uganda, people who have not been directly affected by harm, atrocity, and abuse go about their daily lives without ever confronting what happened in the past. When victims and survivors raise their voices to ask for help, or when plans are announced to address that harm, it is this unaffected population that see such plans as pointless. They complain about what they perceive as the "needless" time and money that will be spent to fix something that they see as unimportant and, ultimately, block any restorative processes.Joanna R. Quinn spent twenty years working in Uganda and uses its particular case as a lens through which she examines the failure of deeply divided societies to acknowledge the past. She proposes that the needed remedy is the development of a very rudimentary understanding—what she calls "thin sympathy"—among individuals in each of the different factions and groups of the other's suffering prior to establishing any transitional justice process. Based on 440 extensive interviews with elites and other thought leaders in government, traditional institutions, faith groups, and NGOs, as well as with women and children throughout the country, Thin Sympathy argues that the acquisition of a basic understanding of what has taken place in the past will enable the development of a more durable transitional justice process.
Things Are Never So Bad That They Can't Get Worse: Inside the Collapse of Venezuela
by William NeumanRichly reported...a thorough and important history." -Tim Padgett, The New York Times A nuanced and deeply-reported account of the collapse of Venezuela, and what it could mean for the rest of the world.Today, Venezuela is a country of perpetual crisis—a country of rolling blackouts, nearly worthless currency, uncertain supply of water and food, and extreme poverty. In the same land where oil—the largest reserve in the world—sits so close to the surface that it bubbles from the ground, where gold and other mineral resources are abundant, and where the government spends billions of dollars on public works projects that go abandoned, the supermarket shelves are bare and the hospitals have no medicine. Twenty percent of the population has fled, creating the largest refugee exodus in the world, rivaling only war-torn Syria’s crisis. Venezuela’s collapse affects all of Latin America, as well as the United States and the international community.Republicans like to point to Venezuela as the perfect example of the emptiness of socialism, but it is a better model for something else: the destructive potential of charismatic populist leadership. The ascent of Hugo Chávez was a precursor to the emergence of strongmen that can now be seen all over the world, and the success of the corrupt economy he presided over only lasted while oil sold for more than $100 a barrel. Chávez’s regime and policies, which have been reinforced under Nicolás Maduro, squandered abundant resources and ultimately bankrupted the country.Things Are Never So Bad That They Can’t Get Worse is a fluid combination of journalism, memoir, and history that chronicles Venezuela’s tragic journey from petro-riches to poverty. Author William Neuman witnessed it all firsthand while living in Caracas and serving as the New York Times Andes Region Bureau Chief. His book paints a clear-eyed, riveting, and highly personal portrait of the crisis unfolding in real time, with all of its tropical surrealism, extremes of wealth and suffering, and gripping drama. It is also a heartfelt reflection of the country’s great beauty and vibrancy—and the energy, passion, and humor of its people, even under the most challenging circumstances.
Think and Act Anew: How Poverty in America Affects Us All and What We Can Do About It
by Larry SnyderA call to action that challenges government, business, and individuals to reexamine poverty in America and to devise new, sustainable solutions. In Think and Act Anew, Larry Snyder, president of Catholic Charities USA, asserts that poverty in America can be reduced or eliminated only if we take a fresh look at "the poor" and understand that there are as many causes of poverty as there are people. Looking at the lives of the millions of people who rely on Catholic Charities agencies for their basic needs, like housing, food, and healthcare, Snyder shows how the recent economic meltdown has affected Americans from every walk of life. Think and Act Anew also includes portraits of those who have fallen into poverty, such as a Tucson family that lost everything in the mortgage crisis and a life-long construction worker from Little Rock now on food stamps. It also includes examples of individuals, organizations, and local governments who are taking a new look at how we serve the poor, such as a celebrity chef in Washington, D. C. , who uses his talents to feed the hungry and to train them for jobs in the food industry, and innovative programs like the Harlem Children's Zone. Snyder draws on Catholic social teaching-particularly Pope Benedict XVI's Caritas in Veritate that declares the inherent dignity of all human beings and maintains that charity and justice are the core principles on which economic decisions must be based. Book jacket.