Political Sociology

Deutschland im Jahr 2019. Billig, konsumfreundlich und auf Nur-nicht-drüber-Nachdenken getrimmt. Gewerkschaften gelten als unsexy, faire Bezahlung ist kein Thema. Dabei gibt es immer mehr Menschen, deren Einkommen nicht zum Leben reicht. Investigativ-Autorin Anette Dowideit nimmt die Löhne und Gehälter verschiedener Branchen unter die Lupe und fragt: Wer ist eigentlich noch Mittelschicht? Ehemals angesehene Berufe rutschen in Richtung Prekariat ab: Pilot, Stewardess, Lehrer, Krankenschwester.

Eamonn McCann’s account of what it is like to grow up a Catholic in a Northern Irish ghetto - first published in 1974 - quickly became a classic account of the feelings generated by British rule. The author was at the center of events in Derry which first brought Northern Ireland to world attention. He witnessed the gradual transformation of the civil rights movement from a mild campaign for “British Democracy” to an all-out military assault on the British state. This book describes the people involved in the war and gives an account of the springs of the "Catholic" opposition.

Once upon a time, any mention of California triggered unpleasant reminders of Ronald Reagan and right-wing tax revolts, ballot propositions targeting undocumented immigrants, and racist policing that sparked two of the nation's most devastating riots. In fact, California confronted many of the challenges the rest of the country faces now - decades before the rest of us. Today, California is leading the way on addressing climate change, low-wage work, immigrant integration, overincarceration, and more.

Here Edgeofsports.com sportswriter Dave Zirin shows how sports express the worst, as well as the most creative and exciting, features of American society. Zirin explores how Janet Jackson's Super Bowl flash-time show exposed more than a breast, why the labor movement has everything to learn from sports unions, and why a new generation of athletes is no longer content to "play one game at a time" and is starting to get political.

Taboo!: The Hidden Culture of a Red Light Area is a journey of discovery into the infamous red-light district of Lahore, Pakistan, known as the Shahi Mohalla (the Royal Bazaar) or Heera Mandi (the market of diamonds). The phenomenon of prostitution coupled with music and dance performances has ancient roots in South Asia. Regardless of the stigma attached to prostitution, it has for centuries given rise to many well-known performing artists. Here author Fouzia Saeed paints a more realistic picture of the phenomenon.

On the Swiss border with Austria in 1938, a police captain refuses to enforce a law barring Jewish refugees from entering his country. In the Balkans half a century later, a Serb from the war-blasted city of Vukovar defies his superiors in order to save the lives of Croats. At the height of the Second Intifada, a member of Israel's most elite military unit informs his commander he doesn't want to serve in the occupied territories.

Beautiful Souls explores the flipside of the banality of evil, mapping out what impels ordinary people to defy the sway of authority and convention.

There is a war going on for the future of our country. Most people know that. What they may not know is that if Christians lose, the result won't merely be enduring public policy we disagree with, it will be a prison sentence for those who oppose it. We've all seen the attack coming. First the Supreme Court said kids can't pray in school. Then the Ten Commandments were ripped from the classrooms.

For much of American history, evangelicalism was aligned with progressive political causes: nineteenth-century evangelicals fought for the abolition of slavery, universal suffrage, and public education. But contemporary conservative activists have defaulted on this majestic legacy, embracing instead an agenda virtually indistinguishable from the Republican Party platform.

In a series of 10 essays, spanning five centuries of history, beginning with the conquest of Mexico by Hermán Cortés and ending in 1992 San Francisco, Rodriguez explores the conflicts of race, religion, and cultural identity for Mexican-Americans across the landscape of his beloved California.

Was bedeutet es, eine Ost-Identität auferlegt zu bekommen? Eine Identität, die für die rasant wachsende gesellschaftliche Spaltung verantwortlich gemacht wird? Der Attribute wie Populismus, ein mangelndes Demokratieverständnis, Rassismus, Verschwörungsmythen und Armut zugeschrieben werden? Der Leipziger Germanist Dirk Oschmann zeigt in seinem augenöffnenden Text, dass der Westen sich über dreißig Jahre nach Mauerfall als Norm definiert und den Osten als Abweichung. Unsere Medien, Politik, Wirtschaft und Wissenschaft werden von westdeutschen Perspektiven dominiert.

Quando noi italiani pensiamo alla nazione che vorremmo diventare, cosa ci viene in mente? Probabilmente vorremmo avere un'economia in grande crescita e la piena occupazione: un paese in cui chiunque voglia lavorare possa farlo. Vorremmo avere le migliori università del pianeta e bellezze naturali adeguatamente valorizzate, prodotti culturali dall'influenza globale e la possibilità di definire «made in Italy» non solo un paio di scarpe ma anche un'app capace di costruire il futuro e un'idea che sappia cambiare il mondo.

From the bottom to the top of our economy, capitalism is too blunt an instrument to tackle Britain's epidemic of inequality. Soaring rents, unfair taxation and a growing gig economy have brought about unprecedented economic shame: Amazon warehouse workers living in tents, nurses turning to foodbanks, London firemen commuting hundreds of miles to work. Even those higher up the ladder are losing their grip on the life they were promised.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and the American Book Award, the best-selling Common Ground is much more than the story of the busing crisis in Boston as told through the experiences of three families. As Studs Terkel remarked, it's "gripping, indelible...a truth about all large American cities."

Bank Job is a white-knuckle ride into the dark heart of the global financial system. Discover how art hacks life as artist and filmmaker duo Hilary Powell and Dan Edelstyn bring a community together to buy up and abolish crippling debt by printing their own money in a disused bank in East London. Behind the opaque language of loans and the defunct diagrams of debt, they discover a system flawed by design and ripe for hacking.

Truth Has a Power of Its Own is an engrossing collection of never-before-published conversations with Howard Zinn, conducted by the distinguished broadcast journalist Ray Suarez in 2007, that covers the course of American history from Columbus to the War on Terror from the perspective of ordinary people - including slaves, workers, immigrants, women, and Native Americans.

In vielen europäischen Ländern sind rechte Bewegungen im Aufwind. Oder mit den Worten Jan Zielonkas: Eine Konterrevolution ist in Gang gekommen. Im Jahr 1990 sah das noch ganz anders aus. Der Eiserne Vorhang war gefallen und Zielonkas Lehrer Ralf Dahrendorf begrüßte eine Revolution in Europa; es herrschten Euphorie und Aufbruchsstimmung.

Ever since the 2016 election, pundits have been saying our country has never been more divided - that if progressives want to reclaim power, we need to be "pragmatic", reach across the aisle, and look past identity politics. But what if we're getting the story all wrong? In The Marginalized Majority, Onnesha Roychoudhuri makes the galvanizing case that our voices are already the majority - and that our plurality of identities is not only our greatest strength, but is also at the indisputable core of successful progressive change throughout history.

Drawing on more than a decade of research and hundreds of interviews, Robert Wuthnow brings us into America's small towns, farms, and rural communities to paint a rich portrait of the moral order -the interactions, loyalties, obligations, and identities - underpinning this critical segment of the nation. Wuthnow demonstrates that to truly understand rural Americans' anger, their culture must be explored more fully. Moving beyond simplistic depictions of the residents of America's heartland, The Left Behind offers a clearer picture of how this important population will influence the nation's political future.

No one wants to be treated like an object, regarded as an item of property, or put up for sale. Yet many people frame personal autonomy in terms of self-ownership, representing themselves as property owners with the right to do as they wish with their bodies. Others do not use the language of property, but are similarly insistent on the rights of free individuals to decide for themselves whether to engage in commercial transactions for sex, reproduction, or organ sales. Drawing on analyses of rape, surrogacy, and markets in human organs, Our Bodies, Whose Property? challenges notions of freedom based on ownership of our bodies.

This international best seller shows why the Danes are happy and how we can be, too. For decades Denmark has ranked at the top of the world's happiness surveys. How is it that these 5.6 million Danes are so content when they live in a country that is dark and cold nine months of the year and where income taxes are at almost 60 percent? At a time when talk across the Western world is focused on unemployment woes, government overreach, and anti-taxation lobbies, our Danish counterparts seem to breathe a healthier and fresher air.