Quixote's Ghost
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$45.00 (05)Description
American social policy, writes David Stoesz, is currently experiencing an alarming paradigm shift. Quixote's Ghost, a provocative new analysis of the ideological fight for control of American social welfare policy, demonstrates how the Right pirated the pragmatism championed by the Left since the New Deal and what that means for the future of social policy. Stoesz's fascinating account documents how conservative think tanks arose to combat the dominance of liberal intellectualism in the university system, and by now have taken command of the "means of analysis," flooding Congress with proposals and effectively shifting American public philosophy from liberalism to conservatism. While the Right devoted enormous amounts of energy in reconstructing social policy, Stoesz argues that the American liberal-intellectual class-the Liberati-abandoned its original mission, defecting from the welfare state project to pursue a philosophical tangent, postmodernism, that vilified social policy and romanticized oppressed populations. Presenting case studies from welfare reform and children's services, he illustrates how both the Right and the Left have shortchanged American social policy. In the process, he proposes radical pragmatism as the solution to counter the dominance of an emerging welfare-industrial complex and revive a Progressive orientation to social policy. Only through citizen empowerment, social mobility, and government restructuring, Stoesz argues, can we effectively craft a new approach to social policy that meets the requirements of the 21st century and transcends the impasse between the Left and the Right. Quixote's Ghost, framed by the metaphor of a Romantic Left whose actions-like Don Quixote's obsession with chivalry-are out of synch with the present reality, will be of immense interest to students and academics alike. As one of the few books to chart this radical shift in social policy and its implications on the ground, it will be sure to challenge both the Right and the Left to craft a new approach to thinking about American social policy.Reviews
"Invoking Don Quixote, David Stoesz tilts at windbags of all stripes. No matter who you are-left, right, or even in the middle-something in this wide ranging critique will make you furious. In a world gone as far wrong as ours has now, puncturing pomposity can't be all bad even if it isn't all good."-Peter Edelman, Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center
"David Stoesz has written an enormously insightful, important, and timely book-helping all of us understand some of the Right's amazing accomplishments in the war of ideas, and how progressives could and should rebound."-Ray Boshara, New America Foundation
"With President Bush's re-election, the paradigm shift in American social policy chronicled herein is being consummated. David Stoesz documents a steady decline in America's enthusiasm for welfare state liberalism and the emergence of a new conservative social policy, epitomized in Bush's concept of "the ownership society." He explains why the American Left is playing defense on health, welfare, and even social security policy, and how the American Right is going on offense through rigorous empirical analysis, superior communications, and an increasingly sophisticated marketing of ideas. A penetrating analysis of the battle of ideas, no student of America's domestic politics can afford to overlook this book."-Robert Emmet Moffit, Ph.D., Director, Center for Health Policy Studies, The Heritage Foundation
"David Stoesz's latest book outlines a 'radical pragmatic' approach to social welfare which, he contends, offers a new and viable alternative to mainstream perspectives. His original and thought-provoking ideas deserve to be widely discussed. This is a lively, readable and enjoyable book."-James Midgley, Dean and Specht Professor of Public
"A provocative look at how U.S. social welfare policy is made....provides a challenge to both Left and Right."-Michael Tanner, Director, Health & Welfare Studies, Cato Institute
Product Details
264 pages; 3 line illus.; 6-1/8 x 9-1/4; ISBN13: 978-0-19-518120-3ISBN10: 0-19-518120-4About the Author(s)
David Stoesz is Professor of Social Policy at Virginia Commonwealth University and a founding member of policyAmerica, an Internet policy innovation nonprofit: www.policyAmerica.org. He has held direct practice as well as administrative appointments in public welfare, mental health, and higher education. His previous books have been on social policy, child welfare, the Clinton presidency, international development, and welfare reform.
