by Gregory Shank* One of the longest-serving Social Justice editorial board members has passed away. Julia Rosalind Schwendinger died at the age of 87 on October 17, 2013, in Hudson, Florida. The daughter of Russian immigrants Jacob and Lena Pliskin Siegel, she was born on September 3, 1926, and grew up on 84th Drive in […]
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Crime Is Up? Decarcerate!
by Alessandro De Giorgi* The news has not garnered much attention on the national media, yet it is rather striking: for the first time in the last twenty years or so, crime has been rising in the United States for two consecutive years. The US Bureau of Justice has just released data from the 2012 […]
NSA and the False Alternative between Liberty and Safety
by Gene Grabiner* Critics have long been concerned about the potential for government abuse and overreach, as well as the desire of officials to conduct civic affairs beyond public scrutiny. As moral philosopher Jeremy Bentham cautioned, “secrecy, being an instrument of conspiracy, ought never to be the system of a regular government.” Gore Vidal observed […]
Suzie Presente!
We are very sad to announce that yesterday (October 5, 2013) Suzie Dod Thomas, a beloved friend and founding member of the SJ Editorial Board, has passed away after a fierce battle against cancer. Suzie has been for many years the Assistant Managing Editor for Social Justice. She was a founding member of Bay Area […]
Police Discreditable Conduct: Legislative Change Needed
by Sulaimon Giwa* This is a time of fiscal austerity, when governments are cutting back their spending and asking Canadians to assume responsibility for the shortfall. Questions are being asked about how publicly funded institutions are being held accountable for how they manage the financial resources entrusted to them for the delivery of their […]
Confronting Prison Slave Labor Camps and Other Myths
by James Kilgore* There are moments when our longings for social justice cloud our vision, times when the way we want the world to be blocks our understanding of the way things really are. A good example of this is the notion of the United States’ prison system as totally driven by profit-hungry corporations that […]
Criminologists and Criminal Justice Reformers Say: Negotiate Now Before There Is Blood on Your Hands
Finally, there is some good news for critics of the American justice system: a decline in the nationwide prison and jail population; a significant drop in the rate of African American imprisonment; conservative activists advocating “criminal justice reform”; judges in New York and California blowing the whistle on unconstitutional police and prison practices; a decrease […]
Mixed Messages: World War II and the Uses of Oral History
by Tony Platt* I have been teaching about the history of inequalities in the United States for more than forty years. I started off using oral histories in my curriculum when it was against the grain to do so. I still use them today, though to do so now has become something of an acceptable […]
Margaret Thatcher
by Phil Scraton* For years I anticipated my emotions and reaction to the day of Margaret Thatcher’s death. I remember being in Liverpool’s Royal Court at an Elvis Costello gig, knocked out by his Tramp the Dirt Down…, but this was at the height of the ferocious ideological and political activation of the “New […]
Drone War Is Coming Home: A View from across the Ocean
by Volker Eick* Since Nobel Peace Prize laureate and US president Barack Obama began targeted killings of supposed Islamic terrorists using Special Forces and the CIA in Yemen, Pakistan, and Somalia,(1) an envious German government has sought to catch up with its Atlantic partner in the adoption of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAVs), or drones. […]