Princeton University Press
The Monochrome Society
Key Metrics
- Amitai Etzioni
- Princeton University Press
- Paperback
- 9780691114576
- 9.32 X 6.14 X 0.81 inches
- 1.04 pounds
- Social Science > Sociology - General
- English
Secure TransactionBook Description
Amitai Etzioni is one of the most influential social and political thinkers of our day, a man synonymous with the ideas of communitarianism. In this book, Etzioni challenges those who argue that diversity or multiculturalism is about to become the governing American creed. On the surface, America may seem like a fractured mosaic, but the country is in reality far more socially monochromatic and united than most observers have claimed.
In the first chapter, Etzioni presents a great deal of evidence that Americans, whites and African Americans, Hispanics and Asian Americans, new immigrants and decedents of the Pilgrims, continue to share the same core of basic American values and aspirations.
He goes on to show that we need not merely a civil but also a good society, one that nurtures virtues. He assesses key social institutions that can serve such a society ranging from revived holidays to greater reliance on public shaming. The most effective sources of bonding and of shared ideas about virtue, he insists throughout, come from the community, not from the state.
Etzioni also challenges moral relativists who argue that we have no right to impose our moral values on other societies. He responds to those who fear that a cohesive community must also be one that is oppressive, authoritarian, and exclusive. And he explores and assesses possible new sources and definitions of community, including computer-mediated communities and stakeholding in corporations.
By turns provocative and reassuring, the chapters here cut to the heart of several of our most pressing social and political issues. The book is further evidence of Etzioni's enduring place in contemporary thought.
Author Bio
After receiving his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of California, Berkeley in 1958, Dr. Amitai Etzioni served as a Professor of Sociology at Columbia University for 20 years; part of that time as the Chairman of the department. He was a guest scholar at the Brookings Institution in 1978 before serving as a Senior Advisor to the White House from 1979-1980.
In 1980, Dr. Etzioni was named the first University Professor at The George Washington University, where he is the Director of the Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies. From 1987-1989, he served as the Thomas Henry Carroll Ford Foundation Professor at the Harvard Business School.
Dr. Etzioni served as the president of the American Sociological Association in 1994-95, and in 1989-90 was the founding president of the International Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics. In 1990, he founded the Communitarian Network, a not-for-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to shoring up the moral, social and political foundations of society.
He was the editor of The Responsive Community: Rights and Responsibilities, the organization's quarterly journal, from 1991-2004. In 1991, the press began referring to Dr. Etzioni as the "guru" of the communitarian movement.
Dr. Etzioni is the author of twenty-four books, including The Monochrome Society (Princeton University Press, 2001); The Limits of Privacy (Basic Books, 1999);The New Golden Rule (Basic Books, 1996), which received the Simon Wiesenthal Center's 1997 Tolerance Book Award; The Spirit of Community (Crown Books, 1993); and The Moral Dimension: Toward a New Economics (Free Press, 1988).
His most recent books are My Brother's Keeper: A Memoir and a Message (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003); From Empire to Community: A New Approach to International Relations (Palgrave Macmillan, 2004); and How Patriotic is the Patriot Act? (Routledge, 2004).
Outside of academia, Dr. Etzioni's voice is frequently heard in the media.
In 2001, he was named among the top 100 American intellectuals as measured by academic citations in Richard Posner's book, Public Intellectuals: A Study of Decline.
Also in 2001, Dr. Etzioni was awarded the John P. McGovern Award in Behavioral Sciences, as well as the Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. He was also the recipient of the Seventh James Wilbur Award for Extraordinary Contributions to the Appreciation and Advancement of Human Values by the Conference on Value Inquiry, as well as the Sociological Practice Association's Outstanding Contribution Award.
Source: The George Washington University Elliott School of International Affairs
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