Humphrey School News on-the-go

Joe Soss discusses his new book, Discliplining the Poor: Neoliberal Paternalism and the Persistent Power of Race.

As Soss put it, "Our notions about who's deserving of help and who isn't are rooted in notions about individual effort and individual success or failure." But, he told Sturdevant, "It's become almost a Catch-22... You're undeserving if you haven't worked hard enough to lift yourself out of poverty. If you had worked hard, you wouldn't be poor. So if you're poor, you must be undeserving."

The Society Pages
January 4, 2012