Few would dispute that we live in an unequal and unjust world, but what causes this inequality to persist? In the new paperback edition of this timely book, Danny Dorling, a leading social commentator and academic, claims that in rich countries inequality is no longer caused by not having enough resources to share but by unrecognized and unacknowledged beliefs which actually propagate it.
Based on significant research across a range of fields, Dorling argues that, as the five social evils identified by Beveridge at the dawn of the British welfare state (ignorance, want, idleness, squalor, and disease) are gradually being eradicated they are being replaced by five new tenets of injustice: elitism is efficient, exclusion is necessary, prejudice is natural, greed is good, and despair is inevitable.
With an informal yet authoritative style, Dorling examines who is most harmed by these injustices, why, and what happens to those who most benefit. With a new foreword by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, authors of The Spirit Level, and a new afterword by Dorling himself examining developments during 2010, this book is hard-hitting and uncompromising in its call to action and continues to make essential reading for everyone concerned with social justice.
... specialist and general readers alike are likely to find much of the book a fascinating read that sticks in the memory. Fiona Taylor in Times Higher Education
List of figures and tables
1 Introduction 1
2 Inequality: the antecedent and outcome of injustice 13
3 'Elitism is efficient': new educational divisions 33
4 'Exclusion is necessary': excluding people from society 91
5 'Prejudice is natural': a wider racism 145
6 'Greed is good': consumption and waste 209
7 'Despair is inevitable': health and well-being 269
8 Conclusion, conspiracy, consensus 307
Notes and sources 321
Index 373
Overview
Few would dispute that we live in an unequal and unjust world, but what causes this inequality to persist? In the new paperback edition of this timely book, Danny Dorling, a leading social commentator and academic, claims that in rich countries inequality is no longer caused by not having enough resources to share but by unrecognized and unacknowledged beliefs which actually propagate it.
Based on significant research across a range of fields, Dorling argues that, as the ...