The Other America: Poverty in the United States

Michael Harrington

Aug 1997 · Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

In the fifty years since it was published, The Other America has been established as a seminal work of sociology. This anniversary edition includes Michael Harrington’s essays on poverty in the 1970s and ’80s as well as a new introduction by Harrington’s biographer, Maurice Isserman. This illuminating, profoundly moving classic is still all too relevant for today’s America.

When Michael Harrington’s masterpiece, The Other America, was first published in 1962, it was hailed as an explosive work and became a galvanizing force for the war on poverty. Harrington shed light on the lives of the poor—from farm to city—and the social forces that relegated them to their difficult situations. He was determined to make poverty in the United States visible and his observations and analyses have had a profound effect on our country, radically changing how we view the poor and the policies we employ to help them.

Ratings and reviews

While old (the book came out nearly sixty years ago), it dwells in very current problems. Poverty, as a social ailment, is criminally untreated and, perhaps, untreatable in the current political climate. But step one of solving the problem is recognizing there is one, and ascertaining its extent and reasoning. And for that, The Other America, is a valuable masterpiece of political, social, and economic discourse in the United States.

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About the author

Born in Missouri in 1928, Michael Harrington was a writer, political activist, theorist, professor, commentator, and founding member of the Democratic Socialists of America. During his time as editor for New America, he wrote his seminal text The Other America: Poverty in the United States, a bestseller that has been credited for sparking the War on Poverty. A frequent writer, Harrington wrote fifteen books and has had articles publishes in journals such as The New Republic, The Nation, and many others. He married in 1963 and had two children. He died in 1989.