Manifesto for a Dream: Inequality, Constraint, and Radical Reform

by Michelle Jackson

A searing critique of our contemporary policy agenda, and a call to implement radical change. Although it is well known that the United States has an inequality problem, the social science community has failed to mobilize in response. Social scientists have instead adopted a strikingly insipid approach to policy reform, an ostensibly science-based approach that offers incremental, narrow-gauge, and evidence-informed "interventions." This approach assumes that the best that we can do is to contain the problem. It is largely taken for granted that we will never solve it. In Manifesto for a Dream , Michelle Jackson asserts that we will never make strides toward equality if we do not start to think radically. It is the structure of social institutions that generates and maintains social inequality, and it is only by attacking that structure that progress can be made. Jackson makes a scientific case for large-scale institutional reform, drawing on examples from other countries to demonstrate that reforms that have been unthinkable in the United States are considered to be quite unproblematic in other contexts. She persuasively argues that an emboldened social science has an obligation to develop and test the radical policies that would be necessary for equality to be assured for all.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sociology

200 pages, Paperback

Published October 20, 2020

About the author

Michelle Jackson studied printed Textile Design in The National College of Art and Design and kicked off her career as a sock designer.

She has written six bestselling novels which have been translated into several European languages.
In 2010 she co-wrote What Women Know a book of wisdom for women.

She is a panelist on the Midday Show on TV3 and writes articles and travel features for several national newspapers and magazines.

She lives in Howth, Co. Dublin, with her husband and two children.

Reviews

[Amelia Little · Rating 5 out of 5]

Somehow further radicalized my ideal policy agenda

[Alan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book — very accessible to any reader; found it particularly helpful to draw on existing understandings and examples of policy, thought it might get a little slow for those without. Love the concepts of fortification/conveyance, and how Jackson frames the goals of policy around equality of constraints and institutions’ central role in it. Found the idea of constructed communities to be compelling, albeit unsure of the path to practical implementation.

Loved how Jackson recognized and explicitly named the exploitation and oppression the welfare of the US relies upon, but was left thinking about how it was framed in a progressive US-centric way that did not address the broader world-system and center-peripheral relationships that undergird US privilege. If we are truly designing policy for “all people,” can we really stop with just the US? Who are we implicitly excluding from “all people”?

[Yurimayra Mendoza · Rating 3 out of 5]

Muy entretenido

[Mar Espadafor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a good book even for non sociologist. Great to understand modern day reforms and how radical thinking could help us envision a more equal society.