NCJ Number
175938
Date Published
1997
Length
511 pages
Annotation
This volume examines the reasons that education, welfare, and family support systems have not succeeded and uses research findings and case examples to address a wide range of social problems and strengthen families; make child protection, family support, and school systems effective; and revitalize troubled neighborhoods.
Abstract
The author challenges the beliefs that the current prevailing distrust of government is a permanent condition of national life and that past efforts at social reform have failed far more than they have succeeded. It also challenges the beliefs that most people in the inner city are there mainly due to individual, personal failings and that it is impossible to undertake major social reform that does more good than harm. The text presents examples of sustaining and expanding small successes to replicate effective approaches, control bureaucracies, shift to results-based accountability, and use new evaluation techniques to examine complex issues. The discussion also notes how citizens, practitioners, administrators, and legislators have created environments that allow effective interventions to flourish and in giving teachers, counselors, and others who interact directly with children and families the flexibility they need to be effective. The volume suggests an agenda around which the public, private, and philanthropic sectors can mobilize to rebuild the inner city, reverse the growth of an underclass, and restore trust in the country's major institutions. Chapter notes, index, and approximately 300 references