Challenging Authority: How Ordinary People Change America, Volume 2

Frances Fox Piven

Bloomsbury Academic, Jul 11, 2008 - Political Science - 195 pages

Challenging Authority argues that ordinary people exercise extraordinary political courage and power in American politics when, frustrated by politics as usual, they rise up in anger and hope and defy the authorities and the status quo rules that ordinarily govern their daily lives. By doing so, they disrupt the workings of important institutions and become a force in American politics. Drawing on critical episodes in American history, Frances Fox Piven shows that it is precisely at those seismic moments when people act outside of self-restricting political norms that they become empowered to their full democratic potential.

About the author

Frances Fox Piven is Distinguished Professor of Political Science and Sociology at the Graduate School at the City University of New York and past president of the American Sociological Association. She is the author of several books, including The War at Home: The Domestic Costs of Bush's Militarism (2004) and Why Americans Still Don't Vote: And Why Politicians Want It That Way (2000).

Bibliographic information

• Title: Challenging Authority: How Ordinary People Change America, Volume 2; Challenging Authority: How Ordinary People Change America, Frances Fox Piven; G - Reference,Information and Interdisciplinary Subjects Series; Polemics (Rowman and Littlefield, Inc.); Polemics Series
• Author: Frances Fox Piven
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic, 2008
• ISBN: 0742563162, 9780742563162
• Length: 195 pages
• Subjects: Political Science / American Government / General; Political Science / Civil Rights; Political Science / General; Political Science / History & Theory; Political Science / Political Ideologies / Democracy; Political Science / Political Process / Campaigns & Elections; Political Science / Political Process / General; Political Science / Political Process / Political Advocacy