Michael Harrington: The Other America (1962)
Michael Harrington (1928–1989), the author of the influential book The Other America: Poverty in the United States (1962), was a prominent author, activist, radio commentator, professor of political science (at Queens College in New York), first editor of New America (the weekly organ of the Socialist Party–Social Democratic Federation), and founder of the Democratic Socialists of America. In The Other America, Harrington called attention to the prevalence of poverty in the United States—doing so at a time when many commentators were celebrating the nation's improving standard of living among the middle class. According to Harrington, some forty to fifty million Americans—about a fourth of the nation's population—were living in poverty. He notes that he is not talking about the bare subsistence poverty often found in undeveloped nations. Rather, his topic is a culture of poverty and lack of hope among America's underclass, people who live in a chronic state of...
