By Karen Sands-O’Connor

Exploring a history of activists writing for and about children of colour from abolition to Black Lives Matter, this open access book examines issues such as the space given to people of colour by white activists; the voice, agency and intersectionality in activist writing for young people; how writers used activism to expand definitions of Britishness for child readers; and how activism and writing about it has changed in the 21st century. From abolitionists and anti-colonialists such as Amelia Opie, Una Marson and Rabindranath Tagore; communist and feminist activists concerned with broader children’s rights including Chris Searle and Rosemary Stones; to Black Panthers and contemporary advocates for people of colour from Farrukh Dhondy to Len Garrison, Catherine Johnson and Corinne Fowler, Karen Sands-O’Connor traces how these activists translated their values for children of colour. Beginning with historical events that sparked activism and the first cultural products for children and continuing to contemporary activism in the wake of the Windrush Scandal, this book analyses the choices, struggles and successes of writers of activist literature as they tried to change Britain and British literature to make it a welcoming place for all child readers.

London: Bloomsbury Academic. 2022, 215pg.

By Joseph H. Jackson

Writing Black Scotland examines race and racism in devolutionary Scottish literature, with a focus on the critical significance of blackness. The book reads blackness in Scottish writing from the 1970s to the early 2000s, a period of history defined by post-imperial adjustment. Critiquing a unifying Britishness at work in black British criticism, Jackson argues for the importance of black politics in Scottish writing, and for a literary registration of race and racism which signals a necessary negotiation for national Scotland both before and after 1997.

Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 2020, 216pg

By Burleigh Hendrickson

Decolonizing 1968 explores how activists in 1968 transformed university campuses across Europe and North Africa into sites of contestation where students, administrators, and state officials collided over definitions of modernity and nationhood after empire. Burleigh Hendrickson details protesters' versions of events to counterbalance more visible narratives that emerged from state-controlled media centers and ultimately describes how the very education systems put in place to serve the French state during the colonial period ended up functioning as the crucible of postcolonial revolt. Hendrickson not only unearths complex connections among activists and their transnational networks across Tunis, Paris, and Dakar but also weaves together their overlapping stories and participation in France's May '68.
Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2022. 258p.

By Mary Pat Brady

In Scales of Captivity, Mary Pat Brady traces the figure of the captive or cast-off child in Latinx and Chicanx literature and art between chattel slavery’s final years and the mass deportations of the twenty-first century. She shows how Latinx expressive practices expose how every rescaling of economic and military power requires new modalities of capture, new ways to bracket and hedge life. Through readings of novels by Helena María Viramontes, Oscar Casares, Lorraine López, Maceo Montoya, Reyna Grande, Daniel Peña, and others, Brady illustrates how submerged captivities reveal the way mechanisms of constraint such as deportability ground institutional forms of carceral modernity and how such practices scale relations by naturalizing the logic of scalar hierarchies underpinning racial capitalism. By showing how representations of the captive child critique the entrenched logic undergirding colonial power, Brady challenges racialized modes of citizenship while offering visions for living beyond borders.

Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2022. 313p.

By Thomas Hanson, Gary Zhang, Anthony Petrosino, Barbara Dietsch, Sarah Guckenberg, Rebeca Cerna, Cindy Zheng, Jeff Polik

CKH is a skill-intensive, systematic process intended to strengthen students’ connectedness to school by improving protective factors (strong bonds with teachers, clear rules of conduct that are consistently enforced) and targeting modifiable risk factors, such as inappropriate behavior and poor social coping skills. Components of CKH have been widely used throughout the United States; however, the whole package of CKH training and service has not been rigorously evaluated to assess its effectiveness.  In filling this research gap, the current evaluation used a true, cluster-randomized, experimental design with repeated measures involving 27 middle schools in the treatment group, 12 schools in the control group, and about 607 students in grades 6-8 (27 schools and 16,385 students). The student population was largely minority, with 45 percent white, 43 percent African American, and 8 percent Latino. Data collection began with the administration of an online survey to all school staff in the spring of 2016 to assess baseline measures of school climate. Control schools received training after data collection was complete (July 2018). There were data collection systems for outcomes, which included disciplinary referrals and an online survey data system. There was also incident tracking and an online survey system. Adjusted post-intervention outcomes for students in treatment schools were compared to the outcomes for their counterparts in the control schools. The evaluation determined that CKH was well-implemented, and the impact evaluation results were mixed. CKH apparently had a small but consistently positive impact on various aspects of school relations, student voice/disciplinary climate, and student behaviors, both individually and schoolwide. The evidence was mixed regarding student attendance and discipline outcomes. 
Los Alamitos, CA: WestEd, 2021. 26p.   

By Emily Chertoff
Drawing on an original, interview-based case study of an immigration enforcement agency and a review of six decades of social science literature, this Article offers a theory of physical violence in the administrative state that challenges foundational assumptions about administrative law. One-fifth of federal employees work for administrative agencies that police, fight wars, enforce immigration law, or incarcerate people – in other words, agencies that use force to execute the laws. These agencies are saturated with administrative law that obligates front-line administrators to confer due process, give notice, and behave non-arbitrarily. Yet this law often fails to constrain administrators, with unauthorized violence the result.

Conventional administrative law fails in these agencies because it has developed out of a model of the administrative state to which they do not conform. Most administrative law is designed for bureaucracy, whose hallmark is rational information processing using standardized rules and procedures. But the lower levels of these agencies belong to the domain of violence. They empower administrators to use physical violence in response to exigent circumstances – a different role, with different norms and decision-making techniques. Ordinarily designed to safeguard core rule of law values, when bureaucratic administrative law is applied to agencies in the domain of violence, it often masks, and at worst accelerates, unauthorized violence.

For administrative law to potentially address unauthorized violence, it would have to override individuals’ responses and alter agency culture, requiring it to take different forms and pursue different goals than bureaucratic administrative law usually does. Recognizing the domain of violence has practical and conceptual payoffs. It can help us understand how and whether law can check violence in the administrative state. And it opens up a universe of questions about the exceptional legal norms applied to agencies in this domain.

California Law Review, Forthcoming

Columbia Public Law Research Paper No. 4548867

By Beth Redbird

The goal of this study was to determine how individuals comprehend, and subsequently deploy, their understanding of standard jury instructions for murder and manslaughter. To this end, this study addresses three primary research questions: (1) Do potential jurors understand the instructions as provided? (2) If they fail to understand the instructions, what is the nature of their misunderstanding?  (3) How does understanding impact the probability of a guilty determination?

Evanston, IL: Institute for Policy Research, 2020. 2022. 25p.

Edited by Nissa Finney, James Nazroo, Laia Bécares, Dharmi Kapadia and Natalie Shlomo

This book illustrates life through the COVID-19 pandemic for ethnic minorities in Britain. Drawing from the Evidence for Equality National Survey (EVENS), the book presents new evidence of ethnic inequalities and sheds new light on underlying racisms, opening them up to debate as crucial social concerns. Written by leading international experts in the field, this is a must-read for anyone interested in contemporary ethnic inequalities and racism from academics and policy makers to voluntary and community sector organisations.

Bristol, UK: Policy Press. 2023, 234pg

By Corine Tachtiris

Translation and Race brings together translation studies with critical race studies for a long-overdue reckoning with race and racism in translation theory and practice. This book explores the "unbearable whiteness of translation" in the West that excludes scholars and translators of color from the field and also upholds racial inequities more broadly. Outlining relevant concepts from critical race studies, Translation and Race demonstrates how norms of translation theory and practice in the West actually derive from ideas rooted in white supremacy and other forms of racism. Chapters explore translation’s role in historical processes of racialization, racial capitalism and intellectual property, identity politics and Black translation praxis, the globalization of critical race studies, and ethical strategies for translating racist discourse. Beyond attempts to diversify the field of translation studies and the literary translation profession, this book ultimately calls for a radical transformation of translation theory and practice. This book is crucial reading for advanced students and scholars in translation studies, critical race and ethnic studies, and related areas, as well as for practicing translators.

London: Routledge. 2024, 188pg

By J.M. Vorster, Nico Vorster, Jan A. du Rand, Riaan Rheeder, Dirk van der Merwe, Theuns Eloff, Ferdi P. Kruger, Reginald W. Nel

Race and inequality have always been sensitive topics in South African society due to its colonial past, diverse social composition and apartheid legacy of legal discrimination against people on the basis of their skin colour. Racial tensions seem to be escalating in South African society and disturbing racialised rhetoric and slogans are re-entering the political and social landscape. Another disturbing phenomenon has been violent incidents of xenophobia against African immigrants. The question probed by this book is: What perspectives can theology offer in addressing the roots of racism, inequality and xenophobia in South Africa and how can it and the church contribute to reconciliation and a sense of togetherness among South African citizens? Various methodologies and approaches are used to address this question. In chapter 1, Theuns Eloff employs a historical and socio-analytical approach to describe the social context that has given rise, and is still giving impetus to racism and other forms of intolerance in South African society. Nico Vorster approaches the issue of distorted racial identity constructions from a theological-anthropological perspective. Utilising various empirical studies, he attempts to provide conceptual clarity to the concepts of racism, nationalism, ethnocentrism and xenophobia, and maps the various racisms that we find in South Africa. His contribution concludes with a theological-anthropological discussion on ways in which theology can deconstruct distorted identities and contribute to the development of authentic identities. Koos Vorster provides a theological-ethical perspective on social stratification in South Africa. He identifies the patterns inherent to the institutionalisation of racist social structures and argues that many of these patterns are still present, albeit in a new disguise, in the South African social order. Jan du Rand provides in chapter 4 a semantic discussion of the notions of race and xenophobia. He argues that racist ideologies are not constructed on a factual basis, but that racial ideologies use semantic notions to construct social myths that enable them to attain power and justify the exploitation and oppression of the other. Du Rand’s second contribution in chapter 5 provides Reformed exegetical and hermeneutic perspectives on various passages and themes in the Bible that relate to anthropology, xenophobia and the imperative to xenophilia [love of the stranger]. Dirk Van der Merwe’s contribution analyses, evaluates, and compares both contemporary literature and ancient texts of the Bible to develop a model that can enable churches to promote reconciliation in society, while Ferdi Kruger investigates the various ways in which language can be used as a tool to disseminate hate speech. He offers an analytical description of hate language, provides normative perspectives on the duty to counter hate speech through truth speaking and phronesis (wisdom) and concludes with practical-theological perspectives that might enable us to address problematic praxis. Reggie Nel explores the Confessions of Belhar and the Declaration of Accra as theological lenses to provide markers for public witness in a postcolonial South African setting. The volume concludes with Riaan Rheeder’s Christian bioethical perspective on inequality in the health sector of sub-Sahara Africa. This book contains original research. No part was plagiarised or published elsewhere. The target audience are theologians, ministers and the Christian community, but social activists, social scientists, politicians, political theorists, sociologists and psychologists might also find the book applicable to their fields.

Durbanville, AOSIS. 2017, 338pg

By Michael German and Emmanuel Mauleón

On April 27, 2019, a white supremacist armed with a high-powered rifle walked into a San Diego synagogue and shot four people, one fatally, before fleeing and finally surrendering to police. A letter the gunman allegedly posted online shortly before the shooting claimed credit for a previous arson attack on an Escondido mosque, spewed racist “white genocide” conspiracy theories, cited earlier white supremacist attacks against a synagogue in Pittsburgh and mosques in New Zealand, and urged like-minded white Christians to commit further acts of violence.

New York: Brennan Center for Justice. 2019, 51pg

By Ghaffar Hussain

Each society needs to clearly define what it considers unacceptable if it wishes to stay functional. 

• We must tackle extremism in a way that preserves civil liberties.

• A definition must be technical and workable and term ‘extremism’ must not become a mere adjective. 

• A definition of extremism must focus on themes that undermine its core ethos of a society, which in the anglosphere context are intolerance, violence and hatred.

  Washington, DC: George Washington University Program on Extremism. 2024, 10pg

By Linda Maizels

Following the October 7 Hamas attack, some parts of the left not only blamed Israel for the aggression, but also expressed hostility toward Jewish supporters of Israel because of their assumed privilege.

• This type of animosity is not new. It began during the 1960s and 70s, especially after the Jewish State’s victories over a coalition of Arab nations in the 1967 War, and it can be linked to the ideology of some parts of the New Left, which included recurring attempts to link Israel with European colonialism and Jews with whiteness and privilege.

• Analysts of the period responded to these tactics by describing a “new antisemitism” that illustrated the parallels between hostility towards Israel’s legitimacy as a state and hostility toward the authenticity of the American Jewish community as a minority ethnic group.

• In the 1980s and 1990s, the focus of the political left trended toward promoting multiculturalism and diversity. This tolerance was not all-inclusive, however, and the animosity toward Israel demonstrated by some factions within the left was coupled with hostility toward Jews, who were seen not only as white and privileged, but also as a particularly malicious example of some of the worst elements of whiteness.

• Against the backdrop of the second intifada and the rise in violence that characterized the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the opening years of the 21st century, vocal factions of the left on American college and university campuses labeled Israel a racist and illegitimate state founded through settler colonialism and fueled by apartheid.

• At the same time, Jews were denigrated both for supporting Israel and for their supposed white privilege.

• Critics claimed that these attacks on Israel, Zionism, and Jews often crossed the line into antisemitism. They also pointed out a seeming double standard in which hostile rhetoric toward Jews – whether it was connected to Israel or to whiteness – was framed as protected political speech, while hateful language towards other minority identity groups was more likely to be condemned and silenced.

• The conclusion of this analysis is that some elements of the left have deep, serious, and systemic issues, not only with Israel but also with Jews.

  Washington, DC: George Washington University Program on Extremism. 2024, 23pg

By Patrick Williams

The key to overcoming institutionalised racism in work with black, Asian and minority ethnic people in contact with the criminal justice system

Why read this evidence review?

This evidence review provides an in-depth look at growing rates of racial disparity in our criminal justice system and highlights key principles for effective interventions with people from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds in contact with the system.

Patrick Williams, Senior lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University, reviews the current evidence-base - to which he is an important contributor - and covers a number of key issues:

• Racial disparity within the criminal justice system

• The multidimensionality of social inequalities experienced by minority groups

• The lack of a clear strategy and officially approved programs to tackle racial disparity in the criminal justice system

• The criminal justice system’s preoccupation with risk as opposed to need

• Principles to govern minority ethnic interventions

• The importance of acknowledging racialisation and racism(s)

• Community empowerment models

• The argument for paying participants to engage

• The importance of the voluntary sector.

An online evidence base for the voluntary sector working in the criminal justice system

This article forms part of a series from Clinks, created to develop a far-reaching and accessible evidence base covering the most common types of activity undertaken within the criminal justice system. There are two main aims of this online series:

1. To increase the extent to which the voluntary sector bases its services on the available evidence base

2. To encourage commissioners to award contracts to organisations delivering an evidence-based approach.

London: Clinks, 2023. 11p.

By Yago Zayed and Grahame Allen

Police recorded crime figures in 2022/23 show that there were 145,214 offences where one or more of the centrally monitored hate crime strands were deemed to be a motivating factor. This represented a 5% decrease on figures::: for 2021/22. These figures do not include Devon and Cornwall police force who did not provide data this year due to the implementation of a new IT system.

The increase in police recorded hate crime over time prior to this year has partly been attributed to better recording methods used and greater awareness in reporting hate crimes.

This briefing paper looks at Hate Crime in England & Wales using figures provided by the Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW) and the Police Recorded Crime Series. The paper also presents data on hate crime rates per 100,000 population in each police force area and for each hate crime strand. It also looks at similar figures in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

London: UK Parliament, House of Commons Library, 2024 51p.

MAY CONTAIN MARKUP

By John Dewey

"The School and Society" by John Dewey delves into the fundamental principles of education and its essential role in shaping society. Originally published in 1899, Dewey's insights remain relevant as ever, advocating for a holistic approach to education that goes beyond traditional classroom boundaries. Dewey challenges the conventional wisdom of his time, emphasizing the importance of experiential learning, active participation, and the integration of education with societal needs. This book serves as a timeless manifesto for reimagining the purpose and practice of education to cultivate engaged, thoughtful citizens in a rapidly evolving world.

Project Gutenberg. University of Chicago press. 1900. 59p.

MAY CONTAIN MARKUP

By William James

In "Principles of Psychology Vol. 2", delve deeper into the complex workings of the human mind with this insightful and comprehensive guide. Building upon the foundational concepts introduced in the first volume, this book explores advanced topics such as cognitive processes, emotional intelligence, and social behaviors. Authored by esteemed psychologist Dr. A. Smith, this volume offers a lucid and engaging exploration of the intricate mechanisms that govern human behavior. Whether you are a student, researcher, or simply curious about the workings of the mind, "Principles of Psychology Vol. 2" is an essential read that will broaden your understanding of the fascinating realm of psychology.

NY. Henry Holt. 1918. 508p.

MAY CONTAIN MARKUP

By William James

"The Principles of Psychology. Vol. 1" is a seminal work in the field of psychology written by William James, a prominent American psychologist and philosopher. Originally published in 1890, this groundbreaking book explores the fundamentals of human behavior, cognition, and emotion.

In this comprehensive volume, James delves into various aspects of the human mind, examining topics such as consciousness, perception, memory, and the self. Drawing on a combination of philosophical insights and empirical research, he presents a holistic view of the complexities of the human psyche.

Whether you are a student of psychology, a researcher, or simply curious about the workings of the mind, "The Principles of Psychology. Vol. 1" is a must-read that continues to shape our understanding of human behavior to this day.

NY. Henry Holt. 1918. 505p.

CONTAINS EXTENSIVE MARKUP.

By C. Wright Mills

"The Marxists" by C. Mills delves into the complex world of Marxist theory and its impact on society. In this insightful book, Mills examines the evolution of Marxist ideas, from its origins to its relevance in the modern world. Through meticulous research and compelling analysis, the author explores the key concepts of Marxism, shedding light on its revolutionary potential and its challenges.

Mills delves into the lives and works of prominent Marxist thinkers, offering a comprehensive overview of their contributions to the movement. From Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels to contemporary Marxist scholars, "The Marxists" provides a rich tapestry of ideas and debates that have shaped the course of history.

This book is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand the complexities of Marxist thought and its enduring influence on politics, economics, and social justice. "The Marxists" invites readers to engage with these profound ideas and ponder their implications for the future of our society.

NY. Dell. M. W. Books. 1977. 452p.

MAY CONTAIN MARKUP

Neil Postman

Neil Postman's groundbreaking book, Technopoly, delves deep into the pervasive influence of technology on modern society. With keen insight and intellectual rigor, Postman challenges readers to critically examine the role of technology in shaping culture. By exploring how technology has become the dominant force in our lives, he raises crucial questions about the impact of this shift on human values, communication, and the very essence of our humanity. A timely and thought-provoking read, Technopoly offers a compelling exploration of the complex relationship between technology and culture in the digital age.

NY. Vintage. 1993. 233p.