Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform / Edition 1

Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform / Edition 1

ISBN-10:
0814757103
ISBN-13:
9780814757109
Pub. Date:
04/10/2006
Publisher:
New York University Press
ISBN-10:
0814757103
ISBN-13:
9780814757109
Pub. Date:
04/10/2006
Publisher:
New York University Press
Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform / Edition 1

Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform / Edition 1

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Overview

Not Working chronicles the devastating effects of the 1996 welfare reform legislation that ended welfare as we know it. For those who now receive public assistance, “work” means pleading with supervisors for full-time hours, juggling ever-changing work schedules, and shuffling between dead-end jobs that leave one physically and psychically exhausted.
Through vivid story-telling and pointed analysis, Not Working profiles the day-to-day struggles of Mexican immigrant women in the Los Angeles area, showing the increased vulnerability they face in the welfare office and labor market. The new “work first” policies now enacted impose time limits and mandate work requirements for those receiving public assistance, yet fail to offer real job training or needed childcare options, ultimately causing many families to fall deeper below the poverty line.
Not Working shows that the new “welfare-to-work” regime has produced tremendous instability and insecurity for these women and their children. Moreover, the authors argue that the new politics of welfare enable greater infringements of rights and liberty for many of America's most vulnerable and constitute a crucial component of the broader assault on American citizenship. In short, the new welfare is not working.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780814757109
Publisher: New York University Press
Publication date: 04/10/2006
Edition description: ANN
Pages: 308
Product dimensions: 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Alejandra Marchevsky is associate professor of liberal studies at California State University, Los Angeles.

Jeanne Theoharis is distinguished Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of CUNY. She is the co-editor of The Strange Careers of the Jim Crow North: Segregation and Struggle outside of the South (NYU Press, 2019), A More Beautiful and Terrible History (Beacon Press, 2018), The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks (Beacon Press, 2013), Want to Start A Revolution?: Radical Women in the Black Freedom Struggle (NYU Press 2009), Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education (NYU Press 2009), and Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform (NYU Press 2006).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Latinas on the Fault Lines of Citizenship
PART I Neither a Hand Up nor a Handout
1 Ending Welfare: New Nativism and the Triumph of Post–Civil Rights Politics
2 Poverty in the Suburbs: Race and Redevelopment Policy in Long Beach
PART II Any Job at Any Wage
3 Tough Love in L.A. County: The Failure of Welfare-to-Work
4 The Myth of Welfare Dependency: Caught between Welfare and Work
5 “It’s Not What You Choose, but Where They Send You”: Inside Personal Responsibility
Conclusion: The Emperor’s New Welfare: Reassessing the “Success” of Welfare Reform
Notes
Index
About the Authors

What People are Saying About This

Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo

"Original and insightful. Not Working is a powerful book, connecting theories of the state, citizenship, and globalization with first rate ethnography. It is an instant classic and will remain the definitive book on immigrant women and welfare reform for some time."
author of Doméstica: Immigrant Workers Cleaning and Caring in the Shadows of Affluence

Sanford F. Schram

"Not Working is an empirically rich and theoretically sophisticated study of welfare reform's deleterious effects on immigrant Latinas struggling to make a life for themselves and their children. This is an incredibly compelling ethnography."
author of After Welfare: The Culture of Postindustrial Social Policy

Arlene Davila

"A smart, engaging, and groundbreaking study that exposes the racist underpinnings of welfare reform. A model of stellar scholarship and a must read for anyone seeking to understand poverty in relation to the meaning of American citizenship today."
author of Barrio Dreams: Puerto Ricans, Latinos, and the Neoliberal City

From the Publisher

“With this book, Marchevsky and Theoharis make a distinct contribution to the welfare reform debate by addressing a topic that has received less attention in the literature, namely how welfare reforms have impacted immigrant. Not Working is particularly timely as immigrants become more visible as they move to less traditional U.S. regions to find work and the immigration debate rages.”
-Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare

,

“Original and insightful. Not Working is a powerful book, connecting theories of the state, citizenship, and globalization with first rate ethnography. It is an instant classic and will remain the definitive book on immigrant women and welfare reform for some time.”
-Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo,author of Doméstica: Immigrant Workers Cleaning and Caring in the Shadows of Affluence

“This is a scholarly, professional critique of social science research paradigms generally, and poverty knowledge industry and associated applied policy research in particular:”
-Choice: Highly recommended

,

“A smart, engaging, and groundbreaking study that exposes the racist underpinnings of welfare reform. A model of stellar scholarship and a must read for anyone seeking to understand poverty in relation to the meaning of American citizenship today.”
-Arlene Davila,author of Barrio Dreams: Puerto Ricans, Latinos, and the Neoliberal City

“This highly significant contribution assures that Latina immigrants will no longer be invisible in scholarly research on welfare reform. This superb ethnography establishes a clear connection to the political, legal, and economic realities that is needed in reassessing the success stories of welfare reform. It should be read by all those concerned with social inequality, poverty, and justice in America.”
-Mary Romero,author of Maid in the U.S.A

Mary Romero

"This highly significant contribution assures that Latina immigrants will no longer be invisible in scholarly research on welfare reform. This superb ethnography establishes a clear connection to the political, legal, and economic realities that is needed in reassessing the success stories of welfare reform. It should be read by all those concerned with social inequality, poverty, and justice in America."
author of Maid in the U.S.A

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