He is Professor of Sociology, University of California-San Diego. With a primary discipline in sociology, John Skretny is also known by political scientists, legal scholars and historians. His research most generally is on law, public policy and inequality. He has recently begun research on immigration law and policy in East Asia and Europe. Skretny is able to comment on any of these topics, or, more generally, on race/ethnicity politics/law, gender politics/law, and immigration politics/law. (full text).
He says: ”But the end of the affirmative action debate suggests that Americans — including both political parties — are no longer interested in racial inequality, in particular the problems of black America. The two policies long identified in the public mind as “black” policies — affirmative action and welfare — have both been severely retrenched in the last several years. As political scientist Paul Frymer has argued, Democrats take for granted the support of black voters. They worry more about alienating white voters by being too closely identified with black interests. Consequently, Democrats have not pushed for a major policy initiative for blacks or other minorities in decades and they do not put up great resistance to retrenchment efforts ». (full text).
John D. Skrentny – USA
John Skrentny received a Ph.D. in Sociology from Harvard University and a BA in Sociology and Philosophy from Indiana University. His research focuses on public policy, law and inequality. He has written two books and edited another on the historical development of laws and policies to protect the rights and opportunities of minorities. These studies have included a wide variety of groups, including African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and white ethnics, as well as immigrants, the disabled, gays/lesbians and women of all races and ethnicities. This research has sought to bring a cultural approach to the fields of historical institutionalism and American political development. Starting with the premise that no policy is developed without the decisions of policy makers, Skrentny has focused his research on the worldviews and actions of policy-making elites, situating them in their historical, local and global contexts. (full text).
John Skrentny’s book, The Ironies of Affirmative Action provides a history of the development of Affirmative Action, which is useful. (full text).
Skrentny’s current research is focusing more on current policy politics and dilemmas, though retaining an interest in culture and inequality. One current project is a book to bring the civil rights story up to date. It will examine whether and how race can be an qualification for employment. This study will have important implications for current civil rights law, the meaning of race in America, immigration, multiculturalism and equal opportunity. An early version of this project was published in 2004 in Connecticut Law Review. (full text).
His Expertise and Areas of Interest: With a primary discipline in sociology, John Skretny is also known by political scientists, legal scholars and historians. His research most generally is on law, public policy and inequality. He has recently begun research on immigration law and policy in East Asia and Europe. Skretny is able to comment on any of these topics, or, more generally, on race/ethnicity politics/law, gender politics/law, and immigration politics/law. (full text).
Some bio. And another CV.
about his book ‘the minority rights revolution’: In the wake of the black civil rights movement, other disadvantaged groups of Americans began to make headway–Latinos, women, Asian Americans, and the disabled found themselves the beneficiaries of new laws and policies–and by the early 1970s a minority rights revolution was well underway. In the first book to take a broad perspective on this wide-ranging and far-reaching phenomenon, John D. Skrentny exposes the connections between the diverse actions and circumstances that contributed to this revolution–and that forever changed the face of American politics. (full text).
His books:
on University of Chicago Press;
on amazon;
on harvard.edu;
on Google-Scholar search for articles;
on Google search for books.
links:
CONCERN FOR THE ENVIRONMENT, A CROSS-NATIONAL PERSPECTIVE;
annual review of sociology 2006;