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Encyclopedia of Activism and Social Justice
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Encyclopedia of Activism and Social Justice

Three Volume Set
Edited by:

April 2007 | 1 832 pages | SAGE Publications, Inc
This is an important historical period in which to develop communication models aimed at creating opportunities for citizens to find a voice for new experiences and social concerns. Such basic social problems as inequality, poverty, and discrimination pose a constant challenge to policies that serve the health and income needs of children, families, people with disabilities, and the elderly. Important changes both in individual values and civic life are occurring in the United States and in many other nations.

Recent trends such as the globalization of commerce and consumer values, the speed and personalization of communication technologies, and an economic realignment of industrial and information-based economies are often regarded as negative. Yet there are many signs - from the WTO experience in Seattle to the rise of global activism aimed at making biotechnology accountable - that new forms of citizenship, politics, and public engagement are emerging.

The Encyclopedia of Activism and Social Justice presents a comprehensive overview of the field with topics of varying dimensions, breadth, and length. This three-volume Encyclopedia is designed for readers to understand the topics, concepts, and ideas that motivate and shape the fields of activism, civil engagement, and social justice and includes biographies of the major thinkers and leaders who have influenced and continue to influence the study of activism.

Key Features
  • Offers multidisciplinary perspectives with contributions from the fields of education, communication studies, political science, leadership studies, social work, social welfare, environmental studies, health care, social psychology, and sociology
  • Provides an easily recognizable approach to topics, ideas, persons, and concepts based on alphabetical and biographical listings in civil engagement, social justice, and activism
  • Addresses both small-scale social justice concepts and more large-scale issues
  • Includes biography pieces indicating the concepts, ideas, or legacies of individuals and groups who have influenced current practice and thinking such as John Stuart Mill, Rachel Carson, Mother Jones, Martin Luther King, Jr., Karl Marx, Mohandas Gandhi, Nelson and Winnie Mandela, Dorothy Day, and Thomas Merton 

Brook Willensky-Lanford
Dorfman, Ariel
Brook Willensky-Lanford
Terkel, Studs
Brook Willensky-Lanford
Habitat for Humanity

"Useful for anyone researching social justice groups or social activists."

James Langan
University of Pittsburgh
Key features
  • An easily recognizable approach to topics, ideas, persons, and concepts based on chronology, alphabetical and biographical listings in civil engagement, social justice, and activism.
  • The inclusion of both small-scale social justice concepts, and more large-scale issues.
  • The inclusion of short to medium biography pieces indicating the concepts, ideas, or legacies of individuals and groups who have influenced current practice and thinking. These include, but are not limited to, John Stuart Mill, Hubert Humphrey, Woodrow Wilson, Martin Luther King, Jr., Karl Marx, Mohandas Gandhi, Justice Louis Brandeis, Dorothy Day, and Thomas Merton. Becasue of the uniform format developed for the inclusion of biographical pieces in the Encyclopedia, all entries contain the same data so readers can quickly see the life span information (in the case of single persons) and the contribution, as well as the connections to current practice and thought in activism, civil engagement, and social justice. The presentations of these groups and personages is not a critique of their ideas or works, but a presentation of them with the identification of areas of continuing influence or controversy without taking sides.
  • All entries in the Encyclopedia are simply notes in larger networks:  Each entry contains enough information so that readers can place the ideas, concepts, and thoughts into chronological context enabling readers to have some idea of where the person, content, or thought, "fit" into the overall flow of things.