Social Ethics for Social Justice
Sourcing the major traditions of progressive Christian social ethicssocial gospel liberalism, Niebuhrian realism, and liberation theologyGary Dorrien argues for the social-ethical necessity of social justice politics. In carefully reasoned essays, he focuses on three subjects: the ethics and politics of economic justice, racial and gender justice, and antimilitarism, making a constructive case for economic democracy, along with a liberationist understanding of racial and gender justice and an anti-imperial form of liberal internationalism.
In Dorrien's view, the three major discourse traditions of progressive Christian social ethics share a fundamental commitment to transform the structures of society in the direction of social justice. His reflections on these topics feature innovative analyses of major figures, such as Walter Rauschenbusch, Reinhold Niebuhr, James Burnham, Norman Thomas, and Michael Harrington, and an extensive engagement with contemporary intellectuals, such as Rosemary R. Ruether, Katie Cannon, Gregory Baum, and Cornel West. Dorrien also weaves his personal experiences into his narrative, especially his involvement in social justice movements. He includes a special chapter on the 2008 presidential campaign and the historic candidacy of Barack Obama.
Through a collection of 19 essays, the gifted social ethicist not only explores the origins and heights of the social justice movement in American liberal Christianity but studies its challengers and traces its decline
Like his previous works, Economy, Difference, Empire not only displays Dorrien's passion for remembering the past but also his ability to discern what aspects of the past are still valuable. He writes vividly and clearly about history, ethics, and theology, and he understands that the voices of religious and political progressivism, whose stories he loves to tell, should not be consigned to the dusty shelves of a library.
Part I: The Social Gospel and Niebuhrian Realism
1. Society as the Subject of Redemption: Washington Gladden, Walter Rauschenbusch, and the Social Gospel
2. Reinhold Niebuhr, Karl Barth, and the Crises of War and Capitalism
3. The Niebuhrian Legacy: Christian Realism as Theology, Ethics, and Public Intellectualism
4. Ironic Complexity: Reinhold Niebuhr, Billy Graham, Modernity, and Racial Justice
Part II: Economic Democracy in Question
5. Norman Thomas and the Dilemma of American Socialism
6. Michael Harrington and the "Left Wing of the Possible"
7. Christian Socialism as Tradition and Problem
8. Breaking the Oligarchy: Globalization, Turbo-Capitalism, Economic Crash, Economic Democracy
9. Rethinking and Renewing Economic Democracy
Part III: Neoconservatism and American Empire
10. The Neoconservative Phenomenon: American Power and the War of Ideology
11. Imperial Designs: Neoconservatism and the Iraq War
12. Militaristic Illusions: The Iraq Debacle and the Crisis of American Empire
13. Empire in Denial: American Exceptionalism and the Community of Nations
Part IV: Social Ethics and the Politics of Difference
14. The Feminist Difference: Rosemary R. Ruether and Eco-Socialist Christianity
15. Pragmatic Postmodern Prophecy: Cornel West as Social Critic and Public Intellectual
16. As Purple to Lavender: Katie Cannon and Womanist Ethics
17. Religious Pluralism as a Justice Issue: Catholicism, Protestantism, Judaism, and Ecumenism
18. The Obama Phenomenon and Presidency
19. Social Ethics in the Making: History, Method, and White Supremacism