This book examines the emergence of the black middle classes in urban Brazil, after 30 years of black mobilization and against the backdrop of deep economic, cultural, and political transformations taking place in recent decades within the country. One of the consequences of such transformations is said to be the restructuring of gender, race, and class relations. Utilizing qualitative research techniques such as ethnography, interviews, life histories, and focus groups among Afro-descendant families in the Northeast region of the country, the book explores contemporary race, class, and gender inequalities and their impact on daily lived experience. It reveals the dynamics underlying upward mobility, the diverse modes and experiences of social ascent into the middle classes, and the everyday negotiations involved in establishing one's status in the socio-racial hierarchy, which are not captured by other, more "macro" lenses. While some of these patterns are not peculiar to black people, this book argues that "race" shaped the contours and possibilities of social mobility in particular ways. This book is critical reading for specialists in the fields of inequality and race, class, and gender relations.

The economic sanctions imposed on Iraq from 1990 to 2003 were the most comprehensive and devastating of any established in the name of international governance. The sanctions, coupled with the bombing campaign of 1991, brought about the near collapse of Iraq's infrastructure and profoundly compromised basic conditions necessary to sustain life. In a sharp indictment of U.S. policy, Joy Gordon examines the key role the nation played in shaping the sanctions, whose harsh strictures resulted in part from U.S. definitions of "dual use" and "weapons of mass destruction," and claims that everything from water pipes to laundry detergent to child vaccines could produce weapons. Drawing on internal UN documents, confidential minutes of closed meetings, and interviews with foreign diplomats and U.S. officials, Gordon details how the United States not only prevented critical humanitarian goods from entering Iraq but also undermined attempts at reform; unilaterally overrode the UN weapons inspectors; and manipulated votes in the Security Council. In every political, legal, and bureaucratic domain, the deliberate policies of the United States ensured the continuation of Iraq's catastrophic condition. Provocative and sure to stir debate, this book lays bare the damage that can be done by unchecked power in our institutions of international governance.