Most Americans would be surprised to learn that their government has declined to join most other nations in UN treaties addressing inadequate housing, poverty, children's rights, health care, racial discrimination, and migrant workers. Yet this book documents how the U.S. has, for decades, declined to ratify widely accepted treaties on these and many other basic human rights. Providing the first comprehensive topical survey, the contributors build a case and specific agendas for the nation to change course and join the world community as a protector of human rights."With Contributions by and on: "

It has been over six decades since the United States closed its borders to international human rights laws and agreements, and of course a great deal has happened in those intervening six decades. Most significant is that more of the world's people embrace the language of human rights and articulate their aspirations in those terms. Americans do not because the U.S. government arrogantly disregards international human rights treaties, declarations, and conventions. Even when the U.S. has occasionally ratified a human rights treaty, it includes a statement that legally exempts the U.S. from the treaty provisions. It is not therefore a legal party to human rights treaties on civil and political rights, elimination of racial discrimination against racial minorities, and against women, the rights of the child, and the rights of migrant workers. Contributors to this volume are prominent social scientists who take topics that are standard fare in sociology, such as inadequate housing, children living in poverty, and inadequate health care, and instead of dwelling on these as social problems, lay out the case for human rights-that is, for example, housing is a human right, children have rights to economic security, all have rights to health care; all have rights to housing, and so on.

This book systematically examines prevailing cultural patterns in contemporary American society. Using information on several thousands of cultural organizations, including opera and chamber music companies as well as cinemas and live rock concerts, Professor Blau examines the geography of culture, the changing demands for culture, the interdependencies among cultural organizations of different kinds, the nature of labor markets for artists, and the effects of arts subsidies on nonprofit cultural establishments over a ten year period.