The Road to Poverty
The Road to Poverty
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USDKathleen Blee and Dwight Billings examine the social dynamics of persistently poor rural communities through the history of Clay County, an especially poor section of the Eastern Kentucky mountains in Appalachia. The authors uncover the systemic problems and patterns of low income by tracing its socio-cultural, economic, and political development of Clay County from its earliest non-native settlement and agricultural development, to the advent of the coal industry, to the present day. This study of the long-term, institutional basis of rural poverty contains some fascinating, new local historical detail, based upon the authors' meticulous archival research. This book makes an important contribution to basic research on inequality - pointing to the shortcomings of treating symptomatic problems of low income, while failing to address systemic ones - at a time when American policymakers are struggling to design and implement effective programs to move people from welfare to work.
- Contains new local historical detail
- Based upon the authors' meticulous archival research
- Makes an important contribution to basic research on inequality
Reviews & endorsements
"Billings and Blee support their often fascinating and at times incredible report with a wealth of archival and contemporary data, grounded in a theoretically comprehensive and thoughtful analysis. Their book is a real eye opener for anyone who has ever wondered why Appalachia is, and has long been, so poor. It is also a rare case study of mostly white poverty with not an inner city in sight." Herbert J. Gans, Columbia University
"...an ambitious history of an Appalachian county in order to understand `how places grow poor.' Skilled history from which interested readers and policy makers can learn much." Kirkus Reviews
"...the Billings and Blee study is a careful and thoughtful one and an important addition to the literature." Journal of Economic History
"An important contribution to the literature on the sourthern Appalachian region." Choice
"Billings and Blee are courageous in their mixing of genres, and the payoffs are this careful empirical study of Appalachia, which will appeal to social theorists, and a social theory of Appalachia that will not alleviate historical sociologists." Jrnl of Interdisciplinary History
"Billings and Blee have together researched and written a fine cultural and economic history of Clay County, Kentucky...The authors have certainly suceeded in bringing alive the nineteenth-century economic and cultural history of Clay County." EH.NET July 01
"Road to Poverty is an extremely impressive book...It is a brilliant accomplishment that will have an impact far beyond Appalachian studies." Jrnl of Social History
"In this important and valuable study of the origins of Appalachian poverty, Dwight B. Billings and Kathleen M. Blee use a variety of materials...to examine Clay County, Kentucky, over the course of the nineteenth century." American Historical Review
Product details
January 2000Paperback
9780521655460
452 pages
229 × 152 × 26 mm
0.66kg
23 b/w illus. 5 maps 29 tables
Available
Table of Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of tables
- Preface and acknowledgments
- Part I. Public Policy and Historical Sociology:
- 1. Introduction
- Part II. Antebellum Capitalist Markets:
- 2. Fronier Kentucky in the capitalist world system
- 3. Industry, commerce, and slaveholding
- Part III. Antebellum State Coercion:
- 4. State making and the origins of elite conflict
- Part IV. Cultural Strategies:
- 5. The patriarchal moral economy of agriculture
- 6. Racial dynamics and the creation of poverty
- Part V. Postbellum Capitalist Markets and the Local State:
- 7. From marginality to integration
- 8. Feud violence
- 9. Epilogue
- Appendix
- Notes
- Index.
