Books in Brief
Democracy by Decree: What Happens When Courts Run Government by Ross Sandler and David Schoenbrod (Yale University Press, 256 pp., $30). “Believers in democracy by decree argue that political progress is not fast enough, or cannot be trusted. We thought the same when we were public-interest attorneys, but we were wrong.” With these words, Sandler and Schoenbrod open their informative book about how courts and lawyers have come to control many of the most important functions of state and local governments.
Carefully and clearly, they demonstrate how federal courts have weakened the political system by taking control of schools, prisons, and mental hospitals for decades at a time, in the name of high-sounding goals for social reform. The courts are no longer in the business of enforcing rights–they are creating them, and they aren’t doing a very good job.
Sandler and Schoenbrod present themselves as sympathetic to those seeking reforms through the courts, but cite examples of “rigid and unrealistic” decrees from “institutional reform litigation.” Judges who legislate have no better track record than elected politicians–and have done dramatically worse with special education, environmental protection, medical care, and foster care. Costing millions, these court-supervised programs often end up harming the constituency they were intended to help.
Blurbed by a wide variety of people, “Democracy by Decree” comes highly recommended. But the most striking blurb is from Ed Koch, the former mayor of New York City: “A fascinating book for someone like me who regretted agreeing to a court-approved consent decree limiting the city’s authority in programs involving prisons, welfare, education, homeless shelters, etc.” We regret it too, Mr. Koch.
–Katherine Mangu-Ward
Why There Are No Good Men Left: The Romantic Plight of the New Single Woman by Barbara Dafoe Whitehead (Broadway, 195 pp., $23.95). Finding true love has never been easy, but it seems particularly difficult for young women today. Evidence of their romantic plight is everywhere: in television shows like “Friends” and “Sex and the City,” in “Chick Lit” fiction like “Bridget Jones’s Diary,” and in the flood of women’s self-help books.
For “Why There Are No Good Men Left,” Barbara Dafoe Whitehead interviewed dozens of young, successful women to find out why getting a mate is so difficult. One reason, she discovers, is the revolution in girl-rearing she calls the “Girl Project.” Inspired by both the feminist vision of independence and the omnipresence of divorce, the Girl Project prepares girls for adult lives as women without any dependence on men or marriage. This new path involves a lot of college degrees and career development, but the central idea is that these girls, once grown, will get all the benefits of marriage–good money, sex, and a nest egg–without actually marrying.
Unfortunately, the Girl Project also drove a stake through the heart of romantic courtship. “Changes in sexual mores and behavior, a persistently high rate of divorce, historic increases in unwed childbearing, the resort to new reproductive and matchmaking technologies, the rise of cohabitation, . . . and the decline of college-based courtship are all signs of weakening in this long established system,” Dafoe Whitehead writes. While the purpose of romantic courtship was to pair off young people for marriage, “relationships” pair them off for anything from “living together, to serial monogamy, to casual partnerings.” What’s more, this new system is particularly suited to young men, especially the educated and affluent. In the old system they had to make a commitment to get a nice girl into bed. But now things are much easier for them.
So how do women feel about their situation? Most are still marriage-minded, but as one twenty-something put it, “Society sucks the hope out of all of us.”
–Rachel DiCarlo
