Bücher der Reihe Contemporary Issues

What is it like to experience disability? What are the prevailing cultural attitudes toward those who experience disability? How do social norms and public policies affect those experiencing disability? This book provides a vivid and concrete introduction to the wealth of social, political and ethical debates that surround the experience of disability.Beginning with an exploration of the perspective of persons with disabilities, the essays demonstrate the extent to which the disability experience is affected by social and cultural values, attitudes, and policies. In addition to these first-person reflections, there are essays relating to such issues as:-The disability rights movement-Disability studies-Social policy relating to disabilityPhysician-assisted suicide, genetic testing, selective abortion, the moral status of handicapped newborns, and living and dying with dignityWritten in an engaging style with a focus on the concrete, this collection of essays includes contributions by John Hockenberry, Oiver Sacks, Peter Singer, and others. It is a marvelous resource for enabling the reader to comprehend the experience of disability and to explore contemporary issues involving the disability community.

What is our goal: equal opportunity or equality of result? The debate rages on.The November 5, 1996 decision by voters in California to eliminate most forms of state sanctioned affirmative action ignited a civil rights debate that sent shock waves across the country. The vote had critics celebrating the dawn of a new era of equal rights, while opponents warned of school and workplace discrimination without the protective blanket of affirmative action.The question of racial equality has inspired new debate today, reminiscent of the conflicts of the 1960s. Again we ask ourselves: Is affirmative action necessary to maintain equal labor practices, school desegregation plans, and broad social standards of racial equality? Does affirmative action or laws to roll it back go against the idea of equality itself? Should race play an important role in college admissions and corporate hiring? Is affirmative action a poison instead of a cure? For some, it depends on how the term is defined.These and other questions are debated in this highly charged collection of essays by a distinguished group of politicians, philosophers, educators, and others including Tom Beauchamp, Ward Connerly, Ronald Dworkin, Stanley Fish, Lyndon Johnson, Nicholas LeMann, Louis Pojman, George Sher, Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, Judith Jarvis Thomson, Richard Wasserstrom, Cornell West, and Steven Yates. Included also are important legal decisions bearing on affirmative action.

The transformation of society brought about by the wide dispersion of computers has given rise to moral dilemmas. This is a collection of twenty-six essays, which offer answers to the ethical questions raised by the interaction of people and computers.

Advances in medical technology and science have made organ procurement, or the search and transfer of organs and tissue from one body to another, an important issue. How are we to meet the need? Can we do so and still respect personal ethics and religious convictions? This book examines the issues that surround organ procurement and distribution.

Many questions are at the centre of the 'science wars' being waged over the role and future of science and technology in our society. This selection of a variety of perspectives on the hotly contested role of science and technology in contemporary society aims to clarify this vital debate for both specialists and non-specialists.

A collection of articles, this title encompasses the many points of contention in the debate about genetically modified foods. Beginning with the history and the science of genetically modified foods, it focuses on the morality of modifying organisms for human use.