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Social Justice Isn't What You Think It Is Hardcover – November 3, 2015

by Michael Novak (Author), Paul Adams (Author), Elizabeth Shaw (Contributor)
4.2 out of 5 stars 10 customer reviews
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Product Details

  • Hardcover: 336 pages
  • Publisher: Encounter Books (November 3, 2015)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1594038279
  • ISBN-13: 978-1594038273
  • Product Dimensions: 6 x 1.2 x 9.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #244,604 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Top Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsAn advancement of the common good is shared by most
By Caleb Michael Graff on November 10, 2015
Format: Hardcover
For those of us who have spent time with Dr.Novak's work, this new masterpiece comes as no surprise. What he and Adams have done is to give us a new lens through which to view Social Justice. Everyone along the political spectrum will find their preconceived notions of what Social Justice is truly challenged by this work.

An advancement of the common good is shared by most, and it would be my hope that as you read this book, you think carefully about whether this new definition will move us in that direction? It is my belief that what Dr. Novak and Paul Adams have done is crafted for us a blueprint that will do just that. And they have managed to do so with clear, compelling, and inspiring prose that is utterly thought provoking.
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5.0 out of 5 starsImportant New Work on the Concept of Social Justice
By Martin B. Tracy on November 15, 2015
Format: Kindle Edition
It is refreshing and encouraging to see the concept of social justice approached from a pragmatic and sustainable perspective, as well as one that is faith based. This thoughtful and engaging work is an important contribution to the understanding of the need to promote the virtues of individual and community responsibility.
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5.0 out of 5 starsMasterly Treatment of Social Justice!
By Amazon Customer on November 9, 2015
Format: Hardcover
It would be daunting to find a more confusing concept than social justice. For some, the concept is vile, an attempt at bringing about the social utopia by way of subterfuge. For others, it is the very essence of the Gospel—all other aspects of faith and morality taking a seat at the back of the bus. Michael Novak and Paul Adams are masterly in their attempt at clearing the space and thinning the air so we can appreciate the concept in all its authenticity. They manage to define and explain social justice as a new virtue fit for new social conditions if we are able to rescue it away from the two extremes of dismissiveness and partisanship.

One of the most fundamental assumptions underpinning the treatment of social justice in America since at least the early 1900s is that the state is preeminent in assuring the common good. In effect, the boundless field of collective action moves in the direction of collapsing the whole of social welfare within the affairs and institutions of the state. The creation of a compassionate and moral society without the protagonism of the state is a task that seems farfetched to many today. At the same time, the failure of government to produce positive transformational change seems evident. Such evidence, however, fails to convince some social justice advocates that freedom and human industry can satisfactorily provide what collective action cannot. Good people are immobilized at the thought of countless souls acutely suffering the calamities befalling on us in the absence of the great machine.

The expansion of government intervention has been one of the main failed attempts to create fairer conditions by redistribution as to avoid the perils of an ‘unjust’ economic system.Read more ›
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5.0 out of 5 starsMichael Novak and Paul Adams give the reader a whole ...
By LadyLibro on December 20, 2015
Format: Kindle Edition
Michael Novak and Paul Adams give the reader a whole new way of thinking about the clumsily used term social justice. Social Justice, they explain, is a relatively new concept and therefore it cannot simply be reduced to the ancient virtue of charity. On the other hand, its vagueness (it is "allowed to float in the air as if everyone will recognize an instance when he sees it") has let the term be used as an effective PR tool for growing government, playing the on the emotions of compassion and guilt of the governed.

Employing the signature charm and wit of Novak with stories of Slovak immigrants, wisdom of presidents, and contemporary polemics, the authors put flesh on what the notion that Social Justice is and how it provides vital lifeblood to democracies. The reader will be rewarded with new clarity on the balance between freedom and compassion.
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3.0 out of 5 starsStrong start, weak finish
By John S. Braun on March 6, 2016
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
Novak writes well in explaining how the current trend in social justice thought isn't what it is. The difficulty he attributes to the trend that makes social justice code for a justification for our centralized, command and control, welfare government is that no one has yet defined it. His chapter on Hayek, who hated the term, is particularly good.
The fault I have with the book is that the authors repeat themselves often rather than developing further their argumments, or instead of stopping.
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