Books by Mary Jo Bane

The authors examine the U.S. welfare system-its recipients and providers, and the policy ideas surrounding it-with objectivity and clarity. Focusing on the AFDC Program (Aid to Families with Dependent Children), they identify three models that have been used to explain "welfare dependency" and test them against an accumulating body of evidence.

Loustaunau and Sánchez-Bane combine their many years of association and collaboration dealing with health issues in the U.S.-Mexico border area, to bring together a series of chapters illustrating that así es la vida, that's life, need not indicate a fatalistic acceptance that poverty, sickness, misery, and misfortune must be taken in stride. The authors of the chapters have researched, studied, worked with, or have been borderlanders themselves.The chapters focus on the impact of the social structure, and on the power and determination of people to change their conditions for the better, increasing their choices and enlarging their worlds. They look beyond political and economic barriers to find the spark in the human spirit that must be identified and nurtured to produce a better life for the benefit of peoples and nations on both sides of the border, and to nourish the third culture as a bridge between nations. The authors note the dangers and pitfalls along the way, and the need for more realistic policies and programs to empower people to define their own problems, and to participate in fashioning the solutions.

People who participate in debates about the causes and cures of poverty often speak from religious conviction. But those convictions are rarely made explicit or debated on their own terms.