Benjamin F. Bobo – författare

African Americans have suffered intensely at the hands of America's dominant group, but the roles played by urban planning, land use policy, and the free market are not well known. Presenting a new conceptual approach, this book considers their locking effect on African Americans, showing, for instance, that one-acre zoning and similar policies in upscale neighborhoods lock African Americans out while market mechanisms in decaying neighborhoods lock them in. Arguing that the locking effect leads to the disenfranchisement of African Americans, Bobo shows how wealth is channeled to the dominant group and African Americans' life choices are denuded, creating a volatile situation.Although classical economic theory holds that a free market allocates scarce resources in the best interest of society, in reality market mechanisms do not work to the advantage of African Americans. Nor does public regulation of land use operate in their interest, although public policy is presumed to produce equitable and favorable outcomes for all members of society. This book explores how a combination of government regulation of land use and free market forces have created the locking effect, which has cultivated and sustained a process of disenfranchisement of African Americans.

In this series of essays that span over 20 years of research, Benjamin Bobo builds the case for multinational corporations to take an active role in combating poverty around the world. Citing sobering statistics (for example, three-fourths of the world's nations are classified as Third World and four-fifths of the world's people live in these nations), Bobo argues that huge corporate entities not only have the wherewithal but an obligation to alleviate the suffering that results from a lack of economic resources and opportunity. Through these provocative and forward-looking essays, he presents a theoretical and practical framework for multinationals to stimulate economic development in the Third World—providing access to capital, entrepreneurial expertise, and emerging technologies.In a bold challenge to conventional thinking about wealth creation and strategic decision-making, Bobo applies such concepts as profit satisficing and stakeholder givebacks, and proposes an agenda for change that begins in business schools (the intellectual training ground for multinational managers), with increased emphasis on sustainability and human development. The net result, he argues, will be a world in which both producers and consumers benefit.