Howell S. Baum – författare

This book tells why people want to feel like members of work organizations, and why doing so is difficult. Using case examples, it presents a psychoanalytic perspective on organizational entry and the process of entry negotiations for workers which sometimes lasts years. Interview material shows how workers try to use organizations to develop and how entire careers reflect satisfaction or disappointment with initial organizational experiences.Baum presents a useful framework for interpreting organizational behavior in terms of workers' efforts to develop. He shows how developmental expectations must be met before workers can identify with organizational goals or feel close to colleagues, and how worker motivation is possible only in organizations that meet individuals' growth needs.

Analyzes the future of urban communities and presents models for community planning, taking into account different classes, ethnicities, and cultures.The Organization of Hope tells the stories of a Jewish community and a white ethnic community as they plan for their futures. Though they differ in class, ethnicity, and culture, they struggle with the same questions: What identity will hold their communities together? How can they plan for their communities' economic, social, and spiritual survival? The book analyzes the future of urban communities, and presents models for community planning.

Presents an innovative community approach to educational improvement.Community Action for School Reform tells the story of a partnership between Baltimore community activists and a university as they created an organization to improve neighborhood schools. The book examines the challenges they faced, such as persuading community members that they had the necessary knowledge to do something about the schools, starting and sustaining an organization, conducting and using research, engaging the school system, and funding their work.

Presents an innovative community approach to educational improvement.Community Action for School Reform tells the story of a partnership between Baltimore community activists and a university as they created an organization to improve neighborhood schools. The book examines the challenges they faced, such as persuading community members that they had the necessary knowledge to do something about the schools, starting and sustaining an organization, conducting and using research, engaging the school system, and funding their work.

In the first book to present the history of Baltimore school desegregation, Howell S. Baum shows how good intentions got stuck on what Gunnar Myrdal called the "American Dilemma." Immediately after the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, the city's liberal school board voted to desegregate and adopted a free choice policy that made integration voluntary. Baltimore's school desegregation proceeded peacefully, without the resistance or violence that occurred elsewhere. However, few whites chose to attend school with blacks, and after a few years of modest desegregation, schools resegregated and became increasingly segregated. The school board never changed its policy. Black leaders had urged the board to adopt free choice and, despite the limited desegregation, continued to support the policy and never sued the board to do anything else. Baum finds that American liberalism is the key to explaining how this happened. Myrdal observed that many whites believed in equality in the abstract but considered blacks inferior and treated them unequally. School officials were classical liberals who saw the world in terms of individuals, not races. They adopted a desegregation policy that explicitly ignored students' race and asserted that all students were equal in freedom to choose schools, while their policy let whites who disliked blacks avoid integration. School officials' liberal thinking hindered them from understanding or talking about the city's history of racial segregation, continuing barriers to desegregation, and realistic change strategies. From the classroom to city hall, Baum examines how Baltimore's distinct identity as a border city between North and South shaped local conversations about the national conflict over race and equality. The city's history of wrestling with the legacy of Brown reveals Americans' preferred way of dealing with racial issues: not talking about race. This avoidance, Baum concludes, allows segregation to continue.

In the first book to present the history of Baltimore school desegregation, Howell S. Baum shows how good intentions got stuck on what Gunnar Myrdal called the "American Dilemma." Immediately after the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, the city's liberal school board voted to desegregate and adopted a free choice policy that made integration voluntary. Baltimore's school desegregation proceeded peacefully, without the resistance or violence that occurred elsewhere. However, few whites chose to attend school with blacks, and after a few years of modest desegregation, schools resegregated and became increasingly segregated. The school board never changed its policy. Black leaders had urged the board to adopt free choice and, despite the limited desegregation, continued to support the policy and never sued the board to do anything else. Baum finds that American liberalism is the key to explaining how this happened. Myrdal observed that many whites believed in equality in the abstract but considered blacks inferior and treated them unequally. School officials were classical liberals who saw the world in terms of individuals, not races. They adopted a desegregation policy that explicitly ignored students' race and asserted that all students were equal in freedom to choose schools, while their policy let whites who disliked blacks avoid integration. School officials' liberal thinking hindered them from understanding or talking about the city's history of racial segregation, continuing barriers to desegregation, and realistic change strategies. From the classroom to city hall, Baum examines how Baltimore's distinct identity as a border city between North and South shaped local conversations about the national conflict over race and equality. The city's history of wrestling with the legacy of Brown reveals Americans' preferred way of dealing with racial issues: not talking about race. This avoidance, Baum concludes, allows segregation to continue.