- Why did America launch a war on poverty in 1964?
- What forces doomed the noble campaign from the start?
- Who paid the cost of escalation and failure?
In "Reparations to Poverty," an outside observer identifies six antagonistic forces that provoked, obstructed, and ultimately defeated the greatest ambition of the Great Society if not human experience: Public versus Private; Federal versus State and Local; Urban versus Rural and Suburban; Mainstream versus Minorities; Prevention versus Relief; and, in particular, Economic versus Social Policy. How each antagonism shaped and doomed the war on poverty and its legacy is traced in the records of participants, observers, and in a wealth of unpublished sources.