How Patriotic is the Patriot Act?: Freedom Versus Security in the Age of Terrorism

How Patriotic is the Patriot Act?: Freedom Versus Security in the Age of Terrorism – Amitai Etzioni. Jules Boykoff. Pacific University. Search for.
Table of contents

Etzioni deserves credit for a real accomplishment here. Etzioni points out the errors of the Left who scream over every possible new power the government might exercise to fight terrorism while taking the Right to task for legislation that could legitimately harm civil liberties.

Ultimately he calls for a communitarian goal for granting the government soli Etzioni deserves credit for a real accomplishment here.

Ultimately he calls for a communitarian goal for granting the government solid tools to help protect the public and root out enemies while creating enough review boards and inspectors to make sure rights are being safeguarded. While not always clearly written, the book sparkles with its common-sense. Sep 01, Coral rated it liked it Shelves: Etzioni does a very thorough job of analyzing each of the components of the Patriot Act. His approach differs from others who tend to discuss the Patriot Act as a whole, without looking at its discrete parts and assessing whether or not there is some good mixed in with the bad.

I did not agree with the author on everything, but I appreciate his willingness to look at the pieces of the Act and look for a middle ground.

How patriotic is the Patriot Act? : freedom versus security in the age of terrorism

Apr 09, Stacy rated it it was amazing Shelves: Particularly intersting look at privacy and the culture of fear that has been created and played upon. Zahari Daskalov rated it it was amazing Mar 01, Jp Finn rated it it was ok Mar 10, Sam rated it liked it Oct 02, Charity rated it liked it Jan 02, John Wimmer rated it really liked it May 13, Sheley rated it really liked it Dec 08, Paula rated it liked it Dec 16, Brandie rated it it was ok Jun 29, Ali rated it liked it Oct 22, Sharon Arnoldi rated it liked it Feb 08, Readers looking for a rigorous legal encounter with the Patriot Act may be disappointed, but Etzioni has provided a very approachable resource for student essays and debates.

Beginning with poll data and crime statistics, Etzioni takes as a premise that public safety measures can be crucial to democracy, but not that? He then goes on to detail security measures undertaken in the U.

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He finds parts of the Patriot Act? All of his arguments are footnoted, most are brief and a few, such as strengthening public health,? While seemingly not comprehensive given the Patriot Act? Copyright Reed Business Information. Is not defending the Constitution as patriotic as defending the homeland?

How Patriotic Is the Patriot ACT?: Freedom Versus Security in the Age of Terrorism

Although the author wants readers to think a balance between the two is reached, Etzioni tips the scale in favor of national security over civil liberty. Chapter 6, "The Limits of Nation Building," is severely misplaced, especially considering the title. The Patriot Act is not mentioned in this chapter or even cited in the notes.

The book title is inept; the subtitle is accurate. Routledge, , p.

Amitai Etzioni, for those not familiar with his work, is a sociologist who directs the Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies at George Washington University. He is the author of some twenty-four books on a range of topics in his field, but in recent years he has focused his efforts on founding a school of social and political theory which he terms "responsive communitarianism.

Additional Information

In How Patriotic is the Patriot Act , Etzioni approaches the Act, and the debate about security and freedom after September 11, from a communitarian perspective. He argues that his version of communitarianism offers a middle ground in what is otherwise a mostly polarized debate in both the popular media and the academy in the United States.

At the outset of the book, he makes a number of assertions that are meant to foreground communitarian principles at work in the U. The Fourth Amendment, for example, does not protect against all search and seizure but only "unreasonable" search and seizure.


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The tension between communal and individual interests is, in this way, inherent in the constitutional formulation of many of the basic rights. The point for Etzioni is that this inherent balancing should preclude from arguing that, in the face of some proposed measure, we would "give up rights" in exchange for security. He is interested in the scope of the proposition that certain "security enhancing measures" can be reasonable and not in violation of any rights.

In its broad outlines, Etzioni's approach to the U.


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