September 4, 1996 Contact: Jennifer McNulty (408) 459-2495; mcnulty@ua.ucsc.edu

UC SANTA CRUZ POLITICAL SCIENTIST HONORED FOR BOOK ON WOMEN AND WELFARE POLICY

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SANTA CRUZ, CA--Gwendolyn Mink, a professor of politics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, has been honored by her peers for her recent book on women and welfare policy.

Mink received the Victoria Schuck Award from the American Political Science Association for her book The Wages of Motherhood: Inequality in the Welfare State, 1917-1942 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995). The Schuck Award recognizes the best book on women in politics published during the previous calendar year. It was presented during the association's annual meeting at the award ceremony on August 30; it carries a $500 cash prize.

Mink is an authority on American politics; she specializes in welfare policy and feminist politics. Her book examines the ways in which welfare policy that was established during the first half of this century reinforced existing patterns of gender and racial inequality. Forged by such stars of feminist history as Jane Addams, Florence Kelley, and Frances Perkins, those policies were laden with cultural and racial bias in a way that structured inequality among women into the welfare state, says Mink.

Although the reformers made important gains, their welfare innovations were based on the belief that certain women were inferior mothers and needed the guidance of government, says Mink. Their policies linked maternity with dependence, poverty with cultural weakness, and need with moral failing--all of which are evident in the current debate over welfare. "Welfare politics are very much informed by welfare history," says Mink, who calls President Clinton's approval of welfare reform "a betrayal of all women."

This release is also available on the World Wide Web at UCSC's "Services for Journalists" site (http://www.ucsc.edu/news/journalist.html) or via modem from UC NewsWire (209-244-6971).

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