| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 90.1

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 90.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Social Scientists for Social Justice: Making the Case against Segregation. By John P. Jackson Jr. (New York: New York University Press, 2001. xii, 291 pp. $45.00, ISBN 0-8147-4266-1.)

The quest for objectivity has troubled scholars for generations. Sometimes noble and sometimes hubristic, the idea that "truth" could be ascertained has fueled debates about the nature of knowledge and the strategies employed in its pursuit. Humanists typically acquiesce to the idea that the quest for objectivity can never be anything but a quest. Scientists, on the other hand, have long accumulated knowledge on the premise that they were building their cathedral one objective stone after another. But what to do with those caught between these extremes? What to make of the social scientist—that scholar who studies human behavior and organization with tools built to resemble those used by the natural scientist?

John P. Jackson Jr. addresses that question by examining the institutions, individuals, and strategies involving social science knowledge as they pertained to the legal fight to desegregate public schools. Jackson focuses much of his inquiry around the use of social science experts by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People—Legal Defense and Education Fund (NAACP-LDEF). This is one of the great subplots of Brown v. Board of Education (1954), and, as a subplot, it is also rich with controversy. In 1954 and since, many have openly wondered whether the Brown experts were appropriately objective or merely unapologetic advocates for a political cause.

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