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The Samaritan's Dilemma

Should Government Help Your Neighbor?

Deborah Stone
June 2008     ISBN: 1568583540

For at least a generation, experts have warned us not reach out to others. Too much help makes people passive and dependent, we are told, and self interest is the only motive that spurs us to work and contribute to society. Liberals and conservatives alike have endorsed this new moral code for government. The Samaritan's Dilemma challenges this conventional wisdom. We are born needing help, we die needing help, and we live out our days getting and giving help. We live by everyday altruism. So when leaders define the ideal citizen as someone who pursues his self interest and withholds help from others, good people are repelled by politics.


What readers are saying

"We need each other. As this fine book reminds us, the recent American creed of hyper-individualism is making us less happy and more vulnerable—real solace lies in rebuilding the kind of communities that take care of everyone. Everyone."
—Bill McKibben, author of Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future

"The Samaritan's Dilemma pinpoints the Orwellian perversion that is now our conventional wisdom—namely, that help for the needy is harmful and cruelty is a form of kindness. Thank you, Deborah Stone, for this powerful call to a moral reawakening!"
—Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed

Read more reviews of the book here and here.

About the Authors

Deborah Stone is the author of Policy Paradox: The Art of Political Decision-Making, which in 2002 won the Aaron Wildavsky Award from the American Political Science Association for its enduring contribution to policy studies. She is a founding editor of The American Prospect.
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Deborah Stone's Book Tour

July 7 - November 2 | Across the United States
Deborah Stone, a Nation Books author, recently published her fourth book, The Samaritan's Dilemma. Robert Kuttner, co-editor of The American Prospect calls it "a brilliant and persuasive statement of the case for organized compassion—not out of sentimentality but for the viability of society and our own self regard as a decent people." Listen to her on the radio and get a copy of the book signed at a bookstore on Stone's book tour. Find the schedule here.

August 25 | 6 pm
Bruce Mau Leads Green Symposium
(Denver, Colorado)
Institute Fellow Bruce Mau will lead the Green Constitutional Congress Symposium, which will cover a wide array of green-related topics. The symposium will take place at Buell Theater in Denver; it is produced by the Rhode Island School of Design and University of Colorado-Denver. The symposium is part of the larger event, Dialog:City at the DNC. For more information, click here. MORE

September 13
2008 ELECTION: What's Really at Stake?
(Cooper Union Auditorium, 30 Cooper Square, NYC)
Come listen to Institute Fellows Naomi Klein and Jeremy Scahill (also a Nation Books author of Blackwater) speak at a benefit for The Indypendent newspaper at Cooper Union Auditorium in New York City. Additional panelists to be announced; meet the speakers at a special pre-event reception. For more information and to reserve tickets, visit indypendent.org or call (212)-221-0521. MORE