BOO KS
641
and this study supports the idea - is by itself a weak lever for societal
change. The notion that small achievements will accumulate to make
for gradual reforms is also challenged as the cleavages between the
underclass and the affluent American seem to grow and the underclass
becomes more and more nonwhite.
If
a multifaceted, coordinated attempt at reform is to be made,
those working on the educational front will probably draw on two con–
siderations, one well documented in the Coleman report and one com–
pletely outside its domain. Coleman
et
at.
show that the extent to which
schools have a bridging effect is due to the upward pull of integrated
classrooms; that is, Negroes in predominantly white schools do not pull
down their fellow students' achievements, but rather are challenged by
the white environment to higher achievements. This suggests that inte–
gration is not only a means of erasing the social evil of a color bar but
also may serve to narrow the educational, and hence cultural and
economic, cleavage. Second, recent studies conducted at Harvard, Chi–
cago and elsewhere suggest the importance of reaching preschool chil–
dren, if they are not to be almost hopelessly behind by the time they
reach school age.
1
This is where the nex t major attempt to bridge the
two "nations" may come, an area that the next Coleman report may
well study.
Frankly, however, I am not sure that the cleavage can be bridged
within the confines of the existing system; and I doubt that whatever
can
be achieved within its confines will be attained.
Amitai Etzione
RUSSELL, SAGE
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF BERTRAND RUSSELL: Volume I. Litile, Brown
and Company. $7.95.
In 1872, Kate Ambcrley, born a Stanley and married to Lord
Amberley, the oldest son of Lord John Russell, gave birth to her third
child, a son. Accordingly, she wrote to H elen Taylor, who since the death
of her mother, Harriet T aylor Mill, had been looking after the then
1.
Maya Pines,
R evolution in L earning: The Y ears from Birth to Six
(New
York: Harper
&
Row,
J
966) .
