text:
Talk:Palestinian National Covenant

Older comments
Whoever edited this page anonymously, if we don't disagree with something, we put it under "Beliefs of Side X" category, as did I. And by the way, most of the statements there were proved by the Palestinian position paper quotes. --User:Uriyan

This whole page is nothing more than a presentation of a particular point of view put forward by a few people who are disposed to such views. It doesn't even pretend to obey the NPOV rules of Wikipedia. Rather, it is propaganda pure and simple.

To see how contentious the claims on this page are, note that the Israeli government site which is cited on the page states without any qualification that the offending articles were "cancelled" (the word chosen by that site's translator).

Similarly, this official PLO site states plainly that the offending articles were "abrogated", which is a bit hard to reconcile with the claims on this page that the PLO official position is that no changes have been made.

I fully expect that the translation of the word as "aged" is pure baloney.

The alleged proof that no changes have been made, as given on this page, consists entirely of context-free translations of unknown accuracy from sources that are not cited. Personally I doubt them. The one from the legal official is almost certainly just a statement that the Draft Palestinian Constitution, intended as a permanent replacement for the amended Covenant, is not yet complete. Its approximate contents are no secret because the Palestinian National Authority publishes drafts at regular intervals. Indeed it is impossible to see how it could be completed without a binding final agreement with Israel. To not even mention it on this page is unconscionable.

What is required is to replace this page by a plain account of the facts, with any contrary opinions relegated to a section at the end.

-- zero 12:06, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

This page was, and still is a mess, from almost any perspective. I made a major overhaul, but did not eliminate anything substantive, my main contribution being to add a great deal - in particular the major lacunae of the official Palestinian position and the Israeli acceptance of the changes in 1998 (and 1996) and make the chronology understandable. I did eliminate incorrect dates and corrected some links put in the wrong place, and eliminated redundant or meaningless statements; the article still jumps around timewise, but less than before, and is more coherent. I kept the same structure to make it easier to see what I changed, in the future some things should be taken out of the various sides views and put in the first, main section, and the 1998 events merged in with that. Obviously, even absurdly wrong / misleading and POV statements like "The PNC was never amended, as far as the Palestinian side is concerned" were removed, and refuting citations provided. (Even if this one is understood merely as one Israeli criticism, is an unsourced and strange opinion of the other side's purportedly universal opinion, completely contrary to both sides' official opinion, something to be taken seriously, something that belongs even there?)

In particular the "context-free translations of unknown accuracy from sources that are not cited" were left in, just modified with words like "reportedly." I believe I've seen them at one place or another, but am putting off citing them correctly to another day. It was a lot of work already. I don't think anyone doubts the veracity of the Arafat - Clinton letter text or says there are real differences with the Blair letter, and think that there is undue doubt cast here - I believe I've seen (basically?) identical official texts and will try to dig them up. I added some references, many of them lifted from the PLO article, when they are more particularly relevant to this one. This seems to be the right place to describe fundamental documents of the PLO/PNA - there already is some description of proposed constitutions here. I put in a weasel word many (instead of most) as that seemed better than  the unsourced original (but of course still bad). --John Z 20:26, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Hi, Jay - Yes, I did. "While unchanged, mentions these amendments" is problematic. An addition is a change, and the official positions of every relevant international personality is that there has been a change and revocation. Having the original document with amendments added at the end is the standard way amended constitutions are presented, like the US constitution with its amendments. It would be odd to say this of the US constitution. Of course, in this case the complexity, reference to other documents and explanatory material are noteworthy.

Howzabout: "The text of the charter at ... appends these amendments, although the redrafting  process referred to in the second amendment has not been completed."?--John Z 23:10, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

 * The actual charter is clearly unchanged. There is an additional piece of text at the bottom.  There is no indication whatsoever, that any re-drafting process is underway.  It's been how many years now, over 10?  I think we can safely leave crystal-ball prognostication about such a process out of the article. Jayjg (talk)  03:56, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

 * Your opinion that the charter is unchanged is not shared by the governments of the USA and Israel and the PLO. (Or by Netanyahu, Sharon, Sharansky and Mordechai, whose statements I cited below.) Who has a better right to have an opinion than these? So "clearly  unchanged" is provably wrong and POV.  One can present arguments that it is unchanged, that the amendment process was not scrupulously done according to the PLO's own rules, etc., but this is not the same thing. There are several drafts floating around - there are many indications of the process being underway.  This was mentioned in the article and discussion before I began editing it, and I plan to add more on it, if only to get the various drafts of the various documents straight in my own mind.  So I don't see any crystal ball prognostication here.  I can hardly see how to write a sentence more sensitive to your concerns than the one I wrote above without departing from the facts.--John Z 04:37, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

 * Did you see the link to the official charter on the website? Regardless of whether or not various politicians have stated that the PLO has fulfilled it's obligation, the plain fact remains that every single disputed article is still in the charter, and there is no currently no re-drafted charter.  I propose "The text of the charter at ..., appends these amendments to the original text; the redrafting process referred to in the second amendment still remains uncompleted." Jayjg (talk)  04:45, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

 * Do you mean the link to the copy at Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations (http://www.palestine-un.org/) ? I put it in here. I am aware and even wanted to show that there were copies of the charter without amendments promulgated.  (Although the 1964 charter is there too, so it is not clear that they are implying the 68 one is current.  Arguably this is a violation of a commitment to Israel to not promulgate old copies. IMHO the one with amendments is not there because of incompetence, stupidity, or they are just playing games.  I just wanted to point out that there is at least one (afaik unique) place that they put the charter and amendments together in a somewhat normal way.)

 * It should refer to 1968 instead of original = 1964. Otherwise this proposal is fine with me.--John Z 05:10, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

 * I'm not sure I fully understand you, but I think I've made the change we've agreed to. Please let me know if this is correct. Jayjg (talk) 14:24, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Blatant POV by omission
Does anyone imagine that it's NPOV to have an article on the Palestinian National Covenant that focuses exclusively (!) on its relationship to Israel's supposed right to exist? Did it even occur to whoever wrote most of this that someone might be interested in the covenant's contents, or authorship, or anything else about it? - Mustafaa 22:19, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

 * Of course you are right. I did almost all of the recent changes, but did not really delete anything - which was even more focused in the way you very reasonably find objectionable.  The rest of the content mainly dates back to a long ago.  There were practically no links to anything before.

 * In my defense - (a) this relation is what almost all of the recent controversy, amendments and writing about focuses on, and actually is inherent to the content of the charter. It is a pretty complicated story that required some space to tell accurately and neutrally.  (b) I plan to write more, which should be relatively straightforward to write if a sometimes a bit obscure and difficult to dig up.  E.g about the original 64 charter - according to Cobban's The PLO, it was presented by Shukeiry along with another, different document the "Basic Constitution of the PLO" to the PLO's founding conference in Jerusalem in 64 - apparently he or some anonymous scribe is the author.  It needs more on the various recent drafts of basic documents too. (c) perhaps you could look at it before my changes?  I think I have done some NPOVing along the lines e.g. zero proposed a couple years ago here, and addition of important factual material necessary to form reasonable judgments as to its current status.  At least it is chronologically and logically ordered now, before, it was utterly chaotic, with factual and opinion material mixed up in each other's sections.

 * Umm, I don't think you should use the PNC as the abbreviation for the covenant/charter as it is used here for the Palestinian National Council. The main paragraph you changed is one I took from the Israeli views section and put in the main one.  You might want to put it back there, perhaps I made a mistake.  Though perhaps POV it is basically concerned with facts so I just put it in the front for the nonce before checking and/or rewriting because something like it was logically necessary there for the narrative. By the way, recognition of the "right to exist" was historically more a precondition for the PLO talking with the USA (It was part of the Kissinger conditions Israel got at the time of the Sinai disengagements, later amplified by Reagan.)  - the recognition and the "caduc" statement was made in 88 at the latest, but it was not enough for Israel to allow, or even present conditions for, IIRC, talks then.

 * Finally, here's a great quote found in Cobban from the Mufti and the Arab Higher Committee at the time 1964 (moribund but still existing) that I can't resist mentioning: that the PLO is "a colonialist, Zionist conspiracy aiming at the liquidation of the Palestinian cause." --John Z 00:05, 26 May 2005 (UTC)

 * Thank you for your reply. I think your edits have been a definite improvement - though it still needs work from someone more knowledgeable in the matter than I am. - Mustafaa 00:14, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

My recent edits edit referring to Naftali Bennett's rejection of Palestine's right to exist has been undone on these grounds "Not according to source. Bennett doesn't say he opposes "Palestine's" right to exist, but he rejects the creation of a Palestinian state" http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Naftali_Bennett&action=history If valid then in interests of NPOV does that principle need to be applied to this page too ? Presumably Michael Zeev means the phrase "right to exist" needs to occur in the source document - and that phrase does not occur in the PNC as far as I can see. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.234.82.114 (talk) 13:18, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

 * http://www.pna.gov.ps/Government/gov/The_Amendment_of_the_Palestinian_National_Charter.asp
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Sun Jul 16 21:21:28 2006, Socket Error: (110, 'Connection timed out')
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Mon Jul 17 16:39:32 2006, 404 Object Not Found
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Thu Jul 27 01:02:36 2006, 404 Object Not Found

maru  (talk)  contribs 05:02, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

 * http://www.pna.gov.ps/Government/gov/plo_Charter.asp
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Sun Jul 16 21:21:29 2006, Socket Error: (110, 'Connection timed out')
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Mon Jul 17 16:39:35 2006, 404 Object Not Found
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Thu Jul 27 01:02:37 2006, 404 Object Not Found

maru  (talk)  contribs 05:02, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

 * http://www.pna.gov.ps/Government/gov/The_Draft_Constitution_of_the_PLO.asp
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Sun Jul 16 21:21:31 2006, Socket Error: (110, 'Connection timed out')
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Mon Jul 17 16:39:50 2006, 404 Object Not Found
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Thu Jul 27 01:02:40 2006, 404 Object Not Found

maru  (talk)  contribs 05:03, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

 * http://www.pna.gov.ps/index.asp
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Sun Jul 16 21:21:34 2006, Socket Error: (110, 'Connection timed out')
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Mon Jul 17 16:39:57 2006, 404 Object Not Found
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Thu Jul 27 01:02:46 2006, 404 Object Not Found

maru  (talk)  contribs 05:03, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

 * http://www.tenc.net/gilwhite/israelplo.htm
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Sun Jul 16 21:18:34 2006, 404 Not Found
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Mon Jul 17 16:42:14 2006, 404 Not Found
 * In Palestinian National Covenant on Thu Jul 27 01:02:58 2006, 404 Not Found

maru  (talk)  contribs 05:03, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Palestinian National Covenant. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20050512033139/http://www.us-israel.org:80/ to http://www.us-israel.org/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 16:36, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 6 external links on Palestinian National Covenant. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.palestine-un.org/plo/back.html
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.palestine-un.org/plo/
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.state.gov/p/nea/rls/22573.htm
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.pna.gov.ps/Government/gov/plo_Charter.asp
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111211172543/http://www.un.int/wcm/content/site/palestine/pid/12355 to http://www.un.int/wcm/content/site/palestine/pid/12355
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080118193127/http://www.un.int/palestine/PLO/PNA1.html to http://www.un.int/palestine/PLO/docone.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 22:46, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

title: Talk:Palestinian National Covenant


text:
Society

A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Societies are characterized by patterns of relationships (social relations) between individuals who share a distinctive culture and institutions; a given society may be described as the sum total of such relationships among its constituent members.

Human social structures are complex and highly cooperative, featuring the specialization of labor via social roles. Societies construct roles and other patterns of behavior by deeming certain actions or concepts acceptable or unacceptable—these expectations around behavior within a given society are known as societal norms. So far as it is collaborative, a society can enable its members to benefit in ways that would otherwise be difficult on an individual basis.

Societies vary based on level of technology and type of economic activity. Larger societies with larger food surpluses often exhibit stratification or dominance patterns. Societies can have many different forms of government, various ways of understanding kinship, and different gender roles. Human behavior varies immensely between different societies; humans shape society, but society in turn shapes human beings.

Etymology and usage
The term "society" often refers to a large group of people in an ordered community, in a country or several similar countries, or the 'state of being with other people', e.g. "they lived in medieval society." The term dates back to at least 1513 and comes from the 12th-century French societe (modern French société) meaning 'company'. Societe was in turn derived from the Latin word societas ('fellowship,' 'alliance', 'association'), which in turn was derived from the noun socius ("comrade, friend, ally").

In biology
Humans, along with their closest relatives bonobos and chimpanzees, are highly social animals. This biological context suggests that the underlying sociability required for the formation of societies is hardwired into human nature. Human society features high degrees of cooperation, and differs in important ways from groups of chimps and bonobos, including the parental role of males, the use of language to communicate, the specialization of labor, and the tendency to build "nests" (multigenerational camps, town, or cities).

Some biologists, including entomologist E.O. Wilson, categorize humans as eusocial, placing humans with ants in the highest level of sociability on the spectrum of animal ethology, although others disagree. Social group living may have evolved in humans due to group selection in physical environments that made survival difficult.

In sociology
In Western sociology, there are three dominant paradigms for understanding society: functionalism (also known as structural functionalism), conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism.

Functionalism
According to the functionalist school of thought, individuals in society work together like organs in the body to create emergent behavior, sometimes referred to as collective consciousness. 19th century sociologists Auguste Comte and Émile Durkheim, for example, believed that society constitutes a separate "level" of reality, distinct from both biological and inorganic matter. Explanations of social phenomena had therefore to be constructed within this level, individuals being merely transient occupants of comparatively stable social roles.

Conflict theory
Conflict theorists take the opposite view, and posit that individuals and social groups or social classes within society interact on the basis of conflict rather than agreement. One prominent conflict theorist is Karl Marx who conceived of society as operating on an economic "base" with a "superstructure" of government, family, religion and culture. Marx argues that the economic base determines the superstructure, and that throughout history, societal change has been driven by conflict between laborers and those who own the means of production.

Symbolic interactionism
Symbolic interactionism is a microsociological theory that focuses on individuals and how the individual relates to society. Symbolic interactionists study humans' use of shared language to create common symbols and meanings, and use this frame of reference to understand how individuals interact to create symbolic worlds, and in turn, how these worlds shape individual behaviors.

In the latter half of the 20th century, theorists began to view society as socially constructed. In this vein, sociologist Peter L. Berger describes society as "dialectic": Society is created by humans, but this creation turns in turn creates or molds humans.

Non-Western views
The sociologic emphasis placed on functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism, has been criticized as Eurocentric. The Malaysian sociologist Syed Farid al-Attas, for example, argues that Western thinkers are particularly interested in the implications of modernity, and that their analysis of non-Western cultures is therefore limited in scope. As examples of nonwestern thinkers who took a systematic approach to understanding society, al-Attas mentions Ibn Khaldun (1332–1406) and José Rizal (1861–1896).

Khaldun, an Arab living in the 14th century, understood society, along with the rest of the universe, as having "meaningful configuration", with its perceived randomness attributable to hidden causes. Khaldun conceptualized social structures as having two fundamental forms: nomadic and sedentary. Nomadic life has high social cohesion (asabijja), which Khaldun argued arose from kinship, shared customs, and a shared need for defense. Sedentary life, in Khaldun's view, was marked by secularization, decreased social cohesion, and increased interest in luxury. Rizal was a Filipino nationalist living toward the end of the Spanish Colonial Period who theorized about colonial societies. Rizal argued that indolence, which the Spanish used to justify their colonial occupation, was instead caused by the colonial occupation. Rizal compared the pre-colonial era, when the Filipinos controlled trade routes and had higher economic activity, to the period of colonial rule, and argued that exploitation, economic disorder, and colonial policies that discouraged farming led to a decreased interest in work.

Types
Sociologists tend to classify societies based on their level of technology, and place societies in three broad categories: pre-industrial, industrial, and postindustrial.

Subdivisions of these categories vary, and classifications are often based on level of technology, communication, and economy. One example of such a classification comes from sociologist Gerhard Lenski who lists: (1) hunting and gathering; (2) horticultural; (3) agricultural; and (4) industrial; as well as specialized societies (e.g., fishing or herding).

Some cultures have developed over time toward more complex forms of organization and control. This cultural evolution has a profound effect on patterns of community. Hunter-gatherer tribes have, at times, settled around seasonal food stocks to become agrarian villages. Villages have grown to become towns and cities. Cities have turned into city-states and nation-states. However, these processes are not unidirectional.

Pre-industrial
In a pre-industrial society, food production, which is carried out through the use of human and animal labor, is the main economic activity. These societies can be subdivided according to their level of technology and their method of producing food. These subdivisions are hunting and gathering, pastoral, horticultural, and agrarian.

Hunting and gathering
The main form of food production in hunter-gatherer societies is the daily collection of wild plants and the hunting of wild animals. Hunter-gatherers move around constantly in search of food. As a result, they do not build permanent villages or create a wide variety of artifacts. The need for mobility also limits the size of these societies, and they usually only form small groups such as bands and tribes, usually with fewer than 50 people per community. Bands and tribes are relatively egalitarian, and decisions are reached through consensus. There are no formal political offices containing real power in band societies, rather a chief is merely a person of influence, and leadership is based on personal qualities. The family forms the main social unit, with most members being related by birth or marriage.

The anthropologist Marshall Sahlins described hunter-gatherers as the "original affluent society" due to their extended leisure time: Sahlins estimated that adults in hunter gatherer societies work three to five hours per day. This perspective has been challenged by other researchers, who have pointed out high mortality rates and perennial warfare in hunter-gatherer societies. Proponents of Sahlins' view argue that the general well-being of humans in hunter gatherer societies challenges the purported relationship between technological advancement and human progress.

Pastoral
Rather than searching for food on a daily basis, members of a pastoral society rely on domesticated herd animals to meet their food needs. Pastoralists typically live a nomadic life, moving their herds from one pasture to another. Community size in pastoral societies is similar to hunter-gatherers (about 50 individuals), but unlike hunter gatherers, pastoral societies usually consist of multiple communities—the average pastoral society contains thousands of people. This is because pastoral groups tend to live in open areas where movement is easy, which enables political integration. Pastoral societies tend to create a food surplus, and have specialized labor and high levels of inequality.

Horticultural
Fruits and vegetables grown in garden plots, that have been cleared from the jungle or forest, provide the main source of food in a horticultural society. These societies have a similar level of technology and complexity to pastoral societies. Along with pastoral societies, horticultural societies emerged about 10,000 years ago, after technological changes of the Agricultural Revolution made it possible to cultivate crops and raise animals. Horticulturists use human labor and simple tools to cultivate the land for one or more seasons. When the land becomes barren, horticulturists clear a new plot and leave the old plot to revert to its natural state. They may return to the original land several years later and begin the process again. By rotating their garden plots, horticulturists can stay in one area for a long period of time. This allows them to build permanent or semi-permanent villages.

As with pastoral societies, surplus food leads to a more complex division of labor. Specialized roles in horticultural societies include craftspeople, shamans (religious leaders), and traders. This role specialization allows horticultural societies to create a variety of artifacts. Scarce, defensible resources can lead to wealth inequalities in horticultural political systems.

Agrarian
Agrarian societies use agricultural technological advances to cultivate crops over a large area. Lenski differentiates between horticultural and agrarian societies by the use of the plow. Larger food supplies due to improved technology mean agrarian communities are larger than horticultural communities. A greater food surplus results in towns that become centers of trade. Economic trade in turn leads to increased specialization, including a ruling class, as well as educators, craftspeople, merchants, and religious figures, who do not directly participate in the production of food.

Agrarian societies are especially noted for their extremes of social classes and rigid social mobility. As land is the major source of wealth, social hierarchy develops based on landownership and not labor. The system of stratification is characterized by three coinciding contrasts: governing class versus the masses, urban minority versus peasant majority, and literate minority versus illiterate majority. This results in two distinct subcultures; the urban elite versus the peasant masses. Moreover, this means cultural differences within agrarian societies are greater than differences between them.

The landowning strata typically combine government, religious, and military institutions to justify and enforce their ownership, and support elaborate patterns of consumption, slavery, serfdom, or peonage is commonly the lot of the primary producer. Rulers of agrarian societies often do not manage their empire for the common good or in the name of the public interest, but as property they own. Caste systems, as historically found in South Asia, are associated with agrarian societies, where lifelong agricultural routines depend upon a rigid sense of duty and discipline. The scholar Donald Brown suggests that an emphasis in the modern West on personal liberties and freedoms was in large part a reaction to the steep and rigid stratification of agrarian societies.

Industrial
Industrial societies, which emerged in the 18th century in the Industrial Revolution, rely heavily on machines powered by external sources for the mass production of goods. Whereas in pre-industrial societies the majority of labor takes place in primary industries focused on extracting raw materials (farming, fishing, mining, etc.), in industrial societies, labor is mostly focused on processing raw materials into finished products. Present-day societies vary in their degree of industrialization, with some using mostly newer energy sources (e.g. coal, oil, and nuclear energy), and others continuing to rely on human and animal power.

Industrialization is associated with population booms and the growth of cities. Increased productivity, as well as the stability caused by improved transportation, leads to decreased mortality and resulting population growth. Centralized production of goods in factories and a decreased need for agricultural labor leads to urbanization. Industrial societies are often capitalist, and have high degrees of inequality along with high social mobility, as businesspeople use the market to amass large amounts of wealth. Working conditions in factories are generally restrictive and harsh. Workers, who have common interests, may organize into labor unions to advance those interests.

On the whole, industrial societies are marked by the increased power of human beings. Technological advancements mean that industrial societies have increased potential for deadly warfare. Governments use information technologies to exert greater control over the populace. Industrial societies also have an increased environmental impact.

Post-industrial
Post-industrial societies are societies dominated by information and services, rather than the production of goods. Advanced industrial societies see a shift toward an increase in service sectors, over manufacturing. Service industries include education, health and finance.

Information

An information society is a society where the usage, creation, distribution, manipulation and integration of information is a significant activity. Proponents of the idea that modern-day global society is an information society posit that information technologies are impacting most important forms of social organization, including education, economy, health, government, warfare, and levels of democracy. Although the concept of information society has been discussed since the 1930s, in the present day, it is almost always applied to ways that information technologies impact society and culture. It therefore covers the effects of computers and telecommunications on the home, the workplace, schools, government, and various communities and organizations, as well as the emergence of new social forms in cyberspace.

Knowledge
As the access to electronic information resources increased at the beginning of the 21st century, special attention was extended from the information society to the knowledge society. A knowledge society generates, shares, and makes available to all members of the society knowledge that may be used to improve the human condition. A knowledge society differs from an information society in that it transforms information into resources that allow society to take effective action, rather than only creating and disseminating raw data.

Norms and roles
Social norms are shared standards of acceptable behavior by groups. Social norms, which can both be informal understandings that govern the behavior of members of a society, as well as be codified into rules and laws, are powerful drivers of human behavior.

Social roles are norms, duties, and patterns of behavior that relate to an individual's social status. In functionalist thought, individuals form the structure of society by occupying social roles. According to symbolic interactionism, individuals use symbols to navigate and communicate roles. Erving Goffman used the metaphor of a theater to develop the dramaturgical lens, which argues that roles provide scripts that govern social interactions.

Gender and kinship
The division of humans into male and female gender roles has been marked culturally by a corresponding division of norms, practices, dress, behavior, rights, duties, privileges, status, and power. Some argue that gender roles arise naturally from sex differences, which lead to a division of labor where women take on reproductive labor and other domestic roles. Gender roles have varied historically, and challenges to predominant gender norms have recurred in many societies.

All human societies organize, recognize and classify types of social relationships based on relations between parents, children and other descendants (consanguinity), and relations through marriage (affinity). There is also a third type of familial relationship applied to godparents or adoptive children (fictive). These culturally defined relationships are referred to as kinship. In many societies, it is one of the most important social organizing principles and plays a role in transmitting status and inheritance. All societies have rules of incest taboo, according to which marriage between certain kinds of kin relations are prohibited; and some societies also have rules of preferential marriage with certain other kin relations.

Ethnicity
Human ethnic groups are a social category that identify together as a group based on shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. These shared attributes can be a common set of traditions, ancestry, language, history, society, culture, nation, religion, or social treatment within their residing area. There is no generally accepted definition of what constitutes an ethnic group, and humans have evolved the ability to change affiliation with social groups relatively easily, including leaving groups with previously strong alliances, if doing so is seen as providing personal advantages. Ethnicity is separate from the concept of race, which is based on physical characteristics, although both are socially constructed. Assigning ethnicity to a certain population is complicated, as even within common ethnic designations there can be a diverse range of subgroups, and the makeup of these ethnic groups can change over time at both the collective and individual level. Ethnic groupings can play a powerful role in the social identity and solidarity of ethnopolitical units. Ethnic identity has been closely tied to the rise of the nation state as the predominant form of political organization in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Government and politics
Governments create laws and policies that affect the people that they govern. There have been many forms of government throughout human history, with various ways of allocating power, and with different levels and means of control over the population. In early history, distribution of political power was determined by the availability of fresh water, fertile soil, and temperate climate of different locations. As farming populations gathered in larger and denser communities, interactions between different groups increased, leading to the further development of governance within and between communities.

, according to The Economist, 43% of national governments were democracies, 35% autocracies, and 22% containing elements of both. Many countries have formed international political organizations and alliances, the largest being the United Nations with 193 member states.

Trade and economics
Trade, the voluntary exchange of goods and services, has long been an aspect of human societies, and it is seen as a characteristic that differentiates humans from other animals. Trade has even been cited as a practice that gave Homo sapiens a major advantage over other hominids; evidence suggests early H. sapiens made use of long-distance trade routes to exchange goods and ideas, leading to cultural explosions and providing additional food sources when hunting was sparse. Such trade networks did not exist for the now-extinct Neanderthals. Early trade involved materials for creating tools, like obsidian, exchanged over short distances. In contrast, throughout antiquity and the medieval period, some of the most influential long-distance routes carried food and luxury goods, such as the spice trade.

Early human economies were more likely to be based around gift giving than a bartering system. Early money consisted of commodities; the oldest being in the form of cattle and the most widely used being cowrie shells. Money has since evolved into governmental issued coins, paper and electronic money. Human study of economics is a social science that looks at how societies distribute scarce resources among different people. There are massive inequalities in the division of wealth among humans; as of 2018 in China, Europe, and the United States, the richest tenth of humans hold more than seven-tenths of those regions' total wealth.

Conflict
The willingness of humans to kill other members of their species en masse through organized conflict (i.e. war) has long been the subject of debate. One school of thought is that war evolved as a means to eliminate competitors, and that violence is an innate human characteristic. Humans commit violence against other humans at a rate comparable to other primates (although humans kill adults at a relatively high rate and have a relatively low rate of infanticide).

Another school of thought suggests that war is a relatively recent phenomenon and appeared due to changing social conditions. While not settled, the current evidence suggests warlike behavior only became common about 10,000 years ago, and in many regions even more recently.

Phylogenetic analysis predicts 2% of human deaths to be caused by homicide, which approximately matches the rate of homicide in band societies. However, rates of violence vary widely according to societal norms, and rates of homicide in societies that have legal systems and strong cultural attitudes against violence stand at about 0.01%.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Society


text:
Kevin J. Anderson

Kevin James Anderson (born March 27, 1962) is an American science fiction author. He has written spin-off novels for Star Wars, StarCraft, Titan A.E. and The X-Files, and with Brian Herbert is the co-author of the Dune prequel series. His original works include the Saga of Seven Suns series and the Nebula Award–nominated Assemblers of Infinity. He has also written several comic books, including the Dark Horse Star Wars series Tales of the Jedi written in collaboration with Tom Veitch, Dark Horse Predator titles, and The X-Files titles for Topps. Some of Anderson's superhero novels include Enemies & Allies, about the first meeting of Batman and Superman, and The Last Days of Krypton, telling the story of how Superman's planet Krypton came to be destroyed.

Anderson has published over 140 books, over 50 of which have been on US and international bestseller lists, and he has more than 23 million books in print worldwide.

Anderson is working as a professor at Western Colorado University. Anderson has been a Literary Guest of Honor and Keynote Speaker at the Life, the Universe, & Everything professional science fiction and fantasy arts symposium, on at least three occasions: 2016, 2006 and 1993. In 2021, Anderson was inducted into the Colorado Authors Hall of Fame along with Stephen King and James Michener.

Early and personal life
Kevin J. Anderson was born March 27, 1962, in Racine, Wisconsin, and grew up in Oregon, Wisconsin. According to Anderson, The War of the Worlds greatly influenced him. At the age of eight, he wrote his first story, titled "Injection". At ten, he bought a typewriter and has written ever since. In his freshman year in high school, he submitted his first short story to a magazine, but it took two more years before one of his manuscripts was accepted. When it was accepted, they paid him in copies of the magazine. In his senior year, he sold his first story for money for $12.50.

For 12 years Anderson worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, where he met fellow writers Rebecca Moesta and Doug Beason. Anderson later married Moesta and frequently coauthors novels with both her and Beason.

Writing
Anderson's first novel, Resurrection, Inc., was published in 1988 and nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel. His 1993 collaboration with Beason, Assemblers of Infinity, was nominated for both a Nebula and Locus Award. Anderson wrote The X-Files novels Ground Zero (1995), Ruins (1996) and Antibodies (1997). Ground Zero reached #1 on the London Sunday Times Best Seller List and Ruins made the New York Times Best Seller list. Contracted to write novels in the Star Wars expanded universe, Anderson published the Jedi Academy trilogy in 1994, followed by the 1996 novel Darksaber. He and Moesta also wrote the 14-volume Young Jedi Knights series from 1995 to 1998. As a noted Star Wars novelist, Anderson was a participant in the FidoNet Star Wars Echo, a 1990s bulletin board system forum cited as one of the earliest influential forms of Star Wars on-line fandom.

In 1997, Anderson and Brian Herbert signed a $3 million deal with Bantam Books to coauthor a prequel trilogy to the 1965 novel Dune and its five sequels (1969–1985) by Herbert's deceased father, Frank Herbert. Starting with 1999's Dune: House Atreides, the ongoing Dune prequel series has expanded to ten novels to date. In 2011 Publishers Weekly called the series "a sprawling edifice that Frank Herbert's son and Anderson have built on the foundation of the original Dune novels." Anderson and Brian Herbert have also published Hunters of Dune (2006) and Sandworms of Dune (2007), sequels to Frank Herbert's final novel Chapterhouse: Dune (1985) which complete the chronological progression of his original series and wrap up storylines that began with his Heretics of Dune (1984). Between 2011 and 2014, Anderson and Herbert also released their Hellhole trilogy of novels unrelated to Dune.

In 2002, Anderson released the steampunk/adventure novel Captain Nemo: The Fantastic History of a Dark Genius and was subsequently asked to write The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003), a novelization of the film of the same name. The following year he also wrote the novelization for the 2004 film Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. In 2005, Anderson co-wrote, along with Dean Koontz, the first book in the Frankenstein series called Frankenstein, Prodigal Son.

Between 2002 and 2008, Anderson published a seven-novel original space opera series called The Saga of Seven Suns. In 2014 he began publishing a sequel trilogy called The Saga of Shadows. Anderson published four novels and two short stories in his Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. series between 2012 and 2014. In 2012, Anderson coauthored a novelization of Clockwork Angels, an album by the Canadian rock band Rush, with Rush's drummer, Neil Peart. Anderson and Peart reunited in 2015 for a sequel, Clockwork Lives.

WordFire Press
In 2011, Anderson and Moesta founded their own publishing imprint, WordFire Press, to reissue some of their out-of-print books in paperback and/or e-book formats. They have subsequently published and reprinted works in various genres, including several out-of-print or previously unpublished novels by Frank Herbert.

In 2013, WordFire acquired the reprint rights to the works of Allen Drury, including his 1959 Pulitzer Prize-winning political novel Advise and Consent. That novel, out of print for nearly 15 years, ranked #27 on the 2013 BookFinder.com list of the Top 100 Most Searched for Out of Print Books before WordFire reissued it in February 2014. The company also reprinted Advise and Consent five sequels — A Shade of Difference (1962), Capable of Honor (1966), Preserve and Protect (1968), Come Nineveh, Come Tyre (1973), and The Promise of Joy (1975) — as well as Drury's later novels Mark Coffin, U.S.S. (1979) and Decision (1983).

WordFire released four previously unpublished novels by Frank Herbert, who died in 1986: High-Opp (2012), Angels' Fall (2013), A Game of Authors (2013), and A Thorn in the Bush (2014). Anderson announced these in his blog. WordFire also reissued several of Herbert's unavailable titles: Destination: Void (1966), The Heaven Makers (1968), Soul Catcher (1972), The Godmakers (1972), and Direct Descent (1980) — as well as Man of Two Worlds (1986), an out-of-print novel cowritten by Herbert and his son Brian. WordFire also possesses non-US/Canadian e-book rights to some of Anderson's own collaborations with Brian Herbert, the Prelude to Dune trilogy (1999–2001), as well as Anderson's Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. series of novels.

Awards, records and nominations

 * Resurrection, Inc. (1988): Nominated for Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel
 * Assemblers of Infinity with Doug Beason (1993): Nebula and Locus Award nominee
 * Blindfold (1995): Preliminary Nebula Award nominee (1996)
 * Ground Zero (1995): No. 1 on The Sunday Times best seller list and voted "Best Science Fiction Novel of 1995" by readers of SFX
 * Ruins (1996): New York Times Best Seller list (first The X-Files novel to make the list) and voted the "Best Science Fiction Novel of 1996"
 * Young Jedi Knights series (1995–98): New York Times Best Sellers, winner of 1999 Golden Duck Award (middle grades) for excellence in science fiction
 * Guinness World Record for "Largest Single Author Signing" (previously set by General Colin Powell and Howard Stern)
 * The Dark Between the Stars (2014): Nominated for a Hugo Award for Best Novel.

Works
Anderson has published over 120 books, over 50 of which have been on US and international bestseller lists, and he has more than 23 million books in print worldwide.

title: Kevin J. Anderson


text:
Eik, Rogaland

Eik is a village in Lund municipality in Rogaland county, Norway. The village is located about 9 km north of the municipal centre of Moi. The small village lies in an area called Hovsherad on the north shore of the lake Hovsvatnet. The river Storåni runs through Eik.

Since 1981 it has had a station for worldwide Inmarsat access. It is part of a communication system that is used by Denmark, and other countries. The Eik treskofabrikk company is a clog factory also located in Eik.

title: Eik, Rogaland


text:
Booker T. Washington

Booker Taliaferro Washington (April 5, 1856 –November 14, 1915) was an American educator, author, and orator. Between 1890 and 1915, Washington was the primary leader in the African-American community and of the contemporary Black elite. Born into slavery on April 5, 1856, in Hale's Ford, Virginia, Washington was freed when U.S. troops reached the area during the Civil War. As a young man, Booker T. Washington worked his way through Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute and attended college at Wayland Seminary. In 1881, he was named as the first leader of the new Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, an institute for black higher education. He expanded the college, enlisting students in construction of buildings. Work at the college was considered fundamental to students' larger education. He attained national prominence for his Atlanta Address of 1895, which attracted the attention of politicians and the public. Washington played a dominant role in black politics, winning wide support in the black community of the South and among more liberal whites. Washington wrote an autobiography, Up from Slavery, in 1901, which became a major text. In that year, he dined with Theodore Roosevelt at the White House, which was the first time a black person publicly met the president on equal terms. After an illness, he died in Tuskegee, Alabama on November 14, 1915. Washington was a key proponent of African-American businesses and one of the founders of the National Negro Business League. Washington mobilized a nationwide coalition of middle-class blacks, church leaders, and white philanthropists and politicians, with the goal of building the community's economic strength and pride by focusing on self-help and education. Washington had the ear of the powerful in the America of his day, including presidents. He used the nineteenth-century American political system to manipulate the media, raise money, develop strategy, network, distribute funds, and reward a cadre of supporters. Because of his influential leadership, the timespan of his activity, from 1880 to 1915, has been called the Age of Booker T. Washington. Washington called for Black progress through education and entrepreneurship, rather than trying to challenge directly the Jim Crow segregation and the disenfranchisement of Black voters in the South. Furthermore, he supported racial uplift, but secretly also supported court challenges to segregation and to restrictions on voter registration. Black activists in the North, led by W. E. B. Du Bois, disagreed with him and opted to set up the NAACP to work for political change. After his death in 1915, he came under heavy criticism for accommodating white supremacy, despite his claims that his long-term goal was to end the disenfranchisement of African Americans, the vast majority of whom still lived in the South. Decades after Washington's death in 1915, the civil rights movement of the 1950s took a more active and progressive approach, which was also based on new grassroots organizations based in the South. Washington's legacy has been controversial in the civil rights community. However, a revisionist view appeared in the late twentieth century that interpreted his actions positively.

Early life
Booker was born into slavery to Jane, an enslaved African-American woman on the plantation of James Burroughs in southwest Virginia, near Hale's Ford in Franklin County. He never knew the day, month, and year of his birth (although evidence emerged after his death that he was born on April 5, 1856). Nor did he ever know his father, said to be a white man who resided on a neighboring plantation. The man played no financial or emotional role in Washington's life.

From his earliest years, Washington was known simply as "Booker", with no middle or surname, in the practice of the time. His mother, her relatives and his siblings struggled with the demands of slavery. He later wrote:

"I cannot remember a single instance during my childhood or early boyhood when our entire family sat down to the table together, and God's blessing was asked, and the family ate a meal in a civilized manner. On the plantation in Virginia, and even later, meals were gotten to the children very much as dumb animals get theirs. It was a piece of bread here and a scrap of meat there. It was a cup of milk at one time and some potatoes at another."

When he was nine, Booker and his family in Virginia gained freedom under the Emancipation Proclamation as U.S. troops occupied their region. Booker was thrilled by the formal day of their emancipation in early 1865:

"As the great day drew nearer, there was more singing in the slave quarters than usual. It was bolder, had more ring, and lasted later into the night. Most of the verses of the plantation songs had some reference to freedom.... [S]ome man who seemed to be a stranger (a United States officer, I presume) made a little speech and then read a rather long paper—the Emancipation Proclamation, I think. After the reading we were told that we were all free, and could go when and where we pleased. My mother, who was standing by my side, leaned over and kissed her children, while tears of joy ran down her cheeks. She explained to us what it all meant, that this was the day for which she had been so long praying, but fearing that she would never live to see."

After emancipation Jane took her family to the free state of West Virginia to join her husband, Washington Ferguson, who had escaped from slavery during the war and settled there. The illiterate boy Booker began painstakingly to teach himself to read and attended school for the first time.

At school, Booker was asked for a surname for registration. He chose the family name of Washington. Still later he learned from his mother that she had originally given him the name "Booker Taliaferro" at the time of his birth, but his second name was not used by the master. Upon learning of his original name, Washington immediately readopted it as his own, and became known as Booker Taliaferro Washington for the rest of his life.

Booker loved books:

"The Negro worshipped books. We wanted books, more books. The larger the books were the better we like[d] them. We thought the mere possession and the mere handling and the mere worship of books was going, in some inexplicable way, to make great and strong and useful men of our race."

Higher education
Washington worked in salt furnaces and coal mines in West Virginia for several years to earn money. He made his way east to Hampton Institute, a school established in Virginia to educate freedmen and their descendants, where he also worked to pay for his studies. He later attended Wayland Seminary in Washington, D.C. in 1878.

Tuskegee Institute
In 1881, the Hampton Institute president Samuel C. Armstrong recommended Washington, then age 25, to become the first leader of Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute (later Tuskegee Institute, now Tuskegee University), the new normal school (teachers' college) in Alabama. The new school opened on July 4, 1881, initially using a room donated by Butler Chapel A.M.E. Zion Church.

The next year, Washington purchased a former plantation to be developed as the permanent site of the campus. Under his direction, his students literally built their own school: making bricks, constructing classrooms, barns and outbuildings; and growing their own crops and raising livestock; both for learning and to provide for most of the basic necessities. Both men and women had to learn trades as well as academics. The Tuskegee faculty used all the activities to teach the students basic skills to take back to their mostly rural black communities throughout the South. The main goal was not to produce farmers and tradesmen, but teachers of farming and trades who could teach in the new lower schools and colleges for blacks across the South. The school expanded over the decades, adding programs and departments, to become the present-day Tuskegee University.

The Oaks, "a large comfortable home," was built on campus for Washington and his family. They moved into the house in 1900. Washington lived there until his death in 1915. His widow, Margaret, lived at The Oaks until her death in 1925.

In 1896 when Washington reviewed the study conducted by George Washington Carver about the infection plaguing the soybean crop he  invited Carver to head the Agriculture Department at Tuskegee, where they became close friends. Carver would later autograph commemorative stamps issued in 1940 in Washington's honor.

Later career
Washington led Tuskegee for more than 30 years after becoming its leader. As he developed it, adding to both the curriculum and the facilities on the campus, he became a prominent national leader among African Americans, with considerable influence with wealthy white philanthropists and politicians.

Washington expressed his vision for his race through the school. He believed that by providing needed skills to society, African Americans would play their part, leading to acceptance by white Americans. He believed that blacks would eventually gain full participation in society by acting as responsible, reliable American citizens. Shortly after the Spanish–American War, President William McKinley and most of his cabinet visited Booker Washington. By his death in 1915, Tuskegee had grown to encompass more than 100 well equipped buildings, roughly 1,500 students, 200 faculty members teaching 38 trades and professions, and an endowment of approximately $2 million (~$ in ).

Washington helped develop other schools and colleges. In 1891 he lobbied the West Virginia legislature to locate the newly authorized West Virginia Colored Institute (today West Virginia State University) in the Kanawha Valley of West Virginia near Charleston. He visited the campus often and spoke at its first commencement exercise.

Washington was a dominant figure of the African-American community, then still overwhelmingly based in the South, from 1890 to his death in 1915. His Atlanta Address of 1895 received national attention. He was considered as a popular spokesman for African-American citizens. Representing the last generation of black leaders born into slavery, Washington was generally perceived as a supporter of education for freedmen and their descendants in the post-Reconstruction, Jim Crow-era South. He stressed basic education and training in manual and domestic labor trades because he thought these represented the skills needed in what was still a rural economy.

Throughout the final twenty years of his life, he maintained his standing through a nationwide network of supporters including black educators, ministers, editors, and businessmen, especially those who supported his views on social and educational issues for blacks. He also gained access to top national white leaders in politics, philanthropy and education, raised large sums, was consulted on race issues, and was awarded honorary degrees from Harvard University in 1896 and Dartmouth College in 1901.

Late in his career, Washington was criticized by civil rights leader and NAACP founder W. E. B. Du Bois. Du Bois and his supporters opposed the Atlanta Address as the "Atlanta Compromise", because it suggested that African Americans should work for, and submit to, white political rule. Du Bois insisted on full civil rights, due process of law, and increased political representation for African Americans which, he believed, could only be achieved through activism and higher education for African Americans. He believed that "the talented Tenth" would lead the race. Du Bois labeled Washington, "the Great Accommodator." Washington responded that confrontation could lead to disaster for the outnumbered blacks, and that cooperation with supportive whites was the only way to overcome racism in the long run.

While promoting moderation, Washington contributed secretly and substantially to mounting legal challenges activist African Americans launched against segregation and disenfranchisement of blacks. In his public role, he believed he could achieve more by skillful accommodation to the social realities of the age of segregation.

Washington's work on education helped him enlist both the moral and substantial financial support of many major white philanthropists. He became a friend of such self-made men as Standard Oil magnate Henry Huttleston Rogers; Sears, Roebuck and Company President Julius Rosenwald; and George Eastman, inventor of roll film, founder of Eastman Kodak, and developer of a major part of the photography industry. These individuals and many other wealthy men and women funded his causes, including Hampton and Tuskegee institutes.

He also gave lectures to raise money for the school. On January 23, 1906, he lectured at Carnegie Hall in New York in the Tuskegee Institute Silver Anniversary Lecture. He spoke along with great orators of the day, including Mark Twain, Joseph Hodges Choate, and Robert Curtis Ogden; it was the start of a capital campaign to raise $1,800,000 (~$ in ) for the school.

The schools which Washington supported were founded primarily to produce teachers, as education was critical for the black community following emancipation. Freedmen strongly supported literacy and education as the keys to their future. When graduates returned to their largely impoverished rural southern communities, they still found few schools and educational resources, as the white-dominated state legislatures consistently underfunded black schools in their segregated system.

To address those needs, in the 20th century, Washington enlisted his philanthropic network to create matching funds programs to stimulate construction of numerous rural public schools for black children in the South. Working especially with Julius Rosenwald from Chicago, Washington had Tuskegee architects develop model school designs. The Rosenwald Fund helped support the construction and operation of more than 5,000 schools and related resources for the education of blacks throughout the South in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The local schools were a source of communal pride; African-American families gave labor, land and money to them, to give their children more chances in an environment of poverty and segregation. A major part of Washington's legacy, the model rural schools continued to be constructed into the 1930s, with matching funds for communities from the Rosenwald Fund.

Washington also contributed to the Progressive Era by forming the National Negro Business League. It encouraged entrepreneurship among black businessmen, establishing a national network.

His autobiography, Up from Slavery, first published in 1901, is still widely read in the early 21st century.

Marriages and children

Washington was married three times. In his autobiography Up from Slavery, he gave all three of his wives credit for their contributions at Tuskegee. His first wife Fannie N. Smith was from Malden, West Virginia, the same Kanawha River Valley town where Washington had lived from age nine to sixteen. He maintained ties there all his life, and Smith was a student of his when he taught in Malden. He helped her gain entrance into the Hampton Institute. Washington and Smith were married in the summer of 1882, a year after he became principal there. They had one child, Portia M. Washington, born in 1883. Fannie died in May 1884.

In 1885, the widower Washington married again, to Olivia A. Davidson (1854–1889). Born free in Virginia to a free woman of color and a father who had been freed from slavery, she moved with her family to the free state of Ohio, where she attended common schools. Davidson later studied at Hampton Institute and went North to study at the Massachusetts State Normal School at Framingham. She taught in Mississippi and Tennessee before going to Tuskegee to work as a teacher. Washington recruited Davidson to Tuskegee, and promoted her to vice-principal. They had two sons, Booker T. Washington Jr. and Ernest Davidson Washington, before she died in 1889.

In 1893, Washington married Margaret James Murray. She was from Mississippi and had graduated from Fisk University, a historically black college. They had no children together, but she helped rear Washington's three children. Murray outlived Washington and died in 1925.

Politics and the Atlanta compromise
Washington's 1895 Atlanta Exposition address was viewed as a "revolutionary moment" by both African Americans and whites across the country. At the time W. E. B. Du Bois supported him, but they grew apart as Du Bois sought more action to remedy disfranchisement and improve educational opportunities for blacks. After their falling out, Du Bois and his supporters referred to Washington's speech as the "Atlanta Compromise" to express their criticism that Washington was too accommodating to white interests.

Washington advocated a "go slow" approach to avoid a harsh white backlash. He has been criticized for encouraging many youths in the South to accept sacrifices of potential political power, civil rights, and higher education. Washington believed that African Americans should "concentrate all their energies on industrial education, and accumulation of wealth, and the conciliation of the South". He valued the "industrial" education, as it provided critical skills for the jobs then available to the majority of African Americans at the time, as most lived in the South, which was overwhelmingly rural and agricultural. He thought these skills would lay the foundation for the creation of stability that the African-American community required in order to move forward. He believed that in the long term, "blacks would eventually gain full participation in society by showing themselves to be responsible, reliable American citizens". His approach advocated for an initial step toward equal rights, rather than full equality under the law, gaining economic power to back up black demands for political equality in the future. He believed that such achievements would prove to the deeply prejudiced white America that African Americans were not "'naturally' stupid and incompetent".

Well-educated blacks in the North lived in a different society and advocated a different approach, in part due to their perception of wider opportunities. Du Bois wanted blacks to have the same "classical" liberal arts education as upper-class whites did, along with voting rights and civic equality. The latter two had been ostensibly granted since 1870 by constitutional amendments after the Civil War. He believed that an elite, which he called the Talented Tenth, would advance to lead the race to a wider variety of occupations. Du Bois and Washington were divided in part by differences in treatment of African Americans in the North versus the South; although both groups suffered discrimination, the mass of blacks in the South were far more constrained by legal segregation and disenfranchisement, which totally excluded most from the political process and system. Many in the North objected to being 'led', and authoritatively spoken for, by a Southern accommodationist strategy which they considered to have been "imposed on them [Southern blacks] primarily by Southern whites".

Historian Clarence Earl Walker wrote that, for white Southerners, "Free black people were 'matter out of place'. Their emancipation was an affront to southern white freedom. Booker T. Washington did not understand that his program was perceived as subversive of a natural order in which black people were to remain forever subordinate or unfree."

Both Washington and Du Bois sought to define the best means post-Civil War to improve the conditions of the African-American community through education.

Blacks were solidly Republican in this period, having gained emancipation and suffrage with President Lincoln and his party. Fellow Republican President Ulysses S. Grant defended African Americans' newly won freedom and civil rights in the South by passing laws and using federal force to suppress the Ku Klux Klan, which had committed violence against blacks for years to suppress voting and discourage education. After Federal troops left in 1877 at the end of the Reconstruction era, many paramilitary groups worked to suppress black voting by violence. From 1890 to 1908 Southern states disenfranchised most blacks and many poor whites through constitutional amendments and statutes that created barriers to voter registration and voting. Such devices as poll taxes and subjective literacy tests sharply reduced the number of blacks in voting rolls. By the late nineteenth century, Southern white Democrats defeated some biracial Populist-Republican coalitions and regained power in the state legislatures of the former Confederacy; they passed laws establishing racial segregation and Jim Crow. In the border states and North, blacks continued to exercise the vote; the well-established Maryland African-American community defeated attempts there to disfranchise them.

Washington worked and socialized with many national white politicians and industry leaders. He developed the ability to persuade wealthy whites, many of them self-made men, to donate money to black causes by appealing to their values. He argued that the surest way for blacks to gain equal social rights was to demonstrate "industry, thrift, intelligence and property". He believed these were key to improved conditions for African Americans in the United States. Because African Americans had recently been emancipated and most lived in a hostile environment, Washington believed they could not expect too much at once. He said, "I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has had to overcome while trying to succeed."

Along with Du Bois, Washington partly organized the "Negro exhibition" at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris, where photos of Hampton Institute's black students were displayed. These were taken by his friend Frances Benjamin Johnston. The exhibition demonstrated African Americans' positive contributions to United States' society.

Washington privately contributed substantial funds for legal challenges to segregation and disfranchisement, such as the case of Giles v. Harris, which was heard before the United States Supreme Court in 1903. Even when such challenges were won at the Supreme Court, southern states quickly responded with new laws to accomplish the same ends, for instance, adding "grandfather clauses" that covered whites and not blacks in order to prevent blacks from voting.

Wealthy friends and benefactors

State and local governments historically underfunded black schools, although they were ostensibly providing "separate but equal" segregated facilities. White philanthropists strongly supported education financially. Washington encouraged them and directed millions of their money to projects all across the South that Washington thought best reflected his self-help philosophy. Washington associated with the richest and most powerful businessmen and politicians of the era, as well as many other educational leaders, such as William Rainey Harper, president of the University of Chicago. He was seen as a spokesperson for African Americans and became a conduit for funding educational programs.

His contacts included such diverse and well known entrepreneurs and philanthropists as Andrew Carnegie, William Howard Taft, John D. Rockefeller, Henry Huttleston Rogers, George Eastman, Julius Rosenwald, Robert Curtis Ogden, Collis Potter Huntington and William Henry Baldwin Jr. The latter donated large sums of money to agencies such as the Jeanes and Slater Funds. As a result, countless small rural schools were established through Washington's efforts, under programs that continued many years after his death. Along with rich white men, the black communities helped their communities directly by donating time, money and labor to schools to match the funds required.

Henry Huttleston Rogers

A representative case of an exceptional relationship was Washington's friendship with millionaire industrialist and financier Henry H. Rogers (1840–1909). Henry Rogers was a self-made man, who had risen from a modest working-class family to become a principal officer of Standard Oil, and one of the richest men in the United States. Around 1894, Rogers heard Washington speak at Madison Square Garden. The next day, he contacted Washington and requested a meeting, during which Washington later recounted that he was told that Rogers "was surprised that no one had 'passed the hat' after the speech". The meeting began a close relationship that extended over a period of 15 years. Although Washington and the very private Rogers were seen as friends, the true depth and scope of their relationship was not publicly revealed until after Rogers's sudden death of a stroke in May 1909. Washington was a frequent guest at Rogers's New York office, his Fairhaven, Massachusetts summer home, and aboard his steam yacht Kanawha.

A few weeks later, Washington went on a previously planned speaking tour along the newly completed Virginian Railway, a $40-million enterprise that had been built almost entirely from Rogers's personal fortune. As Washington rode in the late financier's private railroad car, Dixie, he stopped and made speeches at many locations. His companions later recounted that he had been warmly welcomed by both black and white citizens at each stop.

Washington revealed that Rogers had been quietly funding operations of 65 small country schools for African Americans, and had given substantial sums of money to support Tuskegee and Hampton institutes. He also noted that Rogers had encouraged programs with matching funds requirements so the recipients had a stake in the outcome.

Anna T. Jeanes
In 1907 Philadelphia Quaker Anna T. Jeanes (1822–1907) donated one million dollars to Washington for elementary schools for black children in the South. Her contributions and those of Henry Rogers and others funded schools in many poor communities.

Julius Rosenwald
Julius Rosenwald (1862–1932) was a Jewish American self-made wealthy man with whom Washington found common ground. By 1908, Rosenwald, son of an immigrant clothier, had become part-owner and president of Sears, Roebuck and Company in Chicago. Rosenwald was a philanthropist who was deeply concerned about the poor state of African-American education, especially in the segregated Southern states, where their schools were underfunded.

In 1912, Rosenwald was asked to serve on the Board of Directors of Tuskegee Institute, a position he held for the remainder of his life. Rosenwald endowed Tuskegee so that Washington could spend less time fundraising and more managing the school. Later in 1912, Rosenwald provided funds to Tuskegee for a pilot program to build six new small schools in rural Alabama. They were designed, constructed and opened in 1913 and 1914, and overseen by Tuskegee architects and staff; the model proved successful.

After Washington died in 1915, Rosenwald established the Rosenwald Fund in 1917, primarily to serve African-American students in rural areas throughout the South. The school building program was one of its largest programs. Using the architectural model plans developed by professors at Tuskegee Institute, the Rosenwald Fund spent over $4 million to help build 4,977 schools, 217 teachers' homes, and 163 shop buildings in 883 counties in 15 states, from Maryland to Texas. The Rosenwald Fund made matching grants, requiring community support, cooperation from the white school boards, and local fundraising. Black communities raised more than $4.7 million to aid the construction and sometimes donated land and labor; essentially they taxed themselves twice to do so. These schools became informally known as Rosenwald Schools. But the philanthropist did not want them to be named for him, as they belonged to their communities. By his death in 1932, these newer facilities could accommodate one-third of all African-American children in Southern U.S. schools.

Up from Slavery to the White House
Washington's long-term adviser, Timothy Thomas Fortune (1856–1928), was a respected African-American economist and editor of The New York Age, the most widely read newspaper in the black community within the United States. He was the ghost-writer and editor of Washington's first autobiography, The Story of My Life and Work. Washington published five books during his lifetime with the aid of ghost-writers Timothy Fortune, Max Bennett Thrasher and Robert E. Park.

They included compilations of speeches and essays:
 * The Story of My Life and Work (1900)
 * Up from Slavery (1901)
 * The Story of the Negro: The Rise of the Race from Slavery  (2 vols., 1909)
 * My Larger Education (1911)
 * The Man Farthest Down (1912)

In an effort to inspire the "commercial, agricultural, educational, and industrial advancement" of African Americans, Washington founded the National Negro Business League (NNBL) in 1900.

When Washington's second autobiography, Up from Slavery, was published in 1901, it became a bestseller—remaining the best-selling autobiography of an African American for over sixty years —and had a major effect on the African-American community and its friends and allies.

Dinner at the White House

In October 1901, President Theodore Roosevelt invited Washington to dine with him and his family at the White House. Although Republican presidents had met privately with black leaders, this was the first highly publicized social occasion when an African American was invited there on equal terms by the president. Democratic Party politicians from the South, including future governor of Mississippi James K. Vardaman and Senator Benjamin Tillman of South Carolina, indulged in racist personal attacks when they learned of the invitation. Both used the derogatory term for African Americans in their statements. The meeting was also condemned by the Democratic perennial presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan, who argued that "the more advanced race never has consented, and probably never will consent, to be dominated by the less advanced" despite him having previously praised Washington.

Vardaman described the White House as "so saturated with the odor of the nigger that the rats have taken refuge in the stable," and declared, "I am just as much opposed to Booker T. Washington as a voter as I am to the cocoanut-headed, chocolate-colored typical little coon who blacks my shoes every morning. Neither is fit to perform the supreme function of citizenship." Tillman said, "The action of President Roosevelt in entertaining that nigger will necessitate our killing a thousand niggers in the South before they will learn their place again."

Ladislaus Hengelmüller von Hengervár, the Austro-Hungarian ambassador to the United States, who was visiting the White House on the same day, said he found a rabbit's foot in Washington's coat pocket when he mistakenly put on the coat. The Washington Post described it as "the left hind foot of a graveyard rabbit, killed in the dark of the moon". The Detroit Journal quipped the next day, "The Austrian ambassador may have made off with Booker T. Washington's coat at the White House, but he'd have a bad time trying to fill his shoes."

Death

Despite his extensive travels and widespread work, Washington continued as principal of Tuskegee. Washington's health was deteriorating rapidly in 1915; he collapsed in New York City and was diagnosed by two different doctors as having Bright's disease, an inflammation of the kidneys, today called nephritis. Told he had only a few days left to live, Washington expressed a desire to die at Tuskegee. He boarded a train and arrived in Tuskegee shortly after midnight on November 14, 1915. He died a few hours later at the age of 59. His funeral was held on November 17, 1915, in the Tuskegee Institute Chapel. It was attended by nearly 8,000 people. He was buried nearby in the Tuskegee University Campus Cemetery.

At the time he was thought to have died of congestive heart failure, aggravated by overwork. In March 2006, his descendants permitted examination of medical records: these showed he had hypertension, with a blood pressure more than twice normal, and that he died of kidney failure brought on by high blood pressure.

At Washington's death, Tuskegee's endowment was close to $2,000,000. Washington's greatest life's work, the education of blacks in the South, was well underway and expanding.

Honors and memorials

For his contributions to American society, Washington was granted an honorary master's degree from Harvard University in 1896, followed by an honorary doctorate from Dartmouth College.

At the center of Tuskegee University, the Booker T. Washington Monument was dedicated in 1922. Called Lifting the Veil, the monument has an inscription reading: "He lifted the veil of ignorance from his people and pointed the way to progress through education and industry."

In 1934, Robert Russa Moton, Washington's successor as president of Tuskegee University, arranged an air tour for two African-American aviators. Afterward the plane was renamed as the Booker T. Washington.

On April 7, 1940, Washington became the first African American to be depicted on a United States postage stamp.

In 1942, the liberty ship Booker T. Washington was named in his honor, the first major oceangoing vessel to be named after an African American. The ship was christened by noted singer Marian Anderson.

In 1946, he was honored on the first coin to feature an African American, the Booker T. Washington Memorial half dollar, which was minted by the United States until 1951.

On April 5, 1956, the hundredth anniversary of Washington's birth, the house where he was born in Franklin County, Virginia was designated as the Booker T. Washington National Monument.

A state park in Chattanooga, Tennessee, was named in his honor, as was a bridge spanning the Hampton River adjacent to his alma mater, Hampton University.

In 1984, Hampton University dedicated a Booker T. Washington Memorial on campus near the historic Emancipation Oak, establishing, in the words of the university, "a relationship between one of America's great educators and social activists, and the symbol of Black achievement in education".

Numerous high schools, middle schools and elementary schools across the United States have been named after Booker T. Washington.

In 2000, West Virginia State University (WVSU; then West Va. State College), in cooperation with other organizations including the Booker T. Washington Association, established the Booker T. Washington Institute, to honor Washington's boyhood home, the old town of Malden, and Washington's ideals.

On October 19, 2009, WVSU dedicated a monument to Booker T. Washington. The event took place at WVSU's Booker T. Washington Park in Malden, West Virginia. The monument also honors the families of African ancestry who lived in Old Malden in the early 20th century and who knew and encouraged Washington. Special guest speakers at the event included West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin III, Malden attorney Larry L. Rowe, and the president of WVSU. Musical selections were provided by the WVSU "Marching Swarm".

At the end of the 2008 presidential election, the defeated Republican candidate Senator John McCain recalled the stir caused a century before when President Theodore Roosevelt invited Booker T. Washington to the White House. McCain noted the evident progress in the country with the election of Democratic Senator Barack Obama as the first African-American President of the United States.

Legacy
Booker T. Washington was so acclaimed as a public leader that the period of his activity, from 1880 to 1915, has been called the Age of Booker T. Washington. Historiography on Washington, his character, and the value of that leadership has varied dramatically. After his death, he came under heavy criticism in the civil rights community for accommodationism to white supremacy. However, since the late 20th century, a more balanced view of his very wide range of activities has appeared. As of 2010, the most recent studies, "defend and celebrate his accomplishments, legacy, and leadership".

Washington was held in high regard by business-oriented conservatives, both white and black. Historian Eric Foner argues that the freedom movement of the late nineteenth century changed directions so as to align with America's new economic and intellectual framework. Black leaders emphasized economic self-help and individual advancement into the middle class as a more fruitful strategy than political agitation. There was emphasis on education and literacy throughout the period after the Civil War. Washington's famous Atlanta speech of 1895 marked this transition, as it called on blacks to develop their farms, their industrial skills, and their entrepreneurship as the next stage in emerging from slavery.

By this time, Mississippi had passed a new constitution, and other Southern states were following suit, or using electoral laws to raise barriers to voter registration; they completed disenfranchisement of blacks at the turn of the 20th century to maintain white supremacy. But at the same time, Washington secretly arranged to fund numerous legal challenges to such voting restrictions and segregation, which he believed was the way they had to be attacked.

Washington repudiated the historic abolitionist emphasis on unceasing agitation for full equality, advising blacks that it was counterproductive to fight segregation at that point. Foner concludes that Washington's strong support in the black community was rooted in its widespread realization that, given their legal and political realities, frontal assaults on white supremacy were impossible, and the best way forward was to concentrate on building up their economic and social structures inside segregated communities. Historian C. Vann Woodward in 1951 wrote of Washington, "The businessman's gospel of free enterprise, competition, and laissez faire never had a more loyal exponent."

Historians since the late 20th century have been divided in their characterization of Washington: some describe him as a visionary capable of "read[ing] minds with the skill of a master psychologist," who expertly played the political game in nineteenth-century Washington by its own rules. Others say he was a self-serving, crafty narcissist who threatened and punished those in the way of his personal interests, traveled with an entourage, and spent much time fundraising, signing autographs, and giving flowery patriotic speeches with much flag waving – acts more indicative of an artful political boss than an altruistic civil rights leader.

People called Washington the "Wizard of Tuskegee" because of his highly developed political skills and his creation of a nationwide political machine based on the black middle class, white philanthropy, and Republican Party support. Opponents called this network the "Tuskegee Machine". Washington maintained control because of his ability to gain support of numerous groups, including influential whites and black business, educational and religious communities nationwide. He advised as to the use of financial donations from philanthropists and avoided antagonizing white Southerners with his accommodation to the political realities of the age of Jim Crow segregation.

The Tuskegee machine collapsed rapidly after Washington's death. He was the charismatic leader who held it all together, with the aid of Emmett Jay Scott. But the trustees replaced Scott, and the elaborate system fell apart. Critics in the 1920s to 1960s, especially those connected with the NAACP, ridiculed Tuskegee as a producer of a class of submissive black laborers. Since the late 20th century, historians have given much more favorable view, emphasizing the school's illustrious faculty and the progressive black movements, institutions and leaders in education, politics, architecture, medicine and other professions it produced who worked hard in communities across the United States, and indeed worldwide across the African Diaspora. Deborah Morowski points out that Tuskegee's curriculum served to help students achieve a sense of personal and collective efficacy. She concludes:
 * The social studies curriculum provided an opportunity for the uplift of African Americans at time when these opportunities were few and far between for black youth. The curriculum provided inspiration for African Americans to advance their standing in society, to change the view of southern whites toward the value of blacks, and ultimately, to advance racial equality.

At a time when most black Americans were poor farmers in the South and were ignored by the national black leadership, Washington's Tuskegee Institute made their needs a high priority. It lobbied for government funds and especially from philanthropies that enabled the institute to provide model farming techniques, advanced training, and organizational skills. These included Annual Negro Conferences, the Tuskegee Experiment Station, the Agricultural Short Course, the Farmers' Institutes, the Farmers' County Fairs, the Movable School, and numerous pamphlets and feature stories sent free to the South's black newspapers.

Representation in other media

 * Washington and his family's visit to the White House was dramatized as the subject of an opera, A Guest of Honor, by Scott Joplin, noted African-American composer. It was first produced in 1903.
 * In 1949 the anthology radio drama Destination Freedom recapped his life in "Up from Slavery", written by Richard Durham.
 * E. L. Doctorow's 1975 novel Ragtime features a fictional version of Washington trying to negotiate the surrender of an African-American musician who is threatening to blow up the Pierpont Morgan Library. The role was played by Moses Gunn in the 1981 film adaptation.
 * Washington was portrayed by Roger Guenveur Smith in the 2020 Netflix miniseries Self Made, based on the life of Madame C. J. Walker.
 * In the HBO series The Gilded Age, Washington is portrayed by actor Michael Braugher.

Works

 * The Future of the American Negro – 1899
 * The Story of My Life and Work (1900)
 * Up from Slavery – 1901
 * Character Building – 1902
 * Working with the Hands – 1904, a sequel to Up From Slavery
 * Tuskegee & Its People (editor) – 1905
 * Frederick Douglass – 1906 Online
 * The Negro in the South (with W. E. B. Du Bois) – 1907
 * The Negro in Business – 1907
 * The Story of the Negro: The Rise of the Race from Slavery (1909)
 * My Larger Education (1911)
 * The Man Farthest Down: A Record of Observation and Study in Europe – 1912
 * The Man Farthest Down: A Record of Observation and Study in Europe – 1912

Historiography and memory

 * Bieze, Michael Scott, and Marybeth Gasman, eds. Booker T. Washington Rediscovered (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012), 265 pp. scholarly essays
 * Carroll, Rebecca, ed. Uncle Tom or New Negro?: African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up from Slavery 100 Years Later (Crown, 2013).
 * Crowley, John W. "Booker T. Washington Revisited." American Literary Realism 54.2 (2022): 170–181. excerpt
 * Hamilton. Kenneth M. Booker T. Washington in American Memory (University of Illinois Press, 2017) online; see also online review
 * Thornbrough, Emma Lou, ed. Booker T. Washington - Great Lives Observed (1969), short selections by Washington and by historians; online
 * Zeringue, Joshua Thomas. "Booker T. Washington and the Historians: How Changing Views on Race Relations, Economics, and Education Shaped Washington Historiography, 1915–2010" (MA Thesis, LSU, 2015) online
 * Hamilton. Kenneth M. Booker T. Washington in American Memory (University of Illinois Press, 2017) online; see also online review
 * Thornbrough, Emma Lou, ed. Booker T. Washington - Great Lives Observed (1969), short selections by Washington and by historians; online
 * Zeringue, Joshua Thomas. "Booker T. Washington and the Historians: How Changing Views on Race Relations, Economics, and Education Shaped Washington Historiography, 1915–2010" (MA Thesis, LSU, 2015) online
 * Thornbrough, Emma Lou, ed. Booker T. Washington - Great Lives Observed (1969), short selections by Washington and by historians; online
 * Zeringue, Joshua Thomas. "Booker T. Washington and the Historians: How Changing Views on Race Relations, Economics, and Education Shaped Washington Historiography, 1915–2010" (MA Thesis, LSU, 2015) online

title: Booker T. Washington