Summary: Publisher Summary 1 Presents for the first time in book form Gilman's sociological treatise on social ethics.   Publisher Summary 2 Most famous as the author of "The Yellow Wallpaper," author Gilman (1860-1935) also produced a significant body of sociological work, including Social Ethics, originally serialized in The Forerunner between 1914 and 1916. For the editors of this new edition, the Social Ethics demonstrate Gilman as a feminist pragmatist and Durkheimian structural functionalist. In her critical exploration of social relations, Gilman is concerned with the relation between women and moral decisions, the role of democracy, religion, changes in the nature of women's work in the industrial and domestic spheres, and the desire to expand women's political participation in the public sphere. Annotation 漏2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)   Publisher Summary 3 First serialized in 1914, Social Ethics attempts to convince readers that individualist ethics have failed to make the world a safe place for children, and that we cannot progress to a fully social ethics unless we understand the morality of collective action from a specifically sociological point of view. The social ills she addresses in her attempt to advocate for a reexamination of our ethics include topics still relevant today: militarism, waste, religious intolerance, conspicuous consumption, greed, graft, environmental degradation, preventable diseases, and patriarchal oppression in its numerous manifestations. Hill and Deegan show not only that Gilman's central arguments remain largely valid and cogent today, but also that Gilman is a major and substantive contributor to the shape and importance of sociology in its formative years.