In "The Spirit of Community" by Amitai Etzioni, the author extols the virtues of the "communitarian" approach to living, which he believes will ultimately benefit all members of society. Not only does he believe that everyone will reap the rewards of such a system, he asserts that we must all work in concert with each other in order for this system to flourish. Etzioni believes that we
require a set of social virtues, some basic settled values, that we as a community endorse and actively affirm.
The author suggests that if we agree to abide by these rules, and treat one another with dignity and mutual respect, we can accomplish great things. In that same vein, Etzioni gives us some insight into his mindset by sharing what the term social justice means to him; for Etzioni, his viewpoint can be summed up in these four points: 1)...
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It is your moral obligation to help yourself in every way you possibly can; 2) It is your moral obligation to help your family, friends, and neighbors in any way you possibly can; 3) The community should do all it can to take care of its own people; and 4) Societies (which are made up of multiple communities) must step in to help communities when they need help caring for their people.
Etzioni also examines how a communitarian outlook could make over our current educational system. As before, he claims that communitarians must agree on certain social norms when educating our children, such as the
numerous values we share as a community—such as the inappropriateness of racial and gender discrimination, the rejection of violence, and the desirability of treating others with love, respect, and dignity."
As a realist, Etizioni understands that not all students will receive proper support from their community or parents; it is the school's duty then, he contends, to help out:
If the moral infrastructure of our communities is to be restored, schools will have to step in where the family, neighborhoods, and religious institutions have been failing.
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Your question made me smile quite a bit, actually, because I am going to be a bit politically incorrect when I say that Etzioni's The Spirit of Community is meant to be read by people who may generally be unsure of their exact politics, but who are liberals or people leaning to the left of the political spectrum.
Further, though, let's look at a few specifics as to why this is the intended audience. It is, in its purest form, a list of responsibilities for each member (or each "individual") as a member of a utopian, socialist community. These responsibilities are designed to help the community prosper and further its label as a "utopia." In two adjectives, Etzioni describes his goal as to "safeguard" and "enhance" the future by calling upon the responsibility of these individuals. Further in Etzioni's The Spirit of Community, he calls these individuals by a particular name: "communitarians."
You can see how Etzioni's The Spirit of Community, then, fits within Amitai Etzioni's biography as someone who considers himself both an Israeli and an American and is definitely a sociologist. It is the "communitarianism" that he espouses in The Spirit of Community that is his lasting legacy. Etzioni is the leader of the Communitarian Network, which considers itself non-partisan and has a goal of bolstering the foundations of society that are social, political, AND moral.