Hilary Silver is Professor of Sociology and Urban Studies at Brown University and Director of the Urban Studies Program there. She is also Editor of City & Community, the urban sociology journal of the American Sociological Association, and Research Affiliate at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University. Her broad research focus is social exclusion, including urban poverty, homelessness, racial discrimination, immigrant integration, and long-term unemployment. Her book, Social Exclusion, will be published by Polity Press next year.