Angela M. Eikenberry, coeditor of Reframing Nonprofit Organizations: Democracy, Inclusion, and Social Change:
Professionalization is typically seen as universally good in the worlds of government, nonprofit, and development organizations. Meghan Elizabeth Kallman shows in her insightful study of the U.S. Peace Corps how it can kill idealism and lead to the failure of development. This is a must-read for anyone interested in public service and civic engagement.

Nina Eliasoph, author of Making Volunteers: Civic Life After Welfare's End:
With no places to discuss their potentially life-changing experiences with fellow volunteers, and with many rules to follow and forms to fill out, volunteers in the Peace Corps often encounter an organizational void where their political imaginations and hopes might have bloomed. The Death of Idealism confronts the consequences of this void, and makes important contributions to theories of organizations, the history of American volunteering, and the history of the Peace Corps in particular.