A new edition for our times. First published in 1996. Since then democracy's discontent has deepened to the extent that there are doubts about democracy's future. Preface to the new edition. P. xi
The author is a professor of government at Harvard University and the author of many books on contemporary political and economic issues.
Some people will say, "Don't talk about politics." I say it is impossible not to talk politics. The issues we face today affect everything. The political issues of today affect all of us as to the way we see ourselves, our fellow human beings, and how we we envision the kind of country we wish to live in. Politics is unavoidable now.
Our Civic Life is not going well. A defeated president incites a violent mob to invade the U.S. Capitol, in a violent attempt to prevent Congress from certifying the election results. More than a year into the presence of Joe Biden, most Republicans continue to believe the election was stolen from Donald Trump. Even as a pandemic claims more than a million American lives, angry disputes over masks and vaccines reveal our polarized condition. Public outrage over police killings of unarmed Black men prompts a national reckoning with racial injustice, but states across the country enact laws making it more difficult to vote.
Trump's presidency and its rancorous aftermath cast a dark shadow over the future of American democracy. But our civic troubles did not begin with Trump and did not end with his defeat. His election was a symbol of frayed social bonds and a damaged democratic condition. P. 1
I did not know Sandel was such an historian.
Sandel points out in his positive presentation of Whiggism that the Whigs like Daniel Webster opposed territorial expansion as did the Democrats citing the cohesiveness required of republics. What Sandel does not point out is that Jackssonians favored territorial expansion to maintain slavery. Pl .58-59
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