James Davison Hunter, "Democracy and Solidarity: On the Cultural Roots of America's Political Crisis" (Yale UP, 2024)

James Davison Hunter, "Democracy and Solidarity: On the Cultural Roots of America's Political Crisis" (Yale UP, 2024)

Liberal democracy in America has always contained contradictions—most notably, a noble but abstract commitment to freedom, justice, and equality that, tragically, has seldom been realized in practice. While these contradictions have caused dissent and even violence, there was always an underlying and evolving solidarity drawn from the cultural resources of America’s “hybrid Enlightenment.” James Davison Hunter, who introduced the concept of “culture wars” thirty years ago, tells us in Democracy and Solidarity: On the Cultural Roots of America's Political Crisis (Yale UP, 2024) that those historic sources of national solidarity have now largely dissolved. While a deepening political polarization is the most obvious sign of this, the true problem is not polarization per se but the absence of cultural resources to work through what divides us. The destructive logic that has filled the void only makes bridging our differences more challenging. In the end, all political regimes require some level of unity. If it cannot be generated organically, it will be imposed by force. Can America’s political crisis be fixed? Can an Enlightenment-era institution—liberal democracy—survive and thrive in a post-Enlightenment world? If, for some, salvaging the older sources of national solidarity is neither possible sociologically, nor desirable politically or ethically, what cultural resources will support liberal democracy in the future? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/political-science

Episoder(1000)

Paul Kohlbry, "Plots and Deeds: Agrarian Annihilation and the Fight for Land Justice in Palestine" (Stanford UP, 2026)

Paul Kohlbry, "Plots and Deeds: Agrarian Annihilation and the Fight for Land Justice in Palestine" (Stanford UP, 2026)

The emancipatory potential and limits of land justice, when land is at once home, property, territory, and homeland. Peasant farming was once an integral part of Palestine's agrarian fabric. But afte...

20 Mar 1h 10min

Our Age of War: A Discussion with Author Robert Pape

Our Age of War: A Discussion with Author Robert Pape

Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, has been writing about war for decades, including in his book Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (Cornell University Press, ...

18 Mar 42min

Alex Powell, "Queering UK Refugee Law: Sexual Diversity and Asylum Administration" (Bristol UP, 2026)

Alex Powell, "Queering UK Refugee Law: Sexual Diversity and Asylum Administration" (Bristol UP, 2026)

Utilizing critical legal methodologies, Alex Powell's Queering UK Refugee Law: Sexual Diversity and Asylum Administration (Bristol UP, 2026) gives a vital and needed analysis of migration and queer li...

17 Mar 1h

Lauren M. MacLean, "Negotiating Power and Inequality in Ghana: Electricity and Citizenship as Reciprocity (Indiana UP, 2026)

Lauren M. MacLean, "Negotiating Power and Inequality in Ghana: Electricity and Citizenship as Reciprocity (Indiana UP, 2026)

In Ghana, much as in other parts of the Global South, postcolonial leaders aimed for industrial growth through the establishment of affordable hydroelectric power. However, in the current rapidly chan...

15 Mar 1h 20min

Pepper Culpepper and Taeku Lee, "Billionaire Backlash: The Age of Corporate Scandal and How it Could Save Democracy" (Bloomsbury, 2026) 

Pepper Culpepper and Taeku Lee, "Billionaire Backlash: The Age of Corporate Scandal and How it Could Save Democracy" (Bloomsbury, 2026) 

Giant companies, launch rockets into space, control satellite communication and develop era-defining AI technologies. But they are also seen as promoting misinformation, undermining democracy and viol...

14 Mar 1h 7min

Suzanne Mettler and Trevor E. Brown, "Rural Versus Urban: The Growing Divide That Threatens Democracy" (Princeton UP, 2025)

Suzanne Mettler and Trevor E. Brown, "Rural Versus Urban: The Growing Divide That Threatens Democracy" (Princeton UP, 2025)

How the urban-rural divide drives partisan polarization Why have Americans living in different places come to experience politics as a battle between “us” and “them”? In Rural Versus Urban: The Growin...

14 Mar 40min

Wendy Brown, "States of Injury: Power and Freedom in Late Modernity" (Princeton UP, 2025)

Wendy Brown, "States of Injury: Power and Freedom in Late Modernity" (Princeton UP, 2025)

A sympathetic critique that attempts to free Left politics from its own snares, States of Injury: Power and Freedom in Late Modernity (Princeton University Press, 2025) explores how woundedness became...

12 Mar 41min

Katelyn E. Stauffer, "The Politics of Perception: How Beliefs About Women’s Inclusion Shape Democratic Legitimacy in the U.S." (Oxford UP, 2025)

Katelyn E. Stauffer, "The Politics of Perception: How Beliefs About Women’s Inclusion Shape Democratic Legitimacy in the U.S." (Oxford UP, 2025)

Katelyn Stauffer, Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Georgia, has an excellent new book focusing on how voters and citizens perceive the legitimacy and functionality of poli...

12 Mar 35min

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