Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations

by Amy Chua

The bestselling author of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, Yale Law School Professor Amy Chua offers a bold new prescription for reversing our foreign policy failures and overcoming our destructive political tribalism at home

Humans are tribal. We need to belong to groups. In many parts of the world, the group identities that matter most - the ones that people will kill and die for - are ethnic, religious, sectarian, or clan-based. But because America tends to see the world in terms of nation-states engaged in great ideological battles - Capitalism vs. Communism, Democracy vs. Authoritarianism, the "Free World" vs. the "Axis of Evil" - we are often spectacularly blind to the power of tribal politics. Time and again this blindness has undermined American foreign policy.

In the Vietnam War, viewing the conflict through Cold War blinders, we never saw that most of Vietnam's "capitalists" were members of the hated Chinese minority. Every pro-free-market move we made helped turn the Vietnamese people against us. In Iraq, we were stunningly dismissive of the hatred between that country's Sunnis and Shias. If we want to get our foreign policy right - so as to not be perpetually caught off guard and fighting unwinnable wars - the United States has to come to grips with political tribalism abroad.

Just as Washington's foreign policy establishment has been blind to the power of tribal politics outside the country, so too have American political elites been oblivious to the group identities that matter most to ordinary Americans - and that are tearing the United States apart. As the stunning rise of Donald Trump laid bare, identity politics have seized both the American left and right in an especially dangerous, racially inflected way. In America today, every group feels threatened: whites and blacks, Latinos and Asians, men and women, liberals and conservatives, and so on. There is a pervasive sense of collective persecution and discrimination. On the left, this has given rise to increasingly radical and exclusionary rhetoric of privilege and cultural appropriation. On the right, it has fueled a disturbing rise in xenophobia and white nationalism.

In characteristically persuasive style, Amy Chua argues that America must rediscover a national identity that transcends our political tribes. Enough false slogans of unity, which are just another form of divisiveness. It is time for a more difficult unity that acknowledges the reality of group differences and fights the deep inequities that divide us.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, History, Psychology, Sociology, Political Science, Audiobook

304 pages, Paperback

First published February 20, 2018

About the author

Amy Chua is a Professor at Yale Law School and author of the debut novel THE GOLDEN GATE, coming 9/19/2023. She is also the bestselling author of numerous nonfiction books, including World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability (2003), which was selected by both The Economist and the U.K.’s Guardian as a Best Book of 2003, Day of Empire: How Hyperpowers Rise to Global Dominance – and Why They Fall (2007); The Triple Package: How Three Unlikely Traits Explain the Rise and Fall of Cultural Groups in America (2013); and Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations (2018). Her 2011 memoir Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother was a runaway international bestseller that has been translated into over 30 languages.

Reviews

[mark monday · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book. Clearly and cleanly written, well-sourced, full of both sense and sensibility. The thesis: lack of understanding of the tribal instinct will inevitably lead to disaster both abroad and at home. I appreciated the logical construction of this book: it moves from external to internal. First, the author spends much time detailing how American interventions - portrayed in a number of examples (Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Venezuela) - have started from a place of complete misunderstanding, an arrogant misreading of how American intercessions will impact the countries in question, a refusal to recognize let alone analyze the tribal demarcations within countries where we have forcibly placed ourselves. That lack of understanding and analysis has led to catastrophe; most frustrating of all, these are catastrophes that could have been avoided, if willful arrogance disguised as idealism was not such a foundational attribute of American foreign policy.

After reviewing what went wrong abroad through the lens of how tribalism dictates the power structures within many (most? all?) countries, Prof. Chua turns her assessment inward, towards the U.S. itself. The last two chapters of the book are where extremists on both the right and the left may find horseshoe unity in disregarding or rejecting the author's illustration of how the U.S. itself is a tribalist nation - to its ongoing harm. Her vaccines against this virus are holistic ones, and fairly simple and straightforward: recognize the tribalism that exists across the political spectrum; deploy genuine empathy; and do not revert to binary thinking, no matter how tempting, no matter how good it feels to be a part of a wave of righteous group-think. Every tribe and every individual has their reasons, their rationales, their contexts. These should be understood, not demonized. Us versus Them solves nothing in the long run and is not sustainable; a body in constant opposition to itself is a body that will inevitably fray and then decay.

Pure Pontification:

I often consider tribalism to be a kind of toxin: a harmful substance produced within a living organism. Specifically, a harmful outlook. One that damages the bodies that come in contact with that toxin and one that damages the body where the toxin itself is generated. The tribalistic perspective can be promoted by the individual, by the group, by the nation. The final and key chapters of Political Tribes portrays the harmful impact that tribalism continues to generate within the American body.

And that said, despite the toxin & virus metaphors... I don't want to necessarily demonize tribalism either. Who am I to condescend to those whose tribalist way of thinking is their way of life - their community's way of life, for generations? I want to be able to recognize tribalism and to disengage myself from a tribalist mode of thinking when I see it coming from within. Not a joiner over here. But one of the great points of this book is that if change is to be promoted outside of the U.S., it must come from a place of understanding and respecting those whose ways of thinking and whose experiences are radically different from our own. Tribalism can't be ignored or dismissed. It is a natural part of the human condition. Chua's point is that tribalism - as dangerous and regressive as it may often be, and as much as it should be seen as something to be overcome - cannot simply be handwaved aside as a minor issue. But that is exactly what we have done in many a nation.

This book is important to me on an intellectual and political level because not only did it coalate information both known and unknown (to me) about American misadventures abroad, it establishes a roadmap to avoiding those mistakes in the future. Well, we'll see if those lessons land at all with the powers that be.

More importantly to me, on a personal level (and thus the 5th star), Political Tribes helped clarify my own thoughts about the toxicity that has been raging in this country of mine, and has helped me to stay on the track I've set for myself. I'm an old school progressive, and to me that means we must always progress, as individuals and as groups and as a nation. Binary, tribalist group-think is an inhibitor to actual progress in the United States and should be a relic of the past, despite how strongly we may cling to that and other relics. This country is a collection of cultural identities and each cultural identity is married to an overall American identity; neither identity needs to be subsumed by the other. The ability of each of us to hold multiple identities simultaneously, to recognize that we can be a person of many tribes and no single tribe, and to not be ashamed of any of those different identities, is exactly how we can check our own reductive, tribalist instincts. I do not equal one thing nor does the person whose perspective that is diametically opposed to my own way of thinking equal one thing. As the saying goes: we are large, we contain multitudes.


I've read two works of nonfiction this year that resonated deeply with me: Political Tribes and The Great Chain of Life (the latter a reread of a favorite from college). The lessons of both are central to my own guiding principles, my own personal logic model; namely, that the tenets of empathy and of individualism must be combined and centralized for humans to move forward, together.

❂

Today's purveyors of political tribalism, on both left and right, may think they are defending American values, but in fact they are playing with poison. America will cease to be America... if we define our nationality in terms of "whiteness," "Anglo-Protestant culture," "European Christianity," or any other terms not inclusive of all religions and ethnicities. But it will also cease to be America if enough of us come to believe that our country and its ideals are a fraud. There is a world of difference between saying that America has failed to live up to its own ideals, with egregious injustice persisting today, and saying that the principles supposedly uniting us are just smoke screens to disguise oppression.

The peril we face as a nation today is not only that America might fail to live up to its promise, but that Americans might stop believing in that promise or the need to fight for it. The increasing belief on the left that this promise was always a lie, or on the right that it has always been true - and has already been achieved - are two sides of the same coin.

What holds the United States together is the American Dream. But it must be a version of the dream that recognizes past failure instead of denying it. Failures are part and parcel of the story line of a country founded on hope, a country where there's always more to be done.

[Lyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent, wonderfully written, beautiful book.

GR friends who read my reviews know that I seldom gush and also rarely award a five-star rating, I’m going to do both here.

Amy Chua, a law professor as Yale University, outlines first the necessity of recognizing and accepting tribes. It’s hardwired into us, being tribal is akin to being human – we are going to find and join groups for many purposes: survival, approval, family, friends, national and or regional, racial or political, religious, spiritual, etc. Being a joiner is much more natural for us than not.

Chua also identifies where well-meaning idealists, believing that we’ve evolved beyond the need for tribes, have then myopically underestimated the human need for such associations.

Most noteworthy for me, she explains how overly simplified thinking, especially into binary considerations, grossly misapplies situational awareness of most deliberations, allowing for erroneous misinterpretations of a variety of circumstances, here particularly in the realm of foreign policy. When a mindset is hyper focused on capitalism versus communism, that approach will fail to realize the complicated bigger picture of racial, religious – tribal differences.

This book examines and explores United States foreign policies in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Venezuela and illuminates how in each scenario US planners made ridiculously misguided strategies based upon faulty foundational understandings of tribal realities in the area.

Before my deployment to Iraq in 2005, I was very politically active in binary politics – I was all about democrats versus republicans. When I got back, I was cured of that disease and focused instead on more immediate tribes – my family and community. I’ve been preaching this non-binary / anti-binary sentiment ever since to whoever will listen, though Chua’s erudition helps me to understand how difficult it is to let these affiliations go.

Ever watch an episode of Doctor Phil and the good doctor is interviewing some highly dysfunctional family and he’s letting one family member have it about irresponsibility and selfish behavior? Another family member sits by, smugly agreeing that the other has acted horribly. But Doctor Phil was just getting started and waits to then turn to the smug person and then REALLY let them have it. Binary politicos who read this may also agree with Chua for the first three fourths of the book. But she is only just getting started. She ends with scorching denunciations of both major parties and how they’ve both collaborated on the train wreck that has been American foreign policy for the past half century.

She ends, though, with some ideas about hope and how to intelligently move forward; understanding and accepting the very real need we have for tribal connections while also having an idea about a bigger reality.

If I was rich, I’d buy crates of this book and hand them out.

*** 2026 reread -

I have very different political opinions. To be succinct, I believe the most accurate single word to describe American politics is: crass. Our political system, including political reporting, is only slightly less credible that professional wrestling.

I told my best friend that if she truly wanted to understand my unorthodox leanings, she could begin by reading this wonderful book.

Professor Chua hit the nail on the head so many times, she built a house.

Required reading for everyone at the state department, everyone at GS-15 or higher, and any candidate for political office at county sheriff and higher.

[Mehrsa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of all the post-Trump dystopia books, this one resonated with me the most. Chua has her flaws, but she is a great writer. There is nothing particularly new in here (humans are tribal, the US denies this which is why we keep screwing up in our "nation-building efforts abroad," and most crucially, the US is turning more tribal), but I think her analysis is spot-on. I imagine she'll get attacked from some on the left for her take on the misuse and distractions of of micro-aggressions and intersectionality, but I am with her. We have real racism to deal with and the left has its own tribal language that alienates those not woke enough to understand it. This has long been a frustration of mine (as a progressive person who cares deeply about this country). I think Chua is right that we need a new vision of America as a multi-cultural nation so that we can bridge the gap across the tribes. I am not sure I'm as optimistic as she is that we can fix it.

[Jenna ❤ ❀ ❤ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Back when our ancestors were gathering and hunting their food on the African savannahs or later roaming throughout Europe, Australia, and Asia, or later still, crossing the Bering Strait to settle the Americas, it made sense for them to put their tribe above all others. To feel committed to their own tribe of people at the exclusivity of all others. They were used to living in small groups of people, depending on each other to survive, and the tribal mentality they'd evolved with made perfect sense to thrive as a species.

Just as those with a preference for high calorie, high fat foods survived longer and had more offspring, those tribes with people who had the strongest tribal mentality probably had better survival rates than others (I am not an anthropologist or an evolutionary biologist, so I cannot say this last for sure, but it certainly makes sense that it would be so).

Today in our modern world where most people live amidst an abundance of food without constant exercise, that old love of high caloric, high fat food is no longer good for us. Indeed, the world is facing an obesity epidemic as more and more people are suffering with heart disease, diabetes, even death BECAUSE of this trait that helped our ancestors survive. Likewise, our tribal mentality is no longer so good for us living in our modern world. It might have helped our ancestors survive and flourish and spread to all continents of the earth, but today, in an age of automatic guns and nuclear weapons combined with our ability to go to anywhere on earth in 24 hours, it could easily get us all killed.

So what do we do? Well, as always with problems, we have to first recognise there IS a problem. In Political Tribes, Amy Chua points out the ways in which we humans still are very tribal beings. From studies done with young children, we see that at a certain age, they tend to prefer people who seem more like them, even if it's just that they're wearing the same colour of shirt and another is wearing a different colour. That is rather alarming to me, especially as I always thought this behaviour was something that had to be taught. This does not mean we innately hate others, but it does mean that we innately prefer those we perceive as being most like us, share more with those we perceive as being most like, and think better of those we perceive as being most like us. Certainly we can be taught to not be racist, sexist, bigoted, xenophobic, etc., but there is something instinctual in human beings that give us a preference for those we perceive as being most like us. It is because we have this fundamental need to belong. In the distant past, those who did not belong to a group were unlikely to survive.

This gave me pause for thought and I realised that yes, I too, like when I feel that I belong. When I am out and see someone who's obviously also gay, I feel a certain bond with them. Does this mean I hate straight people or that I only want to be around gays? No. When I learn someone is an unbeliever (atheist or agnostic), I feel a certain connection with them that I don't feel with believers. Does this mean I prefer atheists over theists? No. Does it mean I hate religious people? Not at all. It does, however, mean I like to feel part of a larger whole. I like feeling a connection with other human beings.

Unfortunately, this sense and even need to "belong" can lead to hatred and violence against any who are perceived to be outside one's group. We see this all too often, all over the world. The United States has probably never been as divided as we are today, except during the Civil War. Racists and Nazis are flying their flags proudly. People refuse to even speak to those who voted for the other candidate. I will admit that I have a difficult time talking with those who voted for trump, because I see it as a vote against me as an LGBTQ citizen. Thus, I tend to surround myself more and more with other liberals. On one hand, I feel more than justified; on the other, I'm not so proud of that and know I need to change my way of thinking. Not to accept trump or his politics and hatred and instigating of violence, but to see that some people didn't vote for him BECAUSE of those things, only despite them (which still bothers me, but perhaps I could still try to listen to the other side).

OK, enough about me and back to the book.

Ms. Chua examines the way American leaders have dealt so blindly with tribal politics in other countries. They often see the world as nation-states, and ignore the importance of tribal issues in other countries. Ms. Chua discusses the ways in which America, thinking it would "bring democracy!" to other countries such as Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, blundered things so badly. Just so, she points out how America's political elites have been oblivious to tribal mentality and politics within our own country. This is why they were so certain Hillary Clinton would win the 2016 election, certain there was no way Donald Trump could win. Of course, Donnie himself didn't think he would win, though he was obviously much more aware of tribal mentality and used it so blatantly to bring his adoring audiences to their feet and to the voting booths.

Now, in the Age of Trump, we live in an America where every minority group feels threatened. I certainly do; I fear that my rights will be taken away. I fear that some crazed religious nutter will show up at a pride parade with a bomb. I fear even when I'm walking with my fiancee, holding her hand (which I will continue to do no matter what!) that some anti-gay fanatic will put a bullet in my brain.

However, I didn't realise the extent to which many white Americans feel that they too are threatened, namely because they see that eventually non-Latino whites will become a minority in America, in the not-so-distant future. They often feel like the minority groups are allowed to be proud of who they are (Black Lives Matter, Gay pride, etc), but if/when they claim pride for their whiteness, we condemn them. I wonder if this would still bother them if it wasn't the case that we know whites will eventually cease to be the majority? Of course, straight white people are not targeted for their straightness or whiteness and they do not need to live in fear of hate crimes being committed against them simply because they are white or straight. Minorities do. Just last week in Pittsburgh, PA, someone walked into a Jewish synagogue, brutally murdering 11 people. Blacks, and Muslims, Latinos and gays are all seeing an increase in hate crimes against them.

How can we possibly overcome this? How can we all become simply Americans and stop hating and exploiting other Americans? How can the world, with its increasing hatred of immigrants, especially Muslim ones, come to stop hating but instead recognising the common humanity we share? The first step, as stated above, is to first admit there is a problem, and I don't think anyone will have much difficulty in seeing that there is. Just go to any news site and you will see evidence of hatred and tribal politics at play throughout the world, humans killing and maiming each other simply because they perceive them as different.

It is never OK to hate and mistreat and discriminate against someone because of perceived differences. And it is never the fault of the oppressed that they are hated and abused. Having an innate bias is much, much different than hating, hurting, or not accepting another group of people or person. Having been born with a bias for people most similar to us is not a reason or excuse to mistreat those with less similarities. I also do not think that in the face of oppression or hatred one should look at themselves and wonder how they too might have biases. No, this is something to look at in a quiet moment of reflection when one is not feeling hurt or abused or upset. We can look at ourselves openly and without judgment, because having a bias is not the same thing as hurting another human being. It's not the same thing as being racist, sexist, trans-phobic, homophobic, etc. It is not, never has been, and never will be an excuse for hatred. No one has a justified reason to hate or hurt another human being. And those who are hurt, hated, and victimised are not at fault. (Thank you to Lois for helping me see I needed to be add this paragraph to my review.)

I think many of us are becoming more globally-minded citizens and putting aside our ancestor's tribal mentality. I think we all can evolve out of that need to "belong" to small groups by realizing that we are each and every one of us human. We already belong to the human race, and we no longer need to put each other in categories in order to feel superior and feel it makes it OK to kill/hurt/enslave others. We no longer need to belong to small groups in order to survive; we now need to belong to one large group, the group of humanity, in order to survive and flourish. In the past it was very difficult to communicate with someone unless they were right there with you. Today, I can talk with friends in Australia and the Middle East, England and Italy, China and South Africa, in real time as though we were in the same room together. We can and should use our technology to become closer, to know and understand each other better. To see the common humanity in all of us.

I recommend this book because I see it as pointing out such a crucial step in what the world needs to do, but also because it can help each of us identify our own group preferences, and see how important it is to grow out of them. We can recognise our "differences" but in so doing learn from them and appreciate them. Learning about other cultures and meeting people who are in some ways "different" to us is exciting and gives us the chance to grow and expand our worldview, to make our worlds bigger. The world is a big place, so let's not be small-minded. Let's expand our compassion, consciousness, empathy, and respect to include all human beings.

[sunnydee · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The grand ideals of democracy have a hard time competing with a simpler, more primal need: belonging."

Professor Amy Chua's name is one few have not heard of. Her first book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, tore through the bestseller lists in 2011, bringing to the forefront so much of the anxiety and confusion we have about the way we raise our children and sparking furores about parenting authoritarianism and permissiveness on a global scale. This latest offering of Chua's moves away from the homefront, instead delving into the nature of political and social power, and may well prove no less controversial and provocative.

Political Tribes is an in-depth look at the way tribalism affects us all, and how it is such a misunderstood and yet crucial social phenomenon, one that explains so much about the way hearts, elections and wars are lost and won. It begins by questioning the US political zeitgeist, and how so many people got the 2016 presidential election wrong. Chua explains that tribalism is an aspect of the human psychology that is often overlooked and discounted, yet studies with adults, children and even babies have shown that human beings are invariably motivated by the urge to belong. "Humans," she tells us, "aren't just a little tribal. We're *very* tribal, and it distorts the way we think and feel." Chua meticulously and thoroughly examines some of the ways that political tribalism was erroneously handled in the American military efforts in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. She uses the examples of ISIS, the populism of Hugo Chavez, and social movements found in the U.S. to illustrate how ingrouping distorts thinking, encourages conformism and dehumanizes those outside their group. Most terrifyingly, she paints the clearest picture of the political climate of the United States that we have seen thus far, where racial and sexual insecurity, political correctness taken to horrific levels, identity politicking, ethnonationalism and income inequality all combine to create a molten stew of growing tension and fear in all the many tribal groups to be found within one country.

I found Political Tribes to be completely riveting reading, and it helps that it reads more like a persuasive conversation rather than a didactic schoolroom text. Amy Chua lays out her arguments compellingly, and backs up her argument with tons of research (as the 68 pages of notes included will show!), indeed making this reader wonder how we have been blind for this long, and how we have come this far without accounting for this very vital sociological truism in our examination of political power. Everyone who wants to make sense of humanity and the way we work in multitudes should avail themselves of this very cogent and persuasive piece of work.

As an avid reader of dystopian fiction, I found Chua's book the perfect guide to making sense of the real dystopia we find ourselves in today. Yet grim though her final assessment of the problems she sees in the U.S. political environment in particular, Chua still manages to put together an optimistic epilogue in which she begins by saying, "Despite everything, I sense a shift in America." She then goes on to lay out some of the silver linings she has seen, and the light at the end of the tunnel in America's future. Perhaps there's still the glimmer of hope that if enough people understand more about the tribal instinct so deeply ingrained in all of us, the dystopias we see in our world today can one day become a utopia.

[Zak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Conceptually, there isn't really anything that could be considered new here, but it is a very timely reminder of the role of group identities, which Chua terms as "tribes" in the book. She takes a look at the outsized role group identities played in America's past forays in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Venezuela and against various terror groups, before finally turning to the country's current internal politics. There were so many paragraphs in this book that made me go "Exactly!" - A quick and interesting read, I would give it 5* except that it somehow feels a bit too short, as if there is yet more that could be explored. But I suppose her advice in the epilogue for engagement and dialogue is the best way to start. We really need to stop applying derogatory labels to everyone who doesn't currently hold the same views as us. Calling people stupid, morons, Nazis, etc is a surefire way of ensuring much-needed dialogue never takes place in a meaningful way. [Final rating: 4.5*]

[Gary Moreau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amy Chua doesn’t mince her words. But she is very insightful and this is a good book that will make a significant contribution to the debate over the state of America and our collective future.

For me, actually, it is really two books. In the first book she does a meticulous job of articulating and analyzing America’s many foreign policy blunders, starting with the Vietnam War. Her basic thesis is that American foreign policy has consistently ignored the perils of tribalism, and, specifically, the inevitable powder keg that is a society in which power has been allocated asymmetrically between the tribes. Specifically, when a tribal minority controls the wealth of a country, the tribal fault lines will ultimately seek to release the pent up resentment.

And she’s right. And she’s right that from Vietnam on American foreign policy has been misguided by the false notion that the oppressed people of the world want nothing quite so much as they want the right to vote. They don’t. (Having lived in China for nine years I am constantly amazed that American journalists are still writing about what they imply is an unrecognized groundswell of Chinese that yearn for American style politics. There isn’t one.)

The second half of the book, for me, was a little dicier. It is here that she gets more deeply into the current American political landscape. And she continues to make some great points. But…

Humans have a fundamental desire to see patterns in reality. I think it’s evolutionary. After all, the ability to plan ahead contributes to the ability to stay safe and perpetuate the species. And you can’t plan ahead if you have made no attempt to interpret the past and present – to find patterns that you can learn from and apply to the future.

Tribalism is all about patterns. However you define what it means to be an American, you are defining a pattern. And there are always plenty to choose from because the fabric of reality is rich with them. The context of life and the universe is defined by an almost limitless number of data points existing in a multitude of dimensions all at the same time.

And that’s both the beauty and the challenge of patterns. They’re everywhere. And they are all “real”, and that makes them meaningful. But which are the most meaningful? Which are truly causal and which are more coincidental?

Everything in life is a duality. For every pro there is a con, for dark there is light, for yin there is yang. A pattern, in other words, can be both causal and coincidental at the same time. Or at different times.

And that’s where the book lost me a little bit. If she didn’t take political tribalism too far she peered over the precipice. Sovereign citizens, narco-saints, the prosperity gospel, NASCAR nation, WWE, and other tribal identifiers are obviously real, but are they causal or coincidental? And are they impactful enough that it matters? (NASCAR nation is huge, but is it singularly defining for its many fans?)

My only other observation is that she doesn’t spend much time on technology and the role it has had in defining and aggravating tribalism. She does reference the impact of “echo-chamber social media,” and perhaps that would be too much to expect for one book. I just think we’re just now beginning to understand how tribally divisive, if you will, technology has been.

Ultimately, the author is right when she concludes, “America’s ideals always far exceeded its reality.” And she’s right that whatever we think those ideals are, if we simply walk away from them we walk away from who we are. (Again, as always, true and not true at the same time.) Whether we think that is the right thing to do or not we at least better think it through before we set out. Ultimately the author is right, wherever we want to go, acute and exclusionary tribalism is unlikely to take us there.

[Peter Tillman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I learned a lot of really interesting stuff in Prof. Chua's book. She’s very sharp, does her homework, and writes really well. The book is short & pithy. You should read it. Foreign policy and military officers, in particular. 5 stars!

Start by reading Amy’s (no relation) review here, a good, short introduction: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
“Whether you lean left or right, this book will make you uncomfortable.”
And don't forget to read the publisher's introduction, above.

Here are some highlights:
Immigration to the US
From 1820 to 1914, 30 million immigrants arrived in the US — the largest human migration in history. Mostly poor Europeans, these immigrants faced significant challenges to being accepted in their new homeland. Most of them succeeded.

1990 to 2000: 9 million immigrants to US, mostly from Latin America and Asia.
As of the 2000 census, foreign-born US residents were from:
Mexico 7.8 million
China 1.4 million
Philippines 1.2 million
India 1.0 million
Cuba 1.0 million

The US is still the only large country with birthright citizenship (assuming that survives the Age of Trump). Regardless of the parents nationality, if a child is born in the US, they are an American citizen. No other country in Europe or Asia offers this. She thinks this is a Big Deal for American Exceptionalism, and so do I.

America’s wars and blunders
US made gross errors in understanding the enemy, in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere. This is setting aside the question of the wisdom of starting these wars in the first place. Do your homework first, policy makers! The older I get, the more warts I see on my beloved country.

I’ll review the Vietnam war, as I know a little about the conflict, but learned a lot about the Vietnamese from Chua’s book. The US got involved in Vietnam as part of the Cold War: the Domino Theory, and supposing that North VN was a Communist Chinese proxy. But this grossly misunderstands VN history: they were formerly a Chinese province, won their independence about a thousand years ago, and have been fighting the Chinese, off and on, ever since (and still are). The VN War, in North VN eyes, was a continuation of their centuries-long battles for independence. Not something negotiable. China and VN were back at war in 1978, just 4 years after the Americans left!

Ho Chi Minh even wrote a letter to President Truman, citing his admiration for America’s Declaration for Independence, and asking for America’s help against the French. This wasn’t going to happen, but what if?

VN’s ethnic-Chinese minority, the Hoa, had long dominated VN's private industry and wealth. After the 1954 partition, most of the Hoa moved to South VN, and continued to dominate private wealth. Most of the profits from supplying American troops went to the Hoa. Ethnic Vietnamese got little, and resented the Hoa a lot. So the US effort to support South VN was doomed, we lost the war, and got zero benefit from all the blood and treasure poured into it.

The Vietnamese, of course, got even less benefit. The Hoa suffered grievously after the war, losing their money and their lives. Most of the “boat people” refugees in the late 1970s were ethnically Chinese, and the country has been “cleansed” of ethnic Chinese, with uncounted thousands of deaths.

Chua argues that the reason for the US defeat still isn’t widely understood in the US. I think she’s right. I served in the US Navy during the VN War era (though not in the war, thank heavens), and most of this stuff is new to me.

OK, my notes go on, and so could I. Really, just read the book!

The New York Times review is a little snarky, but good:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/01/bo...

Book Excerpt and notes
“For 200 years,” Chua writes, “whites in America represented an undisputed politically, economically and culturally dominant majority. When a political tribe is so overwhelmingly dominant, it can persecute with impunity, but it can also be more generous. It can afford to be more universalist, more enlightened, more inclusive, like the WASP elites of the 1960s who opened up the Ivy League colleges to more Jews, blacks and other minorities — in part because it seemed like the right thing to do.

“Today, no group in America feels comfortably dominant. Every group feels attacked, pitted against other groups not just for jobs and spoils but for the right to define the nation’s identity. In these conditions, democracy devolves into zero-sum group competition — pure political tribalism.”

She's (sort of) optimistic for the long term, and indeed the Republic seems likely to endure. We hope.

Prof. Chua, you may recall, is the author of "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother". And here's her youngest daughter's account of an incident in her freshman year at Harvard: "... my friend called me over to her computer to show me that her upcoming lecture was on the subject of my childhood. They were holding an entire seminar on how my personality had responded to my mother’s parenting style – and the professor had never even met me!”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/lif...

[Jim · Rating 3.75 out of 5]

This is a book that was sitting in a stack of TBR books--for several years. I decided to pull it out to read during this election year ( 2026) and then donate it to a library sale. The book was published in 2018, during Trump's first term, and the author made an argument to help explain the election of the promoter and reality-TV host Trump. It's one of the best examples of tribalism in the world. People put their tribe above all other considerations, including economic self-interest. I remember Pat Buchanan called it "culture wars," pitting different cultures against each other ( rather than a politics about bipartisan compromise and cooperation to find solutions to social and economic problems, as has been done in most of our 250-year history).
It was of particular interest that Chua shows some of the "subtribes." you might say, that aligned with MAGA Nation--the megachurches with their Prosperity Gospel ( I would say as part of the evangelical movement), the World Wrestling Entertainment fandom, and The NASCAR Nation (which is part of Southern white identity complete with Confederate flags).
This midterm election will be of particular interest as we have seen MAGA's superhero who said he was a "stable genius" show that he is neither stable nor a genius. He got us into a war that he doesn't know how to get out of and his tariffs as well as the war have caused rising inflation ( while tax cuts that primarily benefit the superrich have pushed this country only deeper into debt, reaching $40 trillion in August 2026). How many of the people who voted for Trump before will put their economic self-interest first ( as they find they are unable to buy gas and groceries and pay medical costs--my main issue!---and pay the rent or pay off their mortgage.... ?

[Timo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I gave this book only 3 stars for reasons explained below...but the book is timely and is very important for a project I'm working on, and I do think most people should understand the concepts discussed here.

But much of this book contains very little new perspective, other than to remind us that we are a tribal species. That we live in and support our tribes, even when we don't recognize them as such. This became very important to understand following the election of Trump.

But where this book falls short is in going the next steps of asking whether or not it would even be possible to overcome our tribal instincts. To me, this is the question that underlies all of public life right now. It's just assumed in the West and among academia that Tribes are bad. And that somehow, anyhow, we must suppress this very inherent nature of ourselves.

And that's where this book falls hardest. The "Epilogue" is a tacked-on attempt to provide a solution that basically says "Can't we all just get along?" It's so weak that it challenges the worth of the entire book. Where's the philosophical foundation that would coherently disassemble tribes? What can realistically replace tribes?

Then again, this is a disease rampant in academia and similar non-fiction books. We're going to point out all the problems (descriptive) but totally fail to provide coherent solutions (prescriptive).

[Brad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four and a half stars for me. Before I get into my thoughts on the book, I feel like I need to explain some background of what got me interested in reading it.

The current political scene in America is beyond frustrating to me. I cannot stand the big news outlets such as Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC, and I also am annoyed by the social media takeover of the left vs the right. Everytime anything ‘big’ (election, new bill, a shooting, something said by a political leader, a scandal, etc.) happens, people attack others and attempt to justify their political positions.

Anyone who knows me, knows that I not a confrontational person. In any group situation, I tend be very sensitive to how others around me are feeling and I try to make others feel comfortable. In some ways this is a strength (helping others feel included), and in some ways it is a weakness (sometimes people being bold and upfront is not always malicious and can be a good thing). At work, I have been surrounded by some very vocal political coworkers - both republican and democrat. I never take part in their debates because their conversations seem useless - it is blatantly clear that they are not interested in hearing what the other has to say, they simply want to persuade and justify their position. In other words, no amount of evidence would persuade the other, they have decided what they believe and nothing will change that. One coworker, I’ll call him Bob, a very vocal, (and funny), outspoken guy who leans heavily democratic, asked me about my opinion on an incident he had on a recent business trip. He explained how he and another worker from a different group were in Atlanta at a hotel and were ready to take their bags up to their rooms. Bob is white but the coworker with him was black and the bell-boy offered to take Bob’s (and apparently not his black coworkers’ ) bags up to the room. Bob was telling me this and said - ‘Can you believe that?’ I then asked very honestly “Did the bell-boy not take your coworkers bags up because he is black?” I assumed that was what he was implying but I just wanted to get the facts straight because if that is the case, that is terrible and that is racist. Bob then looked clearly annoyed at me and said in a strong tone “Of course it was because he was black, why else would it be?!” I was taken back by how Bob was talking at this point and I quickly said “Oh I assumed that is what you meant but didn’t know if you had finished the story yet. If the bell-boy didn’t take his bags because he was black, then that is terrible, his manager should be alerted to this” but Bob was clearly mad that I didn’t immediately see his point of view. He then started asking me about my opinions about white privilege the government’s responsibilities about taking care of the poor. I told him that I don’t love talking about this stuff at work (in fact I actually think that we aren’t supposed to) as I feel that people often attack each other and do not listen to actual policy ideas. I could tell he really wanted to get into a discussion and was bugged that I wasn’t willing to participate. Later at lunch, he started going off again about how republicans and conservatives (I think some big event in the news had just happened or something) are often racist and anti-women or something and then he said “I honestly think that anyone who voted for Trump is immoral”. I don’t know what it was, but it lite something in me and I spoke up. I said “Bob, this type of rhetoric stifles any useful conversation that could be had. When you openly judge and classify a whole group of people, no one wants to speak up!” I went on for awhile about how I know many people that voted for Trump, not because they like Trump, but because they wanted a republican in office and hoped for more conservative leaders. I explained how it was a binary decision with plenty of nuance and it was foolish to treat it any other way. He then retorted “You are just like my white family who all voted for Trump” - clearly insinuating that I too voted for Trump. I quickly spoke back explaining that I had barely had any conversations with him since my time at my job (we work on completely separate projects) and then here he was saying he knew who I was - it was beyond frustrating. I told him that he didn’t have a clue what I think politically and that no, I did not in fact vote for Trump (but it shouldn’t of mattered if I did). Long story short, he did apologize and I had numerous coworkers come up to me in private saying that they really appreciated what I had said.

That one incident gave me my first real glimpse of why Trump won. I am not saying he should have, but after this conversation, I too felt glad Trump won. I was annoyed that I was being categorized by someone who didn’t know me from Adam in a negative light and it made me happy his ‘team’ had lost the last election. I have since calmed down and realized that me feeling anger and resentment would not help anything and Trump has continued to be himself which has further led me to strongly dislike him.

This book explains the current political scene in America. Amy Chua is a professor at Yale and has written multiple books/papers on ethnic conflict, particularly about other countries, and she explains how all of us are tribal. We all like to belong to a group and we often defend our groups ruthlessly. In most cases it doesn’t really matter (sports for instance) but it is dangerous when we start seeing the other side as immoral and almost less than human. Both the left and the right are guilty of this. About half of the book is about America’s ‘failed’ (her words, not mine) foreign policy attempts in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Venezuela and how the main reason they failed was because the US did not take into account the tribal nature the country. Those chapters were only a little interesting to me and were not nearly as fascinating as the chapters about America (the beginning and ending portions of the book). In those chapters I felt like she was spot on. I also appreciated her optimism about possible ways to make things better in America, such as simply talking to other people and getting to know them before making a political judgement about them. One issue with social media is that we hide behind computers and spout words at each other which completely separates us from having real conversations with humans in person.

I feel like this book, as well as “The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided on Politics and Religion” are important books for our day. Of course there are probably hundreds of others I should read. I already have given out “The Righteous Mind” to multiple people because it makes me feel better knowing others have read it. I will likely be doing the same for Amy Chua’s book.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations by Amy Chua is an interesting examination of tribalism as an internal and very human trait, with a particular focus on the United States and recent bipartisan tensions in that country. The book first begins by examining American Exceptionalism and the idea of the American nation and American dream. These concepts have long been intertwined in the US's national consciousness, and promote ideals of individualism, human freedom, immigration and so on. The United States has accepted many millions of people from all over the world throughout its history, and has integrated them into a more national conciseness and culture. Chua is not naive, however, and deftly shows the controversy and hypocrisy that often works hand in hand with this consciousness.

First she moves into other territory by examining US interactions with actual tribal societies. A chapter on Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq show the US's historical inability to grasp tribal relationships in its global wars. The US has often focused on ideology - capitalism vs. communism, democracy vs. extremism, etc. etc., but has failed to grasp more complex relationships based on cycles of historical violence and exclusion. In Vietnam, the Chinese community in that country controlled a vast majority of the countries wealth, while maintaining a population below 5% of the total. In Afghanistan, the Pashtun Taliban increased its fighting forces by appealing to Pashtun nationalism against rival Tajik and Uzbek elites in the government. In Iraq, Sunni minorities long supported by colonial powers used violence and suppression against the Shia majority - only to have the tables turn during the growth and violent outburst of hatred that created ISIS. These crisis were largely exacerbated by US state making efforts in these regions, and Chua makes mention of these topics to show the blindness the US has often had toward more tribal forms of relationships.

Chua discusses these relationships in detail. Tribalism is often about group belonging, pride in ones self and ones compatriots, and feelings of connectivity, belonging and family. Tribalism also exhibits hostility to others, and a perceived lack of empathy and similarity to those considered "other." This phenomena has reared its head in the public sphere with the recent election of Donald Trump in 2016 - an event that has sharply increased bipartisan hatred between the left and right in the US. Chua attributes this event to a growing sense of political tribalism in both the left and right wing in the US. On the left, one sees an increasingly divided wing of people who are organizing along minute identity lines - whether they be black, Hispanic, white women, black women and so on. These groups are becoming increasingly hostile to anyone perceived as an outsider, and often target each other and others for expressing different views and opinions. Accusations of racism and bigotry are thrown around with little thought to the actual meaning of these words and concepts. On the right, a similar tribalism is occurring, centered around perceived threats to the white community in the US. This goes beyond white nationalism and racism, and is often rooted in class divisions and poverty, and the perception that this community is being targeted by media and coastal elite. This is a group that does not identify with the splintered left, and is baffled and confused by the rhetoric being thrown their way - an reacting to it by turning to the alluring siren call offered by tribal right wing politics. This group does not understand the left's (deserved) desire to be treated more equally, and worries that this equality will naturally come at their expense.

Chua's analysis is concise and profound, and captures the spirit of this conflict in ways I have difficulty articulating here. The analysis of the viewpoints of these competing groups is well done and non-biased. Each group has legitimate concerns, and all groups feel threatened by the other - leading to a dangerous spiral of hatred and reaction that is ratcheting up tensions and divisions. Chua also discounts the more extremist rhetoric from each side - largely debunking overt accusations of racism against the right, and the splintered identitarian trope being thrown at the left. Each side is really a spectrum of competing interests, wants and needs that are easily relatable by all. She also examines the deeper characteristics of the US as a nation-state - one that has indeed supported and encouraged equality, but also has a dark past of struggling to put these ideals into practice. Chua deftly articulates the natural tensions these conflicting viewpoints of history creates, and is both worried and hopeful that they can be overcome. As Dr. Seuss might say "A persons a person, no matter how small" - or simply put, exposure to other sides in a humane and intimate way is a great way to overcome political tribalism and the schisms it creates. This was a great read, and certainly a timely examination of growing tensions within US bipartisan spheres. Recommended for those interested in the subject matter, and I personally feel this is one of the more important reads coming out of the deluge of Trump-related materials flooding the market.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a timely and provocative book that should be read and discussed by all ideological and ethnic "tribes" in these troubled times.

[J.D. Steens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tribal instinct Chua says is both about belonging to a group and excluding others from it. It is the classic we-they dynamic that, she argues, the U.S. has been “spectacularly blind to” in the conduct of its foreign policy – Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. Instead of tribal factionalism, we have seen conflicts in terms of ideological battles – mainly democracy versus communism, socialism versus capitalism.

Our tribal natures blind us to our domestic politics as well. We know about the disaffected Trump supporters, but Chua writes that elites don’t see their own tribal nature. The “elites often like to think of themselves as the exact opposite of tribal, as ‘citizens of the world’ who celebrate universal humanity and embrace global, cosmopolitan values. But what these elites don’t see is how tribal their cosmopolitanism is…its own highly exclusionary clan, with clear out-group members and bogeymen – in this case, the flag-waving bumpkins….There is nothing more tribal than elite disdain for the provincial, the plebian, the patriotic.”

The U.S., perhaps more than any other country, she says, is also a “supergroup,” with a long history of overcoming tribal identities in favor of something greater, a transcendent ideal that American means more than a collection of identities. The problem now is a reversion to the group identity and rights and opposition to compromise. Now Chua says it’s right-wing tribalism (bigotry, racism) and left-wing tribalism (identity politics and political correctness, though, when she writes that “NASCAR is all about tribalism,” she might be displaying some of her own). That’s where we are now – the left, claiming rights and disdaining, and the right, heretofore dominant in power and attention, afraid of being left behind. To this, Chua adds that the axiom of political tribalism is that dominant groups do not give up their power easily.

The book was a fast read and easy to understand. Chua’s chapter on Vietnam’s tribalism was an eyeopener. To deal with group-versus-group issues in the domestic realm, Chua suggests that both sides come together in a person-to-person way. Just as traveling and living abroad results in understanding, so do attempts to reach out, to become if not friends, friendly and respectful of political differences. Respectful disagreement bumps into the issue of principle, when compromise is not possible. Surprisingly, Chua does not move beyond a generalized equivalency argument between right-wing and left-wing tribalism. Specifically, she does not really address the issue of hierarchy of values – of cosmopolitan-world citizen values which is opposite in every respect from the bigotry and racism attitude and behavior on the other side. In her discussion of tribal factions in foreign countries, she discusses what in retrospect would have been a better way of dealing with our involvement in these countries (e.g., “working with” individual groups/tribes in Iraq), and it’s not clear that Chua is able to draw lessons from these countries as they might be applied to our own domestic politics. While some of this might be outside of the book's scope, her discussion about how to deal with tribal factions struck me as fluffy and flat.

[Graeme · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations because it was highly rated by Goodreads members, though I hesitated because I associated Amy Chua with one of her earlier works, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, which deals with her attempts to parent in the Chinese way. I couldn't have been more wrong.

This book is original in thinking, well-written, concise, and entirely coherent. Ms. Chua shows that American failure to understand the tribal loyalties of Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Venezuela caused the United States to make bad decisions, with great loss of life and treasure. She then points out that our needs for tribal affiliation explain the current political situation and the victory of Donald Trump. It is short, clearly reasoned, and easy to read, so I hope that many people will pick it up. It gives us an approach to understanding each other and working positively together.

[Kressel Housman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m really glad I went into this book knowing something about Amy Chua, or it would have been much tougher to get through. For those who don’t recognize the name, Amy Chua is the famous “tiger mother” whose parenting memoir hit the book charts and stirred up controversy a few years back. She doesn’t portray herself in a flattering light there, but I also got to know her through a more humanizing portrayal in J.D. Vance’s memoir, Hillbilly Elegy. Amy was his professor at Yale, and he doesn’t describe her as a “tiger” at all, but as a kind and thoughtful advisor. She is the one who encouraged him to write his memoir, and both books explore the ethnic backgrounds that shaped them into the people they became. That theme intersects perfectly with the theme of this book, which is all about “tribes,” the groups we identify with, and how they are used for good and for ill in the world at large.

This book is not a memoir, but history and sociology, which is why I found parts of it dry, complicated, and hard to get through. That’s no different than my experience of most histories; I find they all seem to have some dull or confusing parts. I’ve always tried to push my way through for the sake of the knowledge and insight I stand to gain, but I don’t necessarily hold myself to the standard of remembering every detail. That was especially true for the first few chapters of this book. The very first chapter introduces the theme that America’s blindness to tribal divisions has made for disastrous policy decisions, both domestic and foreign. The next several chapters explore different countries where these tragic failings were at their worst: Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Venezuela gets a chapter, too, but it’s different than the others in that there was no American military intervention there. The Afghani chapter was the hardest to follow because its tribal structure was the most complex. The main theme came through just fine though, as it did with every other chapter. It's one that strikes fear into the heart of this Jew: whenever an ethnic minority dominates the economy of a particular region, tribal resentments fester and eventually blow up in the most violent and ugly ways possible.

The Venezuela chapter was a good transition to the U.S. chapters, which was the focus for the remainder of the book. Chua draws some clear parallels between the rise of Hugo Chavez and the rise of Donald Trump. Venezuela also has its own sort of caste system based on skin color in which the light-skinned had more power and favor. In other words, though their systematic racism is not precisely the same as ours, discussing theirs made for a good springboard to discuss ours.

Chua didn’t shy away from anything. She argued that Americans have to be honest about its racist origins and continued inequities, but at the same time, she echoes the criticism I’ve heard from so many of my right-wing friends: the concepts of “microaggressions” and “intersectionality” are being used to alienate and divide people, not bring them together. I was pleased to learn that Kimberly Crenshaw, the Columbia law professor who originally coined the term “intersectionality,” also feels the term has been misused, calling it, “identity politics on steroids.” So between Fox News propaganda and the drive for political correctness on the Left, the U.S. is becoming increasingly divided into the political tribes that give the book its title. How bad will it get? As bad as the Sunnis and the Shias?

Luckily, Chua does not conclude that it will get that bad. Her epilogue is highly optimistic, especially in comparison with the rest of the book. She cites numerous of examples of ordinary Americans trying to bridge the gaps between us, and she’s inspired me to do the same on a larger scale than I have been. So 5 stars to this important book. Some parts were tough, but the message rings absolutely true. But whether the book is a clarion call to action or a cautionary tale of our future is entirely up to us.

[Andrea · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars, rounded down

The first 6 chapters are solid. Chua details the underlying elements of ethnic, religious, and class tribalism in several parts of the world and convincingly shows how ignorance or denial of said tribalism is bad policy. OK, fine. I don’t necessarily agree with every single one of her analyses (what exactly constitutes a “super-group”, for example) but the content she lays out and her supporting arguments are compelling enough to dig into and contemplate. The fact that she cites a few key studies dealing with tribal instinct and group psychology is another positive point, even though most of us are probably more than aware of the social (and evolutionary) benefits of group membership. Just try surviving on your own out there in the woods while the tribe that cast you out warms itself around a fire, feasting on the quarry of a successful (collective!) hunt. Yep, being part of the tribe has definite advantages.

Alas, the final 2 chapters, focusing on ethnic and political tribalism in the U.S. are a bit weak, IMHO.
There is nothing really to disagree with. Again, we are all (painfully) aware of the fact that class, race, politics and more are fracturing forces that tend to pit “groups” against each other. We get it, for the most part, or I suppose we think we do, constrained as we are with our biases and us vs. them tendencies. Why then does Chua go on and on about the extreme loyalty of (overwhelmingly white) Nascar fans (fans is short for fanatics, ain’t it?) the ideologies of the (racially lopsided) Occupy movement, the preponderance of prosperity gospel churches (both black and white but always poor) etc.? To conclude that the “New Tribal Left” and the “New Tribal Right” are both reflections of and amplifying elements of the priorities and fears of these groups, and that each side is fanning divisive flames? Well, duh.

To be fair, I think that reading this in 2022, some 4 years (including 2 lovely pandemic years filled with epic levels of fear, loathing, finger-pointing and basic groupthink nastiness) after publication is the problem. The book is not irrelevant but it already feels a bit dated, like a 2-week old Twitter thread.

[Michael Austin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first book I have read in 2018 that I would call "indispensable." This is kind of silly, I know, because most people will never read it and will live happy and productive lives anyway. So it is not indispensable like, say, water is indispensable. But it is still a very good book and a very important book that most people would profit by reading.

Unlike several other similar books I have read recently about the state of political discourse, it is not skewed towards one side or the other. Nor is it exactly a "plague-on-both-your-houses" book. But it is an intellectually and morally serious book that shows how a basic human trait--the desire to identify as part of a tribe--has been key to a number of recent global conflicts that Americans have understood very badly. And it is also the key to understanding why our own contemporary political scene.

The book starts with an overview of tribalism as a species-specific behavior. Chua could have gone into a little bit more detail here, but this is not a fatal flaw. She asserts that humans are tribal by nature, that these tribes can be ethnic, religious, or national--but are strongest when they are all three. And she argues that modern America has become the world's most successful "super-group," or political entity that combines a wide variety of religious and ethnic groups into a (somewhat) cohesive nation. This has not been the case for most of our history, and it is still only imperfectly the case today. But she provides convincing data that suggests that we have done a better job than any other large nation at incorporating multiple tribes into a single national identity.

In some ways, this is a good thing. But it also creates blinders for us because we have been structurally incapable of understanding how tribal politics shape international affairs, which has led us to do some remarkably stupid things. The next three chapters of the book (2-4) deal with the foreign policy mistakes that Americans have made by not understanding the tribal nature of the Vietnam War (where most of the wealthy and influential people we treated as South Vietnamese were actually ethnic Chinese), the Afghan War (where we all but ignored the role of ethnic Pashtuns in both Afghanistan and Pakistan), and the Iraq War (where we dramatically underestimated the Sunni-Shia dimension of the conflict).

In each case, we approached the situation from our own global narrative--communism vs capitalism in Vietnam, and Islamic fundamentalism vs the West in Afghanistan and Iraq. In the process, we made the kinds of decisions that could not have been worse if they had been specifically calculated to destroy our influence and prestige with these nations and regions.

After discussing the tribal dimensions of these three conflicts, she moves on to a discussion of Hugo Chavez's victories in Venezuela. Chavez, she argues, came to power because the Venezuelan elites--largely white, wealthy, blonde people of European descent--had no idea what was happening in the minds of the 80% of the population made up of people of both African and Indian descent. The elites insisted that race was not a problem in Venezuela, even though the fair-skinned population controlled almost all of the wealth and used the cultural instruments at their disposal to enforce their norms and values on the rest of the country. When Chavez won, people were stunned because they simply didn't understand the tribal dynamics at play.

All of this is a lead in to America in the Age of Trump. Chua devotes the final two chapters to a discussion of political tribalism in America--which, she believes, parallels pre-Chavez Venezuela in many ways, with lower-class white people representing the large faction that the elites completely missed and dangerously underestimated. She sees plenty of blame in the way that Elite Americans--largely, but not entirely represented by faculty and students at elite universities (Chua is a law professor at Yale)--have embraced a form of identity politics that devalues and shames lower-class white people for wanting to feel that they have a culture that should be valued.

But this is not a right-wing rant any more than it is a left-wing rant. Chua also sees the right as having encouraged and immoral racial divisions based largely on the fear that, as the United States becomes more urban and more ethnically diverse, they will lose the power and influence that they have come to see as their birthright. We are in danger of losing our status as the world's only "supergroup" nation because we have divided into tribal groups that now claim our primary civic loyalty. As she writes:

Today, no Group in America feels comfortably dominant. Every group feels attacked, pitted against other groups not just for jobs and spoils but for the right to define the nation's identity. In these conditions, democracy devolves into zero-sum-group-competition--pure political tribalism. (177)

Chua does not offer a lot of concrete solutions in Political Tribes. But she does an exceptional job of defining the problem and setting it in both a biological and political context that should make us very afraid, but that might also help us to find a way out.

[Catherine Tan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A scholarly page-turner you didn't know you needed to read. In IR, we are often given a slew of frameworks w/ which to explain failures in foreign policy (e.g., inorganic exportation of modernity, populism, democratic deficits). A lot of these are even framed in terms of dichotomous battles: left vs right, Democratic vs Republican, capitalism vs communism. But often, one gets the impression that they're not quite what captures the reality of things. Enter Amy Chua's book, which taps on a simpler, more anthropological, more primal way of looking at America's failures in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and its own populace via the Occupy movement and Trump's recent victory. Namely, US foreign policy keeps failing because it fails to see the groups it deals with as "tribes." (Chua then goes on to display her vast knowledge of migrant history, ethnography, and international relations to support this claim.)

Very delighted at encountering this book, I keep thinking about Occam's Razor: In the face of two or more explanations about a phenomenon, choose the simpler one. The idea is that the more assumptions you make about a thing, the more inelegant and unlikely it is as an explanation. Although I still find a lot of value in those other IR frameworks, I'm delighted to have found one that fits Occam's Razor quite excellently.

Also, a small subset of this taps on the hypocrisies of both contemporary Left and Right. Relevant for people such as myself who tended to worship Bernie Sanders et al. Also relevant for people who dislike the current overabundance of political correctness and accusations of cultural appropriation by one class to another. Through the book we see how the sides of those debates are myopic, exclusionary, and quite frankly ironic.

[Caleb Loh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Breezy reading, but I’m not sure if the US was unaware of ethnic tensions in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan as much as it was simply willing to bear the costs of inflaming them in exchange for combating the USSR/Al-Qaeda.

[Osama · Rating 4 out of 5]

اخترت قراءة هذا الكتاب بطريقة عشوائية والحمد لله طلع حظي حلو. مؤلفة الكتاب أستاذة جامعية أمريكية تطرح فكرة مفادها أن العالم مقسم لدول ظاهريا، ولكنه في الواقع لا تزال تحكمه العقلية القبلية. وتستشهد بأمثلة كثيرة من فيتنام والعراق ويوغوسلافيا وفنزويلا حيث نجد ان الانتماء للطائفة أو القبيلة أو العرق أقوى من الانتماء للدولة بنظامها السياسي وحدودها الجغرافية. وأما الدول الغربية كأمريكا مثلا فهي دولة ذات أغلبية من أصول أوروبية بيضاء تنادي بالحرية والمساواة لكنها تعيش صراعا مزمنا مع الأقليات المهاجرة أو ذات الأصول الأفريقية وكذلك تجاه المسلمين حتى يومنا هذا. وقد يأتي يوم يتحول فيه البيض لأقلية أمام النمو المتزايد للمهاجرين اليها. تؤكد المؤلفة أن السياسة الأمريكية غالبا ما تغفل أهمية الجانب الأثني والطائفي والقبلي في الحروب التي خاضتها في فيتنام والعراق وافغانستان بعكس بريطانيا التي تتقن اللعب بهذه الورقة وتوطد سلطتها من خلال سياسة فرق تسد.

[Richard]

Amy Chua was interviewed by the amazing Ezra Klein on his podcast: Amy Chua on how tribalism is tearing America apart, which clearly showed she's near the front on thinking about tribalism and partisanship. That's pretty important: I've become convinced that this problem is the defining one of our age, and that the likely absence of a solution could be the other contributing factor (along with climate change) to a civilizational collapse within the coming decades.

I haven't read the book, so these are preview-style comments:

• She has a curious background to be focusing on this. I think of it as a psychological phenomena with profound social implications, and she studies International Relations. However, that gives her a comparative perspective on the phenomena which I haven't seen elsewhere. That seems likely to be extremely valuable in providing a latitudinal view at the symptoms, but at the same time is likely to limit her expertise on the social-psychological (and even cognitive) origins of the problem. Specifically, my hunch is that the evolved neurocognitive inclinations which drive Tajfel's Social Identity Theory will be the key to understanding the how and why of the problem, and an investigation along those line is going to go too deep into the weeds of fundamental human nature for someone working the political angle to assist — much less the IR angle. Or, to put it another way, I suspect her profession has led her to focus on the tribal aspect, which is the output of the cognitive relationship between identify formation and tribal affiliation, which then leads to the tragically socially detrimental consequence of motivated cognition.

• I enjoyed her World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability back when I was studying IR, but I remember feeling like she tends towards being provocative a bit more than I like in my academic theorists. I never read Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother , but a lot of what I read and heard about that book reinforced that sense of caution. Some of her answers on Ezra Klein's show seemed more like she'd rehearsed certain Talking Points and was pulling those out, as if this was a simple-minded book-tour interview, instead of a long thought-piece with someone building a rep as an important interviewer. Glib? Not quite, but pushing a little in that direction.

[Gordon Larsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Political Tribes because I liked Amy Chua's book The Triple Package and because the topic of political tribalism is really timely. I wasn't disappointed. Chua has some insightful observations about U.S. foreign policy failures that occurred because we didn't understand the powerful role of tribes. And then the most relevant discussion starts about halfway through when she pivots to the role of tribes in the U.S. political system. Here she does a great service in helping us understand better the mindset of enthusiastic Trump supporters, something I'm trying to get my arms around better.

I could see the influence that J.D. Vance had on Chua (Vance was a student of Chua's at Yale Law) and visa versa. I can also see the evolution of some of Chua's ideas expressed in The Triple Package.

My only minor hang-up is with some of the foreign policy observations in the first half—the tribal dynamics seem like overly simplistic explanations for some of the conflicts. There must have been many reasons for failures in Vietnam, for example, that had nothing to do with tribes. But that is a minor hang-up in an otherwise really important book.

[Anastasia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating insight into how “tribal” politics along ethnic, religious, and sectarian lines influence nations, and how U.S. foreign policy in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere in the Middle East has often remained blind to tribal divides, leading to pitfalls in U.S. interventions abroad (that could’ve been preventable with more understanding of regional histories and anxieties). I enjoyed the applications of political science, sociology, and social psychology. I felt the second half of the book lost some steam, and failed to propose real solutions to the problem of rising “tribal” attitudes in the U.S.

[Kristie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Chua seemingly contradicts herself in the book, criticizing US foreign policy claiming we don't understand the tribalism in other countries since we're a "supergroup" in the U.S. But later she discusses tribalism in the United States. And the end was rather unsatisfying given all the evidence she provides of tribalism in the U.S., and her basic punchline is that we just need to... talk to each other more?

[Patricia Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is by far one of the best books I have read all year. I'm especially glad that I read it during election week 2020, since it helped me process some of my emotions around the divided nature of our country. Chua describes with grace, patience, and evidence how the US became so divided and what we will need to do to address it. Now let the hard work begin.

[Shane Hawk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easily the most engrossing book I’ve read this year.

[Regan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating, horrifying, important.

[John Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh man oh man. I've been wanting to read this book forever and I found basically a brand new copy in a used bookstore for $1 today, how awesome is that?

First of all, Amy Chua is a really, really good writer. I feel like I've interacted with a decent amount of post-Trump/2016 political writing trying to explain the state of America, and this is probably the biggest page-turner of what I've read.

The first half of the book is easy to follow along—Chua details American failures in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Venezuela through the lens of ethno-tribalism, and the examples she raises are intuitive and easy to understand. It's hard not to be convinced by her argument that tribalism still plays a huge role in modern governments, whether they be democracies or foreign-backed authoritarian regimes.

When the book transitions into an analysis of modern America, however, it's a lot harder to just stomach. Chua does a good job of offending the left and right equally, although the whole point of the book is (kinda) that you shouldn't be offended. I think at the end of the day, she's largely right about the tribalism problem that exists, and I think she's right that it partially stems from every group in America feeling threatened.

One thing I've thought about a lot is the post-Obama liberal tendency to rest on an intellectual high horse. Some of the things she says really strikes me as true; for example, Occupy's failure to connect to actual poor Americans and the blog post from the American Conservative (linked here—I think it's REALLY worth the read https://www.theamericanconservative.c...). I can't really speak for the other side of the aisle, but imo the left has done a fantastic job alienating those that may be sympathetic to their causes.

But even when Chua can diagnose the problem, it's hard to come away with a solution from this book. I don't even know if Chua necessarily knows why tribalism happens, if this is the endpoint for "super-groups" or if there's a better way to do politics. At one point, I feel like she raises the question of whether identity politics always devolves into tribalism—a conclusion that makes me REALLY uncomfortable.

Now, I don't think that's a fault of the book in and of itself—we would've solved politics by now if there was a way to do it. The book should be commended for the mere fact that it so concisely and astutely explains the phenomenon of tribalism.

Still, it's hard to be as optimistic as Chua is in the epilogue—five years after its writing, the problems in the book are only more prominent and noticeable, and I don't think we're anywhere close to solving them. Perhaps nothing makes this more obvious than J.D. Vance's glowing review printed on the back cover. Every time I put the book down and looked at his words, I couldn't help but think that 2023 Vance would never even acknowledge the presence of this book.

I don't want to be too pessimistic, so I want to end the review on a passage I really liked:

"There is a world of difference between saying that America has failed to live up to its own ideals, with egregious injustice persisting today, and saying that the principles supposedly uniting us are just smoke screens to disguise oppression. The peril we face as a nation today is not only that America might fail to live up to its promise, but that Americans might stop believing in that promise or the need to fight for it."

Not to sound overly patriotic, but the very fact that both the left and right care so much about this country and its ideals might be the biggest reason for hope. 5/5.

[Harith Menon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the view books about politics I’ve read that I would classify as truly “powerful” - probably because this book is less about politics and more about the identity formation. There was a great mixture of analysis and anecdote/example to make the reader not just understand, but feel the reasons behind polarisation & political anger.

Generally, the central arguments of the book were made clearly and with sufficient academic rigour. All-around interesting case studies that linked up really nicely to prove the point that the US government neglected the role played by tribal identities when crafting foreign policy. I enjoyed most the reasons given for why these identities were neglected - they were sophisticated and fit together in a pretty elegant way.