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Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from within on Modern Democracy
A contrarian yet highly engaging account of the spread of illiberal and anti-democratic sentiment throughout our culture that places responsibility on the citizens themselves.
Over the past three decades, citizens of democracies who claim to value freedom, tolerance, and the rule of law have increasingly embraced illiberal politicians and platforms. Democracy is in trouble--but who is really to blame?
In Our Own Worst Enemy, Tom Nichols challenges the current depictions of the rise of illiberal and anti-democratic movements in the United States and elsewhere as the result of the deprivations of globalization or the malign decisions of elites. Rather, he places the blame for the rise of
illiberalism on the people themselves. Nichols traces the illiberalism of the 21st century to the growth of unchecked narcissism, rising standards of living, global peace, and a resistance to change. Ordinary citizens, laden with grievances, have joined forces with political entrepreneurs who thrive
on the creation of rage rather than on the encouragement of civic virtue and democratic cooperation. While it will be difficult, Nichols argues that we need to defend democracy by resurrecting the virtues of altruism, compromise, stoicism, and cooperation--and by recognizing how good we've actually
had it in the modern world.
Trenchant, contrarian, and highly engaging, Our Own Worst Enemy reframes the debate about how democracies have ended up in this dire state of affairs and what to do about it.
Over the past three decades, citizens of democracies who claim to value freedom, tolerance, and the rule of law have increasingly embraced illiberal politicians and platforms. Democracy is in trouble--but who is really to blame?
In Our Own Worst Enemy, Tom Nichols challenges the current depictions of the rise of illiberal and anti-democratic movements in the United States and elsewhere as the result of the deprivations of globalization or the malign decisions of elites. Rather, he places the blame for the rise of
illiberalism on the people themselves. Nichols traces the illiberalism of the 21st century to the growth of unchecked narcissism, rising standards of living, global peace, and a resistance to change. Ordinary citizens, laden with grievances, have joined forces with political entrepreneurs who thrive
on the creation of rage rather than on the encouragement of civic virtue and democratic cooperation. While it will be difficult, Nichols argues that we need to defend democracy by resurrecting the virtues of altruism, compromise, stoicism, and cooperation--and by recognizing how good we've actually
had it in the modern world.
Trenchant, contrarian, and highly engaging, Our Own Worst Enemy reframes the debate about how democracies have ended up in this dire state of affairs and what to do about it.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published August 1, 2021
337 people are currently reading
4878 people want to read
About the author
Thomas M. Nichols
27 books152 followersDr. Thomas M. Nichols is a professor of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College and an adjunct professor in the Harvard Extension School. He also taught at Dartmouth College, Georgetown University (where he earned his PhD), and other schools and lecture programs.
He is currently a Senior Associate of the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs, and a Fellow of the International History Institute at Boston University.
He has also been a Fellow of the International Security Program and the Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
In his Washington days, Professor Nichols was a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a consultant to the U.S. government, and a research analyst for private industry. Later, he served as personal staff for foreign and defense affairs to the late U.S. Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania
He is currently a Senior Associate of the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs, and a Fellow of the International History Institute at Boston University.
He has also been a Fellow of the International Security Program and the Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
In his Washington days, Professor Nichols was a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a consultant to the U.S. government, and a research analyst for private industry. Later, he served as personal staff for foreign and defense affairs to the late U.S. Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania
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August 11, 2021
Nichols' book is an engaging though distressing read. The book builds on his previous book "The Death of Expertise." His arguments jibe with much of my own thinking and my concern for the future of American democracy. (Though I'm pretty sure we're not politically aligned which is encouraging.) For example, I reached the conclusion that we're no longer a serious nation long ago, though Nichols articulates why this is far better than I ever could. He does not address organized religion's role in contributing to the erosion of liberal democracy, which l think is a sizeable contributor. He also doesn't really address how someone like me, who has a visceral revulsion of 21st century Republicans, can get past that in order to begin the work of assuring liberal democracy for my children other than to say it's what's necessary. He identifies the current relations between civilians and the military as an achievable improvement. I had never considered this. This point merited further discussion in the concluding chapter. He bolsters his arguments with writings across the political spectrum. I did not find this book to be a polemic making it a worthwhile read for all concerned Americans. Recommended.
August 19, 2021
Last chapter is a gut punch
I hesitate to say I “liked” this book. Instead, I’ll say I needed this book. Nichols echoes many of my thoughts and fears. I am appalled at the level of civics education in the USA. It seems people don’t know the meaning of democracy or autocracy. This is a confused electorate and my experience harping on the points Tom makes tells me that too many of us don’t want to be bothered thinking. At all. About anything. I hope there are enough of us left to maintain democracy. I used to vote Republican but never again since Trump. If we are going to save our constitution it will be up to the independents and Dems. R’s are nuts.
I hesitate to say I “liked” this book. Instead, I’ll say I needed this book. Nichols echoes many of my thoughts and fears. I am appalled at the level of civics education in the USA. It seems people don’t know the meaning of democracy or autocracy. This is a confused electorate and my experience harping on the points Tom makes tells me that too many of us don’t want to be bothered thinking. At all. About anything. I hope there are enough of us left to maintain democracy. I used to vote Republican but never again since Trump. If we are going to save our constitution it will be up to the independents and Dems. R’s are nuts.
October 11, 2021
Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from Within on Modern Democracy by Thomas M. Nichols presents a contrarian yet highly engaging account of the spread of illiberal and anti-democratic sentiment throughout our culture that places responsibility on the citizens themselves. Over the past three decades, citizens of democracies who claim to value freedom, tolerance, and the rule of law have increasingly embraced illiberal politicians and platforms. Democracy is in trouble--but who is really to blame? In Our Own Worst Enemy, Tom Nichols challenges the current depictions of the rise of illiberal and anti-democratic movements in the United States and elsewhere as the result of the deprivations of globalization or the malign decisions of elites. Rather, he places the blame for the rise of illiberalism on the people themselves. Nichols traces the illiberalism of the 21st century to the growth of unchecked narcissism, rising standards of living, global peace, and a resistance to change. Ordinary citizens, laden with grievances, have joined forces with political entrepreneurs who thrive on the creation of rage rather than on the encouragement of civic virtue and democratic cooperation. While it will be difficult, Nichols argues that we need to defend democracy by resurrecting the virtues of altruism, compromise, stoicism, and cooperation--and by recognizing how good we've actually have it in the modern world. Trenchant, contrarian, and highly engaging, Our Own Worst Enemy reframes the debate about how democracies have ended up in this dire state of affairs and what to do about it.
June 2, 2025
Re-read, physically this time so I could take some notes. Which I did, but the book is way over there so I'm not gonna post those quotes here. Nonetheless, just an incredibly insightful book into the state of today's culture.
One of my favorite non-ficiton books ever. A lot of disparate thoughts I'd had on the state of virtue and self-deification all coalesces into a coherent argument in Nichols's book here. Our system of government, just like the Roman Republic, was meant for a virtuous populace and virtuous leaders, and without that, we get the Athenian mob, influenced by modern-day Cleons. Just a fascinating look at what happens when an affluent populace gets bored. All the stars.
One of my favorite non-ficiton books ever. A lot of disparate thoughts I'd had on the state of virtue and self-deification all coalesces into a coherent argument in Nichols's book here. Our system of government, just like the Roman Republic, was meant for a virtuous populace and virtuous leaders, and without that, we get the Athenian mob, influenced by modern-day Cleons. Just a fascinating look at what happens when an affluent populace gets bored. All the stars.
April 4, 2024
I have many Kindle highlights and notes that I first thought to use in pointing out contradictions or opinion parading as fact, and stuff like that. And I was going to bring in quotes from Erich Fromm (Escape From Freedom) and Reinhold Niebuhr (the Irony of America), buuuut, by the end I just didn’t care enough to explain it all.
I really was expecting more. I have enjoyed seeing and hearing Tom Nichols on Cable news and podcasts and he usually makes good points with an amusing amount of snark, so I thought a book would be even deeper and more thorough . But no, there is still plenty of snark but no depth.
To boil it down Nichols says
*everybody is now a narcissist because of social media and too much affluence.
*Everybody is without virtue and un-serious and democracy cannot thrive without either
there is more I but it is usually a variation of the above.
There are numerous things that fall into my nitpick category, like repeatedly using the 1950’s study of a backward Italian village (The Moral Basis of a Backward Society by Edward C. Banfield) where seemingly the entire village refuses to help each other out in any way and people only think of themselves and their family.
THEN he burns through pages blaming affluence and technology as to why modern America has the same un-virtuous culture. BUT you see affluence and technology had NOTHING to do with the Banfield study. We may end up in the same place but from what I can tell it seems we have a tautological argument that people are selfish because they are selfish, regardless of their technological level.
Or at least that is the conclusion we are left with once we rule out twitter and Facebook as the evil social broth we drank to out own detriment.
To be fair he acknowledges this somewhat ...
Americans are devolving back toward the mentality of the village not because they are poor but because they are comfortable, materialistic, and self-obsessed. Location: 1,440
...but he never goes into explaining why that village and the modern world have the same moral illness. And this study is a cornerstone of this book.
And a tiny nit to pick here,
This is why air conditioners—once an expensive luxury—are now common items sold in local hardware stores for less than the cost of a reasonable family dinner at a restaurant. -| Location: 2,192
that was either a hell of a dinner or a VERY questionable air conditioner
Anyway it was OK but I hoped for more
I really was expecting more. I have enjoyed seeing and hearing Tom Nichols on Cable news and podcasts and he usually makes good points with an amusing amount of snark, so I thought a book would be even deeper and more thorough . But no, there is still plenty of snark but no depth.
To boil it down Nichols says
*everybody is now a narcissist because of social media and too much affluence.
*Everybody is without virtue and un-serious and democracy cannot thrive without either
there is more I but it is usually a variation of the above.
There are numerous things that fall into my nitpick category, like repeatedly using the 1950’s study of a backward Italian village (The Moral Basis of a Backward Society by Edward C. Banfield) where seemingly the entire village refuses to help each other out in any way and people only think of themselves and their family.
THEN he burns through pages blaming affluence and technology as to why modern America has the same un-virtuous culture. BUT you see affluence and technology had NOTHING to do with the Banfield study. We may end up in the same place but from what I can tell it seems we have a tautological argument that people are selfish because they are selfish, regardless of their technological level.
Or at least that is the conclusion we are left with once we rule out twitter and Facebook as the evil social broth we drank to out own detriment.
To be fair he acknowledges this somewhat ...
Americans are devolving back toward the mentality of the village not because they are poor but because they are comfortable, materialistic, and self-obsessed. Location: 1,440
...but he never goes into explaining why that village and the modern world have the same moral illness. And this study is a cornerstone of this book.
And a tiny nit to pick here,
This is why air conditioners—once an expensive luxury—are now common items sold in local hardware stores for less than the cost of a reasonable family dinner at a restaurant. -| Location: 2,192
that was either a hell of a dinner or a VERY questionable air conditioner
Anyway it was OK but I hoped for more
August 29, 2021
...why are people who are already free, and who are by any relative measure materially and politically better off than those in more repressive states, attacking their own system of government? The answers are as disturbing as they are counterintuitive: We are losing because we won. We are suffering because we are successful. We are unhappy because we have what we want.
p21
Tom Nichols argues and provides evidence for his main thesis: our modern problems (intemperateness, rancor, partisanship, dissatisfaction with government, hostility toward democracy) stem largely from our dissatisfaction with our personal lives. Even when those lives are objectively going well or better than we realize. Many of the people protesting the loudest against government, or in support of a monster like Trump, or against immigration, are middle or upper middle class.
It’s like comedian John Hodgman says: “nostalgia is a toxic impulse.” People pine for a bygone era that was objectively worse than today, even for the white working class. Half of the Jan 6, 2021 attackers on the Capitol were business owners or white-collar workers. Most were over 35 years old. Doctors, lawyer, IT specialists, CEOs, accountants. As Nichols says, they were “lumpen-bourgeoisie”, narcissistic, middle class, with deep pockets and shallow minds.
There are psychological frailties, too, and all of us can fall prey to them. Affluent societies have a “hunger for apocalypse” – a struggle for drama and deep meaning (says George Will).
On top of that, there is a psychological concept of “hedonic adaption” whereby human beings acclimate to their current state of comfort as a baseline. And therefore, we won’t tolerate any disruption to this comfort, even if small. Couple this with the ability to instantly compare oneself to thy neighbor, on Instagram or Zillow or a cesspool like Twitter, and you have the recipe for rising intolerance due to small differences. Plus, we now want instant psychic rewards, because we are always performing for one another. It seems one solution would be to take Jaron Lanier’s recent advice seriously, and quit social media entirely.
Nichols is an optimist (or claims so). He says we can characterize our incredible technological revolution like Peter Thiel, who nihilistically says “we were promised flying cars and all we got was 140 characters,” or like writer David Frum, who replied “I was promised flying cars, and instead all I got was all the world’s libraries in my pocket and the ability to videochat 24-hours a day for free with my grandchildren on the other side of the world.”
Ultimately, the book is a short, clear summary of many of American society’s problems. But only that. There is much citation of Nichols’ colleagues at The Atlantic. They are a cogent bunch, but for this reader, mostly familiar. Nichols’ short recommendations for reform at the end are, expectedly, vague, and boil down to the following: we need to be better citizens and politically mature. This is the beauty and drawback of liberal democracy:
“Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wretched situation. No theoretical checks--no form of government can render us secure. To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.”
~James Madison, 1788, Virginia Ratifying Convention
p21
Tom Nichols argues and provides evidence for his main thesis: our modern problems (intemperateness, rancor, partisanship, dissatisfaction with government, hostility toward democracy) stem largely from our dissatisfaction with our personal lives. Even when those lives are objectively going well or better than we realize. Many of the people protesting the loudest against government, or in support of a monster like Trump, or against immigration, are middle or upper middle class.
It’s like comedian John Hodgman says: “nostalgia is a toxic impulse.” People pine for a bygone era that was objectively worse than today, even for the white working class. Half of the Jan 6, 2021 attackers on the Capitol were business owners or white-collar workers. Most were over 35 years old. Doctors, lawyer, IT specialists, CEOs, accountants. As Nichols says, they were “lumpen-bourgeoisie”, narcissistic, middle class, with deep pockets and shallow minds.
There are psychological frailties, too, and all of us can fall prey to them. Affluent societies have a “hunger for apocalypse” – a struggle for drama and deep meaning (says George Will).
On top of that, there is a psychological concept of “hedonic adaption” whereby human beings acclimate to their current state of comfort as a baseline. And therefore, we won’t tolerate any disruption to this comfort, even if small. Couple this with the ability to instantly compare oneself to thy neighbor, on Instagram or Zillow or a cesspool like Twitter, and you have the recipe for rising intolerance due to small differences. Plus, we now want instant psychic rewards, because we are always performing for one another. It seems one solution would be to take Jaron Lanier’s recent advice seriously, and quit social media entirely.
Nichols is an optimist (or claims so). He says we can characterize our incredible technological revolution like Peter Thiel, who nihilistically says “we were promised flying cars and all we got was 140 characters,” or like writer David Frum, who replied “I was promised flying cars, and instead all I got was all the world’s libraries in my pocket and the ability to videochat 24-hours a day for free with my grandchildren on the other side of the world.”
Ultimately, the book is a short, clear summary of many of American society’s problems. But only that. There is much citation of Nichols’ colleagues at The Atlantic. They are a cogent bunch, but for this reader, mostly familiar. Nichols’ short recommendations for reform at the end are, expectedly, vague, and boil down to the following: we need to be better citizens and politically mature. This is the beauty and drawback of liberal democracy:
“Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wretched situation. No theoretical checks--no form of government can render us secure. To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.”
~James Madison, 1788, Virginia Ratifying Convention
September 9, 2021
Lazy, fist-shaking, Twitter-threading, thinkpiece-rehashing scholarship. Discusses the problem but contributes nothing new to the discussion of the problem.
In its favor, it clearly defines the amorphous "problem" in a way that lets the reader get a handle on it, feel like they can recognize it in all its multifarious forms, whether on the internet, in voting patterns, in popular culture, in the local pub. It's a particular flavor of self-centeredness and anger. OK.
Unfortunately, the only work the book performs is in making comparisons - to Putnam's "Bowling Alone", to Banfield's "Moral Basis of a Backward Society", to the countless internet thinkpieces that are the water in which the author swims. When it strikes out on its own, trying to weave a consistent narrative out of these ideas of disparate origin, it flounders and speaks in banal generalities, of feelings rather than figures.
Is it helpful for someone to have collected all these references to better works? Absolutely. Would it have been more helpful to actually perform some scholarship, test out some of these hypotheses, perform some independent research, conduct a single interview, contribute a new idea?
In its favor, it clearly defines the amorphous "problem" in a way that lets the reader get a handle on it, feel like they can recognize it in all its multifarious forms, whether on the internet, in voting patterns, in popular culture, in the local pub. It's a particular flavor of self-centeredness and anger. OK.
Unfortunately, the only work the book performs is in making comparisons - to Putnam's "Bowling Alone", to Banfield's "Moral Basis of a Backward Society", to the countless internet thinkpieces that are the water in which the author swims. When it strikes out on its own, trying to weave a consistent narrative out of these ideas of disparate origin, it flounders and speaks in banal generalities, of feelings rather than figures.
Is it helpful for someone to have collected all these references to better works? Absolutely. Would it have been more helpful to actually perform some scholarship, test out some of these hypotheses, perform some independent research, conduct a single interview, contribute a new idea?
December 29, 2021
If Anne Applebaum and Cal Newport had a book baby, it would be Thomas M. Nichols' Our Own Worst Enemy. It is the perfect companion piece to Applebaum's Twilight of Democracy, but goes deeper into the psychology of a democracy's perception of "the good old days." Here is where Nichols shows us the toxic effects of social media on our political process, as in Digital Minimalism.
It's a curious book; at times it feels downright apocalyptic about the future of the US political system. And then with many examples, it feels hopeful by showing us that things aren't near as bad as we all feel they are. I certainly hope Nichols is right.
If you've read any number of Trump-analysis books, most of the book's content won't be new. But Nichols has a way of packaging it all in a unique way, with fresh clear eyes. The best takeaway quote, which I'll be repeating as often as possible: "A society that is post-factual is pre-fascist."
It's a curious book; at times it feels downright apocalyptic about the future of the US political system. And then with many examples, it feels hopeful by showing us that things aren't near as bad as we all feel they are. I certainly hope Nichols is right.
If you've read any number of Trump-analysis books, most of the book's content won't be new. But Nichols has a way of packaging it all in a unique way, with fresh clear eyes. The best takeaway quote, which I'll be repeating as often as possible: "A society that is post-factual is pre-fascist."
December 16, 2021
Tom Nichols is a brilliant man and, if you follow him on social media, he wants you to know that. A professor and legitimate deep thinker, he brings a self-described "curmudgeonly" perspective to bear on all things in modern American society, and with "Our Own Worst Enemy," Nichols confronts his great fear: that Americans will be only too happy to squander America, if only we have our empty calories, whenever we want them.
In Nichols' telling, empty calories come in all forms. While it's true that too many Americans want to live on a diet of tasty snacks and fast food, Nichols is more concerned with empty calories of an intellectual and spiritual nature. A nation that elects Donald Trump to the highest office in the land does not care for principles or serious debate, we just want the glib showman to entertain us while giving us simple answers to complex questions. Nichols also laments the pursuit of easy money earned in a celebrity-infatuated culture. And he laments that as long as we can distract ourselves with sports and videogames, the real world cannot command our attention.
That's what leads to the insurrection of January 6th - the indifference of the American people. The death of America won't come from a mighty overthrow, but a thousand different distractions that will encourage too many Americans to sit on their couches doomscrolling or consuming hours upon hours of Netflix while their nation is taken over by charlatans.
Nichols is an honest hypocrite as he spends many pages decrying social media as one of the sources of American distraction-into-decline, but he at least owns up that he is essentially a Twitter troll. I follow Nichols on Twitter because he is as smart and caustic there as he is in this book, but his Twitter feed includes all the usual sins of a Twitter troll - he makes strong pronouncements on issues large and small but then gloats over the alleged stupidity of selected responses, citing them as further evidence that he has proven his point. Twitter is not meant for high-minded debate and Nichols knows that, which makes it all the more surprising that he is so good at Twitter (and he clearly spends a *lot* of time on the platform that is contributing markedly to the decline of America). Oh well, at least he owns it.
Nichols is a conservative at heart, even though he's abandoned pretty much all hope for the modern Republican party. He does not spare the Republicans at all in this book, so consider it a bipartisan tongue-lashing if you will.
I can't say that there is anything earth-shattering in this book, and if you follow Nichols on social media or his writing for the New Republic, you'll recognize a lot of the same themes and facts he cites. But it is nice to have all this Nichols in one volume, and he writes clearly and with evident passion for his subject. And his cause is something we can all get behind.
Recommended.
In Nichols' telling, empty calories come in all forms. While it's true that too many Americans want to live on a diet of tasty snacks and fast food, Nichols is more concerned with empty calories of an intellectual and spiritual nature. A nation that elects Donald Trump to the highest office in the land does not care for principles or serious debate, we just want the glib showman to entertain us while giving us simple answers to complex questions. Nichols also laments the pursuit of easy money earned in a celebrity-infatuated culture. And he laments that as long as we can distract ourselves with sports and videogames, the real world cannot command our attention.
That's what leads to the insurrection of January 6th - the indifference of the American people. The death of America won't come from a mighty overthrow, but a thousand different distractions that will encourage too many Americans to sit on their couches doomscrolling or consuming hours upon hours of Netflix while their nation is taken over by charlatans.
Nichols is an honest hypocrite as he spends many pages decrying social media as one of the sources of American distraction-into-decline, but he at least owns up that he is essentially a Twitter troll. I follow Nichols on Twitter because he is as smart and caustic there as he is in this book, but his Twitter feed includes all the usual sins of a Twitter troll - he makes strong pronouncements on issues large and small but then gloats over the alleged stupidity of selected responses, citing them as further evidence that he has proven his point. Twitter is not meant for high-minded debate and Nichols knows that, which makes it all the more surprising that he is so good at Twitter (and he clearly spends a *lot* of time on the platform that is contributing markedly to the decline of America). Oh well, at least he owns it.
Nichols is a conservative at heart, even though he's abandoned pretty much all hope for the modern Republican party. He does not spare the Republicans at all in this book, so consider it a bipartisan tongue-lashing if you will.
I can't say that there is anything earth-shattering in this book, and if you follow Nichols on social media or his writing for the New Republic, you'll recognize a lot of the same themes and facts he cites. But it is nice to have all this Nichols in one volume, and he writes clearly and with evident passion for his subject. And his cause is something we can all get behind.
Recommended.
October 2, 2021
A straightforward and honest analysis of what’s wrong with politics and society today. Prof. Nichols lays the blame squarely on Americans, who have become in his words a selfish and “unserious people” who are willfully fooled by disinformation that plays into their narcissism.
September 29, 2021
I cannot recommend this book enough to all who care about what is happening to our country. Every American needs to read this and then take a good long hard look at him or herself. Democracy is dying in America and we with the help of hyper-connectivity (read the book), social media, and our own narcissistic "me first and screw everyone else" attitude are to blame. (The whole masks and vaccine "controversies" perfectly illustrate the new American disdain for looking out for the common good.) Let me just say too that if I had somehow been able to read this book years ago, I never never would have even opened a Facebook account. Nichols details just how these social media platforms operate--in sum, they play on our worst instincts and fears, and have done so much to contribute to the rise and support for demagogues like Trump (this is happening all over the world, not just here). But he also lambasts the fickleness and ignorance of the American voters (how about those OOTs, the people who voted Obama Obama and Trump--that example alone should tell you how screwed up people are when it comes to choosing the leader of the free world.) The author posts some quotes from voters that will make you want to run screaming into the night. As you read along, you hope that the author can provide us some hope (the last chapter is entitled "Is there a road back?". I will say only that he is brutally honest even after he indicates three things we can all do to maybe turn things around. But as with any problem, one has to admit there is one before we can help to resolve it. My fellow citizens, please buy and read this book and share it when you are done.
July 7, 2022
Perfect for those who believe themselves to be enlightened centrists. What I read of this book was frustrating as Nichols so often gets really close to a point then either stops short or rejects a legitimate answer with handwaving and no decent refutation.
The whole thing has a throughline of rugged individualism; it's the individuals' faults that they are so distracted and hateful.
He touches on wealth inequality, political corruption, dissolution of communities, polarisation through social media, but none of these are seemingly good enough avenues to be considered legitimately.
Consider what tends to be referred to as the 'post-truth' landscape. That's a death spiral towards fascism. It happens when people's living conditions keep getting worse, and politicians lie, hand wave, and hide the reality. Pundits and demagogues fill the gaps with conspiracy theories, which are allowed to fester due to continued government inaction.
It's the school shootings, public assaults on peaceful demonstrations by police, growing healthcare debt in one of the richest nations, where thoughts and prayers are given in response, followed by begging for donations and encouragement to vote. There's far more than just these cases, and Nichols seems to try his best to skirt all the points he can.
I'm not surprised that Nichols used to have a role in the US government. The myopic both-sidesing and lack of much conviction or imagination really shows.
The whole thing has a throughline of rugged individualism; it's the individuals' faults that they are so distracted and hateful.
He touches on wealth inequality, political corruption, dissolution of communities, polarisation through social media, but none of these are seemingly good enough avenues to be considered legitimately.
Consider what tends to be referred to as the 'post-truth' landscape. That's a death spiral towards fascism. It happens when people's living conditions keep getting worse, and politicians lie, hand wave, and hide the reality. Pundits and demagogues fill the gaps with conspiracy theories, which are allowed to fester due to continued government inaction.
It's the school shootings, public assaults on peaceful demonstrations by police, growing healthcare debt in one of the richest nations, where thoughts and prayers are given in response, followed by begging for donations and encouragement to vote. There's far more than just these cases, and Nichols seems to try his best to skirt all the points he can.
I'm not surprised that Nichols used to have a role in the US government. The myopic both-sidesing and lack of much conviction or imagination really shows.
September 29, 2021
Very insightful and thorough analysis of the factors that have brought us to this point. The fact that we have a higher standard of living than ever before, but people think we’re worse off than ever and look back on “simpler” times with nostalgia. We have unrealistic expectations of what we should have materially. We blame globalization for lack of jobs, but no one wants to get rid of cheap TVs and goods from overseas available almost instantly to our doorsteps. Our relative lack of struggle makes us bored and poorly informed citizens looking to be entertained by a political battle, even if it’s in our own worst interests. Our narcissism, hyper connectivity, and tendency to compare lead us to envy, resentment and contempt for others who have more. How our own inability to reflect on how a collective lack of civic virtue and willingness to elect illiberal leaders endanger our democracy.
August 21, 2022
Deși este o carte despre politică, cred că e necesară în viața fiecărui om cu o conștiința civică cât de cât vie.
M-a ajutat să înțeleg mai clar cât de interconectați suntem cu toții, și cum fiecare are un rol în comunitatea din care face parte.
Îmi dau seama tot mai mult cât de toxic e social media ca model de educație, ce tipuri de narațiuni iei de acolo, cât timp petreci acolo, etc.
Cred că e vital să se introducă educația civică în școli, mie mi-ar fi plăcut să învăț despre democrație în liceu, să înteleg cum funcționează societatea modernă și de ce e important să ne preocupe și viața politică externă.
Recomandabilă pt toți oamenii care încă mai cred în oameni sau pur și simplu vor să înțeleagă mai bine lumea în care trăim:)
M-a ajutat să înțeleg mai clar cât de interconectați suntem cu toții, și cum fiecare are un rol în comunitatea din care face parte.
Îmi dau seama tot mai mult cât de toxic e social media ca model de educație, ce tipuri de narațiuni iei de acolo, cât timp petreci acolo, etc.
Cred că e vital să se introducă educația civică în școli, mie mi-ar fi plăcut să învăț despre democrație în liceu, să înteleg cum funcționează societatea modernă și de ce e important să ne preocupe și viața politică externă.
Recomandabilă pt toți oamenii care încă mai cred în oameni sau pur și simplu vor să înțeleagă mai bine lumea în care trăim:)
March 6, 2023
I appreciate a book that tries to make sense of these tumultuous times. Why are the forces of far-right illiberalism on the rise? Why are liberal democracies so vulnerable right now? Author Tom Nichols tries to put together a coherent narrative to explain what he believes is happening.
While I don’t always agree with Nichols, I found this book to be thought-provoking and insightful. If you’re up for a political book, this is a good one.
While I don’t always agree with Nichols, I found this book to be thought-provoking and insightful. If you’re up for a political book, this is a good one.
January 1, 2025
This was a good read although it was fairly pessimistic. It went hand-in-hand with Stolen Focus relating the issues of technology with our inability to focus on maintaining our democracy. The author drew on a lot of literary and popular references. The most striking part that I will continue to think about was his idea of the American military’s Spartanism and how this harms the civil-military relationship.
November 1, 2022
If, like me, you have loved ones whose political anger has made them impossible to converse with, you may find yourself searching for a voice of reason from “their side” to whom they might possibly listen. There’s not a whole lot new here, but it is convincingly and not too confrontationally assembled to emphasize the civic duties and virtues that we’re all supposed to share.
March 10, 2023
If only all would read and ponder...
We truly are the "United States of Amnesia" ...what we won't and cannot seem to learn will lead to our own demise. Sobering thoughts indeed. This book will bring out and clarify so many of the issues and offer some insight into solutions... If only
We truly are the "United States of Amnesia" ...what we won't and cannot seem to learn will lead to our own demise. Sobering thoughts indeed. This book will bring out and clarify so many of the issues and offer some insight into solutions... If only
September 23, 2021
A worthwhile read by all Americans.
October 25, 2024
After a while I just wanted the man to tell me his ideas and not tell like 20 stories
January 23, 2022
Wow. What a good reader. Anyone that votes should read this or have it read to them. The big messages I took out of this one were: We were once a nation too sensible and serious to believe the election of a presidential candidate marked the end of the world. This is a recent phenomenon It is well within our power as citizens to return to a more civic and confident democratic life. We do not have to remain slaves to our anger and our fears. We do not have to destroy our traditions and institutions out of rage and resentment. It is hard to forget that in many democratic countries people throughout history have never had it so good overall. The dangers to our democracy are not external but internal. Trump was elected for a reason. And people are refusing to look at that. It isn’t that 120 million Americans are extreme xenophobes or bigots. He was elected because voting has become an act of hostility against the other party. An attack on our neighbors A way to vent social grievances beyond the reach of social institutions. Our extreme and self centered politics of the present day are far removed from the day to day grind of keeping large nations functioning. Hedonic adaptation has come to the front during the pandemic. We find small pockets of bad things and apply them to the overall population.
His list of how to be a bad citizen was super relevant 1. When we ignore our civic obligations and disengage from society. 2) when we listen to only those with whom we agree. And believe anyone else is wrong based on first principles. 3. When we insist on a standard for ourselves and those we like and a different standard for others 4. When we continually blame the world around us for our nations troubles. While refusing to consider we’ve had any part in them. And lastly when we only do what is best for ourselves we are not citizens at all we are mercenaries. The author goes so far as to say the average American does not have the gumption to research the candidates they are voting for and many of us crave drama by focusing on the most popular aspects of our social media people crave the tv drama playing out over actuall stability. This is hard to argue with. To many of us lack stable political ideologies. The majority lack the interest and information to develop a coherent view of politics beyond a general party identification We as a whole are turning inward toward the mentality of the village not because we are poor but because we are comfortable, materialistic, and self-obsessed. We are inspired in the public sphere not by acts of virtue but by celebrity. We are quickly becoming a modern version of Edward c. Banfields, Montegrano. We have lost our sense of virtue. Our civic virtue drowns in narcissism , anger, and resentment Our most dangerous pandemic is narcissism It is at the root of all democracies problems (look at all the selfies from left and right protests these past two years. It is not enough to be there. You have to show everyone that you were there) and narcissism’s traveling companion entitlement, our selfish and self absorbed sense of self importance warrants constant reward hinders us equally. This makes it hard for social democracies to thrive during hard times. This epidemic is no more evident than the election of trump. The only thing he has in common with the average American is his narcissism. This does not excuse the lefts own narcissism as well. The American liberal has their own brand of dysfunction and celebrity worship. Hate is power and poison and too many people on both sides are addicted to it. During elections we cease to be citizens so that we imagine ourselves as crusaders. We are quick to look for and identify social decay but never inward for the causes. It is always someone else’s fault The Covid pandemic has shown both the left and the right inability to RATIONALLY deal with adversity. If your political party is the only option and are always right. If your news is the only real news. If your opinions are always the right ones and the only ones The you are part of the problem. The entire middle of the political system has gone silent in fear of being labeled by the left and the right. You are not the patriots nor social justice warriors you think you are Our country is not perfect. Never has never will. But president obama said it best when he said we are living in the most prosperous and comfortable time in human history. Our problems are there but not as deep not wide spread as either side makes them out to be. This is not the first author to talk about the fall of our democracy not from a foreign power but from within. As long as the political parties keep the lights on, the cars gassed up, the WiFi strong we will be distracted enough to not notice what’s going on. They keep us distracted with calories, screens, pornography, 200 channels and intoxicants. The distance between the governors and governed has never been more distant.
His list of how to be a bad citizen was super relevant 1. When we ignore our civic obligations and disengage from society. 2) when we listen to only those with whom we agree. And believe anyone else is wrong based on first principles. 3. When we insist on a standard for ourselves and those we like and a different standard for others 4. When we continually blame the world around us for our nations troubles. While refusing to consider we’ve had any part in them. And lastly when we only do what is best for ourselves we are not citizens at all we are mercenaries. The author goes so far as to say the average American does not have the gumption to research the candidates they are voting for and many of us crave drama by focusing on the most popular aspects of our social media people crave the tv drama playing out over actuall stability. This is hard to argue with. To many of us lack stable political ideologies. The majority lack the interest and information to develop a coherent view of politics beyond a general party identification We as a whole are turning inward toward the mentality of the village not because we are poor but because we are comfortable, materialistic, and self-obsessed. We are inspired in the public sphere not by acts of virtue but by celebrity. We are quickly becoming a modern version of Edward c. Banfields, Montegrano. We have lost our sense of virtue. Our civic virtue drowns in narcissism , anger, and resentment Our most dangerous pandemic is narcissism It is at the root of all democracies problems (look at all the selfies from left and right protests these past two years. It is not enough to be there. You have to show everyone that you were there) and narcissism’s traveling companion entitlement, our selfish and self absorbed sense of self importance warrants constant reward hinders us equally. This makes it hard for social democracies to thrive during hard times. This epidemic is no more evident than the election of trump. The only thing he has in common with the average American is his narcissism. This does not excuse the lefts own narcissism as well. The American liberal has their own brand of dysfunction and celebrity worship. Hate is power and poison and too many people on both sides are addicted to it. During elections we cease to be citizens so that we imagine ourselves as crusaders. We are quick to look for and identify social decay but never inward for the causes. It is always someone else’s fault The Covid pandemic has shown both the left and the right inability to RATIONALLY deal with adversity. If your political party is the only option and are always right. If your news is the only real news. If your opinions are always the right ones and the only ones The you are part of the problem. The entire middle of the political system has gone silent in fear of being labeled by the left and the right. You are not the patriots nor social justice warriors you think you are Our country is not perfect. Never has never will. But president obama said it best when he said we are living in the most prosperous and comfortable time in human history. Our problems are there but not as deep not wide spread as either side makes them out to be. This is not the first author to talk about the fall of our democracy not from a foreign power but from within. As long as the political parties keep the lights on, the cars gassed up, the WiFi strong we will be distracted enough to not notice what’s going on. They keep us distracted with calories, screens, pornography, 200 channels and intoxicants. The distance between the governors and governed has never been more distant.
October 7, 2023
I have a bone to pick with this review
Maybe it's not imaginary conspiracies but rather our own failures - moral, intellectual, political - that are leading Americans to support incompetent, inarticulate and even authoritarian politicians. That's the thesis that Tom Nichols argues amusingly and persuasively in this book before concluding that reform must begin from within.
Anne Applebaum
........
Sadly Anne is just one more voice of, merely another form of what she complains about.
I've questioned her authoritarian politics, and her tendency where you question her competence and her shrill inarticulate and blunt debate style.
She's not a fool, like Garry Kasparov and his freaky geopolitical rants, but she's getting there!
In the long run, John Mearsheimer and Stephen F. Cohen had the more accurate predictions on history, and the more correct views in political science.
.......
The elites are collapsing with their political and intellectual views, and it's as Huntington said, the public eventually go from idealism to bitter disillusionment of the people in power.
.......
I might not be a fan of The American Conservative
but i'll quote this much:
........
The American Conservative
Davos Woman And Her Wars
Anne Applebaum's call for eternal militancy against those who reject her idea of democracy
I have said it before, and I will say it again: I really like Anne Applebaum’s histories of the Soviet world. But man, her chronic neoconnery is awfully hard to take. Here she is in The Atlantic, talking about how if the world’s democracies don’t defend themselves, autocracy will destroy them all.
Excerpt:
"There is no natural liberal world order, and there are no rules without someone to enforce them. Unless democracies defend themselves together, the forces of autocracy will destroy them. I am using the word forces, in the plural, deliberately. Many American politicians would understandably prefer to focus on the long-term competition with China. But as long as Russia is ruled by Putin, then Russia is at war with us too. So are Belarus, North Korea, Venezuela, Iran, Nicaragua, Hungary, and potentially many others. We might not want to compete with them, or even care very much about them. But they care about us. They understand that the language of democracy, anti-corruption, and justice is dangerous to their form of autocratic power—and they know that that language originates in the democratic world, our world."
Wait … what?! If a country doesn’t agree with Davos-Man liberal democracy, it is “at war” with us, and must be treated as an enemy nation?!
Even Hungary, a European nation and a democracy which, if it were a real autocracy, would not have to care about this weekend’s elections. If Orban is a shoo-in, nobody has told my Fidesz friends, who are on pins and needles. Is Hungary not a democracy because people here don’t vote in the way Anne Applebaum wishes they would?
Look, Belarus is not my idea of an ideal country, but do we have to be at war with it? With Nicaragua, which the Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega has turned into a shithole, but which is not at war with us — so why should we consider ourselves to be at war with it?
“Potentially many others” — good grief, these people. They really are revolutionaries, ready to make war on the entire world to establish the sole legitimacy of one way of governing a nation.
Ryszard Legutko, the Polish philosopher, has rightly written about the “totalitarian temptations” within the Applebaum-Davos model of liberal democracy.
Here is Legutko, in an excerpt from his excellent The Demon in Democracy, discussing the strange similarities between the Soviet barbarians who took over Poland, and the softer, more sophisticated ones that moved in after the fall of Communism:
"....It is therefore hardly surprising that just as “communism” (or “socialism”) was the favourite word of the communist man, “democracy” has been such a word for the liberal-democratic man. The former liked to say that “but in communism”, “because in socialism”, and suchlike, and the “argument from communism” was always the most ultimate of all ultimate arguments and by definition irrefutable. The latter loves saying, always with due piety mixed with a touch of audacity, that “but in democracy”, “because in democracy”, and the “argument from democracy” refutes all others. The number and frequency of the words “communism” (or “socialism)” and “communist” (or “socialist”) in the ancien régime are equal to the number and frequency of the words “democracy” and “democratic” in the new regime. The eagerness to use these words as trumps was not thought by the users to be a symptom of intellectual and moral capitulation, but rather, and quite sincerely, a manifestation of independence, courage, assertiveness and autonomy. To a mediocre man, an organic assimilation with the system was the easiest way to develop a conviction of being exceptional."
It is striking to see how Applebaum used the word “democracy” to mean “what my international managerial class in the West believes to be a just order,” as if this were uncontestable.
She writes:
"Take democracy seriously. Teach it, debate it, improve it, defend it. Maybe there is no natural liberal world order, but there are liberal societies, open and free countries that offer a better chance for people to live useful lives than closed dictatorships do. They are hardly perfect; our own has deep flaws, profound divisions, terrible historical scars. But that’s all the more reason to defend and protect them. Few of them have existed across human history; many have existed for a time and then failed. They can be destroyed from the outside, but from the inside, too, by divisions and demagogues."
....Yep. The blessings of liberty, I guess, include watching helplessly as your children’s minds and bodies are stolen by Disney, woke educrats, and the media. If this what democracy has become in the West, no wonder much of the rest of the world is skeptical.
The Western democracies have become societies where the anti-liberal ideology of wokeness has become the successor ideology to liberalism, but people like Applebaum speak and write as if nothing has changed. The dispossession and marginalization of large numbers of people on the basis of their race, or their moral or religious opinions, is of no matter.
For example, Applebaum says conservative opposition to Critical Race Theory signifies a conviction that “schoolchildren should not be taught the history of racism in America” — an incredible claim, but typical of the blindness even an intelligent, sophisticated observer like herself has to the radicalization of what used to be liberal culture.
I am a small-d democrat, for sure, but if democracy means having to surrender yourself and your family to what Paul Kingsnorth rightly calls The Machine, then to hell with it.
Kingsnorth:
"Out in the world, the rebellion against God has become a rebellion against everything: roots, culture, community, families, biology itself. Machine progress—the triumph of the Nietzschean will—dissolves the glue that once held us. Fires are set around the supporting pillars of the culture by those charged with guarding it, urged on by an ascendant faction determined to erase the past, abuse their ancestors, and dynamite their cultural inheritance, the better to build their earthly paradise on terra nullius."
I do not see the rival ideologies, or autocracies, as ideals or leaders worth following.
But what would Applebaum have us defend?
What culture, what civilization?
What order are they fighting for?
Seriously, I do not understand these people, these Davos Men And Women, but I do know this: their wars are not my wars. They want to invade the world, eternally. And they never, ever learn.
..............
Huntington is credited with inventing the phrase Davos Man, referring to global elites who
"have little need for national loyalty, view national boundaries as obstacles that thankfully are vanishing, and see national governments as residues from the past whose only useful function is to facilitate the elite's global operations".
The phrase refers to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where leaders of the global economy meet.
......
To quite a critical article on Samuel P. Huntington in the Washington Post:
"Trump’s civilizational rhetoric is just one reason Huntington resonates today, and it’s not even the most interesting one. Huntington’s work, spanning the mid-20th century through the early 21st, reads as a long argument over America’s meaning and purpose, one that explains the tensions of the Trump era as well as anything can."
"Huntington both chronicles and anticipates America’s fights over its founding premises, fights that Trump’s ascent has aggravated. Huntington foresees — and, frankly, stokes — the rise of white nativism in response to Hispanic immigration. He captures the dissonance between working classes and elites, between nationalism and cosmopolitanism, that played out in the 2016 campaign."
"And he warns how populist demagogues appeal to alienated masses and then break faith with them."
.........
So all these military and political elites are floundering, and writing books about how Democracy all over the Western world is getting mistrustful of their leaders, and preferring different leaders...
Huntington predicted this decades ago, and well, well the failures are writing books, scared about Democracy, and people not trusting their media or their politicians anymore.
September 18, 2021
In his introductory chapter, Thomas Nichols gives us his theme and central conundrum which he spends the rest of his book elaborating upon.
“...democracy is now under siege not from declared enemies but form the daily abandonment of the habits and virtues that strengthen the liberal foundations of democratic regimes….
“These assaults on democratic norms…are coming from populations whose anger is rooted far more in notional injustices and imagined dangers than in actual harms…. The threat to democracy now in America and elsewhere comes from the working and middle classes – the people among whom I was born and raised – whose rage comes overwhelmingly from cultural insecurity, inflated expectations, tribal partisan alliances, obsessions about ethnicity and identity, blunted ambition, and a childlike understanding of the limits of government.”
While I found little that was new to me in this book – for I have been reading deeply and widely in recent years about our troubled country and the multiple internal authoritarian threats to our democratic republic – I think Nichols does a remarkable and welcome job of presenting his concerns in a way that most Americans – if they were of a mind to consider his book openly – could easily understand.
Too many of us have gone from being good to bad citizens. And what is this last group like? “When we listen only to those with whom we already agree and believe anyone else is wrong as a matter of first principles, we are bad citizens. When we insist on one standard of treatment from the government and the law for ourselves and for people whom we happen to like, and a different standard for others, we are bad citizens. When we continually blame the world around us for our nation’s troubles while refusing to consider whether we’ve had any part in them, we are bad citizens. And when we only do what’s best for ourselves, we are not citizens at all, but rather we become mercenaries, loose in the ship of state and plundering the hold, with no interest in our direction and no regard for our eventual survival.”
“Americans are devolving back toward the mentality of the village not because they are poor but because they are comfortable, materialistic, and self-obsessed. They are inspired, at least in the public sphere, not by examples of virtue but by celebrity. They are motivated to compete with each other not because they are fighting over scraps but because they are entitled. They insist on their own rights not as a matter of principle but as a means of crowding out others.”
Virtue, private and public, vs. its arch-enemy Narcicissm
Then he turns to the extremely important subject of virtue, the civic glue without which republics cannot long survive and about which the Founders were so concerned.
“But what happens if the citizens of a democratic nation, whatever their civic habits, are no longer virtuous enough as a people to sustain their own institutions?
“…the Founders of the American republic understood the existential link between virtue and democracy…. ‘Public virtue,’ John Adams wrote in early 1776, ‘cannot exist in a nation without private virtue, and public virtue is the only foundation of republics.’…
“More important, the Founder understood that institutional design could not overcome the worse impulses of human nature if human beings themselves decided to give in to those base instincts.” They knew that “without some understanding among the public of duty, tolerance, sacrifice, cooperation, compromise, and the inherent truth of individual rights” a democratic nation could not be sustained.
“…when enough of us are continually angry, entitled, and conspiracy-addled – civic life becomes impossible. The public square empties out. Paranoia and fear become the dominant emotions. In such a world, citizens end up retreating to castles surrounded by moats filled with bizarre rationalizations and parapets loaded with boiling hostility, lowering the drawbridge only long enough to engage in necessary trade for surprise…. Civic virtue drowns in narcissism, anger, and resentment.”
Narcissism is the “most important ingredient in the decline of modern democracy.” It is “an unhealthy preoccupation with the self to the exclusion of all else – and especially to the exclusion of other human beings – [and] tempts us away from thinking about the needs of other people and to see them only as objects in relation to our own happiness. Its traveling companion is entitlement, the selfish and self-absorbed conviction that our own importance merits constant reward. Narcissism undermines virtue of very kind, but it is particularly deadly to the social trust that allows democracy to endure in hard times.”
“The rise in narcissism means increasing esteem for ourselves while our connections to others are decreasing, a terrible confluence of loving oneself more while loving one’s neighbor less.
“Perhaps the most obvious example of the effect of narcissism on political life has been that Americans have become vastly more embracing of narcissistic public figures, especially at the national level.”
The Bile of Resentment
“Resentment in politics is the externalization of envy. If there is one thing authoritarian governments do especially well, it is the way in which they mobilize resentment as a weapon…. [It] is about leveling rather than leadership, about vengeance rather than virtue.
“Resentment, like narcissism, undermines the civic virtues of tolerance, cooperation, and equal justice, because it fuels demands for rewards and punishments based on jealousy and unhappiness rather than reason or impartial justice. It is more than just irritation at the success of others; it is an anti-democratic desire to see those others torn down in the name of ‘equality.’
“Citizens engulfed by [this] seek to bring others down to what they think is their own underappreciated station and to identify scapegoats to bear the blame for their own sense of inadequacy, and to answer for the oppression, real or imagined, they feel has befallen them.”
Part of this is “a blend of racism and an attachment to myths about independence and masculinity. These beliefs are exploited by cynical populists, who feed simmering resentment among people who are neither independent nor particularly privileged because of their race. But the appeal is about more than race. It is the idea that others, whether racial minorities, immigrants, or the far-away city dwellers, are doing better, somehow, at the expense of the ‘real’ Americans who pay the bills but get none of the benefits. This is equality achieved by destroying the playing field rather than leveling it.
Nostalgia
Nostalgia is “the powerful emotion that alternately taunts and comforts us with memories – true or false – of a better life in the past. It is an emotion, strangely, that can produce warm feelings even about terrible times once such days are far enough in the past and can be revisited with a sense of safety. And sometimes it produces a yearning for times that never were, providing a new narrative not only about how much better the past was, but also about who is to blame for the ruinous condition of the present. That latter kind of memory…is “restorative” nostalgia [and]Americans…have been in its grip for years.”
Concluding Thoughts
“Democracy, in the end, is an act of will, a continual reaffirmation of faith in a system of government that enshrines and protect our rights and the rights of our fellow citizens.” Nonetheless, we are presently in a world of extreme authoritarian temptations. “Alone in a world full of bewildering options, human beings will prefer the reassurance of the pack and the safety of the herd rather than choose to grapple with the ambiguities and consequences of freedom.” This is a deep hunger “for ethnic, tribal and nationalistic validation.”
His recommendations? “One is to make political parties stronger [once again]. Another is to reform both the culture and obligations of military service. The last is to think about how to enable representative institutions of the past to better handle the additional demands of larger and more diverse societies.”
With respect to electoral and constitutional reform, he recommends increasing the House of Representatives from the size in which it has been frozen since 1913, adding both the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico to the United States as states with two representatives each in the Senate, and increased participation at all levels by informed voters.
“Measures to increase informed participation and structural reform are not populism. They are [its] very opposite…in that they require intelligent and considered constitutional design by political elites, the limiting of options by those same elites to gals that are achievable (and if they turn out to be mistakes, reversible) before turning to the masses for a vote, and an understanding before undertaking the course of reform that the object is greater unity and inclusion and not electoral revenge. Above all, changing our basic laws should always be done with the understanding that the authoritarian temptation and the populist temptation are more alike, and always closer to us, than we realize.”
“...democracy is now under siege not from declared enemies but form the daily abandonment of the habits and virtues that strengthen the liberal foundations of democratic regimes….
“These assaults on democratic norms…are coming from populations whose anger is rooted far more in notional injustices and imagined dangers than in actual harms…. The threat to democracy now in America and elsewhere comes from the working and middle classes – the people among whom I was born and raised – whose rage comes overwhelmingly from cultural insecurity, inflated expectations, tribal partisan alliances, obsessions about ethnicity and identity, blunted ambition, and a childlike understanding of the limits of government.”
While I found little that was new to me in this book – for I have been reading deeply and widely in recent years about our troubled country and the multiple internal authoritarian threats to our democratic republic – I think Nichols does a remarkable and welcome job of presenting his concerns in a way that most Americans – if they were of a mind to consider his book openly – could easily understand.
Too many of us have gone from being good to bad citizens. And what is this last group like? “When we listen only to those with whom we already agree and believe anyone else is wrong as a matter of first principles, we are bad citizens. When we insist on one standard of treatment from the government and the law for ourselves and for people whom we happen to like, and a different standard for others, we are bad citizens. When we continually blame the world around us for our nation’s troubles while refusing to consider whether we’ve had any part in them, we are bad citizens. And when we only do what’s best for ourselves, we are not citizens at all, but rather we become mercenaries, loose in the ship of state and plundering the hold, with no interest in our direction and no regard for our eventual survival.”
“Americans are devolving back toward the mentality of the village not because they are poor but because they are comfortable, materialistic, and self-obsessed. They are inspired, at least in the public sphere, not by examples of virtue but by celebrity. They are motivated to compete with each other not because they are fighting over scraps but because they are entitled. They insist on their own rights not as a matter of principle but as a means of crowding out others.”
Virtue, private and public, vs. its arch-enemy Narcicissm
Then he turns to the extremely important subject of virtue, the civic glue without which republics cannot long survive and about which the Founders were so concerned.
“But what happens if the citizens of a democratic nation, whatever their civic habits, are no longer virtuous enough as a people to sustain their own institutions?
“…the Founders of the American republic understood the existential link between virtue and democracy…. ‘Public virtue,’ John Adams wrote in early 1776, ‘cannot exist in a nation without private virtue, and public virtue is the only foundation of republics.’…
“More important, the Founder understood that institutional design could not overcome the worse impulses of human nature if human beings themselves decided to give in to those base instincts.” They knew that “without some understanding among the public of duty, tolerance, sacrifice, cooperation, compromise, and the inherent truth of individual rights” a democratic nation could not be sustained.
“…when enough of us are continually angry, entitled, and conspiracy-addled – civic life becomes impossible. The public square empties out. Paranoia and fear become the dominant emotions. In such a world, citizens end up retreating to castles surrounded by moats filled with bizarre rationalizations and parapets loaded with boiling hostility, lowering the drawbridge only long enough to engage in necessary trade for surprise…. Civic virtue drowns in narcissism, anger, and resentment.”
Narcissism is the “most important ingredient in the decline of modern democracy.” It is “an unhealthy preoccupation with the self to the exclusion of all else – and especially to the exclusion of other human beings – [and] tempts us away from thinking about the needs of other people and to see them only as objects in relation to our own happiness. Its traveling companion is entitlement, the selfish and self-absorbed conviction that our own importance merits constant reward. Narcissism undermines virtue of very kind, but it is particularly deadly to the social trust that allows democracy to endure in hard times.”
“The rise in narcissism means increasing esteem for ourselves while our connections to others are decreasing, a terrible confluence of loving oneself more while loving one’s neighbor less.
“Perhaps the most obvious example of the effect of narcissism on political life has been that Americans have become vastly more embracing of narcissistic public figures, especially at the national level.”
The Bile of Resentment
“Resentment in politics is the externalization of envy. If there is one thing authoritarian governments do especially well, it is the way in which they mobilize resentment as a weapon…. [It] is about leveling rather than leadership, about vengeance rather than virtue.
“Resentment, like narcissism, undermines the civic virtues of tolerance, cooperation, and equal justice, because it fuels demands for rewards and punishments based on jealousy and unhappiness rather than reason or impartial justice. It is more than just irritation at the success of others; it is an anti-democratic desire to see those others torn down in the name of ‘equality.’
“Citizens engulfed by [this] seek to bring others down to what they think is their own underappreciated station and to identify scapegoats to bear the blame for their own sense of inadequacy, and to answer for the oppression, real or imagined, they feel has befallen them.”
Part of this is “a blend of racism and an attachment to myths about independence and masculinity. These beliefs are exploited by cynical populists, who feed simmering resentment among people who are neither independent nor particularly privileged because of their race. But the appeal is about more than race. It is the idea that others, whether racial minorities, immigrants, or the far-away city dwellers, are doing better, somehow, at the expense of the ‘real’ Americans who pay the bills but get none of the benefits. This is equality achieved by destroying the playing field rather than leveling it.
Nostalgia
Nostalgia is “the powerful emotion that alternately taunts and comforts us with memories – true or false – of a better life in the past. It is an emotion, strangely, that can produce warm feelings even about terrible times once such days are far enough in the past and can be revisited with a sense of safety. And sometimes it produces a yearning for times that never were, providing a new narrative not only about how much better the past was, but also about who is to blame for the ruinous condition of the present. That latter kind of memory…is “restorative” nostalgia [and]Americans…have been in its grip for years.”
Concluding Thoughts
“Democracy, in the end, is an act of will, a continual reaffirmation of faith in a system of government that enshrines and protect our rights and the rights of our fellow citizens.” Nonetheless, we are presently in a world of extreme authoritarian temptations. “Alone in a world full of bewildering options, human beings will prefer the reassurance of the pack and the safety of the herd rather than choose to grapple with the ambiguities and consequences of freedom.” This is a deep hunger “for ethnic, tribal and nationalistic validation.”
His recommendations? “One is to make political parties stronger [once again]. Another is to reform both the culture and obligations of military service. The last is to think about how to enable representative institutions of the past to better handle the additional demands of larger and more diverse societies.”
With respect to electoral and constitutional reform, he recommends increasing the House of Representatives from the size in which it has been frozen since 1913, adding both the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico to the United States as states with two representatives each in the Senate, and increased participation at all levels by informed voters.
“Measures to increase informed participation and structural reform are not populism. They are [its] very opposite…in that they require intelligent and considered constitutional design by political elites, the limiting of options by those same elites to gals that are achievable (and if they turn out to be mistakes, reversible) before turning to the masses for a vote, and an understanding before undertaking the course of reform that the object is greater unity and inclusion and not electoral revenge. Above all, changing our basic laws should always be done with the understanding that the authoritarian temptation and the populist temptation are more alike, and always closer to us, than we realize.”
April 18, 2022
OH SO YOU DON'T LIKE YOUR DEMOCRACY CRUMBLING AROUND YOU?
WELL STOP BEING SUCH A WHINY, ENTITLED LITTLE BITCH YOU SELF-ABSORBED, DOOMSCROLLING IMBECILE
WHAT? YOU REALLY THOUGHT THE WORLD WAS JUST GOING TO KEEP GOING IN AN EVER-MORE PROSPEROUS AND ENLIGHTENED DIRECTION? THINK AGAIN!
AND STOP SENDING FLATULENT TWEETS AT TWO IN THE MORNING
DEMOCRACIES ARE FOR CLOSERS
WELL STOP BEING SUCH A WHINY, ENTITLED LITTLE BITCH YOU SELF-ABSORBED, DOOMSCROLLING IMBECILE
WHAT? YOU REALLY THOUGHT THE WORLD WAS JUST GOING TO KEEP GOING IN AN EVER-MORE PROSPEROUS AND ENLIGHTENED DIRECTION? THINK AGAIN!
AND STOP SENDING FLATULENT TWEETS AT TWO IN THE MORNING
DEMOCRACIES ARE FOR CLOSERS
December 28, 2023
Thought provoking piece, exceptional writing, very moderate political beliefs. Did a much better job than I on illuminating where are country is, and the where it is headed.
August 7, 2022
The end of democracy will come not with mobs burning the Capitol, or food riots, or juntas of national salvation, or demagogues leading the peasants to burn the castles of the rich. It will end, instead, with highly educated, technically proficient, otherwise decent men and women with families and children and mortgages and car payments who will decide that uninformed, spoiled, irascible voters simply can’t produce coherent demands other than “just get it for us,” and they will act accordingly.
This will not happen after a revolution, or a disaster, or a landmark court case—or even after a pandemic. It will happen as part of a million small decisions made every day without the input of the common citizen, as the fulfillment of an unspoken agreement between technocratic elites and the working and middle classes. Rights and participation and transparency will be shelved—as they too often were during the Cold War in the name of national security—as luxuries simply too expensive to indulge. The population will not be impoverished proles, but reasonably educated, comfortable people who have decided that “democracy” means a certain standard of living.
Nichols, Thomas M., Our Own Worst Enemy (pp. 214-215). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.
As we Americans attempt to deal with the crisis of our democracy, we are blessed to have many capable individuals addressing our plight. In no particular order: Anne Applebaum, David Frum, Thomas Edsall, Francis Fukuyama, Yousha Mounk, Max Boot, Tim Miller (and others in The Bulwark crowd), Steve McIntosh, George Packer, and others whose names escape me for the moment. Suffice it to say that there are many continuing efforts to better understand our plight.
And, oh, yes, there’s Tom Nichols. Like Applebaum and Frum, Nichols also writes for The Atlantic. And like Frum and Applebaum and several of the others, Nichols published a book about this topic in 2017, The Death of Expertise. I haven’t read that book, but I became familiar with Nichols around that time and have followed his work since then. This includes frequent contributions to The Atlantic and podcast interviews with Charlie Sykes on the Bulwark podcast. And, to my surprise, I learned that Nichols had published a book in August 2021, Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from Within on Modern Democracy (OUP). In fact, there’s a bit of an embarrassing story about how I discovered this book, which I detail at the end here.* Suffice it to say that while a year late to the party, I’m glad that I finally arrived. In fact, it may prove to be the best “party” that I’ve attended about this topic.
Nichols's argument is straightforward: the greatest problems facing the U.S. and other established democracies come from within, not from abroad. The electorate in the U.S. (and I’ll focus on the U.S., as Nichols does) has been chronically unhappy with elites and the course of the nation. Why is this so? Our situation (at least our material situation) is really pretty good, notwithstanding the challenging events of the first fifth of the twenty-first century: the 9/11 attacks and related events of radical Islamic terrorism; the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; the crash of 2008; mounting domestic terrorism; the COVID-19 pandemic and the related economic crash—all these events were indeed traumatic and cost precious lives and huge amounts of treasure. But for most Americans living in August 2022, life is nevertheless quite good. Again, not to minimize the pain and death associated with the events listed (and others), but Nichols (and I) agree with former Presidents Obama’s statement that there’s never been a better time to be alive. One must acknowledge that our material well-being, as measured by the amount of stuff we have and the quality of life that we can enjoy, is beyond the dreams of even the wealthiest who lived as recently as less than a century ago.
So, what's eating at us? Nichols summarizes his answer in three words: “narcissism, anger, and resentment.”
In pursuing this line of thought, Nichols distinguishes himself from others who’ve attempted to diagnose our malaise, including popular opinion. Nichols acknowledges that elites have indeed made mistakes, but then they always do, and the magnitude of those mistakes doesn’t justify the magnitude of the malaise claimed by so many.
To arrive at his diagnosis, Nichols, instead of using a searchlight, uses a mirror.
Among the unholy triumvirate of narcissism, anger, and resentment, the anger (and resulting grievance) aspect has received the most attention from many commentators. This line of thought goes a long way in explaining the reactions of those who've suffered direct hits to their well-being by way of job losses and declining communities. Many of these losses are rightly attributable to jobs going overseas and to automation (the latter, I think, being the more significant problem regarding jobs). But the number of Trumpists and sympathizers who have suffered these severe losses is rather small. A full explanation of the approximately 40% of the U.S. electorate who vote for Trumpists requires a deeper, more sweeping explanation.
Of course, anyone who knows much about American politics knows that most citizens, including most voters, are shockingly ill-informed about candidates, policies, and how our political institutions function. It’s a fool’s errand to place an articulated, rational set of reasons for the outcome of any election. It’s most often like trying to draw a detailed picture using just black and white (Yes or No? Candidate A or B?) and beginning the picture from a Rorschach ink blob. Nichols illustrates the problems with a couple of tales from my native Iowa:
The Los Angeles Times reporter Matt Pearce, for example, spoke to a woman who caucused for Sanders in 2016 and then voted for Trump. In 2020, she initially settled on Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, as her choice. If Buttigieg didn’t win the nomination, however, she would move from the young, progressive, gay, once-married Buttigieg back to the elderly, right-wing, serially adulterous, thrice-married bigot Trump—a kaleidoscopic change in preferences that only makes sense as a search for a tailored set of narrow promises that would meet her personal satisfaction, rather than the selection of a candidate who must govern across a range of issues. Location 1306)
. . . .
Another Iowan told the media that she had voted both for Barack Obama and for Donald Trump, “just to shake up Washington, to be honest.” (This is sometimes called the “OOT” voter, the person who voted Obama-Obama-Trump in 2008, 2012, and 2016, respectively.) Had Trump not been available in 2016, she said, she might have gone for—of course—Bernie Sanders. “We’ve just been in a rut so long,” she sighed. (Location 1311)
Even as a native and resident of Iowa most of my life (and as a long-time observer of its politics), this makes my head spin. I migrated from Booker to Buttigieg to Biden (I do like those Bs, I guess), but jump to Trump? How can any mind make that leap? But then it wasn’t the mind so much as the emotions that motivated these voters.
Narcissism and resentment (and its manifestation on steroids, ressentiment—thank you, Nietzsche) both reach beyond the surface rationalizations and reasons to reach the motivating emotional core. I suspect that social scientists tend to shy away from such broad and amorphous concepts that can’t be easily quantified, but happily, Nichols (a Ph.D. in political science and retired college professor) doesn’t shy away from these depths.
In his discussion of narcissism, Nichols draws on the work of American historian and social critic Christopher Lasch. Lasch was active roughly from the 1960s until his death in 1994, and he’s perhaps most remembered for his 1970 work, The Culture of Narcissism. Nichols cites this work and others in his review of contemporary manifestations of narcissism. One wonders what Lasch would make of our situation today. (N.B. Nichols, like me and others, believes Lasch went too far in his criticisms near the end of his career.) Related to narcissism, Nichols draws on the work of political scientist Edward Banfield to note that when the chips are down, individuals often hunker down into the confines of family rather than seeking out and pursuing the common good. Banfield saw this phenomenon demonstrated in a poor Italian village in the 1950s; Nichols sees this increasingly in contemporary America. Nichols quotes Hannah Arendt to capture the implications of the two different potentials exhibited here:
The idiot is one who lives only in his own household and is concerned only with his own life and its necessities. The truly free state, then—one that not only respects certain liberties but is genuinely free—is a state in which no one is, in this sense, an idiot: that is, a state in which everyone takes part in one way or another in what is common. (Location 974)
But while there’s plenty of evidence in support of the anger-grievance and narcissism aspect of our current malaise, it’s the resentment aspect that may manifest the most potent motivating and explanatory power to our current malaise. Let me introduce this topic with an extended quote from Nichols:
Resentment in politics is the externalization of envy. If there is one thing authoritarian governments do especially well, it is the way in which they mobilize resentment as a weapon. Democracy, on principle, is based on the public’s acceptance of regular cycles in which winners and losers exchange places, sometimes unexpectedly. Authoritarians, by contrast, promise stability and equality. They offer placidity by promising, without favor or exception, to make losers of everyone outside of the ruling group. By reducing all citizens to the same miserable condition, they build a constituency among those who are willing to endure oppression as long as the people they hate have to endure it as well. Resentment is about leveling rather than leadership, about vengeance rather than virtue.
(Location 1733)
. . . .
Resentment, like narcissism, undermines the civic virtues of tolerance, cooperation, and equal justice, because it fuels demands for rewards and punishments based on jealousy and unhappiness rather than reason or impartial justice.
(Location 1739)
And if you thought that mere garden variety resentment seems quite enough to invade and perhaps destroy the garden of democracy, then there’s resentment on steroids: ressentiment.
Again, Nichols provides an informative overview:
There is a more evocative word, ressentiment (imported from French by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche), that captures this vague but powerful envy of others. Mere “envy” or “resentment” isn’t enough to express the lasting toxicity of ressentiment. As the writer Joseph Epstein has explained, ordinary resentment is a “quick, stabbing thing, set off by an act of ingratitude or injustice, but that can, fairly quickly, melt away.” But ressentiment is of greater endurance, has a way of insinuating itself into personality, becoming a permanent part of one’s character. Ressentiment, then, is a state of mind, one that leaves those it possesses with a general feeling of grudgingness toward life. . . . So much so that those suffering ressentiment come almost to enjoy the occasions for criticism that their outlook allows them.
(Location 1741)
. . . .
...philosopher Ian Buchanan describes ressentiment as a “vengeful, petty-minded state of being that does not so much want what others have (although that is partly it) as want others to not have what they have.”
(Location 1754)
. . . .
...in the words of the German philosopher Max Scheler, it is existential envy “directed against the other person’s very nature,” and thus unresolvable: “I can forgive everything, but not that you are—that you are what you are—that I am not what you are—indeed that I am not you.”
(Location 1758)
And if the citations to Nietzsche, Epstein, Buchanan, and Scheler seem too highbrow, here Nichols provides the comment of an American voter as an exemplar:
[A]more prosaic example of this kind of resentment in modern America is the voter in Florida who was furloughed from her public sector job during a 2019 budget impasse between the White House and Congress. Initially a supporter of President Trump, she turned on her candidate in helpless anger. “I voted for him, and he’s the one who’s doing this,” she said. “I thought he was going to do good things. He’s not hurting the people he needs to be hurting” (emphasis added).
(Location 1801)
After addressing the issue of resentment, Nichols touches on nostalgia, the tendency to idealize and attempt to recover an imagined past. The answer to malaise becomes time-travel; escape to the past when things were “better.” But time travel isn’t an option, time’s arrow flies only in one direction. And even if some aspects of the past were in some measure “better,” they can only be re-created, not re-captured.
Nichols also notes that democracy and liberalism often prove boring. There’s no Le Mis celebrating the endless wrangling of a congress, legislature, or city council. The flag waving and drama of January 6 proved dramatic, even cinematic, but was not democracy, not the rule of law, and not a future that any sane person would want. Again, reason takes a backseat to the emotional engines that prompt some form of salvation through mindless acts expressing inarticulate dissatisfaction with the status quo. (Fascism, anyone?)
This work of Nichols is the most convincing, comprehensive assessment of our current democratic dis-ease that I’ve read to date (although there are many works out there on this topic that I haven’t yet gotten to). Nichols has the analytical mind of a political scientist that he combines with a keen, appreciative eye for the contemporary American scene. He reports coming from a modest background, and while he’s critical of his fellow Americans, he’s not dismissive or despairing of them. He wants us, our nation, to succeed, but he realizes the realities of our (largely) self-imposed self-destructive traits. Nichols has no magic wand, no simple answers; I imagine he hopes, like an experienced physician, that the first step forward in alleviating the malady is to properly identify it.
There are many aspects of the book that I haven’t addressed here, and there are some avenues that I would like to have seen Nichols explore (for instance, the work of Rene Girard, whose insights about rivalry, memetic desire, envy, jealousy, resentment, and scapegoating, seem to me to be likely quite applicable who what Nichols is exploring. (But in fairness, I’ve only dipped into Girard to date, although I’m planning a deep dive. But we can’t know everything all at once.) Perhaps it’s best to close with a couple of more brief quotes from Nichols:
Can we regain this Athenian sense of honor, civic pride, love of community, self-sacrifice, and deep confidence in our way of life? Or are these virtues now to be lost in a dark sea of grievance, resentment, and envy? (Location 3414)
. . . .
“It cannot come from abroad,” Lincoln warned. “If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.” (Location 3425)
This will not happen after a revolution, or a disaster, or a landmark court case—or even after a pandemic. It will happen as part of a million small decisions made every day without the input of the common citizen, as the fulfillment of an unspoken agreement between technocratic elites and the working and middle classes. Rights and participation and transparency will be shelved—as they too often were during the Cold War in the name of national security—as luxuries simply too expensive to indulge. The population will not be impoverished proles, but reasonably educated, comfortable people who have decided that “democracy” means a certain standard of living.
Nichols, Thomas M., Our Own Worst Enemy (pp. 214-215). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.
As we Americans attempt to deal with the crisis of our democracy, we are blessed to have many capable individuals addressing our plight. In no particular order: Anne Applebaum, David Frum, Thomas Edsall, Francis Fukuyama, Yousha Mounk, Max Boot, Tim Miller (and others in The Bulwark crowd), Steve McIntosh, George Packer, and others whose names escape me for the moment. Suffice it to say that there are many continuing efforts to better understand our plight.
And, oh, yes, there’s Tom Nichols. Like Applebaum and Frum, Nichols also writes for The Atlantic. And like Frum and Applebaum and several of the others, Nichols published a book about this topic in 2017, The Death of Expertise. I haven’t read that book, but I became familiar with Nichols around that time and have followed his work since then. This includes frequent contributions to The Atlantic and podcast interviews with Charlie Sykes on the Bulwark podcast. And, to my surprise, I learned that Nichols had published a book in August 2021, Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from Within on Modern Democracy (OUP). In fact, there’s a bit of an embarrassing story about how I discovered this book, which I detail at the end here.* Suffice it to say that while a year late to the party, I’m glad that I finally arrived. In fact, it may prove to be the best “party” that I’ve attended about this topic.
Nichols's argument is straightforward: the greatest problems facing the U.S. and other established democracies come from within, not from abroad. The electorate in the U.S. (and I’ll focus on the U.S., as Nichols does) has been chronically unhappy with elites and the course of the nation. Why is this so? Our situation (at least our material situation) is really pretty good, notwithstanding the challenging events of the first fifth of the twenty-first century: the 9/11 attacks and related events of radical Islamic terrorism; the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; the crash of 2008; mounting domestic terrorism; the COVID-19 pandemic and the related economic crash—all these events were indeed traumatic and cost precious lives and huge amounts of treasure. But for most Americans living in August 2022, life is nevertheless quite good. Again, not to minimize the pain and death associated with the events listed (and others), but Nichols (and I) agree with former Presidents Obama’s statement that there’s never been a better time to be alive. One must acknowledge that our material well-being, as measured by the amount of stuff we have and the quality of life that we can enjoy, is beyond the dreams of even the wealthiest who lived as recently as less than a century ago.
So, what's eating at us? Nichols summarizes his answer in three words: “narcissism, anger, and resentment.”
In pursuing this line of thought, Nichols distinguishes himself from others who’ve attempted to diagnose our malaise, including popular opinion. Nichols acknowledges that elites have indeed made mistakes, but then they always do, and the magnitude of those mistakes doesn’t justify the magnitude of the malaise claimed by so many.
To arrive at his diagnosis, Nichols, instead of using a searchlight, uses a mirror.
Among the unholy triumvirate of narcissism, anger, and resentment, the anger (and resulting grievance) aspect has received the most attention from many commentators. This line of thought goes a long way in explaining the reactions of those who've suffered direct hits to their well-being by way of job losses and declining communities. Many of these losses are rightly attributable to jobs going overseas and to automation (the latter, I think, being the more significant problem regarding jobs). But the number of Trumpists and sympathizers who have suffered these severe losses is rather small. A full explanation of the approximately 40% of the U.S. electorate who vote for Trumpists requires a deeper, more sweeping explanation.
Of course, anyone who knows much about American politics knows that most citizens, including most voters, are shockingly ill-informed about candidates, policies, and how our political institutions function. It’s a fool’s errand to place an articulated, rational set of reasons for the outcome of any election. It’s most often like trying to draw a detailed picture using just black and white (Yes or No? Candidate A or B?) and beginning the picture from a Rorschach ink blob. Nichols illustrates the problems with a couple of tales from my native Iowa:
The Los Angeles Times reporter Matt Pearce, for example, spoke to a woman who caucused for Sanders in 2016 and then voted for Trump. In 2020, she initially settled on Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, as her choice. If Buttigieg didn’t win the nomination, however, she would move from the young, progressive, gay, once-married Buttigieg back to the elderly, right-wing, serially adulterous, thrice-married bigot Trump—a kaleidoscopic change in preferences that only makes sense as a search for a tailored set of narrow promises that would meet her personal satisfaction, rather than the selection of a candidate who must govern across a range of issues. Location 1306)
. . . .
Another Iowan told the media that she had voted both for Barack Obama and for Donald Trump, “just to shake up Washington, to be honest.” (This is sometimes called the “OOT” voter, the person who voted Obama-Obama-Trump in 2008, 2012, and 2016, respectively.) Had Trump not been available in 2016, she said, she might have gone for—of course—Bernie Sanders. “We’ve just been in a rut so long,” she sighed. (Location 1311)
Even as a native and resident of Iowa most of my life (and as a long-time observer of its politics), this makes my head spin. I migrated from Booker to Buttigieg to Biden (I do like those Bs, I guess), but jump to Trump? How can any mind make that leap? But then it wasn’t the mind so much as the emotions that motivated these voters.
Narcissism and resentment (and its manifestation on steroids, ressentiment—thank you, Nietzsche) both reach beyond the surface rationalizations and reasons to reach the motivating emotional core. I suspect that social scientists tend to shy away from such broad and amorphous concepts that can’t be easily quantified, but happily, Nichols (a Ph.D. in political science and retired college professor) doesn’t shy away from these depths.
In his discussion of narcissism, Nichols draws on the work of American historian and social critic Christopher Lasch. Lasch was active roughly from the 1960s until his death in 1994, and he’s perhaps most remembered for his 1970 work, The Culture of Narcissism. Nichols cites this work and others in his review of contemporary manifestations of narcissism. One wonders what Lasch would make of our situation today. (N.B. Nichols, like me and others, believes Lasch went too far in his criticisms near the end of his career.) Related to narcissism, Nichols draws on the work of political scientist Edward Banfield to note that when the chips are down, individuals often hunker down into the confines of family rather than seeking out and pursuing the common good. Banfield saw this phenomenon demonstrated in a poor Italian village in the 1950s; Nichols sees this increasingly in contemporary America. Nichols quotes Hannah Arendt to capture the implications of the two different potentials exhibited here:
The idiot is one who lives only in his own household and is concerned only with his own life and its necessities. The truly free state, then—one that not only respects certain liberties but is genuinely free—is a state in which no one is, in this sense, an idiot: that is, a state in which everyone takes part in one way or another in what is common. (Location 974)
But while there’s plenty of evidence in support of the anger-grievance and narcissism aspect of our current malaise, it’s the resentment aspect that may manifest the most potent motivating and explanatory power to our current malaise. Let me introduce this topic with an extended quote from Nichols:
Resentment in politics is the externalization of envy. If there is one thing authoritarian governments do especially well, it is the way in which they mobilize resentment as a weapon. Democracy, on principle, is based on the public’s acceptance of regular cycles in which winners and losers exchange places, sometimes unexpectedly. Authoritarians, by contrast, promise stability and equality. They offer placidity by promising, without favor or exception, to make losers of everyone outside of the ruling group. By reducing all citizens to the same miserable condition, they build a constituency among those who are willing to endure oppression as long as the people they hate have to endure it as well. Resentment is about leveling rather than leadership, about vengeance rather than virtue.
(Location 1733)
. . . .
Resentment, like narcissism, undermines the civic virtues of tolerance, cooperation, and equal justice, because it fuels demands for rewards and punishments based on jealousy and unhappiness rather than reason or impartial justice.
(Location 1739)
And if you thought that mere garden variety resentment seems quite enough to invade and perhaps destroy the garden of democracy, then there’s resentment on steroids: ressentiment.
Again, Nichols provides an informative overview:
There is a more evocative word, ressentiment (imported from French by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche), that captures this vague but powerful envy of others. Mere “envy” or “resentment” isn’t enough to express the lasting toxicity of ressentiment. As the writer Joseph Epstein has explained, ordinary resentment is a “quick, stabbing thing, set off by an act of ingratitude or injustice, but that can, fairly quickly, melt away.” But ressentiment is of greater endurance, has a way of insinuating itself into personality, becoming a permanent part of one’s character. Ressentiment, then, is a state of mind, one that leaves those it possesses with a general feeling of grudgingness toward life. . . . So much so that those suffering ressentiment come almost to enjoy the occasions for criticism that their outlook allows them.
(Location 1741)
. . . .
...philosopher Ian Buchanan describes ressentiment as a “vengeful, petty-minded state of being that does not so much want what others have (although that is partly it) as want others to not have what they have.”
(Location 1754)
. . . .
...in the words of the German philosopher Max Scheler, it is existential envy “directed against the other person’s very nature,” and thus unresolvable: “I can forgive everything, but not that you are—that you are what you are—that I am not what you are—indeed that I am not you.”
(Location 1758)
And if the citations to Nietzsche, Epstein, Buchanan, and Scheler seem too highbrow, here Nichols provides the comment of an American voter as an exemplar:
[A]more prosaic example of this kind of resentment in modern America is the voter in Florida who was furloughed from her public sector job during a 2019 budget impasse between the White House and Congress. Initially a supporter of President Trump, she turned on her candidate in helpless anger. “I voted for him, and he’s the one who’s doing this,” she said. “I thought he was going to do good things. He’s not hurting the people he needs to be hurting” (emphasis added).
(Location 1801)
After addressing the issue of resentment, Nichols touches on nostalgia, the tendency to idealize and attempt to recover an imagined past. The answer to malaise becomes time-travel; escape to the past when things were “better.” But time travel isn’t an option, time’s arrow flies only in one direction. And even if some aspects of the past were in some measure “better,” they can only be re-created, not re-captured.
Nichols also notes that democracy and liberalism often prove boring. There’s no Le Mis celebrating the endless wrangling of a congress, legislature, or city council. The flag waving and drama of January 6 proved dramatic, even cinematic, but was not democracy, not the rule of law, and not a future that any sane person would want. Again, reason takes a backseat to the emotional engines that prompt some form of salvation through mindless acts expressing inarticulate dissatisfaction with the status quo. (Fascism, anyone?)
This work of Nichols is the most convincing, comprehensive assessment of our current democratic dis-ease that I’ve read to date (although there are many works out there on this topic that I haven’t yet gotten to). Nichols has the analytical mind of a political scientist that he combines with a keen, appreciative eye for the contemporary American scene. He reports coming from a modest background, and while he’s critical of his fellow Americans, he’s not dismissive or despairing of them. He wants us, our nation, to succeed, but he realizes the realities of our (largely) self-imposed self-destructive traits. Nichols has no magic wand, no simple answers; I imagine he hopes, like an experienced physician, that the first step forward in alleviating the malady is to properly identify it.
There are many aspects of the book that I haven’t addressed here, and there are some avenues that I would like to have seen Nichols explore (for instance, the work of Rene Girard, whose insights about rivalry, memetic desire, envy, jealousy, resentment, and scapegoating, seem to me to be likely quite applicable who what Nichols is exploring. (But in fairness, I’ve only dipped into Girard to date, although I’m planning a deep dive. But we can’t know everything all at once.) Perhaps it’s best to close with a couple of more brief quotes from Nichols:
Can we regain this Athenian sense of honor, civic pride, love of community, self-sacrifice, and deep confidence in our way of life? Or are these virtues now to be lost in a dark sea of grievance, resentment, and envy? (Location 3414)
. . . .
“It cannot come from abroad,” Lincoln warned. “If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.” (Location 3425)
January 11, 2023
I was excited to pick this book up, as I always enjoy Nichols' incisive Tweets. Yes, I found this book through Twitter, and I believe I found Nichols’ feed through a friend, so I guess add a point to the power of social influence! I’m glad I picked it up, as Nichols proves himself even more incisive when armed with more than 280 characters.
For those not familiar with Nichols, I’ll say up front that he’s not for everyone. Neither staunch Trump nor Sanders supporters are likely to care for him. He’s very pragmatic in the classic liberal sense, though rather anglo-centric in his nostalgia for America's past and analysis of its current struggles.
Something I very much appreciate about him is that, while now a quintessentially “coastal elite,” he’s someone with deep working-class roots and first-hand knowledge of "red" America, and it serves him well in his writing.
An especially interesting observation in the book comes from his juxtaposition of Orwell’s 1984 with Huxley’s Brave New World. He points out that we tend to fear the gritty and brutal totalitarianism that crushes Winston in 1984, but that America, with her endless stream of entertainment and an increasingly disinterested electorate, is far more likely to fall to the clean and seemingly innocuous totalitarianism that destroys Bernard in Brave New World.
His central point, and this is where there’s a bit of hope that peers through the collective dread, is that we’re not victims of our current precipitous descent - we’re participants. In our boredom, we fixate on things that excite and enrage us, rather than (or at least to a lesser degree than) things that really move the needle of progress. We’re more compelled to share and amplify that which makes us feel validated or vengeful than we are to share solutions for their own sake. What good is winning, after all, if you can’t push your opponent into the mud on your way to the finish line?
Unfortunately, politicians are wise to these basest of human tendencies and have traded actual ideals for the populism of rage to great effect for their clutch on power.
The reality of our participation in this spiraling flame war is both painful to hear and empowering to consider. On a personal level, there’s much we can do to combat populism. The challenge will be combatting it in time. Because democracy, for all its virtues, can still choose its own destruction and replacement. Democracy is not a destination, it is a means of travel, and where we go from here is still very much uncertain.
For those not familiar with Nichols, I’ll say up front that he’s not for everyone. Neither staunch Trump nor Sanders supporters are likely to care for him. He’s very pragmatic in the classic liberal sense, though rather anglo-centric in his nostalgia for America's past and analysis of its current struggles.
Something I very much appreciate about him is that, while now a quintessentially “coastal elite,” he’s someone with deep working-class roots and first-hand knowledge of "red" America, and it serves him well in his writing.
An especially interesting observation in the book comes from his juxtaposition of Orwell’s 1984 with Huxley’s Brave New World. He points out that we tend to fear the gritty and brutal totalitarianism that crushes Winston in 1984, but that America, with her endless stream of entertainment and an increasingly disinterested electorate, is far more likely to fall to the clean and seemingly innocuous totalitarianism that destroys Bernard in Brave New World.
His central point, and this is where there’s a bit of hope that peers through the collective dread, is that we’re not victims of our current precipitous descent - we’re participants. In our boredom, we fixate on things that excite and enrage us, rather than (or at least to a lesser degree than) things that really move the needle of progress. We’re more compelled to share and amplify that which makes us feel validated or vengeful than we are to share solutions for their own sake. What good is winning, after all, if you can’t push your opponent into the mud on your way to the finish line?
Unfortunately, politicians are wise to these basest of human tendencies and have traded actual ideals for the populism of rage to great effect for their clutch on power.
The reality of our participation in this spiraling flame war is both painful to hear and empowering to consider. On a personal level, there’s much we can do to combat populism. The challenge will be combatting it in time. Because democracy, for all its virtues, can still choose its own destruction and replacement. Democracy is not a destination, it is a means of travel, and where we go from here is still very much uncertain.
September 29, 2023
It's OK. I didn't like his last book, this was better but not great.
It's a very shallow exploration of the case he's trying to make. He rests more on his own authority and other's opinions than really building a fact based argument. Which is consistent with his earlier book about trusting
It's a very shallow exploration of the case he's trying to make. He rests more on his own authority and other's opinions than really building a fact based argument. Which is consistent with his earlier book about trusting
November 29, 2022
i really tried... i like @radiofreetom when he's a guest on pods and the youtubes etc... but man, this book was too much tom.
March 17, 2025
I have read no other book that so coherently and succinctly captures how we ended up with the political outcome of the 2024 election fueled by populism, nationalism, and the march towards authoritarianism. Nichols' book, which was written during the pandemic, explains how it happened. The call is coming from inside the house. Who is to blame for our current state of affairs? We are to blame. People weren’t duped into electing a narcissistic populist – we voted for the caricature of ourselves. That it is our own narcissism killing democracy because democracy requires virtue and an inherent belief that our fellow citizens share our same rights. Our collective ego is hurting us.
Nichols’ point can be best summed up in this way: We suffer because we are successful. We are unhappy because we have what we want. This seems counterintuitive, but those raising their fists and shouting the loudest grievances do not have it as bad as they claim—at least not materially.
Nichols explains this using philosopher Ian Buchanan’s phrase: Ressentiment. Ressentiment is a vengeful, petty-minded state of being that does not so much want what others have as want others to not have what they have. It is regressive.
Through smartphones, social media, and algorithms designed to stir up anger, we’re fueling our resentment like never before. It feeds on information we like to believe to be true – regardless if it is true or not – promoted by political entrepreneurs who tell us our petty grievances are justified, that it is someone else’s fault, and that they alone can fix all our ills. Like scholar Timothy Snyder says as quoted in the book, “a society that is post-factual is pre-fascist.”
The best summary of Nichols’ overall message is probably the following excerpt:
“A serious people know the difference between righteous anger and resentful rage, between material deprivation and unmet wants, and between reality and nostalgia. But when an entire population slides after years of peace and plenty into narcissism and resentment and entertains itself with comforting lies about the past in order to avoid the responsibilities of the present, the political environment sinks into a corrosive slurry that eats away at the foundations of democracy.”
My copy of this book is dog-eared and will likely be referenced often. If you are going to read one book this year about the state of American democracy, this is the book you should read.
Nichols’ point can be best summed up in this way: We suffer because we are successful. We are unhappy because we have what we want. This seems counterintuitive, but those raising their fists and shouting the loudest grievances do not have it as bad as they claim—at least not materially.
Nichols explains this using philosopher Ian Buchanan’s phrase: Ressentiment. Ressentiment is a vengeful, petty-minded state of being that does not so much want what others have as want others to not have what they have. It is regressive.
Through smartphones, social media, and algorithms designed to stir up anger, we’re fueling our resentment like never before. It feeds on information we like to believe to be true – regardless if it is true or not – promoted by political entrepreneurs who tell us our petty grievances are justified, that it is someone else’s fault, and that they alone can fix all our ills. Like scholar Timothy Snyder says as quoted in the book, “a society that is post-factual is pre-fascist.”
The best summary of Nichols’ overall message is probably the following excerpt:
“A serious people know the difference between righteous anger and resentful rage, between material deprivation and unmet wants, and between reality and nostalgia. But when an entire population slides after years of peace and plenty into narcissism and resentment and entertains itself with comforting lies about the past in order to avoid the responsibilities of the present, the political environment sinks into a corrosive slurry that eats away at the foundations of democracy.”
My copy of this book is dog-eared and will likely be referenced often. If you are going to read one book this year about the state of American democracy, this is the book you should read.
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