The Great Experiment: How to Make Diverse Democracies Work

by Yascha Mounk

One of Barack Obama's Recommended Reads for Summer “[A] brave and necessary book . . . Anyone interested in the future of liberal democracy, in the US or anywhere else, should read this book.” —Anne Applebaum“A convincing, humane, and hopeful guide to the present and future by one of our foremost democratic thinkers.” —George Packer“A rare [an] academic treatise . . . that may actually have influence in the arena of practical politics. . . . Passionate and personal.” —Joe Klein, New York Times Book ReviewFrom one of our sharpest political thinkers, a brilliant big-picture vision of how to bridge the bitter divides within diverse democraciesNever in history has a democracy succeeded in being both diverse and equal, treating different ethnic or religious groups fairly. And yet achieving that goal is now central to the democratic project. It is, Yascha Mounk argues, the greatest experiment of our time. Drawing on history, social psychology, and comparative politics, Mounk explains why we need to create a world in which our ascriptive identities come to matter less—not because we ignore global injustices, but because we have succeeded in addressing them.The Great Experiment is that rare book that offers both a profound understanding of an urgent problem and genuine hope for our human capacity to solve it. As Mounk contends, it is up to us and the institutions we build whether we come to see each other as strangers or compatriots. Giving up on the prospect of diverse democracies is simply not an option—and that is why we must strive to realize a more ambitious vision for the future of our societies.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, History, Philosophy, Sociology, Political Science, Society

409 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 19, 2022

About the author

Yascha Mounk is a writer, academic and public speaker known for his work on the crisis of democracy and the defense of philosophically liberal values.
​
Born in Germany to Polish parents, Yascha received his BA in History from Trinity College Cambridge and his PhD in Government from Harvard University. He is a Professor of the Practice of International Affairs at Johns Hopkins University, where he holds appointments in both the School of Advanced International Studies and the SNF Agora Institute. Yascha is also a Contributing Editor at The Atlantic, a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a Moynihan Public Fellow at City College. He is the Founder of Persuasion, the host of The Good Fight podcast, and serves as a publisher (Herausgeber) at Die Zeit.

Yascha has written five books: Stranger in My Own Country – A Jewish Family in Modern Germany, a memoir about Germany’s fraught attempts to deal with its past; The Age of Responsibility – Luck, Choice and the Welfare State, which argues that a growing obsession with the concept of individual responsibility has transformed western welfare states; The People versus Democracy – Why Our Freedom Is in Danger and How to Save It, which explains the causes of the populist rise and investigates how to renew liberal democracy; The Great Experiment – Why Diverse Democracies Fall Apart and How They Can Endure, which argues that anybody who seeks to help ethnically and religiously diverse democracies thrive has reason to embrace a more ambitious vision for their future than is now fashionable; and his latest, The Identity Trap – A Story of Ideas and Power in Our Time, which tells the story of how a new set of ideas about race, gender and sexual orientation came to be extremely influential in mainstream institutions, and why it would be a mistake to give up on a more universalist humanism.

Next to his work for The Atlantic, Yascha also occasionally writes for newspapers and magazines including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Foreign Affairs. He is also a regular contributor to major international publications including Die Zeit, La Repubblica, El País, l’Express and Folha de São Paolo, among others.

Reviews

[Stetson · Rating 3 out of 5]

If the great experiment is to be truly successful, it must offer a realistic account of human nature and be honest about the injustices of the past. But it must also be unapologetically sanguine about the possibility that members of different groups can pull together to build fair and thriving democracies whose members share a sense of common purpose.

The Great Experiment by Yascha Mounk is a brief argument (see above quote) for maintaining and strengthening the system of liberal democracy in increasingly diverse (in ethnic, religious, and ideological dimensions) Western countries, especially the United States. Mounk's book has a tripartite structure. First, he describes the challenges that face diverse societies then responds to the questions that these challenges provoke. Finally, he concludes with some reasons for optimism and policy prescriptions. Mounk's writing is accessible though maybe overly simplistic. Nonetheless, he succinctly provides a traditional center-left position on liberal governance with some idiosyncratic heterodoxies mixed in. These philosophical divergences include Mounk's foundational view of human nature, which is admittedly Hobbesian, his acknowledgement of the stickiness of identitarian/tribal psychology, and his rejection of the "demography is destiny" hypothesis. These idiosyncrasies make the work more interesting because for any reader versed in college-level political philosophy the work will largely feel like well-organized normie platitudes.

Mounk's work fits neatly at the replacement-level into the ongoing public discourse concerning the status and fate of liberalism in diverse societies. It is an incredibly competitive publishing space with many provocative and erudite options: Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam, Coming Apart by Charles Murray, Why Liberalism Failed by Patrick Deneen, Why Liberalism Works by Deidre McCloskey, Suicide of the West by Jonah Goldberg, The Narrow Corridor by Daron Acemoğlu and James A. Robinson, Liberalism and Its Discontents by Francis Fukuyama, etc. Relative to the works just listed, this book benefits from being designed for a broader (more popular) audience. Don't let the long bibliography and notes section convince you otherwise. Generally, these notes do also serve as a satisfactory reference for digging deeper into the issues Mounk raises, which I would recommend.

Despite the clarity and accessibility, The Great Experiment suffers a bit from an uneven tone and unnecessary personal color passages that add little to the overall work. This detracts from the gravity of work and makes some of the claims seem irresolute, ambivalent, or thoughtlessly optimistic. This with the fact that much of the work contains predictably center-left liberal arguments or recycles the works of others, underscores that this book could probably be boiled down to a pamphlet-type essay (though obviously economic and attention incentives compel book length works). Clones of Mounk's perspective are easy to access across numerous platforms, including his own, Persuasion.

There are of course some silly policy prescriptions in the book (again, sort of made off-the-cuff near the end) and other things I have political, philosophical, or descriptive quibbles with but these aren't things that should get in the way of reading and enjoying it. The Great Experiment makes for a decent read for a high school or college level student with little prior background in political philosophy but still has general interests in civics.

*Disclosure: I received this as an ARC through NetGalley.

Longer review available on my Substack -> https://stetson.substack.com/p/is-the...

Links to Podcast Interview with Yascha Mounk
Yascha Mounk on Making Diverse Democracies Work -> https://www.persuasion.community/p/mo...

Yascha Mounk: The Most Dangerous Idea in American Politics -> https://www.thebulwark.com/podcast-ep...

The Lawfare Podcast: Yascha Mounk on the Future of Diverse Democracies -> https://www.lawfareblog.com/lawfare-p...

[Chris Boutté · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the first book I’ve read from Yascha Mounk, and I’m a fan. This was a really interesting book with a fresh take on issues going on in the United States as well as other democratic countries. Yascha Mounk starts by telling the story about how he was speaking somewhere and said “The Great Experiment” isn’t working, and he got some backlash. Basically, he discusses how the diversity of all these different cultures mixing together leads to problems we never really considered or planned for, and this is still kind of new.

As a psychology nerd, what I really liked was how Mounk starts out by explaining how we’re naturally tribal and the research that explains why that is like the minimal group paradigm research. He then dives into a ton of different issues we face while also providing stories from around the world, which educated me quite a bit and let me know that this isn’t uniquely American. Many of the issues he discusses and his diagnosis were some things I haven’t considered, so it was pretty enlightening.

Finally, I think he ended the book incredibly. He discussed the “chapter 10 dilemma”, which is when authors tackle big issues and big ideas in a book, but there aren’t easy fixes. So, he lays out some ideas that are pretty well thought out. Overall, I highly recommend the book, and I’ll probably start reading some more of his stuff soon.

[Angie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've read a lot of books about democracy in the past year and this is one of my favorites, because it is realistic, practical and hopeful. My intention is to read it a second time soon.

[bussy barbecue · Rating 4 out of 5]

if you're reading this, either from goodreads itself or on my spam, YOU'RE A G!!!!! I don't have time to write a big brain review I'm in the middle of packing but yeah this book is pretty good; Mounk is direct, trenchant, and a bit self deprecating as he assesses and diagnoses the greatnesses and ills of diverse democracies. I think it is noble to even try to solve such an amorphous and worldwide problem but regardless of his ambitions, the book is imbued with a stolid empathy that strikes me as different from other political books I've read that is also central to his solution. We live in an unprecedented era where people of such different backgrounds, religions, races, and beliefs exist to form a polity that strives for prosperity. To give up on that "great experiment" is to give up on a courageous vision of society that everybody can live in. We might fail. Democratic backsliding on the news is unfortunately trite if not still existentially concerning, but the book brings me a bit of hope that there is still a human capacity to solve it. Otherwise, divine intervention is needed

[Kathryn Bashaar · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book delivers on its promise. The author provides both an analysis of the problems facing diverse democracies, and his ideas on how they can endure and thrive. His thoughts are based in human nature and political history.

I liked how the book was written. It is definitely aimed at the general reader who is concerned about our democracy, not at other academics. He explains at the beginning of each section and chapter what that part of the book is going to be about, and provides a summary at the end of each chapter. The language is clear and forthright.

I also liked that Mounk is an optimist. Although income inequality and humanity's "groupishness" pose real threats to diverse democracies, Mounk believes that those challenges are surmountable.

This wasn't a five-star book for me, because I already understood the challenges we are facing and the potential solutions that Mounk suggests. None of it was really new for me. But, for someone who doesn't read about current events as much as I do but is interested in this topic, this is a well-written summary of the history, threats and solutions.

Like my reviews? Check out my blog at http://www.kathrynbashaar.com/blog/
Author of The Saints Mistress https://camcatbooks.com/Books/T/The-S...

[David Steele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very glad I found this positive and clever book.
Wide-ranging and thoughtful (such a nice change to find a writer who’s as comfortable talking about Europe as America) with lots of solid examples of the pitfalls and potential of how society might succeed in the future.
To boil it down, success will depend on a combination of fairness, representation, participation, gratitude and all stakeholders letting go of the resentments of the past. I would suggest the latter will be the most difficult.
Mounk is careful to avoid taking sides while giving fair representation to both (or all) sides of complex issues, and to spell out viable blueprints for how working solutions might be found.
I got this on audiobook, but found it so useful as a reference companion that I’ve since downloaded the kindle version.

[Jamie · Rating 2 out of 5]

A poorly handled treatment of an important subject, "The Great Experiment" lacks the historical examples, attention to data, and policy rigor necessary to meaningfully explore the issue. Mounk (who I like) appears to have wanted his thesis to cover all Western countries, but apparently didn’t want to go through the ordeal of addressing each and every nation's somewhat unique dynamics on a substantive country-by-country basis. Instead of doing that, or simply limiting the scope to focus on the US, he filled hundreds of pages with lofty but vague platitudes. These platitudes, while agreeable to anyone of a philosophically liberal persuasion, are largely vacuous, unconvincing to anyone who does not already hold them, and frankly a waste of the reader’s time. The book has some moments of genuine interest and insight, but on the whole, very disappointing. 2.5/5

[Izzy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review of the Great Experiment by yascha Mounck
I read the first nine chapters closely looking forward to the 10th which would explain Yascha’s reasons for optimism, despite the dismal dilemmas facing so many democracies at the current time….unfortunately, he delivers only the pious optimism that the “fake” demographic dilemma- replacement of the majority white by a majority minority may not ever occur, because of self identification as “white” of many of the offspring of increasingly frequent mixed marriages, as well as by many Latinos. The book is a good companion to Pankaj Mishra’s Age of Anger, but I wasn’t convinced of the basis for the optimism which Mounck espouses for the future of democracies, much as I would like to…..

[John Laliberte · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book for it gave some constructive insights into how we can work together to develop a unified democracy, even with all the chaos that we currently are dealing with.

I wish Mr. Mounk would have addressed the concept of TRUTH. I believe he only mentioned it in passing. Truth is fundamental for our relationships, let alone our democracy. We have for the past 6+ years lived in a world where falsehoods - flat our lies! - have become the norm for governing, for some. This is unacceptable.

Even with this omission, it is a worthwhile read. Thank you for adding to the discussion.

[Sid Groeneman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yascha Mounk is a professor of the practice of international relations at Johns Hopkins University and regular contributor to The Atlantic magazine. Born in Germany after his mother earlier fled anti-Semitism in Poland, he came to the U.S. as a Ph.D. student at Harvard after getting his B.A. at Cambridge. As someone who has lived in five countries and spent considerable time in ten others, Mounk is well-equipped to take on this ambitious analysis.

A superficial assessment might pan the book as an unimaginative naive application of philosophical liberalism, laced with optimistic invocations of empathy toward minorites, greater economic equality, tolerance of outgroups, making it easier for previously excluded groups to vote, social integration, and so forth. But this would be wrong and a disservice to Mounk. For one thing, he states (and illustrates) from the outset the hard-headed view that people are naturally drawn to identify with and join groups of others like themselves and easily prone to discriminate against others based on race, class, religion, and nation. In addition, he is just as critical toward the left's tendency to double-down on minority groups' supposed interests and values over accommodation and compromise with the majority. In so doing, he convincingly debunks the popular "demography is destiny"concept.

Mounk also takes down two other popular ideas--commutarianism and consociational democracy, both of which focus on power-sharing among a nation's minority groups--as inadequate long-term solutions because they (1) do little to promote a common identity across groups (vital for a diverse democracy to thrive), and (2) do not address the within-group "cage of norms" that can oppress those unwilling to fully conform to the strictures inside their group.

But integrating formerly excluded segments by getting them to embrace even some of the majority culture in the quest of a common identity is a difficult process. Similarly for the majority to accept the newly emergent and immigrant populations who they perceive threaten their way of life. Citing real progress that has been made, Mounk admits to being more optimistic than is currently fashionable. The concluding chapters contains a list of sage but incremental actions and policies to help diverse democracies succeed. These include shared economic growth, universal social welfare programs (not aimed at specific minority groups), electoral reforms (open primaries, rank voting, making it easier to vote), maintaining border security, mandatory national service, and, last but not least, getting out of your bubble.

The Great Experiment offers a refreshing intermediate perspective between radical overhaul of the system from the left or return to an earlier time from the right, on the one hand, and political despair that things will not change. But as Mounk is quick to admit, it does not contain a formula likely to produce meaningful progress in the short term.

[Ari Rickman · Rating 2 out of 5]

Perhaps this book was meant to be digestible to readers who haven't thought or read much about democracy or diversity. It provided a very cursory introduction to the topic. But only in the last chapter does it really discuss how democracy and diversity can coincide.

For much of the book everything you'd need to know about a chapter comes in the first few paragraphs. The following pages mostly repeat the same ideas without adding much research to back anything up.

I had hoped the book would dive into nuances between diverse democracies. It seems to me that European ethno-states which homogenized over centuries of war and exclusion are substantially different from post-colonial states in which retreating European powers arbitrarily combined competing ethnic groups, forcing them to share a government (see Peter Ekeh, Colonialism and the Two Publics in Africa), which are in turn different from New World countries which have a history of regularly reinventing themselves after successive waves of immigration.

Even when Mounk discusses some context specific history the analysis is usually not very deep. For example, in the chapter "Demography isn't Destiny" the author points to the history of Irish and Italian immigrants gradually becoming 'white' overtime as evidence that America might be able to continually expand mainstream status to new comers. While it is undoubtedly true that America has been able to incorporate erstwhile minorities into the majority, one wonders to what extent this process relied on excluding other groups; i.e. to what extent did Italians become white by successfully arguing they were not black? As with many quibbles I have with this book, I don't think this question undermines Mounk's general optimism that diverse democracies can work, but I do think it's worth asking.

The book really only gets specific in the final chapter, when focusing on potential policy solutions. Mounk introduces many interesting ideas and fully explores a few. This chapter should have been the book's main focus.

[Roland Glotzer · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book which is a plea for democracy is good in its intentions but was too basic and superficial for me. I would recommend the book to anyone interested in understanding the pros and cons of inclusive democratic regimes in an environment confronted with inequality, immigration, terrorism, racism, etc..with no prior knowledge of the topics. However for anyone with some understanding of these challenges and the history that led to them, the book will appear to be very basic.

[Rod Cash · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars- focused and subtle thinking regarding diverse democracies, their risks, and how to enhance their prospects. The book is a comparative study that addresses a number of countries that are rapidly becoming more diverse. Mounk provides a hopeful alternative to the extreme pessimism about democratic prospects so prevalent in the US and Europe today. My principle criticism of the book is that it was repetitive and could’ve been quite a bit shorter.

[Yupa · Rating 3 out of 5]

L'autore afferma fin da subito e con gran chiarezza che il problema concreto del libro è la convivenza tra due cose che finora non hanno mai convissuto: democrazia e multiculturalismo. La prima è il sistema che permette alle masse di partecipare (seppure in maniera indiretta) ai processi decisionali dello Stato, cosa che porta sempre alla paura da parte della maggioranza di essere danneggiata da minoranze già presenti sul posto o da "nuovi arrivati" che potrebbero dirottare le istituzioni a proprio vantaggio.
È un problema nuovo, che non esisteva sotto i dispotismi di vario tipo, perché allora le masse non avevano accesso alla gestione del potere, e difatti sino all'800 stati multiculturali non democratici in qualche modo se la sono cavata. I problemi cominciano quando le strutture statali cominciano a integrare nel proprio sistema di funzionamento le masse, con l'arrivo dell'industrializzazione e la conseguente necessità di un sistema scolastico via via più universale. Stati più o meno culturalmente omogenei (penso alla Francia), anche se tramite un percorso accidentato, sono riusciti a realizzare una democrazia funzionante, paesi come gli Stati Uniti ci sono riusciti escludendo a lungo o comunque marginalizzando le minoranze (ad esempio con la schiavitù e poi la segregazione razziale). Ma ora i paesi occidentali sono sottoposti a ondate migratorie particolarmente massicce, e questo porta al problema affrontato dal libro: come conciliare democrazia e multiculturalismo? Va detto che le soluzioni proposte dal libro non sono del tutto esenti dal problema di una grande vaghezza e di pochi dettagli, nonostante lo stesso autore, nell'ultimo capitolo, affermi di voler scendere nel concreto, cosa che secondo lui hanno fatto finora pochi dei pensatori che hanno affrontato il problema.
Dal punto di vista più generale il richiamo è a quello che l'autore chiama "liberalismo filosofico", ovvero concedere a tutti i cittadini la libertà di parola e di associazione, ottenendo così due risultati: consentire alle varie comunità che si trovano entro lo Stato, comunità culturali e non, di formarsi o perpetuarsi pacificamente; al contempo difendere la possibilità degli individui di mettere in discussione o abbandonare, se lo desiderano, le comunità entro cui vivono o crescono. Si tratta in sostanza di rispettare la presenza di diverse comunità culturali entro uno stesso territorio statale senza perdere di vista che esse stesse possono non essere omogenee al loro interno, ovvero possono essere messe in discussione dai membri che le compongono.
Qui però l'autore avrebbe dovuto riportati più esempî concreti, visto che anche il multiculturalismo più benintenzionato si ritrova comunque ad affrontare problemi di ardua soluzione. Pensiamo, in Francia, al divieto nelle scuole per gli studenti di indossare simboli religiosi: giusta affermazione della neutralità delle istituzioni pubbliche o sopruso sulla libertà religiosa dei ragazzi? Pensiamo alle proposte, che sono state fatte anche in Italia, di vietare per i minorenni di indossare il velo islamico: difesa di chi è ritenuto non in grado di decidere dalle imposizioni delle famiglie o, di nuovo, repressione della libertà individuale? L'autore purtroppo non chiarisce quali dovrebbero essere l'uso e i limiti della coercizione statale per difendere gli individui dalle costrizioni che rischiano di subire dalle culture di appartenenza.
Altrettanto sul vago rimane quando parla del "patriottismo culturale" che, a suo dire, dovrebbe far da base per cementare nel concreto in un'unità nazionale le diverse culture presenti in uno stesso territorio. Non esplicita in che forme questo patriottismo culturale dovrebbe esprimersi e soprattutto, non tocca il ruolo che potrebbe (dovrebbe?) avere di nuovo la coercizione statale. Si tratta di innalzare di nuovo a culto civico il tipico armamentario post-ottocentesco e tutt'ora vigente del patriottismo, quello fatto di bandiere, inni nazionali, date fondative, culto del passato, degli eroi e delle vittime? Potrebbe essere un'opzione suadente ed efficace per chiunque tema il disgregarsi dell'insieme delle comunità in un tutto contro tutti (pericolo che il libro sottolinea a più riprese), ma non va dimenticato che, sempre, nel momento in cui lo Stato fa sacri determinati simboli (la bandiera, l'inno, le date, ecc.) cercando di imporli come "condivisi", sono proprio le fasce socialmente marginalizzate a vedere quei simboli come l'emblema di un'oppressione da combattere con rinnovata ferocia, e quei simboli che vorrebbero accomunare rinfocoleranno ulteriormente le divisioni, specialmente se imposti tramite un'ottusa coercizione. Cosa deve fare uno Stato che si voglia tollerante e aperto al dissenso con coloro che dissacrino i simboli di cui va ammantandosi? Vanno mantenuti nel codice penale reati come il vilipendio della bandiera nazionale, reati anacronistici, lesivi della libertà d'espressione cui questo libro sembra aderire, e soprattutto intrinsecamente e inevitabilmente divisivi nonostante (o forse proprio perché) si propongano a tutela dell'unità nazionale?
L'autore tutto questo non lo affronta, forse perché sottovaluta la potenza per gli esseri umani del reame simbolico, qualcosa che va invece ad attivare reazioni viscerali e profondissime, basti pensare alla questione (di nuovo) del velo islamico, a come essa scuota le masse a livello globale, arrivando a mettere a rischio la tenuta sia di democrazie evolute che di regimi autoritarî. Io penso si debba andare ancora più in là di quanto siano arrivati sinora i paesi democratici nella loro progressiva liberazione dalle vestigia del passato, verso quella che chiamo "laicità estesa", ovvero l'uscita dello Stato (se proprio deve esisterne uno!) da qualunque tipo di politica simbolica e culturale, che siano le bandiere, gli inni nazionali, le date, le celebrazioni collettive, le tradizioni e così via, e ovviamente e di conseguenza da qualunque regolamentazione della libertà d'espressione. L'alternativa è che le istituzioni siano di volta in volta (ab)usate dalle fazioni che giungono al potere (proprio il pericolo connaturato alle democrazie di cui parla l'autore all'inizio del libro) per imporre una propria agenda simbolica particolare (ovviamente sempre spacciata come unificante e non divisiva!) o per distruggere i sistemi simbolici e culturali delle fazioni avverse. Da questo punto di vista non c'è differenza tra una destra che vuole vietare l'episodio di Peppa Pig con la famiglia con due madri per "proteggere i bambini dal gender" e una sinistra che dirotta l'istituzione scolastica per inculcare nei ragazzi vaghi ideali di inclusione o che vuole emanare leggi punitive contro "discorsi d'odio" mai ben definiti.
La mia prospettiva può portare solo a uno Stato il più possibile minimo, proprio per evitare che esso venga sfruttato indebitamente dalle diverse fazioni che compongono la società multiculturale. Forse il contrario di quanto propone l'autore in termini di politica economica e sociale visto che, a suo dire, solo uno Stato che garantisca benessere diffuso con robuste politiche di welfare universali può evitare di far precipitare un paese in una guerra di tutti contro tutti. Mi confesso comunque ignorante di economia e aperto a qualunque tipo di politica che si dimostri concretamente (e non per mera questione di principio) efficace nell'aumentare il generale benessere materiale di un paese, cosa quest'ultima fondamentale per disinnescare avvitamenti autoritarî indotti dal un impoverimento generalizzato.
Giusto invece che l'autore stigmatizzi un utilizzo del welfare "razzializzato", cioè che vada a distribuire i benefici materiali in base all'appartenenza a determinate comunità e non in base alle condizioni di bisogno degli individui in quanto tali. L'autore mette in luce come un welfare "razzializzato" sarebbe dannoso, perché (e riporta degli studi che dimostrano sia così) verrebbe percepito come iniquo da parte dei cittadini e quindi andrebbe a rinfocolare le contrapposizioni tra comunità lacerando il tessuto sociale. Personalmente lo troverei ingiusto anche in quanto tale, come in genere tutti i sistemi di quote, che siano etniche o di genere, o tutti i sistemi pubblici che vanno a rapportarsi con i cittadini non in quanto individui ma in quanto parte di determinati gruppi, senza quindi considerare le differenze entro questi ultimi. In questo senso è da elogiare il coraggio dell'autore, che pure si definisce di centro-sinistra, nello stigmatizzare l'identitarismo che da diversi anni sta ammorbando proprio la sinistra, quella che depreca gli scambi tra culture definendoli come "approprazioni culturale" o che essenzializza il razzismo e l'oppressione vedendoli come connaturati ai membri delle comunità (i bianchi concepiti come tutti o inevitabilmente razzisti, ecc), e che in generale perde di vista sia che anche entro le varie comunità possono esserci differenze individuali sia che è possibile una comunicazione feconda tra i varî gruppi, che non sono quindi condannati a una lotta perenne.
Molto debole purtroppo la parte del libro sulla polarizzazione politica, vero problema di questi ultimi tempi, parte ridotta a un semplice appello alle buone intenzioni, al cercare di essere più comprensivi. Certo, sarebbe bello, se non fondamentale, cessare di vedere vedere gli avversarî politici (o di altri gruppi) come nemici esistenziali e il confronto pubblico come uno scontro che è questione di vita o di morte. Ma l'autore non dimostra come ciò potrebbe essere realizzato, e soprattutto non affronta la spinosa questione dei conflitti su internet, di come (e se) andrebbero gestiti e di che fine dovrebbe fare in proposito la libertà di parola. Confido comunque che l'appello a quest'ultima fatto a inizio libro, e alla complementare libertà d'associazione, per quanto fuggevole, indichi che anche l'autore pensa che siano due libertà a fondamento di una società che tutti possiamo auspicare, una base per un vivere in comune che sia aperto e tollerante, qualcosa che attualmente, purtroppo, versa in pericolo per attacchi che giungono sia da destra che da sinistra.

[Susan Tunis · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

[Mike Horne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of stuff I agree with and others I disagree with. And then stuff I don't know the answer to. Two take aways.

I. How you personally can stop our diverse democracy from falling apart

Don't believe something just because it is the opposite of your enemy.


Criticize your own side.


Don't ridicule or vilify; engage and persuade.


II. The liberal democracy based on Thomas Hobbes and John Locke places the individual and their liberties as basic building blocks of society and politics. Yet men are political animals. They are born into families, religious tribes, societies. The Lockean liberalism does not seem to “deal” with the communitarian nature of man.


“An even bigger problem is that such a communitarian conception would, even as it seemingly protects people from persecution and allows them to be true to their inherited identity, make it impossible for them to chart their own course through life. Individuals who do not agree with the customs of the communities into which they were born would, on the model of diverse democracy advocated by Kukathas and his allies, be left at the mercy of an oppressive cage of norms.


States that conceive of themselves as a mere "association of associations" have no apparent justification for interfering in the internal affairs of these groups. This means that they would have to stand aside when groups fail to tolerate internal dissent, render their children incapable of living a self-determined life, or stop those who want to strike out on their own from exiting the “group.”


“On the liberal view, diverse democracies are constituted by a broad variety of individuals, not a set of groups. They should be committed to protecting the core freedoms of these individuals. And so it seems straightforward that a just democracy has a legitimate reason, and even an obligation, to step in when ethnic or religious groups attempt to coerce their own members.”

[Catherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not much is new in this book and it’s really quite simplistic. Personally, I would have liked a methodology section, more data, and heftier theoretical background. But I think the reason for a generous rating is precisely because I know how difficult it is to simplify and present complex topics in an accessible manner.

Overall message of the book is timely and Mounk is able to retain a good level of nuance considering the fact that a 10th grader could probably get through this. His examples might be simplistic, but he doesn’t make any truly false claims from what I can tell. As well, considering his qualifications, I trust that he is not skewing reality to fit his argument.

Not the most fascinating book I’ve read on politics, but let’s be real: he takes a more balanced approach than most writers and does it all in under 300 pages.

Bonus points for having the guts to challenge mainstream leftist discourse and actually persuade me to think more optimistically about democratic futures. If we are going to have “a meaningfully shared life” then it has to start with publishing books that the average person can understand, even if they do oversimplify the issue a bit.

[Serge · Rating 5 out of 5]

A much more optimistic book than I expected with practical recommendations for creating coalitions that can sustain civic virtue in the face of authoritarian populism. I found his description of structured anarchy convincing and never before fathomed that there could be something more pernicious than the war of all against all. Did not see the Manu Chao love coming at the end of book. I am a fan.

[Patrick · Rating 2 out of 5]

A critically important subject and an author I respect.

But this work is little more than a series of platitudes, over-simplified checklists, and superficial surveys of others’ work. Does not justify itself as a book.

[Lawrence Roth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yascha Mounk has written a compelling political science book that seems quite prescient here as we are about to cross into 2026. The Great Experiment is a pretty great introduction to the issues confronting modern liberal democracies with a focus on the racial demographic aspect that seems to drive much of the animus in democratic polities today.

While much of this book isn't particularly new to me as I've read quite a lot about the reason why democracies around the world are suffering from internal malaise, I think this could be a very valuable resource to someone looking to be introduced to a good analysis of the topic, especially those of a leftist persuasion. This is all the more important as we end 2025, the first year of the second Trump admin, and only a few years after the original publication date of 2022, where Mounk correctly wrote that the fractures within the United States and other nations based on racial and ethnic concerns would continue to be important and that the "challengist" (his term for radical political reformers) instinct on the left could be going down the wrong path to winning elections. Minorities aren't monoliths, demography isn't destiny, and people wanting to engage with their culture and their nation will do so on their own terms, not the terms of pollsters, political scientists, or pundits. Leftists learned (or perhaps didn't learn) this lesson hard in 2024. Now it seems the right is repeating their mistake. 2025 was the year that Trump and the MAGA movement, so convinced that they had just pulled off a permanent realignment with black voters, latino voters, women, young men, Arabs, Jews, and anyone else you could think of (possibly putting together the most diverse winning campaign coalition in Republican history) have instead been sobered by the 2025 elections and the alarming and yet quite obvious reality that voters don't like MAGA, or the Republican Party, or even Trump necessarily, but that they will vote for anyone who runs as a change candidate in a high inflation, high cost of living nation like the United States whose various institutions are basically running crappy legacy code. Race looks less and less like a factor in voting behavior going into the future.

But authoritarianism isn't better because there's a diverse face on the poster. If democracies want to get back to a vibrant and free world, they must acknowledge the realities and perceptions that their voting populations are screaming at them to acknowledge, lest those nations go the way of countless other dead democracies throughout history.

A pretty high recommend to me for anyone interested in the current authoritarian or anti-immigrant moment, and especially recommend for anyone running a political campaign.

[Richard Thompson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mr. Mounk has a good heart, and I found myself mostly agreeing with his philopsophical positioning. To build strong democracies that give everyone a fair shake we need to build communities of people of different backgrounds who interact with each other as equals in normal situations. We need to honor and empower groups of people who have common backgrounds and beliefs, but not let them tyrannize group members who want to opt out. Neither the left nor the right have good answers for dealing with the challenges of building a diverse democracy. We can only come together if we find a middle way. So far so good. But honestly, I found Mr. Mounk to be completely uninspiring. He's on the right track, but he's boring. If you want to achieve the goals that he aspires to, it's not enough to be well intentioned and a good person. It's not even enough to be right. You also have to have a spark, which Mr. Mounk sadly lacks. Without that, you can never ignite the flames of change.

[Boudica · Rating 2 out of 5]

Yascha Mounk's "The Great Experiment: The Story of Ancient Empires, Modern States, and the Quest for a Global Nation" provides a narrative of the rise of modern nation-states and the challenges they face in the 21st century, particularly with regard to increasingly diverse populations. He argues that the modern nation-state system is facing a profound crisis and that the world is on the cusp of a great experiment in global governance:

Mounk argues that the world is facing a choice between two paths: a future of fragmentation and conflict, or a future of greater cooperation and global governance. Mounk's prescriptions for the future of global politics are too prescriptive and utopian. He argues for a future of greater cooperation and global governance, but does not provide a detailed plan for how this can be achieved. In short this book states a problem that it manifestly fails to provide a realistic solution for.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good companion to Moisés Naím's The Revenge of Power. Mounk's three recommendations:

Do not lazily adopt the opposite position of your ideological opponent (the enemy of my enemy is my friend);

Do not suspend critical thinking regarding your own side's positions;

Get outside your ideological bubble.

[Aurora Jablon · Rating 4 out of 5]

repetitive but really good. has a lot of historical and sociopolitical evidence

[Paweł Czech · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anyone who is interested in the future of democracies should read this! I love how deep is author’s analysis! Highly recommended!

[Shray · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather peachy, optimistic view on diverse democracies. Good read with great stories.

[Leib Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

**Book Review**
**The Great Experiment**
4/5 stars

*"Speculation about things that only future historians will have answers to."*

---

* 10 chapters + conclusion
* 291 pages of prose (fabulously easy to read and non-pretentious)
* 26.5 pages per chapter/ enough to read one chapter over lunch or in a sitting)
* Dated (the book was published in 2022, and Joe Biden has come and gone, and Donald Trump has returned.)

---

This book talks about many things and contains a lot of food for thought.

In a nutshell, he is saying that, “Yes, a democracy could be multi-ethnic and successful IF the right steps are taken.” (Something that is highly experimental—“conspicuous by its absence” [p. 281].)

But there are several major flaws in his epistemic foundations:

### 1.

Trying to predict the direction of a democracy *ab initio* is like trying to predict the direction of an avalanche based on the starting snowflake and initial conditions. (It’s perfectly predictable in hindsight, but there’s no reason it could not have been otherwise.)

The relationships between the factors are too subtle for political and governing bodies to understand them and adjust their actions accordingly.

*Even* assuming that they want to. (Demagogues like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib stay employed as a result of grievance-mongering. Clerics in Lebanon and Saudi Arabia need constituents in order to do their jobs.)

### 2.

In the specific case of the United States, it has proven that it is not particularly good at the specific management of granular issues.

For example:

* Affirmative action was enacted only by executive order over several administrations (never properly legislated), and the government did not even construct a baseline against which it could make periodic comparisons to test the effectiveness of the policy.

* And let’s not forget that it took the better part of a century after Reconstruction to come up with the Civil Rights Act (approximately 50 different Congresses and 25 different presidencies).

### 3.

The author assumes equal cognitive ability among all of these different groups of people who come here or are already here. (And then perhaps the disparities would disappear.)

There is an abundance of data about substandard test scores pointing toward generally lower cognitive performance in some populations.

So what can *any* government really do about this?

More generally, where is the case in which some number of ethnic groups exist within a given space and are substantially equal in almost every way?

### 4.

This could have been a different book if Mounk had studied the small set of countries (not necessarily democratic ones) that have had multi-ethnic populations for a long time and are still stable. Or perhaps he could have examined the track record of successful multi-ethnic democracies.

China has had multiple ethnicities for thousands of years, and it has never brought up the issue of elections, and likely never will.

Iran is multi-ethnic, and a participatory democracy does not appear forthcoming.

Could we conclude that the stability of multi-ethnic states is negatively affected by democracy?

Ultimately, it will be what it is, and only future historians will be able to tell us what went wrong (or right)—of course, with a good deal of Monday-morning quarterbacking.

---

The author is intellectually disciplined and manages to keep his political opinions largely out of sight.

### 1.

But sometimes he slips from describing things as they are to asserting things as they *might be* based largely on his own judgment. For example (p. 176):

“But at times, the aspiration to be race-blind can turn into a reality of being racism-blind… These injustices need to be studied, acknowledged, and remedied.”

When one starts with these arguments, he gets on the same treadmill as the reparations advocates—who have gone nowhere since the topic was raised over a century ago.

And (p. 177):

“When neither that acknowledgment nor that apology is forthcoming, it is unsurprising that many people will refuse to buy into the airbrushed story their country tells about itself—and feel reluctant to embrace a shared identity.”

(More of the apology-for-slavery discussion. The U.S. military is one-third Black. It seems they buy into the shared identity disproportionately more. I believe the first apology for slavery was issued in 2008, and Black pathologies and income disparities have not magically abated.)

### 2a.

At some point, he becomes rather unrealistic (p. 256). The government just needs to offer “secure prosperity” and “universal solidarity” a generous welfare state), and it needs to “build a culture of mutual respect.”

In short, to go in the opposite direction suggested by Allport’s conditions letting people work together and build exposure that way).

### 2b.

And even more unrealistic (p. 263): “Supplement funding to schools in poor districts,” as if he has never heard of places like Washington, D.C. (best funded in the country, heavily Black, and predictably poor performing).

There are a number of interesting cases and factoids in this book:

1. Afghanistan’s failure to develop a government is explained as excessive, mutually antagonistic tribes.

2. The difficulties in Iraq are explained as a Shia state with a Sunni government. (Bahrain has the same case, is stable, and is not mentioned in this book.)

3. The author echoes Thomas Sowell (“Affirmative Action Around the World”) and makes a more general case.

4. I never knew that the division between Catholics, Protestants, and Socialists in the Netherlands was so deep—separate schools and separate television stations. (I have read this in one other place.)

5. (p. 238) Only one in four Hispanics saw themselves as “people of color.”

6. (p. 89) Allport’s four conditions for positive interaction among different ethnic groups:
a) equal status
b) common goals
c) intergroup cooperation
d) support from authorities and customs

(This is basically what happens when people get up and go to work every day. They learn to get along with different people.)

7. Majority-minority. Mounk lets us know that this is not what many academics wish it would be (i.e., the country dividing into “whites” and “people of color,” forming two blocs that do nothing but bicker with each other).

Sidebar: Many non-white people who live outside academic environments would argue that ethnic groups often do not see themselves as politically unified and may emphasize differences rather than solidarity.

8. (p. 251) “In Germany, a majority of immigrants and their descendants vote for right-wing parties. And in the United Kingdom, a conservative government has given a majority of the most important cabinet positions to politicians whose parents or grandparents arrived in the country.”

9. (p. 258) “Looking at 20 different countries over 140 years, they found that political parties on the far right appear to be the biggest political beneficiaries of a financial crash.”

Sidebar: AI and technology have been extremely economically disruptive in the United States. Are these developments the harbingers of a further rightward shift?

10. (p. 275) “There appears to be a tight empirical link between border enforcement and public views of immigration… Countries that have weakened their determination to control their own borders have seen attitudes toward immigration turn more hostile. By contrast, countries that have strengthened their control over their borders have seen citizens grow more welcoming of immigration.”

---

**Verdict:** I recommend this book at a price of no more than $7 and about three afternoons of reading time. It is worth a first read, but not a second.

**Vocabulary:**
Strategic essentialism
Usman Khan

**Outside Factoids:**

1. Black people make up 13% of the population but commit 50% of the crime.

2. According to FBI data, Black individuals account for 27% of all reported rapes, 53% of robberies, 33% of aggravated assaults, 30% of burglaries, 42% of weapons charges, and 42% of prostitution charges. Adjusted for population size, they are overrepresented in multiple crime categories.

[B. Glen Rotchin · Rating 3 out of 5]

You know how when you were in school your teachers would tell you to be as focused as you can when you are writing a paper? Don't bite off more than you can chew. Try not to take a big issue, solve a big problem, rather, pinpoint a small issue and delve deeply into it. That's the ticket to success. Well, credit Yascha Mounk for ambition, he throws that rule out the window, choosing perhaps the biggest political topic possible, and to my mind basically shows why your teachers were right. Not only does he want to define, identify and diagnose the uphill battle that diverse democracies face, it's democracies plural, because there are more than one kind, so not only in the US (which is his main example), European democracies as well. But he also wants to suggest new approaches to ensure their future stability. A big meal to digest. On the positive side this is a clearly written think-piece, which, in the most general terms, offers quite a lot of common sense, if not-terribly original, food for thought. But in the end, lumping the US with European countries, republican forms of democractic government with parliamentary forms, and countries with vastly different populations, cultures, histories and ethnic compositions, leaves one feeling that there's not much that's particularly useful to take away from the book. For example, here in Canada our political problems, although certainly influenced by American politics, bear little resemblance to our neighbours to the south (ie. the hard swing right) even though we may both be considered 'ethnically diverse' democracies. While the US seems to be on the brink of foundational upheaval, we in Canada appear to be very stable. There are several obvious reasons for this that dovetail nicely with Mounk's hypothesis ie. that we have a more developed social safety net and so our population has less disparity of wealth, we did not have slavery and such pronounced racial discrimination etc. And yet Canada has its own problems of racial discrimination and exploitation with indigenous communities. And we've also had domestic terrorism and a separatist movement that threatened to tear the country apart. Can the US be compared with Canada, both 'diverse democracies' but vastly different in so many basic ways, including age, size, wealth, status, system of governance, history etc.? I can understand why Mounk never mentions Canada, even though one might argue that as a North American neighbour of the US, the example of Canada would be more obvious comparison than say, comparing the US to Hungary, France or the UK. Incidentally he does not mention Mexico either. So, the book left me thinking that the more useful discussion, and maybe one that Mounk will take up in his next book, would be more specific, to demonstrate how those specific differences articulate themselves for the benefit of a democracy or against it.

[Damon · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most compelling thinkers of democracy, Mounk delivers a highly readable treatise on how citizens of diverse democracies can strengthen their democratic institutions in the face of anti-democratic forces from within the system.

Listeners of Mounk's podcast (and I am one) will find the arguments familiar, but the book manages to add to the rich volume of conversations and lay out a clear roadmap for how to interpret some of the challenges that democracies face, and how to mitigate them, in particular at the individual level. Mounk expertly points out many of the misdiagnoses from the far left and far right of the political spectrum in the US, and gives a strong voice to the moderate middle which often gets subsumed by more shrill commentary.

This book is the perfect antidote to a diet of mainstream media that seems all too willing to overemphasize systemic flaws at the expense of inherent strengths.

[Enee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Firstly, though I am a constant follower of international relations and student of its theories, I am a bit new to the world of IR literature. I have read only a few books on theories in recent years.

That being said, I found Mounk's work to be incredibly thought provoking about the future of this new era of diverse liberal states; this is a topic that I am particularly interested in. While I have read some critiques stating that Mounk is unnecessarily optimistic and personal, this added to the context of the book for me as it gave some context to the author's perspective and experiences. Additionally, I find the optimism to be incredibly relatable and justified as we are truly entering a new era of globalism in which racial diversity on an unprecedented scale will be the next step for liberal democracies and the world to achieve both peace and efficiency. In my life living between numerous cultures in Asia and the United States, I have often wondered where this system could be headed; could it even be possible for this unrecognizable demographic composition of equal and diverse cultures to persevere under one state? After reading Mounk's book, I believe that the answer is yes.