The democratic ideal demands that the citizenry think critically about matters of public import. Yet many Democrats and Republicans in the United States have fallen short of that standard because political tribalism motivates them to acquire, perceive and evaluate political information in a biased manner. The result is an electorate that is more extreme, hostile and willing to reject unfavorable democratic outcomes. In this work, the author provides a host of actionable strategies that are designed to reduce the influence of political tribalism in our lives. The text includes instructions for plumbing the depths of political views; evaluating sources of political information; engaging in difficult political conversations; appraising political data; and assessing political arguments. The first of its kind, this how-to guide is a must-read for partisans who want to become more critical political thinkers.

Discusses the failure of America's political elites to recognize how group identities drive politics both at home and abroad, and outlines recommendations for reversing the country's foreign policy failures and overcoming destructive political tribalism at home.

From MSNBC correspondent Steve Kornacki, a lively and sweeping history of the birth of political tribalism in the 1990s—one that brings critical new understanding to our current political landscape from Clinton to Trump In The Red and the Blue, cable news star and acclaimed journalist Steve Kornacki follows the twin paths of Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich, two larger-than-life politicians who exploited the weakened structure of their respective parties to attain the highest offices. For Clinton, that meant contorting himself around the various factions of the Democratic party to win the presidency. Gingrich employed a scorched-earth strategy to upend the permanent Republican minority in the House, making him Speaker. The Clinton/Gingrich battles were bare-knuckled brawls that brought about massive policy shifts and high-stakes showdowns—their collisions had far-reaching political consequences. But the ’90s were not just about them. Kornacki writes about Mario Cuomo’s stubborn presence around Clinton’s 1992 campaign; Hillary Clinton’s star turn during the 1998 midterms, seeding the idea for her own candidacy; Ross Perot’s wild run in 1992 that inspired him to launch the Reform Party, giving Donald Trump his first taste of electoral politics in 1999; and many others. With novelistic prose and a clear sense of history, Steve Kornacki masterfully weaves together the various elements of this rambunctious and hugely impactful era in American history, whose effects set the stage for our current political landscape.

In the “tribal moment in American politics,” which occurred from the 1950s to the mid- to late-1970s, American Indians waged civil disobedience for tribal self-determination and fought from within the U.S. legal and political systems. The U.S. government responded characteristically, overall wielding its authority in incremental, frequently double-edged ways that simultaneously opened and restricted tribal options. The actions of Native Americans and public officials brought about a new era of tribal-American relations in which tribal sovereignty has become a central issue, underpinning self-determination, and involving the tribes, states, and federal government in intergovernmental cooperative activities as well as jurisdictional skirmishes. American Indian tribes struggle still with the impacts of a capitalist economy on their traditional ways of life. Most rely heavily on federal support. Yet they have also called on tribal sovereignty to protect themselves. Asking how and why the United States is willing to accept tribal sovereignty, this book examines the development of the “order” of Indian affairs. Beginning with the nation’s founding, it brings to light the hidden assumptions in that order. It examines the underlying deep contradictions that have existed in the relationship between the United States and the tribes as the order has evolved, up to and into the “tribal moment.”

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • An urgent argument that America and other democracies are in peril because they have lost the will to defend the values and institutions that sustain freedom and prosperity. Now updated with a new preface! “Epic and debate-shifting.”—David Brooks, New York Times Only once in the last 250,000 years have humans stumbled upon a way to lift ourselves out of the endless cycle of poverty, hunger, and war that defines most of history. If democracy, individualism, and the free market were humankind’s destiny, they should have appeared and taken hold a bit earlier in the evolutionary record. The emergence of freedom and prosperity was nothing short of a miracle. As Americans we are doubly blessed, because the radical ideas that made the miracle possible were written not just into the Constitution but in our hearts, laying the groundwork for our uniquely prosperous society. Those ideas are: • Our rights come from God, not from the government. • The government belongs to us; we do not belong to it. • The individual is sovereign. We are all captains of our own souls, not bound by the circumstances of our birth. • The fruits of our labors belong to us. In the last few decades, these political virtues have been turned into vices. As we are increasingly taught to view our traditions as a system of oppression, exploitation, and privilege, the principles of liberty and the rule of law are under attack from left and right. For the West to survive, we must renew our sense of gratitude for what our civilization has given us and rediscover the ideals and habits of the heart that led us out of the bloody muck of the past—or back to the muck we will go.

An investigation of how tribalism affected the evolution of the human mind. The analysis reveals a process that beliefs are a primary means of group identification and are a natural component of the evolution of human thought and culture. The results are mental processes that divide population groups into "us" and "them" which result in methods of thought and perception that affect major areas of human culture, specifically politics and religion. Us Against Them argues that the essential difference between the religious/conservative and the secular/liberal is driven by tribalism, not ideology. This is evidenced by the exclusive nature of conservative ideology that divides people into separate groups as evidenced by common features such as "you're with us or against us", "believers and heretics", and "attack to defend". The book is written for the general public without technical jargon and is arranged as a series of arguments in the manner of traditional philosophy.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The acclaimed social psychologist challenges conventional thinking about morality, politics, and religion in a way that speaks to conservatives and liberals alike—a “landmark contribution to humanity’s understanding of itself” (The New York Times Book Review). Drawing on his twenty-five years of groundbreaking research on moral psychology, Jonathan Haidt shows how moral judgments arise not from reason but from gut feelings. He shows why liberals, conservatives, and libertarians have such different intuitions about right and wrong, and he shows why each side is actually right about many of its central concerns. In this subtle yet accessible book, Haidt gives you the key to understanding the miracle of human cooperation, as well as the curse of our eternal divisions and conflicts. If you’re ready to trade in anger for understanding, read The Righteous Mind.

Unearthing the most primal motivations behind the fear politics movements sweeping across the USA, Europe, and the Middle East, Stevan E. Hobfoll examines how the increasing sense of threat from the political and cultural “other” or “outsider” engenders an evolutionary, built-in “defend and aggress” response. This deep-wired evolutionary response is a defining aspect of our tribal origins and has allowed for the rise of propaganda, extremist politics, and—in turn—violence. In this timely work, which binds theories in psychology, sociology, evolution, biology, linguistics, iconography, rhetoric, and religion, Hobfoll explores the tribalist roots of radical militant Islam, violence against women, white supremacy, the rise of authoritarian leaders, and an increasingly polarized and uncompromising political landscape. Grounded in evolutionary psychological research, Hobfoll’s long term study of stress, and in conversation with contemporary academic literature, Tribalism not only offers an explanation for society’s worst impulses, but also points us towards the best protections against tribalism and other evolutionary traps.

Winner • National Council of Teachers of English - George Orwell Award for Distinguished Contribution to Honesty and Clarity in Public Language The “philosopher of truth” (Jill Lepore, The New Yorker) returns with a clear-eyed and timely critique of our culture’s narcissistic obsession with thinking that “we” know and “they” don’t. Taking stock of our fragmented political landscape, Michael Patrick Lynch delivers a trenchant philosophical take on digital culture and its tendency to make us into dogmatic know-it-alls. The internet—where most shared news stories are not even read by the person posting them—has contributed to the rampant spread of “intellectual arrogance.” In this culture, we have come to think that we have nothing to learn from one another; we are rewarded for emotional outrage over reflective thought; and we glorify a defensive rejection of those different from us. Interweaving the works of classic philosophers such as Hannah Arendt and Bertrand Russell and imposing them on a cybernetic future they could not have possibly even imagined, Lynch delves deeply into three core ideas that explain how we’ve gotten to the way we are: • our natural tendency to be overconfident in our knowledge; • the tribal politics that feed off our tendency; • and the way the outrage factory of social media spreads those politics of arrogance and blind conviction. In addition to identifying an ascendant “know-it-all-ism” in our culture, Lynch offers practical solutions for how we might start reversing this dangerous trend—from rejecting the banality of emoticons that rarely reveal insight to embracing the tenets of Socrates, who exemplified the humility of admitting how little we often know about the world, to the importance of dialogue if we want to know more. With bracing and deeply original analysis, Lynch holds a mirror up to American culture to reveal that the sources of our fragmentation start with our attitudes toward truth. Ultimately, Know-It-All Society makes a powerful new argument for the indispensable value of truth and humility in democracy.

This New York Times bestseller “argues that Americans are richer, more informed and ‘connected’ than ever—and unhappier, more isolated and less fulfilled” (George Will, The Washington Post). Something is wrong. We all know it. American life expectancy is declining. Birth rates are dropping. Nearly half of us think the other political party isn’t just wrong; they’re evil. We’re the richest country in history, but we’ve never been more pessimistic. What’s causing the despair? In Them, former US senator Ben Sasse argues that, contrary to conventional wisdom, our crisis isn’t really about politics. It’s that we’re so lonely we can’t see straight—and it bubbles out as anger. Local communities are collapsing. Across the nation, little leagues and Rotary clubs are dwindling, and in all likelihood, we don’t know the neighbor two doors down. Work offers less security, few lifelong coworkers, shallow purpose. Stable families and enduring friendships—life’s fundamental pillars—are in statistical freefall. As a result, we rally against common enemies so we can feel part of a team. Foreign adversaries use technology to exploit these toxic divisions by sowing misinformation and mistrust, to confuse us, exhaust us, make us angry—and thereby make us weaker. Reversing our decline requires something radical: a rediscovery of real places and human-to-human relationships. Even as technology nudges us to become rootless, Sasse shows how only a recovery of rootedness can heal our lonely souls. America wants you to be happy, but more urgently, America needs you to love your neighbor and connect with your community. Fixing what’s wrong with the country depends on it. “Sasse is highly attuned to the cultural sources of our current discontents and dysfunctions. . . . an attempt to diagnose and repair what has led us to this moment of spittle-flecked rage. . . . a step toward healing a hurting nation.” —National Review “Perhaps at last we have a politician capable of writing a good book rather than having a dull one written for him.” —The Wall Street Journal “Unpretentious, thoughtful, and at times, quite funny . . . his arguments are worth reading—as are his warnings about what our country might become.” —NPR