Why We're Polarized

ONE OF BARACK OBAMAS FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2022 One of Bill Gatess 5 books to read this summer, this New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller shows us that Americas political system isnt broken. The truth is scarier: its working exactly as designed. In this superbly researched (The Washington Post) and timely book, journalist Ezra Klein reveals how that system is polarizing usand how we are polarizing itwith disastrous results. The American political systemwhich includes everyone from voters to journalists to the presidentis full of rational actors making rational decisions given the incentives they face, writes political analyst Ezra Klein. We are a collection of functional parts whose efforts combine into a dysfunctional whole. A thoughtful, clear and persuasive analysis (The New York Times Book Review), Why Were Polarized reveals the structural and psychological forces behind Americas descent into division and dysfunction. Neither a polemic nor a lament, this book offers a clear framework for understanding everything from Trumps rise to the Democratic Partys leftward shift to the politicization of everyday culture. America is polarized, first and foremost, by identity. Everyone engaged in American politics is engaged, at some level, in identity politics. Over the past fifty years in America, our partisan identities have merged with our racial, religious, geographic, ideological, and cultural identities. These merged identities have attained a weight that is breaking much in our politics and tearing at the bonds that hold this country together. Klein shows how and why American politics polarized around identity in the 20th century, and what that polarization did to the way we see the world and one another. And he traces the feedback loops between polarized political identities and polarized political institutions that are driving our system toward crisis. Well worth reading (New York magazine), this is an eye-opening (O, The Oprah Magazine) book that will change how you look at politicsand perhaps at yourself.