The Great Experiment

* SELECTED FOR BARACK OBAMA'S SUMMER READING LIST 2022 *

'Anyone interested in the future of liberal democracy should read this book'

ANNE APPLEBAUM

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One of our most important political thinkers looks to the greatest challenge of our time: how to live together equally and peacefully in diverse democracies.

It’s easy to be pessimistic about the fate of democracy in multi-ethnic societies. At the end of the Second World War, fewer than one in twenty-five people living in the UK were born abroad; now it is one in seven. The history of humankind is a story of us versus them, and the project of diverse democracies is a relatively new one – it is, in other words, a great experiment.

How do identity groups with different ideologies and beliefs live together? Is it possible to embark on a democracy with shared values if our values are at odds?

Yascha Mounk argues that group identity is both deeply rooted and malleable. No community is beyond conciliation: groups are moving towards cooperation across the world. The Great Experiment offers a profound understanding of the problem behind all our other problems, and genuine hope for our capacity to solve it.