I have two regrets about The Three Languages of Politics, both of which concern the cover.
1. I am really jealous of the graphic for Andrew Sullivan’s piece in New York Magazine. It depicts three separate clusters of sheep, with each cluster a different color. You get the sense that each individual sheep wants desperately to be in the middle of its cluster, so they crowd closer together. As they crowd closer together within a cluster, the more distinct the clusters become from one another.
2. I think that the subtitle we came up with, “talking across the political divides,” is misleading. It makes it sound as though I offer a pat solution for political polarization. Instead, I delve into the nature of the problem. In terms of the sheep-clustering metaphor, I talk about what makes us cluster and the importance of resisting the urge to push into the middle of your cluster.
A major unanswered question is whether any of the three clusters of sheep actually offer a better solution than the others. A priori, I don’t see any reason to presume they are each equally baaaaad. Someone else might say that a priori they can’t make an assumption about which is the best; but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a best.
Obviously, most people their own cluster has the best solutions, and the cluster only exists because its members are drawn to the truth. Ask Paul Krugman, and he’ll probably tell you that conservatives and libertarians are tribal and polarized; but progressives aren’t; they’re just right.
I think perhaps the point is that one has to think outside the cluster-based paradigm to properly evaluate which has ‘the best solution.’ More over, clusters are based on a broad range of issues, so if one cluster has the best solution to one, and another cluster the best solution to another, the clustering impedes the capacity of each to realize the inferiority of particular ideas from their own cluster.
So, one could content that, most likely, all major clusters are significantly in error. The question is, what matters more to you: finding the right position (which will probably require deviation from your cluster, though how much depends on which cluster you’re in) or defending your cluster’s position (which requires some forfeiture of truth, though how much depends on which cluster you’re in)?
Love your three languages book. I have both editions. And agree on your two points on an improved cover.
That sheep photo would have been great. If you have a 3rd edition, that’s kind of image is the cover.
For a subtitle , the idea of incomprehension across divides captures the spirit of the book better. But “incomprehension across political divides” is not pithy enough. Maybe more like “the dialects of division”. Or understanding the dialects of division.
How about “the hidden structure behind every political argument”? Think how much better political journalism would be if every reporter regularly made use of these categories in their explainers. The linked article makes the same mistake of describing tribes without explaining why they are tribes, I think.
Keep up the great work!!!!
One topical exception to the three-axis model might be gun control. The libertarian case for gun rights is made along the liberty-coercion axis, but the progressive case against guns does not seem to be about privilege. In fact, the progressive case seems more like an anti-barbarism argument that conservatives might make: guns lead to violent destruction of society.
Progressives do often argue that the reason we don’t have tougher gun laws is because of the NRA’s power, but every tribe argues that special interests are powerful. Progressives don’t really argue that the *underlying reason* the NRA supports gun rights is somehow a reflection of privilege. One might also argue that gun rights are seen (by both progressives and conservatives) as rights that primarily rural whites care about and that progressive antipathy for guns reflects antipathy for rural whites. However, I haven’t heard any progressives try to argue that rural white support for gun rights reflects some sort of white privilege.