Why Politics Fails

£20.00

Why Politics Fails: The Five Traps of the Modern World & How to Escape Them | By Ben Ansell

Democracy: we all want a say in how we're governed, but it's impossible to have any true 'will of the people'. Equality: we want to be treated equally, but equal rights and equal outcomes undermine each other.

Solidarity: we want a safety net when times are tough, but often we care about solidarity only when we need it ourselves. Security: we want protecting from harm, but not if it undermines our freedoms. Prosperity: we want to be richer tomorrow, but what makes us richer in the short run makes us poorer over the long haul.

You've probably noticed a pattern here, which is that our self-interest undermines our ability to deliver on our collective goals. And these traps reinforce one another, so a polarized democracy can worsen inequality; a threadbare social safety net can worsen crime; runaway climate change will threaten global peace. Drawing on examples from Ancient Greece through Brexit and using his own counterintuitive and pathbreaking research - on why democracy thrives under high inequality, and how increased political and social equality can lead to greater class inequality - Ansell vividly illustrates how we can escape the political traps of our imperfect world.

He shows that politics won't end, but that it doesn't have to fail.

Quantity:
Add To Cart

Why Politics Fails: The Five Traps of the Modern World & How to Escape Them | By Ben Ansell

Democracy: we all want a say in how we're governed, but it's impossible to have any true 'will of the people'. Equality: we want to be treated equally, but equal rights and equal outcomes undermine each other.

Solidarity: we want a safety net when times are tough, but often we care about solidarity only when we need it ourselves. Security: we want protecting from harm, but not if it undermines our freedoms. Prosperity: we want to be richer tomorrow, but what makes us richer in the short run makes us poorer over the long haul.

You've probably noticed a pattern here, which is that our self-interest undermines our ability to deliver on our collective goals. And these traps reinforce one another, so a polarized democracy can worsen inequality; a threadbare social safety net can worsen crime; runaway climate change will threaten global peace. Drawing on examples from Ancient Greece through Brexit and using his own counterintuitive and pathbreaking research - on why democracy thrives under high inequality, and how increased political and social equality can lead to greater class inequality - Ansell vividly illustrates how we can escape the political traps of our imperfect world.

He shows that politics won't end, but that it doesn't have to fail.

Why Politics Fails: The Five Traps of the Modern World & How to Escape Them | By Ben Ansell

Democracy: we all want a say in how we're governed, but it's impossible to have any true 'will of the people'. Equality: we want to be treated equally, but equal rights and equal outcomes undermine each other.

Solidarity: we want a safety net when times are tough, but often we care about solidarity only when we need it ourselves. Security: we want protecting from harm, but not if it undermines our freedoms. Prosperity: we want to be richer tomorrow, but what makes us richer in the short run makes us poorer over the long haul.

You've probably noticed a pattern here, which is that our self-interest undermines our ability to deliver on our collective goals. And these traps reinforce one another, so a polarized democracy can worsen inequality; a threadbare social safety net can worsen crime; runaway climate change will threaten global peace. Drawing on examples from Ancient Greece through Brexit and using his own counterintuitive and pathbreaking research - on why democracy thrives under high inequality, and how increased political and social equality can lead to greater class inequality - Ansell vividly illustrates how we can escape the political traps of our imperfect world.

He shows that politics won't end, but that it doesn't have to fail.

The Light of Asia
£30.00
Free to Obey
£12.99
Your Wild and Precious Life
£16.99
Atlas of Unexpected Places
£9.99
Dragged Up Proppa
£10.99