How Books Can Save Democracy – Michael Fischer

In practice, seeing the world through the eyes of others credits them with the same humanity we claim for ourselves: the same capacity for hope, love, fear, and grief that informs our own lives and gives us the right to expect consideration from others. Mandela’s willingness to establish a personal connection with his adversaries bolstered his ability to compromise with them and allow them a chance to move with him beyond the past. By strengthening his relationships with Afrikaner leaders, Mandela backed up his commitment to include them in the new society taking shape.

He gave them reasons to trust that his vision of South Africa included them. In dysfunctional or faltering democracies, the values I have been attributing to Mandela collapse into their opposites. Empathy gives way to bitter polarization and dehumanization, compromise to unyielding opposition, and forgiveness to an unrelenting quest for retribution. A perpetual fight to the finish results when despising one’s adversaries drives decisions and commitments.

I am for x because the opponents I despise are against it, and I will do everything I can to defeat what I see as their threat to who I am and what I value. I can’t imagine talking with these adversaries, let alone working things out with them. The issue triggering unbounded conflict between bitter enemies can be almost anything, from climate change and public health policies to the choice of a carryout.

The constructive debates that democracies depend on devolve into shouting matches or vicious attacks that disputants can imagine ending only when their side wipes out the other. Like the people cursing Elizabeth Eckford, citizens who have lost faith in dialogue, elections, and persuasion gravitate toward undemocratic ways of achieving their political goals, including bullying, intimidation, violence, and in some cases support for authoritarian leaders who promise to protect their supporters from their despicable enemies and to get things done on their behalf.

The autocratic boast “I alone can fix it” gains support when people lose confidence in working out their differences with others. In dysfunctional democracies, in short, opportunities for disagreement multiply while trust in peacefully resolving conflict declines. It is a terrible combination. In these backsliding democracies, instead of everyday life tempering political differences (Tocqueville’s ideal), toxic political divisions seep into everyday life, turning even friends and family members into strangers and adversaries.

There’s no escaping political strife, no respite from all the fighting. The habits of the heart that sustain democracy can’t find a foothold anywhere, not even in an everyday lunch in a park. We end up dreading family gatherings instead of looking forward to them.

San Antonio, Texas 78212 Copyright © 2025 by Michael Fischer All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher. Book design by Anne Richmond Boston Author photo by Jeri Krentz ISBN 978-1-59534-321-5 paper ISBN 978-1-59534-322-2 ebook Trinity University Press strives to produce its books using methods and materials in an environmentally sensitive manner. We favor working with manufacturers that practice sustainable management of all natural resources, produce paper using recycled stock, and manage forests with the best possible practices for people, biodiversity, and sustainability.

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In Zadie Smith’s short story “The Waiter’s Wife” (1999), three women are sitting on a park bench in 1970s London: Clara Jones, of Jamaican ancestry, pictured by Smith as “a black girl with a winning smile”; Alsana Iqbal, a recently arrived immigrant from Bangladesh; and Neena, Alsana’s niece. Clara and Alsana are both pregnant. Clara is expecting a girl and Alsana twin boys. Clara and Alsana have gotten to know each other through their husbands, longtime friends who served together in World War II.

Alsana calls Neena “Niece-of-Shame” because she objects so strongly to Neena’s westernized political and cultural opinions, which reflect her experience as a university student. As the women talk and eat, Alsana and her niece quarrel early and often, with Neena provoking Alsana by belittling her as a “little submissive Indian woman” much too subservient to her husband. “It’s 1975,” Neena scolds Alsana. “You can’t conduct relationships like that any more.

It’s not like back home. There has to be communication between men and women in the West, they’ve got to listen to each other. . . .” Their conflict escalates when Neena brings up what especially bothers her about Alsana: her arranged marriage (“How could you bear to marry someone you didn’t know from Adam?”). An infuriated Alsana defends her marriage as “by far the easier option,” but that doesn’t stop Neena. Things get even more tense when Neena goes on to lament that Alsana is expecting boys: “I mean, I just think men have caused enough chaos this century.

There’s enough bloody men in the world. If I knew I was going to have a boy. . . I’d have to seriously consider abortion.” Alsana is outraged, to put it mildly.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: d27f45c6337b11a7
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 1,006,909 bytes (0.96 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• ISBN: 9781595343215, 9781595343222
• Pages: 41
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 58.85 minutes
• Total Words: 11,770
• Total Characters: 74,984
• Average Words per Page: 287.07
• Average Characters per Page: 1828.88

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