Book Review -- Why We're Polarized

Ezra Klein is flat out brilliant. He has his own great ideas, but his magical power is synthesis. For his book Why We're Polarized, he read volumes and volumes of material and interviewed countless experts. And then he analyzed, synthesized, and organized all of that information into a coherent story. And he made it easy to read -- digestible -- without sacrificing reference to the underlying research and analysis that supports his work. 

I've read many of the books and articles that he references. Most of the concepts he highlights are familiar to me. The new ground he paves is in the logically constructed big picture where all the pieces fit together and make sense -- even if the big picture isn't particularly attractive.

He starts with historical context and how the supposed "golden age" (when both parties were on average more moderate and willing to compromise) was the result of a devil's bargain with southern racists. When that bargain fell apart after the passage of civil rights laws in the 1960's, we began to sort ourselves into liberals and conservatives aligned by party.

Klein's pillar premise is that we are living in Identity politics with a capital "I." Most of our identities are stacked and aligned with our political party so that our party affiliation becomes a mega-identity. And the other party becomes Other with a capital "O." Our party's success and the other party's failure become equally important (which is how our hard-coded group think works). 

He spends a lot of time exploring how Trump won the nomination and ultimately concludes that in some ways, it didn't matter. Many Republican party leaders were terrified that Trump would win the nomination but helpless to prevent it. And in the end, their hatred of Hilary and everything she stands for trumped their disdain for Trump. That's fundamentally important to understanding our polarization -- being against is just as important, if not more so, as being for.

Klein examines the media's role in fostering the polarization and ultimately enabling Trump. And he highlights stark differences in how Democrats and Republicans consume media. An important part of the Democrat's identity is embracing diversity -- width rather than depth. Republicans are precisely the opposite. Depth explains Fox News. Breadth explains a Democrat's willingness to read much more broadly (but not Fox News).

Klein also talks about how the idea of balance written into our Constitution was built around the idea that the individual states would have competing interests. They would have to compromise to achieve results that a majority of states could accept. Seeking compromise among many states is far different from trying to seek compromise between two nearly equal, diametrically opposed political parties. Nor did the Founding Fathers conceive of a time when population would be spread so unequally among the states. Their notion of balancing geography and the competing interest of the various states has, in our time, lead to gross inequity in representation.

I've only scratched the surface of Klein's analysis. His book is eye-opening and sobering. Although he has suggestions that might soften the hard edges of partisanship or blunt its effects, basically it is hard to see an optimistic way forward.