From the Publisher: A cultural history of the last forty years, The Age of American Unreason focuses on the convergence of social forces-usually treated as separate entities-that has created a perfect storm of anti-rationalism. These include the upsurge of religious fundamentalism, with more political power today than ever before; the failure of public education to create an informed citizenry; and the triumph of video over print culture. Sparing neither the right nor the left, Jacoby asserts that Americans today have embraced a universe of "junk thought" that makes almost no effort to separate fact from opinion

What does it mean to be an American today? What does it mean to be middle class? Public opinion polls tell us that the nation is deeply divided between the Right, which is religious, traditional, as well as distressed by the belief that the nation has gone seriously downhill, and the Left, which is pro-choice, pro-welfare, as well as sympathetic to multiculturalism and gay rights. After spending two years speaking with middle-class Americans of many religious and ethnic backgrounds in eight different communities around the country, leading sociologist Alan Wolfe comes to the surprising conclusion that we are in fact one nation, after all. In this work, Wolfe presents a new picture of who the typical middle-class American is, and what he or she thinks about the most important issues of our day, including religion, family, work, immigration, welfare, racism, and our ability to trust one another. What One Nation, After All shows is that Americans really are in the center. Wolfe also shows us that we have become the nation our founding fathers said we ought to be, that the greatest political experiment in the world has not only succeeded, but succeeded brilliantly. And yet our politicians have no idea what Americans think, and the media polls and social critics are consistently off the mark, raising disturbing questions about the future of our country.

In this book, Amitai Etzioni, public intellectual and leading proponent of communitarian values, defends the view that no society can flourish without a shared obligation to "the common good." Rejecting claims made by some liberal thinkers that it is not possible to balance individual rights with uncoerced civic responsibility, Etzioni explores a number of key issues which pose important questions for those concerned with promoting the common good in contemporary society. Are we morally obliged to do more for our communities beyond treating everyone as endowed with basic rights? Should privacy be regarded not merely as a right but also as an obligation? And should the right to free speech take priority over the need to protect children from harmful material in the media and on the internet? and public safety in an age of global terrorism. He evaluates various new government devices, from wiretaps to viruses, which open our lives to public scrutiny. Particular attention is given to the issues surrounding government-issued DNA tests. The book concludes by questioning whether we can still talk of a relationship between the common good and the nation-state, or whether the "online" society in which we live will make it increasingly difficult to maintain those communities which are the very homeland of the common good. will be important reading for students and scholars of political science, social philosophy, sociology, and public policy, as well as for the interested general reader.