A healthy democracy thrives on ideological struggle, robust debate, dissent and compromise. But, in the 1850s and 60s, deep splits drove the country to civil war. Has the divide really healed? The same fault lines exist today, on race, geography, ideology, culture and class, and some argue that divisions are becoming more and more extreme. When the “other side” becomes illegitimate, the room for democracy shrinks. When politics is the problem, can it also provide the solution?
Guests: Joanne Freeman,author The Field of Blood: Congressional Violence in Antebellum America; Jennifer McCoy , distinguished university professor at Georgia State University, who leads an international research group on polarized democracies ; Kwame Anthony Appiah , author , Cosmopolitan: Ethics in a World of Strangers.