global conversation about proper free orders is going to have to part with the theological conversation so i think that's where i would begin by saying what they got to understand the different ideas and the different ideologies and we can assume they are going away. because they come back to life. >> thank you. >> and we give our speakers a round of applause? [applause] >> thank you david and great questions and thank you for all the great questions and i'm glad i didn't have to answer them thank you chris and kevin for doing that and we will reconvene and 50 minutes at 10:30 for a panel on civic virtue. >> thank you for being here. i'm dustin and i'm a fellow at

the stockdale center. it's a great pleasure to be a peer with chair wits to discuss virtue. peter wits is a senior fellow at the institution. you ball up and is director of constitutional studies at the american enterprise institute and the author of numerous books and we will start i think with peter. >> thank you very much. it's great to be here with my fellow panelists and thanks to ed at the naval academy for this opportunity. i thought it might be useful and unusual for me at least to approach the panel is topics civic virtue it's decline it's

reinvigoration but a somewhat autobiographical perspective. long ago and far away when i went to college the cutting-edge topic was something that we called the grave tone, the critique of liberalism. and we had leading authors and books. i was at college and we read a book called knowledge and politics by roberto unger, a kind of genius underlining both words. we read the writings back of charles taylor and alastair mcintyre. especially influenced by book called after virtue. some of you have studied political theory may be familiar with this book. the core argument of mcintyre's book of great interest for those who are

interested the critique of liberalism and liberalism the course meant the modern tradition of freedom. mcintyre's core argument to be familiar to many the especially those of you who follow debates about post liberalism mcintyre's argument 40 years ago was we have lost the ability to beat speaking co-lay about the virtues of excellence is of mind and character. we have even forgotten we modern contemporary men and women we have forgotten the virtues are central to the moral life. the culprit is liberalism, but modern tradition of freedom. according to mcintyre nietzsche expose the incoherent of this modern tradition of freedom and nietzsche showed the modern position of freedom inevitably to tear it into

nihilism. but argued mcintyre somehow nietzsche's criticism did not reach the thinking of modern figures most notably aristotle and the aristotelian tradition and therefore argued mcintyre our choice was a stark one. nietzsche and nihilism currently arisa trew and tradition and the virtue. faced with that choice all reasonable people would choose the course aristotle. the aristotelian tradition which includes coyness synthesis of aristotle and christian -- that outline of the history of uncle philosophy should sound familiar especially to those people that follow contemporary debates in the views of the post liberal.

now i want to assert and i'll be brief here of course that mcintyre's analysis was wrong in all major respects. i say that as someone who greatly admires mcintyre from whom i've learned more than almost any thinker but nevertheless i think he was wrong about nietzsche wrong about aristotle and wrong about the modern liberal tradition. here i can mostly only assert these claims and sketch what i think is a better view but i hope the assertions in this sketch will shed some light on her question civic virtue in the liberal rights protecting democracy. and what i say about mcintyre at think applies to the post

literal critique of literalism first. mcintyre misrepresents nietzsche's critique of philosophy. nietzsche did not show specifically modern philosophy was an expression of will and he did not believe himself to have schoen. nietzsche believed he had come to something much more radical but he believed to establish that all great philosophy plato and aristotle no less than lock and comment more culpably than monem velocity was reducible to the moral intention of the philosophers themselves in all restaurants and beginning with plato and at the moment nietzsche was thinking in the 19th century old but calm unaided and nihilism. so contrary to mcintyre nietzsche's critique embraced

classical and medieval political thought. second contrary to mcintyre aristotelian political science does not dictate their repudiation of liberal democracy, a regime based on the premise that human beings are by nature created equal. aristotelian political science does not demand his replacement with a regime devoted to the promotion of virtue. rather aristotelian political science sets forth an alternative way of understanding liberal democracy. an alternative however that takes the regime as it is based on the premise natural freedom and equality devoted to protecting the rights and focuses on the aristotelian political science that is focuses on liberal democracies abiding principals and looks for

ways to preserve and improve liberal democracy. the politics aristotle does describe the best regime that is devoted to promoting virtue. he does not however put it gently. more less he advises the two are extremely unlikely not just at this moment in the 21st century but in ancient greece as well. you are extremely unlikely to live in a regime devoted to the promotion of virtue and aristotle ads adds you are extremely unlikely to find yourself in the circumstance that allows you to build on that best regime. the most we can recently hope for is an imperfect regime. aristotle called it polity of a regime in which some people,

they are in the minority are wealthy and the majority tends to be less wealthy and they are balanced by a large middle class. each class contributes distinctive virtues and vices to this mixed regime. in short, particularly if you live in a regime that recognizes democratic freedom and equality aristotelian political science recommends measures of accommodation, balancing calibration to prevent the regime from veteri being into something much worse. so much for nietzsche and aristotelian political science. mcintyre's third big error. he wrongly argues that liberalism is better to call it the modern tradition of freedom repudiates or renders incoherent

the moral virtues. so if you decades ago now inspired by mcintyre i set out to write a book that more less vindicated that peace is the tradition repudiates or renders incoherent an account of moral virtue. before it began writing in earnest i undertook due diligence so with the resolve to reread a major figure of the modern tradition of freedom hobbes locke mail just to make sure there were no stray mentions of virtue here and there. and they could establish the liberal tradition was not only repudiated the virtues but was intrinsically incapable of giving them account. i started with hobbes who seem to me the easiest case. maybe not a liberal or

proto-liberal. he was for inalienable rights and government protects them that he was known as the of -- yet of political theory based on the mechanistic understanding of nature and the hedonistic view of humanity. so course he had no room for virtue. in i began rereading leviathan. the deduction i thought maybe i had a misbegotten copy of it but right there in the introduction the first page hobbes says all serious study of politics is based on the syncretic maxim know thyself. and to engage in political science one had to study ones own passions, compare those passions with the passions of others and reason from the passion listed in some

mechanistic and connected to what i understood to be political science that appreciated the virtues. qualities of excellence. so i was only slightly thrown off. then i got to the end of chapter 15 of leviathan. chapter 15 it's three crucial chapters in which hobbes discusses the state of nature and lays out 19 laws of nature that enable us to leave the state of nature and create political society. the laws of nature. and at the end of chapter 15 he writes he says the ways our means to peace our justice, gratitude modesty, equity, mercy and the rest of the laws of nature which are good.

that is to say moral virtues and he adds the science of virtue and buys his moral philosophy. i set out to ride back a book that said this tradition notes nothing of the virtues calling mcintyre and can't make sense of them and hobbes is telling me at the end of chapter 15 that actually the laws of nature are not really lost and are theorems in more than that they name quality of minding character. and with each additional thinker i studied i had a similar experience. i will only mention locke here. lock much-maligned taken as a kind of figure by the posts of liberal is a turning point for responsible for establishing a philosophy of obsessively focused on individual freedom

but an individual freedom that really means radical emancipation from all external causes. lock is really a postmodern. but they are him rereading john locke and i come to chapter 6 in the middle of an account of book of the origins of the extent the aims of political power, the chapter on education and the family and parents essential role of comparing their children daughters as well as sons rights of freedom by disciplining them, by teaching them the virtues and then i'm guided to a book of thoughts concerning education and some thoughts concerning education john locke with typically president once again

is obsessed radical he would freedom provide a manual for parents on how to educate their children. what is that at the heart of lockean education? a moral virtue to enjoy freedom into main freedom argues locke children need to be raised and disciplined by their parents in a way to inculcate a whole range of qualities of mind and character. locke insisted moral and was essential to society based organized freedom. i wanted to say something simpler about kant and mills and many others in the tradition of freedom. to conclude what about today? they certainly do suffer from a dearth of serb -- civic virtue. one can identify a multiplicity

of causes. mater dei cyclization, the unraveling of the traditional family the decline of community. as liberal democracy itself undermined the virtues necessary to his survival and opposed la rosa are fought so fond of saying. answer, guess of course it does. i immediately had this important qualification. liberal democracy undermines the virtues on which it depends by taking it's principle, the principle of individual freedom to an extreme but supposed liberals who are so fond of making this argument in the name of aristotle forget aristotle's teaching which is also plato's teachings. aldrich ames not just liberal democracy but all regimes undermined the virtues necessary for survival or by taking the

leading principals to an extreme. this is a problem of all regimes. proper response therefore is not to denounce and overthrow a liberal democracy especially given it's great blessings individual freedom equality under the law prosperity and toleration. instead the proper response is for reforms to contract the disease as to which liberal democracies are prone. i intend to echo the conclusion of federalist number 10. today one of the key virtues that we should be concerned about, a long topic but for starters liberal democracy depends on stability, toleration sympathetic imagination prudence moderation and courage. these are both civic virtues, the virtues connected to citizenship and moral virtues

connected to excellence of human beings. how should liberal democracies cultivate the virtues they need? and liberal democracies we don't rely primarily on government for the cultivation of virtues that don't make the mistake that therefore berkshires are unimportant. we rely on civil society especially the family but the most important factor i believe most under our control today is education, the educational system. we need to revive our liberal education, and education for freedom. such an education would focus on literacy reading writing and arithmetic for the principals of american constitutional government in the history of america, the focus on larger western civilization, understanding the treasures of western civilization and students would also learn about other civilizations and the entire education from youth

through higher education would ensure that students hear the other side of the argument because in education you hear the other side of the argument it promotes the virtues we so desperately need. and i'm happy to elaborate on these and other things during the discussion. thank you. [applause] >> thanks very much. i'm going to pick up on some of the themes that peter has and it's great honor to be on a panel with him and is to be here speaking to all of you. a crucial set of questions. when i sat down to think about what to say here i've looked at the agenda in the name of our panel is just virtue. that's nice but i needed a

little more and i have since added a note and asked him what is the question we are answering here and he wrote back to me saying the question for your panel is quote how should liberal democracies cultivate the civic virtues they need? that's actually a very rich question which i really like alive and i'm going to try to answer that question by thinking about the question just a little bit. it's a question that assumes to begin with several important premises that i think are right but they are worth stating that the first of these is a liberal democracy or a democratic republic requires certain particular virtues. i think that's true of any society and the virtues that every society requires are related to the kind of society that it is or that it wants to be so that our society which is a liberal democratic republic requires certain liberal and democratic and republican virtues. exactly what those are peter started to get into that some

and i think it's a long and fantastic question but maybe we can agree that as a liberal democracy we require some virtues like toleration and patience and humility and at the republic were require virtues like responsibility courage honesty and magnanimity and faith. republican virtues and liberal virtues are compatible of two-point though there's also some tension between them. does i think are the kinds of virtues that we need to fulfill and to cultivate to sustain our society strength. the second premise than the fact that our society needs a particular kinds of virtues is society's cultivate or tend to produce certain kinds of virtues but i think that's plainly true, the way in which he lived tends to shape the people we are in societies by their practices and by their habits and assumptions

can form a self-understanding intends to shape particular sorts of people. our society needs a certain kind of person or society shapes a certain kind of person so the question for us is how can those to be aligned? how can we cultivate the kind of people that we also need in order to sustain the strength of our society? i think we have to see that this will not happen on it's own fight inertia, by default. we have to do it explicitly and intentionally and maybe that's especially true in a liberal democracy. there's no avoiding the fact that left to ourselves we the citizens of the democratic republic will often tend to ignore our obligations to one another into the larger society. we will remember our rights but not our duties and we will remember what we are owed but not what we owe. we forget free and responsible

individual is less a natural fact than the social achievement that we have to work to sustain. i think that's true in any society that people tend to become an extensive forest aborted is fundamentally and will turn virtues and vices but in some ways because we are free this is especially true of large kind of society and is also true he particularly tend to neglect the republican virtues that are essential to government by the people in which we all have to place a big role and for which we all join in responsibility. we tend to neglect the ways by which it becomes optimal for the citizens of a free society to understand themselves or engage in some common effort on the half of the common good so to speak of our country in the first person plural is we the people is we who hold certain truths to be self-evident. freedom and equality and prosperity and sheer energy of a

liberal society tend to make us forget all of these virtues even though these are all dependent on these virtues. free societies don't course people to do the right thing so they can only really succeed if people generally choose to do the right thing so what we wanted and what we ought to do are more or less roughly aligned and that requires serious attention to the formation of our design teaching us what to want. that kind of attention is more essential in a free society than a nonfree society especially if in a free society that wants to govern itself in a liberal democracy that's a republican -- james madison put republican governor presupposes the existence of these kinds of virtues and a higher degree than any form and yet the dominant ethos of liberal democratic life can sometimes undermine that kind of attention through the formation of our society and can tell us what everyone does good

and concerns our country away from the cultivation of virtue. there is not a way around that fact but that reality is not in itself an argument against democracy but he cannot deny the extraordinary moral achievement that is a society of free people living together as fellow citizens despite their differences are the extraordinary balance of dynamism and prosperity and moral purpose and commitment to human dignity that our particular liberal democracy has achieved. the fact that the liberal ethos can enter by the precondition for some society is not an argument against the society it's rather an argument working consciously and conscientiously to cultivate the ethos of our society to push against some tendencies of liberal democratic life and cultivate a more poor virtuous potential. can we do that? the course we can do that. look around you.

we do it all the time. it's too easy when we look at our country now to see the ways it's failing for the ways our culture is corroding our trust in one another. it's true although things are happening. they aren't made up but it's essential. look at our country first to see what it's doing well so we can see how it might realistically address the many things it does in their country does a lot of this work of cultivation very well. it produces the kind of people that attend the naval academy and in a vast variety of ways all over country are working hard to reform the next generation and to sustain our society strength. that happens in countless communities in america all the time in religious congregations and schools in many pockets throughout higher education and a vast array of bottom-up political and economic and cultural efforts to strengthen our society. that kind of work is always

threatened in some respects is threatened now more intensely than usual but it goes on and to pretend that it's no longer possible ultimately assures the work of doing it which is hard work. puig to cultivate it but that's question to me begin with an important word and the word is how. how can we cultivate these virtues so how can we do it better? that question i would argue the prices to think about the question of free and liberal societies which are therefore often individualistic societies tend to like to avoid it requires us to speak about institutions and when we think about or society we tend to imagine it is the kind of vast open space filled with individuals making choices. sometimes we see these individuals are having trouble connecting with each other so we work to address that by looking for ways to connect them. we talk about loneliness and

isolation through various ways building bridges and tearing down walls. there's value in that kind of thinking that but it ultimately mistakes the character of our social life and ignores the structure of service and forms a common action that made it possible. if society is the best in open space not just a space filled with individuals by the space filled with the structure of social life the space filled with institution. sedition is very broad and vague term but for the sake of simplicity here we could say institutions are precisely the form of our common live in the shapes and structures of what we do together. some institutions or organizations and they are the naval academies and institutions a hospital hospital business or church technically legally formalized but some institutions are formed of a different sort. they aren't exactly organizations.

the family is first and foremost the institution of any. we can talk about a profession like medicine or law. institutions are to keep their shape over time they tend to change slowly and gradually. a flash mob is not institution most importantly what's distinct about an institution is it is a form in the deepest sense. a form is a structure, a shape that the whole and the social form the institution is not just a bunch of people, it's a bunch of people order together to achieve purpose and to pursue a goal to advance an ideal. institutions give each of them a role in relation to each other and didn't relation to the purpose they are trying to achieve together. if you are student and you're a teacher or principal you could have different responsibilities and obligations and privileges. because of that role and together you're pursuing the education of the rising generation and that's the purpose. that means institutions are by their nature formative structure

interacting with each other so they structure each of us but they shape our habits and our expectations but they shape our character and a shape our story and help to form us in that way the cultivate distinctive virtues and us. they are often the answer to the how question. when you shape by institution precisely because you are given a role you are just a person floating out there in the world you are a student at the school are doctor or a that hospital or a member of that church or work or that gives you a particular character a set of goals and boundaries and behaviors. there such a thing in the world as a lawyer. you run into people you haven't talked over why the us and what they do in a stamina count in the rye memory and. the reason you ask is precisely because you have expectations about how institutions are

formed. institutional life is often where virtues are cultivated and what happens inside of her institutions that makes that cultivation possible is not just instructions but examples were shape to live in a certain way by watching others by asking ourselves in ways that give us -- so the challenge of cultivating the habits of her democratic republic is a challenge to her institutions. their failures of formation are very often failures of the family, a community of professional institutions and educational and religious institution so successful formation of citizens of the democratic republic requires healthy institutions that are geared to have that joining us in those virtues. because those virtues sometimes cut against the ethos of low -- democritus out some of our most important cetaceans haptic and study those two.

many institutions are essential to liberal democracy are not themselves liberal or democratic families not a democracy and neither is the naval academy but the habits they give us that the habits of a free society but they aren't always the habits of free society will call to fight -- cultivate. although there culture shaping their counterculture and they shape our culture but keeping the intention to itself in the attention is the secret sauce of american life. every kind of society tends to go to excess and turn his virtues and devices. every kind of society there for requires the kind of moderation of those and that's where lot of her institutions do. people inside this institutions especially the people of the most authority and power them have this to think consciously about the informative part that they play in the institution and what kind of example they are setting what kind of habits they are creating and the people that

are shaped by these institutions. part of what that means is leaders of any institution how to work to sustain people's trust in the institutions they are responsible for by upholding their end of the bargain by doing their core job. for people in leadership and authority in some ways for all of us since we all have some important part to play in institutions that often has the start by asking the great unasked question given my role here how should i behave like that's what somebody is involved with seriously. it's a widespread failure to ask that kind of question. even my role how should i behave as a member of congress a soldier sailor student per teacher what should i be doing and the question can make us better because it forces us to think about what's expected of us and what's required of us in to think about what would be

responsible. we can only think easily think of an every day situation where that question makes a difference if i'm driving on the highway and someone cuts me off and i want to tell them what i think of them i remember the kids are in the backseat. i don't do it. that's a very simple sense of how our society teaches us and what role we help it requires us to behave in a particular way. the lot of people think about that before they make important decisions and let the people that drive us seem to be part of the problem and not the solution failed to answer that question when it's obvious. the appeal of ignoring that question is very powerful. there's a strong temptation by many for of our institutions to abandon their core work and instead treat the institution as a kind of platform performance for making a political speech

for sending a cultural message getting more followers on social media rather than playing a particular role in the institutions that matter to them. that temptation is deadly to trust and institutional integrity and deadly to the work of cultivating the virtues that are the most crucial to her democratic republic. you feel that pressure here to pressure to be another place for the prejudices that we have reaffirmed over and over again rather than places that play a distinct role of purpose to distinction that are willing to be countercultural for society's future. it's an irony of live in a free society the source of great strength for a free society money for crucial institutions are countercultural. they are always pushing against the tide of fashion and conventional wisdom cultivating virtues that are inactive tension to default tendencies of our society. to remain free and republican

our society cast to be sure that sustains the space for these institutions he then maybe especially when they aren't always liberal institutions themselves. safe for family and religion and the generally searching education of military virtues and traditional ideas regarding a capacity to cultivate these virtues were requires guarding institution and the space in which those institutions can work. and it's insisting on ability parents make choices about how their children are raised insisting on a genuine freedom of religious community in teaching and learning even those ideas that pose real challenges in the temporary temporary forays and assumptions better system of government and i will close here is very aware of this need to facilitate formation within institutions. we often think for example of the key rights protecting the first amendment that purely individual rights you can do whatever you want but if you look at those rights they are

rights to participate in informative institutions, institutions that teach us what we want the freedom of assembly offers the practice individually with neither can freedom of the press or of speech or petition or even religious freedom that necessarily comes first in the first amendment. these are all writes that adhere to individuals but they are right for individuals to participate in lives of individuals and communities informative ways. a society can cultivate the virtues it acquires by working to keep it's core institution from the family strong free and protected. and we as individuals can cultivate those virtues in ourselves and others by self-consciously embracing a role in these institutions. often fail on both of these fronts now at the same time and doing better will require us to understand how virtues are cultivated my institutions that are and what the freedom of a free society is ultimately for

and about. these are the questions we are picking up in these today so again thank you very much for a man is. [applause] [applause] we have a short time for questions if you want to queue up at the mic. percival thank you for taking the time to meet us. you spoke of nietzsche and i wasn't referring to his ideas and solutions. what is your take on the pursuit and it's relevance to individual liberty and a liberal democracy given his radical departure from traditional community values symbolized by the metamorphosis of man. >> it's my fault, i haven't been asked a question like that since knows how long and i'm delighted

to be asked the question. that speech was his opening speech is an effort describing the metamorphosis of the superman. three stages. the first stage you submit to discipline what nietzsche had in mind. he speaks about the tyranny of capricious laws being the source of all moral virtue. the second stage is a lion shaking off the values of thousand one values and the third stage is actually the characters of as a child who

invents sacred games and festivals of atonement a radical form of creation from my point of view nietzsche's sketch of the three metamorphoses of the spirit that shows how utopian and unrealistic nature is ultimately can be radically free of inherited values traditions disciplined institutions is to be a childlike and to yourself become responsible for creating rites and ceremonies. from my point of view the achievement of there if you stress is to demonstrate this original dream of being wholly free of traditions and inherited

values that cannot be achieved and therefore that gives us a motive to reconsider what he thought to repudiate. both the modern tradition of freedom and conviction. >> thank you sir. >> thank you so much. thank you to all you gentlemen. my question specifically is for dr. levin. our institutions mentioned the family in the naval academy is a good institution that are countercultural but besides those in your view what are some of the best and worst institutions of shaping a republican virtues that are liberal society often and besides embracing our roles of where we are and what can be done to change these

institutions especially when you mention they slowly change over time? i think the challenge for us is that allowed at the key key institutions that are necessary for that kind of formation are in shape now but they don't recognize their own purpose, their own part in that very important work. as that information and soul forming. so the question is not exactly which institutions to look typically up to look to family way up to look to schools and we had to go to church and university. we have looked to our political system to put each of those cases and those cases in one way or another there's work to be done to think that's always true but we find yourself now to when the lot of them are confused about their role and really about the character of our society and even the character itself in ways that are connected and require concerted

work to reacquaint ourselves with the foundation of civic virtue and of a liberal society. some of that work as i said had to be countercultural work. it's critical work so often in places like universities where it's not happening enough and belongs in a sense and are larger cultural effort to understand and combat his devices. part of the reason of the this idea of institutions and free society when things are going well we don't need to think about it. we like to imagine we are just doing what we want but before we do we want in a way that won't destroy us all we have two recall what we want. and the institutions that teach us what to want are in trouble now that requires us to get to the bottom of what a lot of them are for and to think very hard

about what her society requires what it's good at and what it's not and whether it needs help or it needs us and that means this is the moment that requires foundational and fundamental conversation. >> thank you very much. >> this question is for dr. levin. an institution that we haven't discussed so far is the role of the media. they feel that institutions are shaped by the media that we have today instead of cronkite telling us the way it was when of institutions held by shareholders and engagement? which drive congressional leaders up to provide discussion in congress but often for showmanship for more views. how do you feel the media plays a role in shaping people in the

way you see institutions often do? >> thank you. i agree with the umpire. i'm not not so nostalgic for walter cronkite telling us how it is. that isn't very often how it really was and i think it is important for us to recognize that control of the flow of information shouldn't be too tightly constricted. there are lots of ways in which american the middle of the 20th century nostalgia for which is essentially the theme of our politics in the last 25 years actually have a lot of problems. there reason which some more the opposite of ours. they have too much confidence in the institutions. they had, they were to constricted and solidified a society where we are too fragmented and degenerative so

there things we can learn the ways in which that society looks at it differently but look coming up as two wars and depressions the american middle was cohesive and consolidated. we are not that. we had to think about how we get from where we are to a more functional version of this free society in a way that is relatively free of nostalgia for the middle of the 20th century. i think instead we had to think about those foundational questions about what's required from us from where we are now to be a free society. the media certainly has a role and in a sense the collapse of trust witnessed in so many institutions began the earliest without collapse and trust the media and some of it's driven by economic motives as you suggest

the basic economic model of journalism is very different now than it was in that heyday. but i think the media is responding to the character of our social live in a way that forces us to think about it. exemplifying a kind of institution dysfunction that's evident in many other institutions. in the processing conference as congress and universities incorporation to find people to the playing a part within the institution instead of standing on it and building a personal following and making it systematically making it impossible for us to trust them. there is a way to think about that with the media but we had to think about it as a larger pattern because there is a larger pattern of 21st century americanism. i agree with this warning is

defined as a longing for a time that never was. we should keep in mind the two differences between let's say the walter cronkite and going back to the 1960s if you scroll through the newsroom at the "washington post" most of the reporters you would have found that the post were not graduates of elite universities through today he strolled to the newsroom at the "washington post" and those that cover most of those who are reporting the news say nothing of those who are -- are the product of an elite education. and much more so than in the post time of the unity for the mainstream media and members of the mainstream media who were educated in the same schools and perceived the same set of values and especially these days more

inculcated if not indoctrinated in a common set of ideas. at the same time because of a digital era we all now can personally pay for our news feeds and create cocoons around ourselves. as the mainstream media "the new york times" the networks have become more unified and it's easier and easier for each of us to encase ourselves in our own almost private conversations so that has become harder, because we haven't read the same articles and essays every day, it becomes harder for us to engage in a common conversation across party lines and now identity lines. i would just emphasize those are the challenges we face. >> the point about consolidation of the leads is very important but denied a state used to stand

up for having a diversity of beliefs. it was different from europe in this respect. the people who ran the corporations were very different from the people who ran major city newspapers or the people who ran the union or the people who ran a government agency or the people or a hollywood studio or her share of english department at brown. those people are very similar to each other now. they are essentially interchangeable and one of the things that means is at the de-formations of our universities matter much more than they used to. universities form elites across our society in a way that simply did not use to do until fairly recently. it's one of the reasons why people who worry about american society are so obsessed with the university. that isn't just a function of their own background, that's a function of a change in our society that's worth noting. >> you've heard some very fine speeches about