Richard Kreitner | Trust, Mistrust, and the Myth of American Unity

How to Fix Democracy

Is mistrust a defining feature and flaw in American democracy? Or is it a manifestation of basic opposition against long-term democratic and aspirational concepts such as "all men are created equally"? In this thought provoking conversation author and historian Richard Kreitner joins Andrew Keen to explore the deep mistrust in U.S. political life. Drawing on themes from his book Break it up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America's Imperfect Union. Kreitner traces the fractured origins of the American project, argues that national cohesion may be neither possible nor desirable at the continental scale, and makes the provocative case, that mistrust - even secessionist thinking - can sometimes be a rational response to genuine democratic failures. A timely conversation that challenges prevailing narratives about unity and the Constitution in an age of polarization and rising political anxiety.