ABSTRACT
The Future of Democratic Equality examines the challenge that growing social inequality and decline in support for the welfare state poses for activists and intellectuals who believe that political democracy can only be realized under conditions of social equality. The work does not offer a comprehensive strategy for how a politics of social solidarity can be revived in a post-industrial America divided not only by class, but also by race, gender, educational attainment, and national origin. But I hope to have demonstrated that a democratic pluralist polity that affirms the value of “difference” can only be achieved if the ethos of solidarity-a sense that the fate of each citizen affects the destiny of all-is revived as a public philosophy underpinning majoritarian support for social rights. Theoretical analysis can only help inform political practice; strategic questions will only be answered by those engaged in real world politics. But political and social theory, at its best, informs public intellectual debate and influences the moral fabric of the broader community.
