ABSTRACT
No matter how good our scientific understanding of challenges facing us may be, the choices of policies for dealing with them (or evading them) will depend on our values and beliefs. Moreover, systemic changes in the patterns of government tend to be resisted, and, when they do occur, it’s in the face of crisis and dissent. This chapter aims to understand why people disagree so vigorously, if not violently. This addresses the psychological nature of political belief and its role in social cohesion and division. Symbols and beliefs may be variable and controversial, but we can’t govern without them, and hence we learn why the emperor actually does have clothes. The conclusion is that we should take political disagreement seriously as integral to political belief-formation, rather than strive for unity. The ethical test is less about what we agree on than about how well we disagree. Good government doesn’t eliminate disagreement; it manages through and across disagreements.
