In recent years, Senator Chris Murphy has stepped forward to challenge the Trump administration’s assaults on our democracy. But he also sees that these assaults are a symptom of a deeper crisis: the abandonment of the common good as our country’s organizing principle. In his unflinching new book, he draws on history and political philosophy to expose how six different cults have seized hold of American life and paved the way to our current troubles: a cult of profit that punishes workers, a cult of globalism that weakens communities, a cult of technology that turns us against one another and poisons our young, a cult of consumption that undermines citizenship, a cult of credentialism that devalues those without degrees, and a cult of corruption that threatens democracy.

Refusing despair, Murphy offers a new politics of the common good that is both deeply rooted in our past and a radical challenge to the status quo. It is also capable of drawing support across the political spectrum: as Murphy shows, a majority of Americans—including many Trump voters—favor policies that confront these destructive cults by curbing corporate power, controlling predatory technology, enhancing face-to-face connection, granting workers greater control of their lives, and removing big money from our politics. The common good, Murphy shows, is no object of nostalgia; it is a vital principle ready to be claimed today.