Book Presentation

For Americans who came of age shortly after World War II, politics was a field of dreams as democracy promised to cure the world’s ills. But the conservative economists’ view that promoted self-interest as the source of all good worked its way into public policy in the 1970s. Government’s main role was no longer to help people, but to get out of the way of personal ambition. Politics turned mean and citizens turned away.

In The Samaritan’s Dilemma, Stone argues that democracy depends on altruism, not self-interest. She examines the seven myths of this self-interest philosophy and calls on a restoration of the public sphere as a place where citizens can fulfill their moral aspirations. If government helps the neighbors, citizens will once again want to help govern.

Deborah Stone is a Research Professor of Government at Dartmouth College and a founding editor of The American Prospect. She has taught at M.I.T. and Brandeis University, and as a visitor at Yale and several other prestigious universities. She has written essays for The Nation, The New Republic, Boston Review, and Natural History. She is the author of three previous books, including Policy Paradox.

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