Trust: America's Best Chance

Description

'His campaign was historic for all America' Guardian Trust will be our essential tool as we face unique challenges of the decades ahead. In a century warped by terrorism, Trumpism, financial collapse, populism, systemic racism, Russian interference and a global pandemic, trust within and among nations has been squandered, sacrificed, abused, stolen, or never properly built in the first place. In a piercing exploration of the soul of the American nation involving history, philosophy and memoir, former presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg explores the strong relationship between prosperity and social trust. Our success, or failure, in confronting the greatest challenges of the decade - racial and economic justice, pandemic resilience, and climate action - will rest on whether we can effectively cultivate, deepen and repair the networks of trust that are now endangered, or for so many, have never even existed. This means trust in institutions, in each other, and in the democratic project itself.

Pete Buttigieg is the former two-term mayor of South Bend and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate. A Rhodes scholar and U.S. Navy veteran, Buttigieg, whose first book, Shortest Way Home, became a New York Times best-seller, was educated at Harvard and Oxford. He currently serves as the U.S. Secretary of Transportation, based in Washington, D.C. He lives with his husband, Chasten Buttigieg, and their two dogs.

PRAISE FOR SHORTEST WAY HOME: The best American political autobiography since Barack Obama's Dreams from My Father.... Buttigieg writes unusually well for a politician.... Is it too much to imagine that America could elect a gay president? I don't think so.... Especially a man like this. - Charles Kaiser, The Guardian Combining candor and compassion with a brilliant understanding of how government can be more effective, Shortest Way Home demonstrates that Pete Buttigieg is not only a key political figure in his generation, but also an appealing and even funny writer. Far from a conventional politician's book, his work is an important entry in the American political tradition for the twenty-first century. - Walter Isaacson Personal, beguiling and quite moving as he talks about coming out and getting married... The story is told with brisk engagement. It is difficult not to like him...When Obama wrote his memoir, the idea that the nation would soon put an African-American in the White House seemed beyond the realm of the possible. After reading this memoir written 25 years later, the notion that Buttigieg might be the nation's first openly gay president doesn't feel quite as far-fetched. - Adam Nagourney, New York Times