60 pages AEI Press  (Washington) Publication Date: January 1978 Paperback ISBN: 0844733245

This title is currently out of print, but online booksellers sometimes have used copies available. See links below.

This book is a pioneering attempt to explore the links within the "trinitarian" American system--the three-in-one political, economic, and cultural system that constitutes liberal (or pluralistic) democratic capitalism. Although the workings of the political system and the economic system have been amply described, humanists have been deficient in presenting a full theory of the cultural system. This book examines fundamental components of life in the United States such as liberty, equality, and fraternity, in light of experiences that are seldom noted in cliches about the nation. The competition between the two American elites--the business elite and the "new class"--is also examined, and a strategy for a spirited intellectual offensive on the part of democratic capitalism is set forth.

Michael Novak is the George Frederick Jewett Scholar in Religion, Philosophy, and Public Policy at AEI.