GOOD REASONABLE PEOPLE

An examination of the psychology of our increasing political division.

“This book is not about politicians or political strategists or party organizations. It is about ordinary people making sense of their world in the best way they know how to,” social psychologist Payne asserts in the opening pages. He stays true to this promise, beginning first with his own upbringing. Raised in a house off the highway in Kentucky by working-class, Christian parents, his childhood was characterized by conservative leanings. When Payne left for college, his dad told him he’d better not return a “long-haired hippie.” But after only three months away, Payne began to stray from his family’s beliefs, returning with hoop earrings and untrimmed hair—things his father chose not to mention. “So many families like mine have reached a brittle peace in recent years,” he writes, “holding their breath, limiting their conversations to the weather and sports and children”—but why? How did our differences in political beliefs gain so much animosity in recent years? Payne uses psychology to demonstrate that people aren’t fundamentally different from one another. Belying the stereotype that liberals are inherently more open-minded and conservatives more dogmatic, beliefs are a product of circumstance. Given the option, we all defend our own viewpoints before considering others. Cognitive research shows that “all persuasion is self persuasion,” as we confirm what we already suspected. And those viewpoints are largely from chance elements of our upbringing and other life encounters. Interesting, compassionate, and ultimately a bridge between those too often depicted as opposites, this book provides background for why we believe what we do and what makes us stick to it. Remarkably accessible despite its academic nature and rigorous research, it opens dialogue about how we can consider both sides as people, not concepts.

Compelling, eye-opening research that humanizes political discord and encourages understanding and compassion.