Boston Book Festival

It is impossible to ignore the increasingly bitter polarization of our society. In If We Are Brave: Essays from Black America, Washington Post opinion columnist Theodore Johnson examines the rift that race exposes in our national identity and the ways it hinders our ability to connect with one another. Darrin McMahon, in Equality: The History of an Elusive Idea, points out that across time, the movement towards equality is seldom linear: greater equality within one group is often premised on the exclusion of those outside the group. There is no easy fix for our nation’s  deep fissures, but Nick Troiano, in The Primary Solution: Rescuing Our Democracy from the Fringes, argues for abolishing partisan political primaries, which favor extremists of both parties. The result would be more democratic elections and less polarization. This thought-provoking discussion will be led by Jeremy Siegel, co-host of Morning Edition on GBH.