Political from "summary" of The Unwinding by George Packer
Politics is in the air we breathe, the water we drink, the land we walk on. It is the fabric that holds society together, the force that shapes our lives in ways seen and unseen. It is a game played by the powerful, a drama that unfolds on the stage of history. Politics is not just about elections and politicians; it is about power and influence, about who gets what, when, and how. It is about the distribution of resources, the exercise of authority, the pursuit of interests. Politics is the art of the possible, the science of the strategic, the craft of the cunning. It is about compromise and conflict, negotiation and manipulation, persuasion and coercion. Politics is about winning and losing, about success and failure, about triumph and tragedy. It is about the clash of ideas, the clash of interests, the clash of values. Politics is about the big picture and the small detail, the grand design and the petty squabble. It is about the long term and the short term, the immediate and the distant, the urgent and the important. It is about the past and the present, the future and the eternal. Politics is about memory and forgetfulness, about tradition and innovation, about continuity and change. Politics is about identity and difference, about belonging and exclusion, about unity and diversity. It is about solidarity and division, about community and conflict, about cooperation and competition. Politics is about us and them, about me and you, about here and there. It is about the individual and the collective, the local and the global, the personal and the impersonal. Politics is about power struggles and power relations, about winners and losers, about the haves and the have-nots. It is about privilege and disadvantage, about wealth and poverty, about influence and marginalization. It is about domination and resistance, about oppression and liberation, about exploitation and emancipation. Politics is about the public and the private, the domestic and the foreign, the national and the international. It is about the state and the market, the government and the economy, the public sector and the private sector. It is about institutions and actors, about structures and agents, about rules and norms. Politics is about discourse and practice, about language and action, about rhetoric and reality. It is about propaganda and persuasion, about manipulation and mobilization, about spin and substance. It is about ideology and pragmatism, about principle and expediency, about theory and practice.
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