{"id":703883,"date":"2026-07-21T19:23:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T19:23:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/703883\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T19:23:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T19:23:08","slug":"is-we-the-people-still-possible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/703883\/","title":{"rendered":"Is \u201cWe the People\u201d Still Possible?"},"content":{"rendered":"

This month, as the United States celebrated its 250th anniversary, the immortal phrase \u201cwe the people\u201d appeared on parade banners, in commemorative essays, in speeches, and across celebrations. The phrase evokes the possibility that people across a diverse society can hold a meaningful identity<\/a> in common. Even beyond the United States, in countries around the world, \u201cwe the people\u201d is shorthand for the idea of the shared public good.<\/p>\n

Still, at a time of deep polarization and political gridlock, those three words that form the opening of the preamble of the Constitution can feel more and more elusive as an everyday reality. <\/p>\n

Looking at the state of societies globally, it\u2019s now an open question: <\/p>\n

Is \u201cwe the people\u201d still possible?<\/p>\n

Or are we more realistically consigned to a world of \u201cus versus them\u201d?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to conclude that \u201cus versus them\u201d is one of the oldest features of human nature. We are group-forming beings. We sort, compare, and defend our own. This is part of how people have survived, organized, and defended themselves across history. The fact is that it\u2019s easier to organize people when there\u2019s an \u201cother.\u201d<\/p>\n

Consider the challenge of climate mobilization. For a time, many climate campaigners tried to frame the climate crisis as requiring a \u201cWorld War II\u2013style mobilization<\/a>.\u201d The point was understandable\u2014climate change<\/a> is an existential threat that demands shared sacrifice, public investment, technological transformation, and a willingness to act beyond short-term self-interest.<\/p>\n

Yet the analogy exposed something about group psychology. World War II mobilization was sustained by a literal human enemy. There was an opposing force people could name, see, fear<\/a>, and fight. Climate change doesn\u2019t present itself in the same way. It\u2019s a systematic challenge where there\u2019s no single villain whose defeat would solve the problem.<\/p>\n

The psychology of \u201cus versus them\u201d can generate intensity, sacrifice, and solidarity in ways that appeals to the common good often struggle to match.<\/p>\n

Social psychology confirms this. In Henri Tajfel<\/a>\u2019s \u201cminimal group\u201d experiments, people showed favouritism toward members of their own group even when the groups were assigned on trivial or arbitrary grounds. People don\u2019t need much reason to form an \u201cus.\u201d And once there is an \u201cus,\u201d a \u201cthem\u201d can quickly emerge, because group identity often gains strength through contrast.<\/p>\n

The same longing for belonging that brings people into community can also be redirected into exclusion, fanaticism, and violence. When people feel unseen, humiliated, displaced, or powerless, a demagogue can offer a counterfeit form of belonging by giving them someone to blame.<\/p>\n

I have come to think of this as the shadow side of belonging. <\/p>\n

It looks like connection, and it may even feel like connection at first. It can offer a shared language, a shared enemy, and a shared sense of purpose. Yet this kind of belonging is hollow because it builds cohesion for some by denying dignity or respect to others. It offers people the feeling of being part of something larger, but only by narrowing the circle of moral concern.<\/p>\n

Yet this isn\u2019t the whole story of human nature.<\/p>\n

Many of the problems that most require collective action\u2014including climate, but also AI<\/a>, inequality, loneliness<\/a>, and democratic distrust<\/a>\u2014don\u2019t come with a simple enemy. They require a broader and more mature form of belonging. They require something bigger than unity against an adversary. They require commitment to a shared future.<\/p>\n

Psychology Essential Reads<\/p>\n

And, thankfully, human beings also raise children together, mourn together, build institutions for public service, and make sacrifices for people we will never meet. Beyond tribalism, we are also wired for care, collaboration<\/a>, mutual aid, and compassion.<\/p>\n

The key psychological question is which identity becomes most salient. Are we primarily insiders and outsiders, winners and losers? Or can we also remember that we are neighbours, citizens, parents, workers, caregivers, and members of one human family?<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the biggest reason for hope: Group boundaries<\/a> are never fixed. They can narrow, but they can also widen. Under the right conditions, people can come to see former strangers as part of a larger \u201cwe.\u201d<\/p>\n

So how do we promote an ethos of \u201cwe the people\u201d that\u2019s grounded in genuine belonging?<\/p>\n

First, we need to get beyond online sorting systems that profit from sorting people into opposing camps. Personalized feeds can expose us to different villains, different facts, and different moral realities. We need to create more shared attention<\/a> in everyday life, through meeting places and shared practices like libraries, community meals, service projects, neighbourhood walks, sports leagues, rituals, and public spaces where people encounter one another as real human beings.<\/p>\n

Second, we need to solve real problems together. People build trust when they work side by side<\/a> cleaning up a park, rebuilding after a flood, mentoring young people, caring for elders, serving meals, planting trees, or deliberating over a local budget.<\/p>\n

Third, we need to practice a psychology of the wider \u201cwe.\u201d This is the perennial moral calling to put ourselves in another person\u2019s shoes. It can begin with intellectual humility, like admitting, \u201cI might be wrong.\u201d It can mean asking, \u201cWhat fear, wound, loyalty, or need might be underneath the troubling behaviour that I see?\u201d It\u2019s the ethic of seeking to understand. Understanding is not the same as condoning. It is the beginning of responding to the conditions that allow destructive forms of belonging to take hold.<\/p>\n

Overall, we need to build belonging into the institutions that shape our lives. Schools, workplaces, media platforms, faith communities, governments, and businesses all help determine whether people feel respected, rooted, heard, and able to exercise agency. Belonging cannot depend solely on individual goodwill; it must also be supported by the systems through which we live together.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe the people\u201d has never been complete\u2014in virtually any society I know of.<\/p>\n

But the fact that \u201cwe the people\u201d has been incomplete doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s impossible. It means it\u2019s a practice, a discipline, and a moral and psychological vision that we have to work to make real.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This month, as the United States celebrated its 250th anniversary, the immortal phrase \u201cwe the people\u201d appeared on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-703883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}