Returning to the most fundamental goal of democracy - the realization of the potential of all citizens - and drawing on the best of the American progressive tradition, the authors challenge the widely held assumption that it's impossible to stimulate economic growth and at the same time guarantee opportunity and a minimum of resources for all citizens.

Seizing the quintessentially American idea that everything is possible, Roberto Mangabeira Unger and Cornel West argue that we can use it to reinvent our public institutions. While they propose specific reforms in business, taxation, social security, and education, their program is an image of American political and civic life as a vital, evolving, and hopeful arena for solving our collective problems.