America’s institutions are failing to command the respect they need to be effective.
Why it matters: A wave of discontent with institutions that started at the federal level has now metastasized to encompass almost every center of power in the country, from the media to technology to sports, retail, and — most visibly — the police.
The big picture: These powerful institutions, which are almost always run by white men, are increasingly being seen as manifestations of systemic racism and white supremacy.
In government, President Trump rendered ineffectual or abolished entire agencies including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the National Security Council’s global health security unit. His signature move has been to appoint officials like Mick Mulvaney and Rick Perry to run agencies they had previously called to abolish.
Between the lines: Two highly educated lawyers were arrested in New York last week on charges of throwing a largely ineffectual Molotov cocktail into an empty NYPD vehicle.
- The damage caused was minimal, but if found guilty the two face a mandatory minimum sentence of at least five years in prison.
- Both lawyers, it seems, by taking to property destruction and what is sometimes called not-nonviolent crime, had lost all faith in the system they had sworn to uphold.
The bottom line: A multiracial country’s national identity rests on the strength of its institutions. When those institutions no longer command broad respect, the nation is likely to fracture into tribalism.