TGC carries my review of James Skillen’s new book The Good of Politics today. I’m in sympathy with what Skillen is trying to do:

As American evangelicals have grown disappointed with politics, it has become commonplace to draw a strict separation between “politics” and “the culture.” People are starting to say that politics is ultimately about power, but culture is about meaning and purpose, and that’s where we find all the really important action.

Skillen gently rebukes this dualistic way of thinking. He reminds us of the critical truth that politics is always and everywhere a part of human culture, never separate from it. It is one essential element of our search for meaning and purpose. It is only one part, so we must resist the temptation to politicize everything. But separating politics from culture only encourages immorality and injustice. It gives aid and comfort to those who treat politics as a cynical power game. It also ensures that our apolitical “cultural” efforts will be neutered and incoherent, unable to give a full account of justice.

But I think Skillen has taken on more tasks than he can carry out well in the short space he has. For example:

Skillen’s deep desire to show that all things in God’s universe are ultimately made to be in harmony leads him to ignore the hard choices we face. To take only one from many examples, his chapter on economics says that society must “recognize and encourage entrepreneurial talent, production and commerce, free markets for the exchange of goods and services, and the creative development of economically qualified organizations of diverse kinds” (178). It also says that “the political community [should] agree from the start that any change in environmental conditions would trigger government’s action to protect the environment and its sustainability” (181). If Skillen sees any tension between these pronouncements, he’s not showing the slightest sign of it.

We can and must find ways of reconciling an entrepreneurial economy with environmental protection. But Skillen is not contributing anything useful or interesting when he simply proclaims that we can have our cake and eat it, too. He should have allowed himself to wrestle with more tensions.