Editors’ Introduction

Abstract

Because the last several years have seen no dearth of Augustine volumes, another one requires justification. As the post-war consensus of the twentieth century continues to unravel, the theme of crisis emerges with urgency: there is no understanding the course of the twenty-first century without thinking about crisis conditions. A loss of confidence in public, corporate, and religious institutions has cultivated a growing skepticism of liberalism across the political spectrum. This skepticism is exacerbated by population displacements fueling calls for revanchist ethno-states or nationalist turns against globalism. The increasingly vitriolic and partisan interpretation of the post-Westphalian nation-state paradigm, coupled with economic upheaval, devastating pandemics, growing income inequality, rampant political cynicism, and threats of environmental degradation, discloses that the crisis extends beyond foreign peril or economic instability. It concerns the underpinning of social order itself.