We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For

Such an important book…A call for people to take control of our democracy. * MSNBC Morning Joe * This is a beautiful book [that] tackles some very big ideas…An absolute call to action. -- Amna Nawaz * PBS NewsHour * A call to rethink American leadership. -- Diane Rehm * WAMU * It's a must read…He makes the argument that for too long we've outsourced our responsibility to democracy, to politicians, to prophets, to heroes. While it's comforting to put the fate of the democracy in the hands of visionaries, Glaude encourages the individual to take the first steps toward reaching a freer, more equitable society. -- Ali Velshi * MSNBC * Though they speak directly to tendencies within the ongoing Black political struggle, the wisdom these important essays offer about the true nature of democratic action is equally relevant to all Americans seeking to rebuild a ravaged democracy and its broken institutions. A powerfully eloquent, concise book. * Kirkus Reviews * We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For is nothing short of a complete refreshment of the concept of intellectual vocation. It is a work of critical and rigorous social theory, elegant prose, and immediate political consequence. We know Glaude is prolific and pathbreaking as a scholar and highly influential as an intellectual working for the public good. But in this book, we see Glaude as we haven’t previously witnessed—a public philosopher. -- Imani Perry, author of <i>South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation</i> Reading We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For is like attending a jazz concert with all of one’s favorite musicians. In his long meditation on the nature of intellectual and cultural inheritance, of nostalgia and self-possession, of prophecy and soul-craft, Glaude riffs on some of the most compelling voices in the tradition: James Baldwin, Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, Ella Baker, Toni Morrison, and more. In one relatively short volume, he brilliantly takes us on an epic tour through their lives and work. -- Henry Louis Gates, Jr., author of <i>The Black Box: Writing the Race</i>