Alongside the institutions, roles, and rules that compose the nominally democratic elements of the American political system lies what Nancy Rosenblum calls “the democracy of everyday life.” It is a realm so familiar and so close that we (Americans or observers of the American political scene) are largely unaware of it as a distinct sphere of democratic activity. Composed of practices that emerge from the ordinary interactions of people living in proximity, this sphere is regulated by an ideal of what it means to be a good neighbor. In this ideal, individuals see one another as nothing more or less than “decent folk” who disregard race, religion, ethnicity, and class in their interactions and seek to uphold the norms of reciprocity, speaking out when necessary, and living and letting live. Central to these norms is the desire to balance the value of a zone of privacy around the home with the value of acting cooperatively with one’s neighbors to protect it. Rosenblum’s book is an accessible, always interesting, narrative-filled theoretical engagement. Whether one agrees or disagrees, the journey is nuanced, insightful and original.

Good Neighbors is divided into four parts. The first argues that our sense of who is our neighbor emerges from an imagined proximity to home. Further, our sense of what is a good neighbor can be extracted from three archetypical narratives in American literature: frontier living, the life of immigrants, and suburban accounts. The second part of the book outlines the contours of the phrase “democracy in everyday life” and explicates the three norms just mentioned. The third part focuses on the various ways that the democracy of everyday life can be undermined from within and without through the use of informants and racialized violence. It also looks at how neighborhoods torn apart by natural disasters seek to recover and enact a sense of what it means to be a good neighbor. The final part of the book turns to Thoreau and argues that through our neighbor’s lives we can better understand our own. Rosenblum also sees the neighbor as the “saving remnant” of democracy in America. When formal democracy has “lost its integrity,” at least everyday democracy remains.

At the heart of Rosenblum’s theory is a deep-seated pluralism reminiscent of Michael Walzer’s (1983) Spheres of Justice. Instead of spheres of justice, however, there are parallel, distinct worlds of democracy: one populated by citizens, the other populated by decent folk. In the former, citizens are guided by laws, institutions, and norms of civility. In the latter, good neighbors are guided by a reciprocity that is both face to face and open ended. Theirs is a more intimate world of give and take based on a trust that has developed through casual greetings and prosaic conversations. Once the interactions of neighbors are formalized, say through a homeowners association, then they are no longer part of the democracy of everyday life.

In the sphere of formal democracy, the voices of citizens can be heard on social media, in the voting booth, on the streets, and in court. In the sphere of everyday democracy, the voices of decent folk are heard individually in ordinary exchanges and collectively when they speak out against the untoward actions of their neighbors. Bullies, petty tormentors, and the inconsiderate boors who violate understood norms of “what anyone would do” in the neighborhood are the target of their collective action.

In the formal democratic sphere, the civility and respectful distance of citizens, protected by legal rights, may shore up norms of toleration and restraint. Analogously, good neighbors are governed by a disposition to live and let live. Being a good neighbor, however, is something different from following the rules of civility and being tolerant. It requires a certain délicatesse of conduct; a hesitancy to publicize what we may have seen or heard from our neighbors across the street; a tactfulness in enforcing the idea of what anyone would do here (in the neighborhood); a sensitivity to how minding the business of our neighbors can be abused by moralistic enforcers and nosey neighborhood monitors; an acceptance of them as decent folk as opposed to loving them or being concerned with their moral well-being. It is neither too much nor too little.

The contrasts between the two spheres are clear. A key resemblance is that like the formal sphere of democracy, the democracy of everyday life involves self-government and decision-making. Rosenblum argues that the term “democratic” is misleading only if we think citizens must act as a formal unit or need set rules and procedures to make a decision (p. 100). In contrast, decisions in the everyday life of democracy emerge by way of consensus when neighbors speak out against and collectively resist their local petty tyrants. But the idea of “ruling” here (embedded in the kratos part of democracy) is somewhat attenuated. Neighbors have no obligation to obey their neighbors. Consequently, abiding by those decisions looks less like being ruled and more like subscribing to an ethos. At best, each is seeking to rule herself. Are they ruling others in a democratic fashion? It is in dealing with the despot next door that the democratic bona fides of Rosenblum’s sphere become even less certain. The neighbors may say, “We exercise freedom to name the offense, blame the offender, claim the support of others nearby, decide on action and enforce our judgment” (p. 99). The question here is not that of reaching a decision democratically, but whether it makes a difference if the decisions are applied to someone (the neighborhood petty despot) who does not necessarily have a say.

What is the relationship between these two spheres of democracy? Although they can work in tandem, Rosenblum argues they are largely independent of one another. One can endorse, as does the character of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mocking Bird, the formal norms of legal equality without seeing one’s neighbors as decent folk. Scout, Atticus’s daughter, in contrast is unable to participate in the formal elements of democracy (such as it was in the American South), but fully enacts the democratic ethos of everyday life (Rosenblum’s reading of Atticus and Scout is both confirmed and disrupted by Go Set a Watchman). One can be a good neighbor without being a good citizen and, Atticus’s example suggests the reverse is true as well.

Despite Rosenblum’s discussion of the myriad ways for neighbors to fail as democrats, the book is optimistic about the existence and resilience of the democracy of everyday life as an American ideal. One wonders, however, whether her optimistic account is ultimately overwhelmed by the stubborn, staggering levels of de facto segregation of housing in the United States (of which she is well-aware). Do Americans really subscribe to an ideal of “decent folk” that disregards the characteristics of race, religion, ethnicity, and class? Or, is it the case that because we prefer to live near people who look like us, our understanding of “decent folk” is already coded by those categories? If the former is true, then the ideal remains untested at best and its potential role as a saving remnant unfounded. If the latter is true, then we are left with the depressing hypothesis that everyday life in America looks democratic only because we live in places where the “decent folk” look like “us.”