Jared Goldstein raises important points about the dual-motivations and intended and unintended consequences of many of the projects of attachment I identify. Projects of attachment can, as he argues, employ patriotic language that in turn bolsters other, more pernicious projects. Goldstein’s own work shows how seemingly innocuous declarations of patriotism have been used to advance hierarchical and violent ends. I still think the fact that leaders identified their projects as specifically aimed at developing national attachments matters. Even if they ultimately cared more about other partisan or personal goals, America’s early leaders were openly and consciously identifying attachments as a problem and associating their efforts with a national-scale solution. More detailed studies of these individual political leaders can and should do a better job of illuminating the relative weight of motivating factors behind their actions.

In a similar vein, Goldstein argues that the development of national attachments should not be seen as unequivocally positive, precisely because attachments have also been used for violent and exclusionary purposes. This is a problem I grappled with a great deal in writing the book. I ultimately concluded what Goldstein mentions at the end of his paragraph: that they are necessary for democratic governments to function. Goldstein adds a “but”—that attachments are only beneficial if the government they bolster is pursuing good ends. The problem with that approach, I think, is that a government that only maintains the support of its people when it is pursuing ends that they deem to be “good” is akin to anarchy. We can and should do everything possible to ensure that our democracy pursues just policies. And we need not be attached to a democracy that violates its own constitutional constraints. But if citizens only support their constitutional system when it enacts policies they think are just, and dissolve their attachments when they disagree with it, democracy will fail. I argue that attachments should be pursued and strengthened even when government enacts unjust policies precisely because democracy requires attachments to survive, and the pursuit of justice, I believe, requires democracy. I fully acknowledge, however, that an individual’s choice to promote attachments may be fraught.

Finally, Goldstein brings up the interesting case of the January 6 insurrectionists who were seemingly motivated by precisely the kind of attachments that should protect, rather than endanger, proper institutional functioning. This is another area where I think Goldstein correctly points to the difficult problems at the core of a project to develop powerful emotional connections that can in turn be manipulated and abused. The January 6 case might be one in which the distinction between patriotism or nationalism and attachments is useful. Many of the insurrectionists clearly viewed themselves as patriots, or as nationalists. Attachments are emotional connections between citizens and the particular institutions of government. I would point to Vice President Pence’s actions on January 6, 2021, as exemplifying strong political attachments, and would argue that stronger attachments among some of the insurrectionists might have led them to the conclusion that upholding proper institutional processes was the more patriotic option. Some insurrectionists were clearly at the Capitol that day because they genuinely believed that institutions had been violated or set aside, but it is still a case where I think the concept of political attachments and its relationship to American democracy is of vital importance.