Kim Phillips-Fein

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Country of Lords by Kim Phillips-Fein
Country of Lords by Pulitzer-finalist historian Kim Phillips-Fein

On Sale July 21, 2026

Country of Lords: Neo-Aristocrats, Social Darwinists, Tech Utopians, and the Long Fight against Equality in America

A Pulitzer-finalist historian charts a 250-year-old intellectual and political tradition―the conviction that all Americans are NOT created equal.

We think of the United States as a nation committed, at least on paper, to ideals of human equality, under God and/or under the law. But as robust as the notion of the “American dream” is a longstanding defense of social hierarchies, including vast gulfs between rich and poor.

Drawing on forgotten characters and neglected archives, Kim Phillips–Fein tells the story of the executives, intellectuals, and political leaders who have argued that the words of the Declaration of Independence―that “all men are created equal”―are a myth. John Adams, William Graham Sumner, Andrew Carnegie, journalist Lothrop Stoddard, Henry Ford, Harvard psychologist Richard Herrnstein, Peter Thiel, and others represent this counter-tradition of hostility to democratic government. Phillips-Fein explores their ideas, and the aspirations they were reacting to, in order to understand our political life today―in hopes we might imagine a more egalitarian way forward.

PRAISE FOR FEAR CITY

"This is a history with huge implications for the remaking of American politics and economics in our time."

—Thomas J. Sugrue, author of Origins of the Urban Crisis

2017-02-01T00:33:02+00:00

—Thomas J. Sugrue, author of Origins of the Urban Crisis

"This is a history with huge implications for the remaking of American politics and economics in our time."
“Fair, thorough, incisive, and stylish, this is the best book to read not just on New York’s fiscal crisis of the 1970s, but about how bankers became our unacknowledged legislators ever since.”

—Rick Perlstein, author of Nixonland and The Invisible Bridge

2017-02-01T00:33:45+00:00

—Rick Perlstein, author of Nixonland and The Invisible Bridge

“Fair, thorough, incisive, and stylish, this is the best book to read not just on New York’s fiscal crisis of the 1970s, but about how bankers became our unacknowledged legislators ever since.”
“A tour de force...Fear City is essential reading to understand how finance capital, real estate speculation, austerity budgeting, and punitive policing first came together to create the toxic politics of today.”

—Greg Grandin, author of Fordlandia and Kissinger’s Shadow

2017-02-01T02:31:05+00:00

—Greg Grandin, author of Fordlandia and Kissinger’s Shadow

“A tour de force...Fear City is essential reading to understand how finance capital, real estate speculation, austerity budgeting, and punitive policing first came together to create the toxic politics of today.”
"Fear City helps sheds much-needed light on a range of contemporary crises, from the starvation of public services amidst enormous private wealth to the rise of Donald Trump. Kim Phillips-Fein is a historian of the first order."

—Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine and This Changes Everything

2017-02-01T02:32:31+00:00

—Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine and This Changes Everything

"Fear City helps sheds much-needed light on a range of contemporary crises, from the starvation of public services amidst enormous private wealth to the rise of Donald Trump. Kim Phillips-Fein is a historian of the first order."
“Fear City provides the definitive account of the moment when New York City liberalism ran out of momentum and money, and the conservative reaction that has culminated in Donald Trump began.”

—Joshua B. Freeman, author of American Empire and Working-Class New York

2017-02-01T02:33:47+00:00

—Joshua B. Freeman, author of American Empire and Working-Class New York

“Fear City provides the definitive account of the moment when New York City liberalism ran out of momentum and money, and the conservative reaction that has culminated in Donald Trump began.”