Robert Christopher Lasch (June 1, 1932 - February 14, 1994) was an American historian and social critic, as well as a professor at the University of Rochester in New York state. He published a number of nonfiction books, includingThe Culture of Narcissism (1979),The True and Only Heaven (1991), andThe Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy (1996), completed before his death and published posthumously.
If elites speak only to themselves, one reason for this is the absence of institutions that promote general conversation across class lines. Civic life requires settings in which people meet as equals, without regard to race, class, or national origins.
p. 117
Since the public no longer participates in debates on national issues, it has no reason to inform itself about civic affairs. It is the decay of public debate, not the school system (bad as it is), that makes the public ill informed, notwithstanding the wonders of the age of information. When debate becomes a lost art, information, even though it may be readily available, makes no impression.
