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Eboo Patel
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We Need to Build: Field Notes for Diverse Democracy Kindle Edition

by Eboo Patel (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.4 out of 5 stars 33 ratings
“You don’t create societies by burning things down, You create societies by building things.”

From the former faith adviser to President Obama comes a fresh manifesto for those who seek to promote positive change and build a more diverse and just democracy

The goal of social change work is not a more ferocious revolution; it is a more beautiful social order. It is harder to organize a fair trial than it is to fire up a crowd, more challenging to build a good school than it is to tell others they are doing education all wrong. But every decent society requires fair trials and good schools, and that’s just the beginning of the list of institutions and structures that need to be efficiently created and effectively run in large-scale diverse democracy.

We Need to Build is a call to create those institutions and a guide for how to run them well.
 
In his youth, Eboo Patel was inspired by love-based activists like John Lewis, Martin Luther King Jr., Badshah Khan, Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Dorothy Day, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Thich Nhat Hanh. Their example, and a timely challenge to build the change he wanted to see, led to a life engaged in the particulars of building, nourishing, and sustaining an institution that seeks to promote positive social change—Interfaith America. Now, drawing on his twenty years of experience, Patel tells the stories of what he’s learned and how, in the process, he came to construct as much as critique and collaborate more than oppose.
 
His challenge to us is clear: those of us committed to refounding America as a just and inclusive democracy need to defeat the things we don’t like by building the things we do.
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  1. Print length
    223 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Beacon Press
  4. Accessibility
    Learn more
  5. Publication date
    May 10, 2022
  6. File size
    1.3 MB
  7. Page Flip
    Enabled
  8. Word Wise
    Enabled
  9. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
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From the Publisher

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“Eboo Patel is one of America’s most visionary civic leaders and one of our most vital bridge builders. We Need to Build is both a blueprint and a guidebook for an inclusive twenty-first-century democracy. Read this book!” —Van Jones, author of Beyond the Messy Truth

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“Revelatory and profoundly timely! This is the essential handbook for every activist ready to move from resisting injustice to rebuilding a world of justice. A legendary builder and visionary teacher, Eboo Patel gives us the blueprint for how to build institutions that will birth the beloved community.” —Valarie Kaur, author of See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love

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“Revelatory and profoundly timely! This is the essential handbook for every activist ready to move from resisting injustice to rebuilding a world of justice. A legendary builder and visionary teacher, Eboo Patel gives us the blueprint for how to build institutions that will birth the beloved community.” —Valarie Kaur, author of See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A centrist call to actively build—rather than passively critique—civic institutions."
—Kirkus Reviews

"Patel wants to build, and help others build, institutions to do all of this good work. He wants to inspire and train new civic leaders who nurture pluralism and community that is welcoming."
—Jon W. McSweeney, Spirituality & Practice

“Revelatory and profoundly timely! This is the essential handbook for every activist ready to move from resisting injustice to rebuilding a world of justice. A legendary builder and visionary teacher, Eboo Patel gives us the blueprint for how to build institutions that will birth the beloved community.”
—Valarie Kaur, author of See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love

“Eboo Patel is one of America’s most visionary civic leaders and one of our most vital bridge builders. We Need to Build is both a blueprint and a guidebook for an inclusive twenty-first-century democracy. Read this book!”
—Van Jones, author of Beyond the Messy Truth

“In this moment in civic life, we need institutional leaders who can absorb radical critiques—and radical critics who can build institutions. Eboo Patel is both, and he has the self-awareness and standing to send both messages to both parties. This bracing, necessary book is a guide for deep civic renewal.”
—Eric Liu, CEO, Citizen University

“Eboo Patel holds a singular place in American life and thought. His expertise on the pluralistic religious reality of twenty-first-century life has influenced virtually every major field—from education to the workplace to political policy and culture. We Need to Build comes at precisely the right moment to become a key handbook for navigating the transformative healing—the building—that our world of fracture and disarray so urgently demands.”
—Krista Tippett, author of Being Wise and host of On Being

“Eboo Patel has long served as one of America’s most trusted and impactful leaders for religious pluralism. In his latest book, We Need to Build, Patel provides an invaluable and must-read road map filled with practical wisdom and timely prescriptions to help all of us better build the thriving organizations and communities and healthy democracy we so desperately need.”
—Rev. Adam Taylor, president of Sojourners and author of A More Perfect Union

“In fractious times, Eboo Patel draws on the lessons he’s gleaned from his own inspiring journey to offer us the thing we need most—a credible path to hope and reconciliation.”
—David Axelrod, author of Believer: My Forty Years in Politics

About the Author

Named “one of America’s best leaders” by U.S. News and World Report, Eboo Patel is Founder and President of Interfaith America, the leading interfaith organization in the United States. Under his leadership, Interfaith America has worked with governments, universities, private companies, and civic organizations to make faith a bridge of cooperation rather than a barrier of division. Eboo served on President Obama’s Inaugural Faith Council, has given hundreds of keynote addresses, and has written five books. He is an Ashoka Fellow and holds a doctorate in the sociology of religion from Oxford University, where he studied on a Rhodes scholarship. Eboo lives in Chicago with his wife, Shehnaz, and their two sons.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B096DM6X1Y
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Beacon Press
  • Accessibility ‏ : ‎ Learn more
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ May 10, 2022
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 1.3 MB
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 223 pages
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0807024072
  • Page Flip ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 out of 5 stars 33 ratings

About the author

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Eboo Patel

Eboo Patel

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Named by US News & World Report as one of America's Best Leaders of 2009, Eboo Patel is the Founder and President of Interfaith America, the largest organization positively and proactively engaging religious diversity in the United States. Author of five books, including "Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation" (Beacon Press, 2010) which won the Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion, Eboo has contributed to the New York Times, the Washington Post, USA Today, the Chicago Tribune, CNN and National Public Radio. He served on President Obama's inaugural Advisory Council of the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships and holds a doctorate in the sociology of religion from Oxford University, where he studied on a Rhodes scholarship. He is an Ashoka Fellow, part of a select network of social entrepreneurs changing the world, and has been awarded honorary degrees from over fifteen colleges. Eboo lives in Chicago with his wife, Shehnaz Mansuri, and their two sons.

For more on Eboo, check out https://www.interfaithamerica.org/people/eboo-patel/, follow him on Twitter @EbooPatel and "Like" him on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/EbooPatel.

Also, visit Interfaith America's website at www.interfaithamerica.org or follow us on twitter @InterfaithUSA.

Photo credit: Chris Popio, 2012.

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
33 global ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

  • Jeffrey N. Mccollum
    5.0 out of 5 stars a path forward
    Reviewed in the United States on December 12, 2022
    Format: KindleVerified Purchase
    This is a powerful message for a country locked in contention and lack of dialogue. The vision of pluralist religion uplifted me. The letter to his sons is reminiscent of scriptural messages from other faiths.
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  • anh36
    5.0 out of 5 stars An Idealistic and also Pragmatic Vision for the USA
    Reviewed in the United States on May 10, 2022
    Format: Hardcover
    This is not your garden variety "diversity education" book, in that problems are accompanied by practical solutions rather than vague platitudes.
    Dr Patel articulates a clear vision for the USA which involves engagement with people of diverse religious and non-religious backgrounds, all for the purpose of improving our collective society. We can disagree with others on certain points but there are still many areas of agreement.
    He supports this argument with practical examples from his personal and professional life, and is very frank about stumbles along the way which prompted a bottom-up remaining of his ideas.
    What impressed me most was Dr Patel's willingness to admit his political persuasion while still calling out the weaknesses of both sides of the political aisle. For example, there is a whole chapter on the dangers of political posturing without solutions, using the example of the San Francisco school board trying to rename schools in the midst of a pandemic which harmed students of color the most.

    This is also a relatively short read and easy to follow because the chapters are structured thematically and paced well.

    Overall, a good read to find some ideas for engagement in our current hyper polarized atmosphere, and to feel inspired about real individuals taking practical steps to engage with others and improve our society.
    3 people found this helpful
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  • Saundra G.
    5.0 out of 5 stars Anyone who calls themselves a leader should read this book
    Reviewed in the United States on May 24, 2022
    Format: Kindle
    Everyone – and I do not say this lightly – everyone should read “We Need to Build.” This is a must-read for any leader in today’s religiously diverse 21st-century democracy. Eboo has effectively built an institution from the ground up, and has packed this book full of wisdom for leaders that’s relevant for anyone in nonprofit mission-driven work, business, education, the arts, or in any civic spaces. I literally had to stop using my yellow highlighter to highlight passages that I found useful, because I would’ve ended up highlighting the whole book and running out of ink. The big idea of the book is that critique is important and has its place, but what’s even harder to do as a leader is to build something. As Patel says, defeat the things that you hate by building the things that you love - and this book shows how. The topic of building could not be more timely in today’s polarized times. Highly, highly recommended.
    5 people found this helpful
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  • Toni Clark
    5.0 out of 5 stars Guidebook and Inspiration for Building a Better America
    Reviewed in the United States on May 26, 2022
    Format: Kindle
    If ever there were a time in America that screams “DO SOMETHING,” it is now, when protest and polarization mark our days. Patel’s book provides the reader another path. Making the effort to lean into conversations with people with whom we disagree takes courage, patience, and humility. Eboo Patel has spent the past 20 years working to make interfaith cooperation—interfaith broadly defined as including people with of different faiths as well as those with different world views—a social norm. He has lived this mission. And he wisely developed an organization and a team to teach, train and model interfaith leadership among college students across the US. In We Need to Build, he makes the case for expanding this kind of leadership into our civic lives and helps us understand how important it is to our democracy. Inspiring and practical.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Kristin H.
    5.0 out of 5 stars A hopeful vision for reconnecting America, and a blueprint for how we can all help
    Reviewed in the United States on October 12, 2022
    Format: Hardcover
    I had the privilege to hear Eboo Patel deliver a spoken version of this timely and hopeful book, then I couldn't wait to read it, then I folded half the pages so I could go back and re-read them later! During a time of divisive political rhetoric and strategies, heightened grievances, and creeping hopelessness, Patel empowers all of us instead to choose building, connecting, tolerance for one another, and love of the beautiful, fragile country we all inhabit. A hopeful, helpful, practical blueprint. What alternative is there for America, really, but to build up together from here?
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  • David Hirsch
    5.0 out of 5 stars If You Were To Read One Book On Interfaith, This Is The One
    Reviewed in the United States on February 28, 2023
    Format: Hardcover
    Eboo Patel is a gifted and authentic communicator, with a vision to build interfaith bridges and the humility to recognize his own journey has been a circuitous one. I found myself making notes in the margins and underlining important passages. If you were to read one book on Interfaith, this is the one. If you need to furhter scratch the Eboo itch, be sure to check out his TEDx Talks too.
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  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Hopeful read on democracy!
    Reviewed in the United States on May 31, 2022
    Format: Hardcover
    I really enjoyed reading this book because it provides a hopeful perspective on how diversity can be leveraged in democracies. Eboo brings his incredible experience to life in this book and I recommend this to all.
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  • Joshua M. Z. Stanton
    5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant book!
    Reviewed in the United States on May 25, 2022
    Format: Hardcover
    We should all behold Dr. Patel's eloquence in explaining how we can heal our social ills and build anew a better society. This book is a tour de force.
    One person found this helpful
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