Haidt synthesizes research from social psychology, anthropology, and evolutionary biology to present a model of moral judgment and moral reasoning where intuition comes first and reasoning follows, often serving to justify decisions already made. He introduces Moral Foundations Theory—a framework identifying several innate psychological systems (e.g., care/harm, fairness/cheating, loyalty/betrayal, authority/subversion, sanctity/degradation) that shape how individuals and cultures prioritize values. Haidt uses this theory to explain why liberals, conservatives, and libertarians differ in their moral emphasis, and how these differences fuel political disagreement. The book also examines the role of group‑oriented social instincts and the need for cohesion in forming shared moral matrices, with implications for dialogue across ideological divides.
From Penguin Random House and Jonathan Haidt