As I have suggested, there is a link between populism and the growing distrust of national and international institutions. But the distrust is wider and relates to the post-Second World War economic trajectory and its cultural and societal effects, including a general weakening of various forms of authority, often described as “globalisation”.143 Of course, globalisation is a compendious term and can be invoked to encompass diverse – and even contradictory – phenomena. In what follows, I will focus on the social and cultural effects of the globalisation of trade in goods and services, and the flow of capital.

Anxiety is compounded in our era by two interlocking developments, the rapid emergence of new technologies that threaten livelihoods, and the growing dominance of network platforms that challenge our received understanding of privacy, and perhaps even of human personality and autonomy. Economic globalisation, with its huge flows of goods and services, has of course been driven in part by technology, along with the increasing ease of capital movements and the search for cheaper labour. From the global automotive supply chain to the makers of smartphones, corporations now participate in complex networks connecting research and development facilities in Western countries to chip producers in South Korea to assembly lines in Southeast Asia. But it may be that these supply chains have run their course. For example, electric cars are now being produced more cheaply in diverse “local” settings. Factory workers are being replaced by robots, thereby reducing the need for cheaper offshore manufacturing.

Our contemporary social and political dynamics can be understood, in part, as a recalibration after the undue optimism of the early 1990s. We witness a divisive counterpoint to what proved to be naive assumptions about common purposes, common values and shared norms. History did not end with the fall of the Berlin Wall.897 Liberal multilateralism did not triumph. The upswing of globalism in the early 1990s marked a high point of both international cooperation and domestic optimism, at least within Western societies. However, the common ground on which to build has proven to be more restricted and far more fragile than it once seemed. We find ourselves in a new age of anxiety, confronting widespread populist nationalism, persistent fears of the effects of globalism, and deep worry over the economic and psychological consequences of disruptive new technologies and dominating network platforms. The twin, and interrelated, spectres of environmental catastrophe and pandemic illness hang over us. Increasing geopolitical conflict means that even the possibility of nuclear war now seems far less remote than it did five years ago.

I want to conclude with some thoughts on what the approach to the rule of law I have traced out means for the contemporary practice of law, and for legal education and scholarship. I will look at the failed practice of some very influential US lawyers in the post 9/11 era to show how the roles and responsibilities of jurists, and more broadly of members of legal communities of practice, intersect with ethical dilemmas associated with the three sources of our contemporary anxiety.

We live in a profoundly complex and often disheartening time. People all around the globe feel lost and anxious. I have seen this anxiety first-hand as a university leader, facing an explosion of mental health problems amongst students and staff alike. Mine is by no means a unique experience. Across education, especially in the secondary and post-secondary sectors, friends and colleagues face the same explosion. And multiple reports suggest that a mental health crisis is affecting young adults in all walks of life, and all around the world.

In Part II of the book, I consider a wide swath of human thought, but to help trace the trajectory of the argument I will begin with a short summary. Bear with me for a few pages. I will explain the ideas in more detail, but I suspect that an overall map of the argument will help keep the author and reader on a shared track. My purpose is to lay out a way of thinking about people in society that I hope will be both instructive and encouraging in what can sometimes feel like a bleak time. More specifically, I hope to show that there are productive ways of building towards and then applying a modest conception of the rule of law that can provide concrete help in steering our societies through our new age of anxiety.

He had dreamed that the whole world was doomed to fall victim to some terrible, as yet unknown and unseen pestilence spreading to Europe from the depths of Asia. Everyone was to perish, except for certain, very few, chosen ones. Some new trichinae had appeared, microscopic creatures that lodged themselves in men’s bodies. But these creatures were spirits, endowed with reason and will. Those who received them into themselves immediately became possessed and mad. But never, never had people considered themselves so intelligent and unshakeable in the truth as did these infected ones. Never had they thought their judgements, their scientific conclusions, their moral convictions and beliefs more unshakeable. Entire settlements, entire cities and nations would be infected and go mad. Everyone became anxious, and no one understood anyone else; each thought the truth was contained in himself alone, and suffered looking at others, beat his breast, wept, and wrung his hands. They did not know whom or how to judge, could not agree on what to regard as evil, what as good. They did not know whom to accuse, whom to vindicate.

Although writing in 1866, it feels as though Dostoyevsky were speaking directly to you and me, talking about our own time. A pestilence has indeed struck the world, but not just a pestilence affecting our physical health. We are living in a time when it really does seem that there is an epidemic of anxiety, one that has multiple causes that Dostoyevsky imagined in the nightmare he describes. People infected with ripe over-confidence in exclusive truth that is not open to challenge. People judging each other so harshly and with such strong language that discourse becomes manic and unproductive. People living in desperation, envy and loathing, despite the extraordinary human progress of the last few centuries.13 How can we move beyond this troubling vision?

In the first part of this book I painted a rather grim portrait of some unique attributes of our age of anxiety. I suggested that the pervasive anxiety of the era is grounded primarily in three interlocking sets of concerns over populist nationalism, certain forms of globalisation, and socially disruptive technologies and powerful networks, although, of course, these issues are experienced differently by diverse types of people. Now I want to argue that there are ways to navigate through this anxiety; that we can draw upon a rich intellectual heritage for reassurance and inspiration. From ancient Greece through to the twentieth-century American philosophical pragmatists and contemporary theorists of social practice, we can derive insights that will help to construct a modern understanding of the role of law in society. In turn, this conception of law, when put into day-to-day practice, can help to alleviate some of our anxieties, as I will explain.

In Part I of the book, I traced out sources of the pervasive anxiety that marks our age. There are many deep uncertainties – far more unsettling than calculable risks – affecting our perception of both the present and the future. I emphasised three because I believe they underlie many others: populist nationalism; the economic, social and cultural complexity of globalism; and profound technological change. Part II explored the intellectual resources at our disposal to confront these uncertainties, to alleviate our anxieties. Those resources are considerable and plural. Drawing upon diverse sources of inspiration, including classical thought, pragmatist philosophy, sociology and international relations theory, I articulated an optimistic – but I believe equally realistic – means to address pervasive worry.

The violent mob that stormed the US Capitol in January 2021 was indeed bred in factories, many now closed, in corporations and college towns, and even in the military. They came mostly from rural areas, towns and smaller cities across the United States. A surprisingly large number would identify themselves as “evangelicals”, claiming to be religiously motivated even though the leader they supported, President Trump, could hardly be defined as a paragon of religious virtue. They were all part of a collection of discrete forces often lumped together under the banner of “populism”. People who occupied the office of House Majority Leader, Nancy Pelosi, included Chris Hood of the neo-Nazi “National Socialist Club” and Nick Ochs from the Proud Boys, a far-right group that President Trump famously called upon to “stand back and stand by” in the first presidential debate of 2020. The Proud Boys are openly misogynistic and anti-immigrant.

I suspect that most of us have an intuitive sense that we learn best by doing. Throughout high school and into university, my passion outside my studies was acting. I was lucky to find talented teacher-directors, and then equally passionate fellow student-directors and brilliant professionals who encouraged and stretched me. My extraordinary public high school drama teacher had high expectations. Ours were not your average “high school productions”. We worked for months on major plays with big casts and serious production values.