Jim Block, with a Ph.D. from the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago, has taught political theory, history of ideas, literature, and political culture at DePaul University for more than three decades. The focus of his two books, A Nation of Agents: The American Path to a Modern Self and Society (Belknap/Harvard U.P.) and The Crucible of Consent: American Child Rearing and the Forging of Liberal Society (Harvard U.P.) are on the psychological and metapsychological developments and complementary child rearing and socialization shifts characterizing the making of the modern world. His forthcoming book, The Agony of American Ascendancy: The Crisis of Liberalism in the Organizational Age, addresses the attenuation and erosion of the liberal psychosocial frame in the twentieth century, leading to the fragmentation of society and liberal institutions. In the later stages of this last work, together with a subsequent project now underway entitled A World of Authors: Selfhood and Community in the Post-Liberal Epoch, the goal will be to develop a new paradigm of human development and interpersonal connection utilizing centrally the work of Heinz Kohut. In addition, Jim has lectured on these themes and run workshops on moral development throughout the U.S. and abroad, and written essays, blogs, and blog posts on these themes throughout.