Even if one is interested only in one's own society, which is one's prerogative, one can understand that society much better by comparing it with others.

Let me say again that the relationship is asymmetrical: there's no democracy without a market economy, but you can have a market economy without democracy.

The problem with liberal Protestantism in America is not that it has not been orthodox enough, but that it has lost a lot of religious substance

The human organism is thus still developing biologically while already standing in a relationship to its environmont. In other words, the process of becoming man takes place in an interrelationship with an environment. (...) From the moment of birth, man's organismic development, and indeed a large part of his biological being as such, are subjected to continuing socially determined interference.

I'm sure Putnam is right that there's been a decline in certain kinds of organizations like bowling leagues. But people participate in communities in other ways.

If you say simply that pressures toward democracy are created by the market, I would say yes

One can't understand the Christian Right and similar movements unless one sees them as reactive - they're reacting to what they call secular humanism