The Necessity of Character:
Moral Formation and Leadership in Our Time

edited by

James Mumford & Ryan S. Olson

Supplement to 

The Hedgehog Review

Volume 26, Number 1
Missing Character

About the Book

“Moral formation” can sound unacceptably paternalistic and insufferably moralistic. But if virtue has something to do with our flourishing as human beings, if the content of our character is connected to our ability to “make a success of life,” then moral formation is what we owe the rising generation.

This landmark volume brings together a series of original and penetrating essays by educators, scholars, leaders, policymakers, and political commentators convinced of the necessity of character in our cultural and political moment.

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Edited By 

James Mumford is a British writer. A graduate of Oxford and Yale universities, he is a senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture and the author of Ethics at the Beginning of Life and Vexed: Ethics Beyond Political Tribalism.

Ryan S. Olson is a research professor at the University of Virginia and a senior fellow and co-chair of the Colloquy on Culture and Formation at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture. He is the author of Tragedy, Authority, and Trickery: The Poetics of Embedded Letters in Josephus and coeditor of The Content of Their Character: Inquiries Into the Varieties of Moral Formation.