The War for Kindness: Building Empathy in a Fractured World

4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars | 559 ratings

Price: 13.78

Last update: 10-15-2024


About this item

“In this masterpiece, Jamil Zaki weaves together the very latest science with stories that will stay in your heart forever.” (Angela Duckworth, author of Grit)

Empathy is in short supply. We struggle to understand people who aren’t like us, but find it easy to hate them. Studies show that we are less caring than we were even 30 years ago. In 2006, Barack Obama said that the United States was suffering from an “empathy deficit.” Since then, things seem to have only gotten worse.

It doesn’t have to be this way. In this groundbreaking book, Jamil Zaki shares cutting-edge research, including experiments from his own lab, showing that empathy is not a fixed trait - something we’re born with or not - but rather a skill that can be strengthened through effort.

He also tells the stories of people who embody this new perspective, fighting for kindness in the most difficult of circumstances. We meet a former neo-Nazi who is now helping extract people from hate groups, ex-prisoners discussing novels with the judge who sentenced them, Washington police officers changing their culture to decrease violence among their ranks, and NICU nurses fine-tuning their empathy so that they don’t succumb to burnout.

Written with clarity and passion, The War for Kindness is an inspiring call to action. The future may depend on whether we accept the challenge.

Praise for The War for Kindness:

“A wide-ranging practical guide to making the world better.” (NPR)

“Relating anecdotes and test cases from his fellow researchers, news events and the imaginary world of literature and entertainment, Zaki makes a vital case for ‘fighting for kindness.’ ...If he’s right - and after reading The War for Kindness, you’ll probably think so - Zaki’s work is right on time.” (San Francisco Chronicle)

“In this landmark book, Jamil Zaki gives us a revolutionary perspective on empathy: Empathy can be developed, and, when it is, people, relationships, organizations, and cultures are changed.” (Carol Dweck, author of Mindset)


Top reviews from the United States

LM
5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful, engaging, moving, and important
Reviewed in the United States on June 16, 2019
What a fantastic book—a tapestry of science, human interest stories, and personal memoir to understand empathy as a key force in our lives and make the case that it's a skill we can grow. A few things I loved about it:

-It's engaging and the science is made clear.
-The science is interwoven with interviews and stories from former hate group members, police officers, actors, doctors, and others. Their stories are fascinating and moving in turn. One chapter in particular (about empathy in medical settings) made me tear up. I can't recall another popular science book having that effect on me.
-It’s important. So much in our society seems broken right now, and Zaki explores how and why empathy matters—across policing, political divides, school discipline, health care, and our digital lives. He considers negative trends and shows how empathy can yield better outcomes for us—whether to improve people's social lives, help doctors avoid burnout, or help police officers hold the trust of their communities.

The author is clear early on that it isn’t a self-help book, so don’t go into it expecting a 10-step program or anything like that. (Although, the book does still outline a lot of evidence on what works to build people’s empathy; it offers plenty enough that I’ve been thinking about how to incorporate it into my life.) But if you want a scientific perspective on what empathy is and how it works, how individuals and societies can build it, and why that matters for making our lives better, this book is a must-read.
Dr Ali Binazir
5.0 out of 5 stars An important book on empathy, a superpower we'd all do well to cultivate
Reviewed in the United States on August 2, 2019
How does an Aryan Nation white supremacist turn into a peace activist? Does throwing Palestinian and Israeli kids in summer camp together really improve relations in a troubled region? With vivid, unforgettable stories like these, Dr Jamil Zaki of Stanford brings to life today's cutting edge research on empathy, altruism, cooperation and how it all relates to behavioral change.
The findings are often encouraging, sometimes counterintuitive, always fascinating. For example, even though humans are the kindest animal species on the planet, their sense of empathy has been decreasing over the past few decades. Well-intentioned programs like Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) either don't work or backfire. Patients of empathic physicians tend to be more satisfied with their care and fare better overall, but too much empathy results in physician burnout.
This is a new science that affects the life of everyone that deals with other humans -- from the microscale of family, friendships and romance, to the macroscale of racism, war, and peace. Empathy is a superpower, and if you'd like to know about its subtle workings, Prof Zaki's book is an excellent place to start.
-- Ali Binazir, M.D., M.Phil., Happiness Engineer and author of The Tao of Dating: The Smart Woman's Guide to Being Absolutely Irresistible, the highest-rated dating book on Amazon, and Should I Go to Medical School?: An Irreverent Guide to the Pros and Cons of a Career in Medicine
Schildkrote
4.0 out of 5 stars The author discusses the need for empathy in American society
Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2019
The author illustrates how a lack of empathy causes us not to care about other people.
E. N. Anderson
5.0 out of 5 stars Working toward empathy
Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2019
Other amazon reviews have well covered this book...I need only add that the various methods, workshops, and personal encounters are well validated and some are widely used, so this is a valuable how-to book for communities. The disturbing roblem is that they are all labor-intensive: "saving the world one person at a time." The depressing thought occurs that Hitler and people like him can galvanize millions of people at a time to hate and kill. We have to figure out how to get millions to do right. That said...I really wish I had had this book when I was young. I wish everybody had this book.
Drew Fox
5.0 out of 5 stars Bringing hope for a more empathetic world -- great read!
Reviewed in the United States on June 17, 2019
In this good read, Dr. Zaki argues that we can "choose empathy" in an unjust and complex world. Zaki thoughtfully integrates scientific findings with compelling stories making this a fun and informative read. As a scientist in a related field of psychology, I was delighted to see that he provides a realistic overview of what scientists have learned about empathy. In making his argument that empathy is a skill which can be trained, nudged, and chosen, is heartwarming and true. I would recommend this book to anyone who believes that people "are the way they are" and/or who seeks to understand what scientists have to say about our capacity to increase kindness in ourselves and the world around us.
Sagar Jethani
5.0 out of 5 stars Full of surprises
Reviewed in the United States on February 11, 2020
Jamil Zaki's "The War for Kindness: Building Empathy in a Fractured World" is a fascinating look at a subject we think we understand. Zaki shows how empathy can change throughout a person's life, and how specific activities like mediation, reading, and deliberately engineered "nudges" can increase a person's empathy. To me, the most surprising part of his argument is that far from being a categorical evil, technology can actually increase a person's empathy if it is designed to do so. In other words, technology is what we design it to be.

Far from a recitation of the sorry state of empathy in America, "The War for Kindness" is a gripping, beautifully-written account that is full of surprises.
Guy E. Deaner
3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing
Reviewed in the United States on December 26, 2019
Heard interview with author on podcast of Hidden Brain. Great interview so bought book. However book is not nearly so good. Study after study with some author comment in between. Choppy, no flow. Have put book aside and not sure I will get back to it.
Sebastian
5.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable read that is relevant to today and tomorrow
Reviewed in the United States on July 20, 2019
I thoroughly enjoyed reading The War for Kindness - Jamil Zaki makes a compelling case that empathy is on the retreat these days, and to bolster his point he relates compelling stories that often tugged at my heart strings while I was reading this on the subway going to work. Overall I felt like I learned quite a bit from it - not just academically, but at a human level - that spending the time build my own empathy is both possible and worth while.

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