Liberalism is on the defensive. Political discussion is shifting from “what’s wrong with liberalism” to “what’s true about politics”—to the question of what exactly must displace liberalism. In The Politics of the Real, D. C. Schindler takes us to the definitive metaphysical roots of liberal politics: the modern reversal of the priority of act over potency; the modern privileging of empty possibility over flourishing perfection. In this podcast, Michael Boland and D. C. Schindler discuss liberalism, and how we can build a politics of the real.