The Dignity of Dependence

Leah Libresco Sargeant Sargeant is a writer and speaker whose work covers religion, culture, statistics, and family policy. She is the author of Building the Benedict Option and Arriving at Amen. She runs the Substack community Other Feminisms.

1. The World is the Wrong Shape for Women 2. The Lie of the Lonely Individual 3. Helping Women be Better Men 4. The Incredible Shrinking Woman 5. The Limits of Labor Language 6. Illegal to Care 7. The Blessing of Burdens 8. Choosing to Care 9. The School of Love

"In this atmosphere, it’s remarkable to hear an influential conservative voice calling for more, not less, feminization. . . . But her overarching message to put others first, as women so often do, is a much-needed antidote to the celebration of the masculine and denigration of the feminine that have become a hallmark of the right." —The Atlantic

"What Sargeant invites is fundamentally a change of mind first before a practical set of actions. . . . Her insight deserves an especially wide hearing, especially if Christians can proclaim it with right emphasis: less servant leadership as claimed by people more interested in the leadership part, and more outright service. Less self-sufficiency and more self-gift. We all bear dignity. We all need help." —Christianity Today

"Sargeant has provided an essential alternative to feminist ideals that efface womanhood, and The Dignity of Dependence should be assigned on every college campus in the country. This book is a much-needed antidote to the poisonous alienation between the sexes that besets our culture." —The Federalist

"What Leah Libresco Sargeant’s new book encourages the reader to consider is that dependence, properly understood, actually goes far deeper, and that self-sufficiency is, essentially, a kind of mirage. In its moral imagination and clear-eyed assessment of the reality of what it means to be human, The Dignity of Dependence inherits and builds upon the best tradition of Christian radicalism." —Family Matters

"So, yes, to the dignity of dependence. Can we grab hold of it? Can we honour it? When we do so, especially as women, we may find the trajectory of an autonomous, expedient, falsely independent and efficient-in-all-the-wrong-ways world actually changes. To this end, may the readership for Sargeant’s book be large and appreciative." —The Catholic Register

"Sargeant blends personal anecdote with policy discussion and cultural commentary. . . . The resulting book is something akin to a phenomenology of everyday vulnerability and love." —First Things

"The Dignity of Dependence makes a nuanced argument not only about a better model of feminism but also about the importance of a proper anthropology to ground our politics and economics." —Religion & Liberty

"This book cuts through tribal lines to offer something truly innovative: a vision that is pro-feminist, pro-femaleness, and pro–human life, that sees the interests of men and women as interdependent rather than at odds. This is an exciting, provocative, original book." —Abigail Favale, author of The Genesis of Gender

"The Dignity of Dependence provides a window into Leah Libresco Sargeants beautiful mind, allowing us to see the world as she sees it and to imagine we can become the men and women she believes we can be. This magnificent book is a love letter, not only to her own beloved husband and children, but to all women, all children, and all men, too. A humane and dignified vision of how men, women, and children can thrive together, as the kinds of beings we are, with plenty of space for the most vulnerable among us." —Erika Bachiochi, author of The Rights of Women

"Leah Libresco Sargeant has written a beautiful and profound meditation on what it means to be human. The Dignity of Dependence is a humanist manifesto of the finest caliber and a cri de coeur that all of us would be wise to heed." —Ryan T. Anderson, co-author of Tearing Us Apart

"Leah Libresco Sargeant is one of those rare prophetic voices: redescribing the world around us to see it with fresh perception, and enjoining us to a future worth building together. These stories and ideas of dependence-with-dignity will help readers find their way to a vision of life with needfulness fully intact, a gift economy of both giving and receiving." —Sara Hendren, author of What Can a Body Do?

"This wise, perceptive book is an essential corrective to the tendency of our society to identify independence with flourishing. As Leah Libresco Sargeant shows, flourishing is only possible if we depend on those we love, and if they depend on us. This is essential reading for all who have been shaped toward blindness to this simple truth—and so maybe for men above all." —Yuval Levin, author of American Covenant

"With sharp insight and persuasive argument, Sargeant dismantles the false vision of humanity that undervalues care, vulnerability, and interdependence—offering instead a radical reimagining of dignity itself. This book is a call to embrace relationships of encounter, where care is not a burden but a shared and dignified act of love." —Kristin Collier, clinical associate professor of internal medicine and associate residency program director, University of Michigan Medical School

"This book isn’t just a feminist manifesto—it’s a human manifesto. It is one of the wisest and most compelling portrayals of human dignity I’ve ever read."—Karen Swallow Prior, author of You Have a Calling

"[The Dignity of Dependence] is a manifesto for another kind of feminism, laying out both an overarching vision (especially in the opening pages), one discomfiting to the political left and right alike, and the concrete particulars, the decisions and values and policy choices, necessary to implement it. . . . The book is a culmination and synthesis of [Sargeants] public writing for more than a decade." —Arc: Religion, Politics, Et Cetera

"Instead of attempting to erase the innate biological differences which make women more dependent, Libresco Sargeant calls for husbands and extended family to participate in caregiving, thus dignifying women’s dependence." —The Critic

"[I]f truth is not relative, as Sargeant argues it isn’t, then men and women truly need each other for not only survival but sanctification. And they need a society that sees them for what they are: fully human." —Commonplace

"Sargeant’s book is a must-read not only for those involved in feminist discourse, but for anybody concerned with creating a kinder and more inclusive society." —Institute for Family Studies