Democracy Works

From COVID-19 policies to reproductive rights, conversations about freedom and liberty seem to be front and center in politics and the culture wars. This week, we take a deep dive into the philosophical underpinnings of these concepts and how different interpretations of them impact our ability to sustain a democracy. We also examine how bringing the idea of freedom into political debates can obscure what's really at stake and make it difficult to come to meaningful resolution.Democracy Works host and McCourtney Institute for Democracy Managing Director Chris Beem talks with John Christman, professor of philosophy, political science, and women's studies at Penn State and director of the Humanities Institute. He is the author of numerous articles and books in social and political philosophy, specializing in topics such as the social conception of the self, theories of justice and oppression, and the idea of freedom. Christman is the editor of the newly-published Positive Freedom: Past, Present, and Future. The book includes both historical studies of the idea of positive freedom and discussions of its connection to important contemporary issues in social and political philosophy.Additional InformationPositive Freedom: Past, Present, and FuturePenn State Humanities Institute Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We are excited to share the first episode of a new narrative series on ballot initiatives from the McCourtney Institute for Democracy: When the People Decide. In this reported series, Jenna Spinelle tells the stories of activists, legislators, academics, and average citizens who changed their cities, states, and the country by taking important issues directly to votes — like Medicaid expansion in Idaho, sentencing reform in California, and LGBTQ workplace protections in Ohio. This episode tells the story of a campaign in Michigan to end partisan gerrymandering in 2018 and shows how it is part of a legacy of ballot initiatives dating back to the 1800s. After becoming disillusioned with the results of the 2016 election, Katie Fahey took to Facebook to gauge the interest of grassroots mobilization amongst her colleagues, friends and family. Now the executive director of a nonpartisan voter reform organization, Fahey shares how the ballot initiative excited everyday people about becoming active in politics, including its 10,000 volunteers, and how they were inspired to make political changes in their communities. We also hear from historian Steven Piott about the unlikely origin of the initiative and referendum in the United States at the turn of the 20th century.New episodes will be released throughout the summer. Subscribe to When the People Decide in your podcast app:Apple PodcastsSpotifyOvercastPodcast AddictGoogle Podcasts StitcherOther platformsLearn more about the podcast at thepeopledecide.show and follow us on Twitter @PeopleDecidePod. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Democracy Works is taking its annual summer hiatus starting next week, but that does not mean the wheels of democracy will stop turning while we're away. In fact, this summer could prove to be quite the opposite. In this episode, we discuss what's going on in the Supreme Court and the impact of the rulings that are expected to come out by the end of June. We'll also be watching the January 6 committee hearings, which are scheduled to begin June 9. We consider what the goals of the hearings are and how our fractured media landscape will impact how the committee's work is received by the public. Finally, we share some recommendations for books and series that have nothing to do with politics and tease a new series that we'll be launching this summer while Democracy Works is on break. Additional InformationCandis's recommendation: A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George SaundersChris's recommendation: Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa CatherMichael's recommendation: The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley RobinsonJenna's recommendation: Station Eleven by Emily St. John MandelRelated EpisodesThe Federalist Society's ideas have consequences for democracyHow national parties are breaking state politicsThe roots of radical partisanship Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In 100% Democracy: The Case for Universal Voting, E.J. Dionne and Miles Rapoport argue that all members of a democracy must participate in elections. Universal voting would be the surest way to protect against voter suppression and the active disenfranchisement of a large share of our citizens. And it would create a system true to the Declaration of Independence's aspirations by calling for a government based on the consent of all of the governed.The system works in Australia, but can it work in the United States? Would it become just another tool in partisan warfare? Can American democracy even handle something like universal voting? We explore those questions this week.Dionne is is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a syndicated columnist for the Washington Post, university professor at Georgetown University, and visiting professor at Harvard University. He is the author of Code Red: How Progressives and Moderates Can Unite to Save Our Country.Rapoport is the Senior Practice Fellow in American Democracy at the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation at the Harvard Kennedy School. He formerly served in the Connecticut state legislature and as secretary of the state. He also served as president of Demos and of Common Cause.Additional Information100% Democracy: The Case for Universal VotingRelated EpisodesDanielle Allen on achieving democracy's idealsHow national parties are breaking state politicsE.J. Dionne on empathy and democracy - E.J.'s first appearance on the show in April 2019 Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Baby Boomers are the most powerful generation in American history — and they're not going away anytime soon. Their influence in politics, media, business, and other areas of life is likely to continue for at least the next decade. What does that mean for younger generations? Generational conflict, with Millennials and Generation Z pitted against the aging Boomer cohort, has become a media staple. Older and younger voters are increasingly at odds: Republicans as a whole skew gray-haired, and within the Democratic Party, the left-leaning youth vote propels primary challengers. The generation gap is widening into a political fault line. Kevin Munger leverages data and survey evidence to argue that generational conflict will define the politics of the next decade.Munger is an assistant professor of political science and social data analytics at Penn State and the author of the new book Generation Gap: Why Baby Boomers Still Dominate American Politics and Culture.Additional InformationGeneration Gap: Why Baby Boomers Still Dominate American Politics and CultureKevin Munger on SubstackKevin Munger on TwitterRelated EpisodesMillennials' slow climb to political power Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Millennials are often seen as a progressive-minded generation – as 80’s and 90’s kids, they grew up in a digital landscape that exposed them to a diversity of perspectives. But while expectations were high that this generation would be on the frontlines in the fight for racial equality, recent research by Democracy Works host Candis Watts Smith paints a different picture. During this conversation with Lisa Hernandez and Lizzy Ghedi-Ehrlich, host of the Scholars Strategy Network's No Jargon podcast, Candis discussed how white millennials’ really think about race and the ways in which their views and beliefs have largely halted progress for Black Americans and other racial minorities in the United States. Additional InformationRacial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making All Black Lives MatterRelated EpisodesThe clumsy journal to antiracism Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Book bans are nothing new in the United States, but our guest this week says the current movement to restrict access to books about race and gender has a different flavor than bans in previous eras. Rather than coming from individual parents or from the ground up in a community, demands to ban dozens or even hundreds of books at a time are coming from state legislators or national parent groups who circulate lists of books online. This trend is troubling for free speech and for the democratic processes that govern how students access information in schools. Joining us to unpack what's happening and what we can do about is Jonathan Friedman, director of free expression and education at PEN America. He oversees advocacy, analysis, and outreach concerning educational communities and academic institution and drives PEN America’s efforts to catalyze a more informed, civic culture through education and advocacy for the rising generation and the general public.Additional InformationPEN America's report on book bansRelated EpisodesHow national parties are breaking state politicsPublic schools, not government schools Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We love a good debate — and have certainly had plenty of them on this show. But how effective are they in today's media and political landscape? We take up that question this week, prompted by the Republican National Committee's recent decision to withdraw from the Commission on Presidential Debates.John Hudak, deputy director of the Center for Effective Public Management and a senior fellow in Governance Studies at Brookings, wrote a piece on the GOP's decision that caught our attention. He joins us to discuss the commission's history and where things might go between now and 2024. Additional InformationHudak's piece for BrookingsHudak on Twitter Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Americans owe more than $1.5 trillion in student debt and some members of the Millennial and Gen Z wonder whether they'll ever pay off their loans. Student loans began as a well-intended government program to help increase America's brainpower in the Cold War era, but as our guest this week describes, grew into a political and financial morass that's swept up millions of people over the past 50 years. The Department of Education announced on April 19 that at least 40,000 borrowers will be eligible for debt forgiveness through a loan forgiveness program for public servants, but as we discuss in this episode, the program is complicated and places an administrative burden on borrowers to comply with its rules.Our guest this week is Josh Mitchell, a reporter who covers the economy and higher education for The Wall Street Journal, and author ofThe Debt Trap: How Student Loans Became a National Catastrophe. In the book, Mitchell draws alarming parallels to the housing crisis in the late 2000s, showing the catastrophic consequences student debt has had on families and the nation’s future. Additional InformationThe Debt Trap: How Student Loans Became a National CatastropheApril 2022 loan forgiveness announcement from the Department of Education Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Peter Pomerantsev visited Penn State at the end of March, when he was just back from a trip to Ukraine. We discuss what he saw there, as well as how American media is covering the war. We also talk about the similarities between Ukraine and the United States when it comes to being vulnerable to Russian disinformation — and how both countries can strengthen democratic media. Pomerantsev is a senior fellow at the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University and author of the books This Is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality and Everything Is True and Nothing Is Possible : The Surreal Heart of the New Russia. Additional InformationPeter's lecture on Ukraine at Penn StatePeter's article on Ukraine in TimePeter's article on Ukraine in The Economist Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Jon Meacham is one of America's leading thinkers on how the country's political history can inform the present. He recently visited Penn State to present a lecture on his 2018 book The Soul of America and joined us for a wide-ranging conversation on the war in Ukraine (and whether Zelensky really is like Churchill), American polarization polarization, the changing media landscape, and more. Meacham is author of multiple New York Times bestsellers, a distinguished visiting professor at Vanderbilt University and co-chair of Vanderbilt's Project on Unity and American Democracy, a contributing writer for The New York Times Book Review, and a fellow of the Society of American Historians.Thank you to the Center for Character, Conscience, and Public Purpose at Penn State for bringing Jon to campus and making this interview possible. Additional InformationVanderbilt Project on Unity and American DemocracyHope Through HistoryFate of Fact The Soul of AmericaHis Truth is Marching On Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Political violence is rising in the United States, with Republicans and Democrats divided along racial and ethnic lines that spurred massive bloodshed and democratic collapse earlier in the nation’s history. The January 6, 2021 insurrection and the partisan responses that ensued are a vivid illustration of how deep these currents run. How did American politics become so divided that we cannot agree on how to categorize an attack on our own Capitol?In the new book Radical American Partisanship, Lilliana Mason and Nathan Kalmoe bring together four years of studying radicalism among ordinary American partisans. They draw on new evidence—as well as insights from history, psychology, and political science—to put our present partisan fractiousness in context and to explain broad patterns of political and social change. Mason joins us this week to discuss the findings and the rocky path toward making the United States a fully-realized multiracial democracy She is an associate professor of political science at the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University and author of Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity.Additional InformationRadical American Partisanship: Mapping Violent Hostility, Its Causes, and the Consequences for DemocracyLilliana Mason on TwitterSNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins UniversityRelated EpisodesSore losers are bad for democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Peter Pomerantsev will visit Penn State March 31 and April 1 to discus Ukraine, Russian misinformation, and more. To get ready for his visit, we're rebroadcasting our conversation with him from May 2021. Click the link below to register to watch his lectures via livestream.Misinformation, disinformation, propaganda — the terms are thrown around a lot but often used to describe the same general trend toward conspiratorial thinking that spread from the post-Soviet world to the West over the past two decades. Peter Pomerantsev had a front seat to this shift and is one of the people trying to figure out how to make the Internet more democratic and combat disinformation from both the supply side and the demand side. Pomerantsev is a senior fellow at the London School of Economics and the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University. He is the author of This is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality and Nothing is True and Everything Is Possible: Adventures in Modern Russia. He has a forthcoming project with Anne Applebaum that will examine why people believe in conspiracies and how to create content that fosters collaboration, rather than sows division. Additional InformationRegister to watch Pomerantsev's lecturesPomerantsev on TwitterThis is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against RealityRelated EpisodesA path forward for social media and democracyCan pranksters save democracy?How conspiracies are damaging democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The concept of dignity comes up a lot when we think about the condition of American democracy. Francis Fukuyama wrote about the demand for dignity and the politics of resentment and Chris Bail talked with us how dignity offline impacts our behavior online, just to name a few.Rep. Ro Khanna combines his experience in politics and technology policy to address the question of dignity in his new book, Dignity in the Digital Age. Khanna presents a vision for how the digital economy can create opportunities for people all across the country without uprooting them. He argues that democratizing digital innovation to build economically vibrant and inclusive communities. Instead of being subject to tech’s reshaping of our economy, Khanna says we must channel those powerful forces toward creating a more healthy, equal, and democratic society.We begin this conversation by talking about the war in Ukraine and whether it might help bring unity to America. We also discuss why it's essential to make sure companies are contributing more than just jobs to the communities they operate in, as we heard from Alec MacGillis in his work on Amazon.Khanna represents Silicon Valley in Congress. He has taught economics at Stanford, served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce in the Obama Administration, and represented tech companies and startups in private practice. Additional InformationDignity in a Digital Age: Making Tech Work for All of UsRelated EpisodesHow Amazon is disrupting democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Was the war in Ukraine inevitable? What is Vladimir Putin trying to achieve? What does the conflict say about Ukraine as a democracy? Those are just a few of the questions Michael Berkman explores this week with Donna Bahry, professor emerita of political science at Penn State and an expert in Soviet and post-Soviet politics and democratization. Donna has studied Russia and the Soviet Union for decades and traveled to the country dozes of time from late Gorbachev era through 2018. She also talks about the challenges of doing scholarly work in the region and how that task will become even more difficult in the wake of the current crisis. Related EpisodesWill Alexei Navalny make Russia more democratic? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Robert Kagan is a foreign policy expert who turned his focus to the United States last fall in a Washington Post column titled "Our Constitutional Crisis Is Already Here" that became one of the Post's most-read pieces of 2021. We're lucky to have Kagan with us this week to discuss the ongoing crises of democracy at home and abroad as Russia's war on Ukraine continues to unfold.Kagan has argued that there was nothing inevitable about the relatively peaceful liberal democratic order that followed World War II, and that there is nothing inevitable about the perseverance of American democracy. In fact, he says that because so many reject the 2020 presidential election, we are already in a constitutional crisis, and it will take deliberate actions by the public and members of both political parties to get us out. For too many politicians, a recognition of our condition, let alone a commitment to those actions, appears to be a long way off.Kagan is the Stephen and Barbara Friedman Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institute and a member of the Foreign Affairs Policy Board in the U.S. State Department. He is the author of The Jungle Grows Back: America and Our Imperiled World and The New York Times bestseller, The World America Made.Additional InformationKagan's piece on constitutional crisisKagan's piece on UkraineKagan's lecture at Penn StateRelated EpisodesSore losers are bad for democracyHow national parties are breaking state politics Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What should academic freedom look like in 2022? How has it become conflated with the idea of free speech? Who should decide how issues regarding faculty speech should be adjudicated? Those are just a few of the questions we explore this week with Michael Bérubé and Jennifer Ruth, authors of It's Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy, and the Future of Academic Freedom. The book considers the ideal of academic freedom in the wake of the activism inspired by outrageous police brutality, white supremacy, and the #MeToo movement. Arguing that academic freedom must be rigorously distinguished from freedom of speech, Bérubé and Ruth take aim at explicit defenses of colonialism and theories of white supremacy—theories that have no intellectual legitimacy whatsoever. They argue that the democracy-destroying potential of social media makes it very difficult to uphold the traditional liberal view that the best remedy for hate speech is more speech.Bérubé is the Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Literature at Penn State; Ruth is a professor of film at Portland State University. They've also coauthored Humanities, Higher Education, and Academic Freedom: Three Necessary Arguments. Additional InformationIt's Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy and the Future of Academic FreedomRelated EpisodesJonathan Rauch on The Constitution of KnowledgeAre land-grant universities still democracy's colleges? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Thomas Main's new book The Rise of Illiberalism explores the philosophical underpinnings of this toxic political ideology and documents how it has infiltrated the mainstream of political discourse in the United States. By the early twenty-first century, Main writes, liberal democracy’s failure to deal adequately with social problems created a space illiberal movements could exploit to promote their particular brands of identity politics as an alternative. While illiberalism has found a home across the political spectrum, it is far more prevalent on the right — so much so that it appears to have taken over the modern-day Republican Party as evidenced on January 6, 2021. We explore those ideas with Main this week and also revisit the foundations of liberal democracy as outlined in the Declaration of Independence. Additional InformationThe Rise of IlliberalismThomas Main on TwitterRelated EpisodesSore losers are bad for democracyDaniel Ziblatt on how democracies die Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We've talked a lot on this show about the problems that news deserts, misinformation, and information silos present to democracy. Our guest this week says these things are all downstream from a much more fundamental disconnect between the need for a free press in a democracy and the models the United States has set up to make it happen.Victor Pickard is the C. Edwin Baker Professor of Media Policy and Political Economy at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Democracy Without Journalism? Confronting the Misinformation Society. We discuss the history of market failures and policy choices that led to the decline of local journalism and the spread of misinformation. Victor walks us through his vision for what a re-imagined public media ecosystem in the United States might look like and what it will take to get there. Examples like WBEZ's recent acquisition of the Chicago Sun-Times provide examples of what's possible. Candis and Chris discuss how Victor's arguments about the assault on public media are similar to what we heard from Derek W. Black about public education last year.Additional InformationDemocracy Without Journalism? Confronting the Misinformation SocietyWBEZ acquires the Chicago Sun-TimesRelated EpisodesNews deserts are democracy deserts tooPublic schools, not government schoolsHow democracies can win the war on reality Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Over the past generation, the Democratic and Republican parties have each become nationally coordinated political teams. American political institutions, on the other hand, remain highly decentralized. In his forthcoming book, Laboratories Against Democracy, Jake Grumbach argues that as Congress has become more gridlocked, national partisan and activist groups have shifted their sights to the state level, nationalizing state politics in the process and transforming state governments into the engines of American policymaking in areas from health care to climate change. He also traces how national groups are using state governmental authority to suppress the vote, gerrymander districts, and erode the very foundations of democracy itself.Grumbach is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Washington. He was recently granted tenure. Congratulations, Jake! Additional InformationLaboratories Against Democracy: How National Parties Transformed State PoliticsGrumbach's websiteGrumbach on TwitterRelated EpisodesFederalism in uncertain times Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Recent elections and the January 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol insurrection have underscored worrisome trends in the present state of our democracy: the extreme polarization of the electorate, the dismissal of people with opposing views, and the widespread acceptance and circulation of one-sided and factually erroneous information. Only a small proportion of those who are eligible actually vote, and a declining number of citizens actively participate in local community activities.In Flunking Democracy, Michael Rebell makes the case that this is not a recent problem, but rather that for generations now, America’s schools have systematically failed to prepare students to be capable citizens. In the book and in this interview, he specific recommendations for how the courts can and should address this deficiency. He also talks about his efforts to make those ideas a reality — including petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court later this year.Rebell is Professor of Law and Educational Practice and Executive Director of the Center for Educational Equity at Teachers College.Additional InformationCook v. McKee - the case Rebell and his colleagues are taking to the U.S. Supreme courtCenter for Educational Equity at Columbia UniversityFlunking Democracy: Schools, Courts, and Civic ParticipationRelated EpisodesPublic schools, not government schoolsCitizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Correction: In this episode, we referred to St. John's Church in Lafayette Square as a Presbyterian Church. It is an Episcopalian Church. We apologize for the error.Around the world, religion is being used to fuel "us vs. them" narratives and undermine the foundations of democracy. This week, we dive into what this means and how people of faith can chart a different path forward.Faith, Nationalism, and the Future of Liberal Democracy highlights the use of religious identity to fuel the rise of illiberal, nationalist, and populist democracy. It examines the ways religious identity is weaponized to fuel populist revolts against a political, social, and economic order that values democracy in a global and strikingly diverse world. The book is intended for readers who value democracy and are concerned about growing threats to it, and especially for people of faith and religious leaders, which is why we're excited to have author David M. Elcott on the show this week. Elcott is the Taub Professor of Practice in Public Service and Leadership at the Wagner School of Public Service at NYU and director of the Advocacy and Political Action specialization.Additional InformationFaith, Nationalism, and the Future of Liberal DemocracyDemocracy and the language of faith - article in Democracy Journal Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We're back for a new season and our 200th episode! Penn State's Jim Piazza returns to the show this week to discuss a new study on why the loser's consent is a critical part of a healthy democracy — and what happens when politicians and other elites fail to abide by it. Piazza found that countries where one of the main political parties lost the election but refused to accept the results experienced five domestic terrorist attacks per year, compared to one attack every two years in countries where political parties accepted election results. The “sore loser” effect also makes terrorism more acceptable, with one-third of people in countries that reject election results saying terrorism is justified, compared to 9% of people in countries where election results are accepted.At a time when many experts are sounding the alarm that "it can't happen here" might not hold, Piazza's work and the principles behind it are critically important to consider.Additional InformationArticle in Political Research QuarterlyArticle in The ConversationHow Civil Wars StartRelated EpisodesUnderstanding domestic terrorism - Piazza's first appearance on the show Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

There's no shortage of articles these days about how democracy is doomed in 2022 and/or 2024. Michael, Chris, and Candis discuss them this week and work through how much weight to give the doomsayers and how to take antidemocratic forces seriously without falling too far into despair. We also touch on what's happened in schools and at school board meetings over the past year, and what these developments mean for long-held theories about the power and stability of local government. Finally, we discuss the University of Austin, which is led by several former guests of this show, and whether it will really solve the problems it aims to.Thank you to everyone who's listened to and supported the show over the past year. We are taking a few weeks off and will be back with new episodes in January. Happy holidays! Additional InformationTrump's next coup has already begin - The AtlanticOur constitutional crisis is already here - The Washington PostTrump won't let America go. Can Democrats pry it away? - The New York TimesRelated EpisodesAmerican democracy's violent disruption Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Political disagreements are everywhere these days and most experts agree that too much political polarization is bad for democracy in the long run. How do we move beyond those disagreements, or at least not make them worse? Does the solution come from individual actions or institutional reform? Or perhaps a mix of both? This is what Robert Talisse describes as the "democrat's dilemma" and he argues the solution starts with introspection that he calls "democratic reflection."Drawing on social science research concerning political polarization and partisan identity, Talisse's new book Sustaining Democracy suggests that when we break off civil interactions with our political opponents, we imperil relations with our political allies. In the absence of engagement with our political critics, our alliances grow increasingly homogeneous, conformist, and hierarchical. Moreover, they fracture and devolve amidst internal conflicts. In the end, our political aims suffer because our coalitions shrink and grow ineffective.Michael and Chris contrast the need for democratic introspection and collaboration with the prospect of institutional reform and discuss how to make sense of Talisse's arguments as we approach the one-year anniversary of the January 6 insurrection. Talisse previously joined us in December 2019 to discuss his book Overdoing Democracy.Additional InformationSustaining Democracy: What We Owe to the Other SideRelated EpisodesIs it possible to overdo democracy? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In her book Until I Am Free, Keisha N. Blain situates Fannie Lou Hamer as a key political thinker alongside leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Rosa Parks and demonstrates how her ideas remain salient for a new generation of activists committed to dismantling systems of oppression in the United States and across the globe.Despite her limited material resources and the myriad challenges she endured as a Black woman living in poverty in Mississippi, Hamer committed herself to making a difference in the lives of others and improving American democracy for everyone. She refused to be sidelined in the movement and refused to be intimidated by those of higher social status and with better jobs and education. As she saw it, no one was free until everyone was free.Blain is an award-winning historian of the 20th century United States with broad interests and specializations in African American history, the modern African diaspora, and women’s and gender studies. She is an associate professor of History at the University of Pittsburgh and the president of the African American Intellectual History Society. She is currently a fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard University. She is also a columnist for MSNBC, covering race, gender, and politics in historical and contemporary perspectives.Additional InformationUntil I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer's Enduring Message to AmericaHamer's 1964 Democratic National Convention speechBlain's websiteBlain on TwitterRelated EpisodesThe ongoing struggle for civil rightsCivil rights, civil unrest Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This week, we broadcast a recording from a virtual event with Andrew Yang and Charlie Dent on political parties and democracy reform. We discuss open primaries, ranked-choice voting, universal voting, and more. Dent was the McCourtney Institute for Democracy’s fall 2021 visiting fellow. He spent seven terms in Congress representing Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley and served in the Pennsylvania state legislature before that. He’s currently executive director of the Aspen Institute Congressional Program, a CNN political analyst, and a 501c3 adviser for the Renew America Movement, which supports candidates who are committed to democracy and the rule of law. Yang ran for president in 2020 and mayor of New York City earlier this year. Most recently, he founded the Forward Party, a movement that brings together people interested in solving America’s problems, debating ideas in good faith, and advocating for policies like open primaries and ranked-choice voting. Before that, he started Humanity Forward to advance policies aimed at ending poverty. His latest book is Forward: Notes on the Future of Our Democracy.Both Dent and Yang spend a lot of time thinking about how to fix what’s broken in American politics but have different ideas about how to do that and where go from here, which made for a very interesting discussion.Additional InformationWatch the event on YouTubeForward Notes on the Future of Our DemocracyForward PartyRenew America MovementRelated EpisodesThe case for open primariesYour guide to ranked-choice votingHow to end democracy's doom loopA roadmap to a more equitable democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

As we've heard from Carol Anderson and others on this show, the fight for voting rights often breaks down along racial and partisan lines. Desmond Meade saw that as a problem and set out to change it by channeling our shared sense of humanity and the common good to push for change.Meade is a formerly homeless returning citizen who overcame many obstacles to eventually become the President of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC), Chair of Floridians for a Fair Democracy, and a graduate of Florida International University College of Law. He led the FRRC to a historic victory in 2018 with the successful passage of Amendment 4, a grassroots citizen’s initiative which restored voting rights to over 1.4 million Floridians with past felony convictions. He is a 2021 MacArthur Fellow — a recipient of the organization's prestigious genius grant — and was recognized by Time Magazine as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World for 2019. He received the 2021 Brown Democracy Medal from the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State.Additional InformationAmerica's Disenfranchised: Why Restoring Their Vote Can Save the Soul of Our DemocracyLet My People Vote: My Battle to Restore the Civil Rights of Returning CitizensMeade's Brown Democracy Medal lectureFlorida Rights Restoration CoalitionRelated EpisodesVoter suppression doesn't repeat, but it rhymesDanielle Allen on achieving democracy's ideals Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Jonathan Haidt is part of the newly-announced University of Austin, created in response to what its founders deem a lack of viewpoint diversity among college faculty. Haidt was beginning to explore those themes when he joined on the show in March 2019.We say on this show all the time that democracy is hard work. But what does that really mean? What it is about our dispositions that makes it so hard to see eye to eye and come together for the greater good? And why, despite all that, do we feel compelled to do it anyway? Jonathan Haidt is the perfect person to help us unpack those questions.We also explore what we can do now to educate the next generation of democratic citizens, based on the research Jonathan and co-author Greg Lukianoff did for their latest book The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas are Setting Up a Generation for Failure.Jonathan is social psychologist at New York University’s Stern School of Business. His research examines the intuitive foundations of morality, and how morality varies across cultures — including the cultures of American progressive, conservatives, and libertarians.Additional InformationThe University of AustinHeterodox AcademyThe Coddling of the American MindRelated EpisodesA love letter to democratic institutions Andrew Sullivan on democracy's double-edged sword Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In an era of increasing social isolation, platforms like Facebook and Twitter are among the most important tools we have to understand each other. We use social media as a mirror to decipher our place in society but, as Chris Bail explains, it functions more like a prism that distorts our identities, empowers status-seeking extremists, and renders moderates all but invisible. Bail's book, Breaking the Social Media Prism, challenges common myths about echo chambers, foreign misinformation campaigns, and radicalizing algorithms, revealing that the solution to political tribalism lies deep inside ourselves. Drawing on innovative online experiments and in-depth interviews with social media users from across the political spectrum, this book explains why stepping outside of our echo chambers can make us more polarized, not less. Bail is professor of sociology and public policy at Duke University, where he directs the Polarization Lab. He is the author of Terrified: How Anti-Muslim Fringe Organizations Became Mainstream.Additional InformationBreaking the Social Media PrismThe Polarization LabBail's websiteBail on TwitterRelated EpisodesA path forward for social media and democracyFacebook is not a democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Political campaigns in the United States, especially those for the presidency, can be nasty—very nasty. And while we would like to believe that the 2020 election was an aberration, insults, invective, and yes, even violence have characterized U.S. electoral politics since the republic’s early days. By examining the political discourse around nine particularly deplorable elections, Mary E. Stuckey seeks to explain why. Stuckey is the Sparks Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences at Penn State. She specializes in political and presidential rhetoric, political communication, and American Indian politics.After the interview, Michael Berkman and Candis Watts Smith discuss how the despicable discourse Stuckey describes trickles down to local politics, particularly school board races in the current election cycle.Additional InformationDeplorable: The Worst Presidential Campaigns from Jefferson to TrumpMary Stuckey on TwitterRelated EpisodesDemagogues are more common than you think Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

As another election cycle approaches, moderates in the Republican Party have some choices to make. Will they continue to fight Trumpism from within? Or break out to form a new political party, perhaps in coalition with moderate Democrats who feel alienated by the party's leftward turn? Miles Taylor and Charlie Dent are two Republicans at the forefront of addressing that question through the Renew America, a movement to deepen America’s pro-democracy bench.By working together across party lines, the group hopes to shift the balance of power in Washington, DC away from those who want to dismantle democracy’s guardrails and back to real leaders who will put country over party.Taylor is the co-founder of Renew America, former chief of staff in the Department of Homeland Security and author of the New York Times bestseller A Warning. Dent is the McCourtney Institute for Democracy’s fall 2021 visiting fellow. He served seven terms in Congress representing and is now executive director of the Aspen Institute Congressional Program and CNN political analyst.Additional InformationRenew AmericaMiles Taylor on TwitterCharlie Dent on TwitterRelated EpisodesWhat really motivates Trump supportersCongressional oversight and making America pragmatic again Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Over the past 30 years, citizens of democracies who claim to value freedom, tolerance, and the rule of law have increasingly embraced illiberal politicians and platforms on both the right and the left. Democracy is in trouble, but who is really to blame?In Our Own Worst Enemy, Tom Nichols challenges the current depictions of the rise of illiberal and anti-democratic movements in the United States and elsewhere as the result of the deprivations of globalization or the malign decisions of elites. Rather, he places the blame for the rise of illiberalism on the people themselves. Ordinary citizens, laden with grievances, have joined forces with political entrepreneurs who thrive on the creation of rage rather than on the encouragement of civic virtue and democratic cooperation. While it will be difficult, Nichols argues that we need to defend democracy by resurrecting the virtues of altruism, compromise, stoicism, and cooperation — and by recognizing how good we've actually had it in the modern world.Nichols is Professor of National Security Affairs, at the US Naval War College, a columnist for USA Today, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. He is the author of The Death of Expertise, No Use: Nuclear Weapons and US National Security (2013), and Eve of Destruction: The Coming Age of Preventive War.Additional InformationOur Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from Within on Modern Democracy Tom Nichols on TwitterRelated EpisodesPrimaries, parties, and the publicChris Beem on democratic virtues Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Gerrymandering is one of the topics we've discussed most on this show, with good reason. But those conversations mostly stopped at the solution of creating independent redistricting commissions to draw electoral maps, taking the process out of partisan-controlled state legislatures. While that's undeniably a good thing, this week's guest argues it's just one part of a bigger solution. An independent nonpartisan commission is not always going to create a nonpartisan map. Christopher Fowler is an associate professor of geography at Penn State and a member of Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf's Redistricting Advisory Council. His research examines the way our choices about geographic boundaries shape the outcomes we are able to observe. He examine neighborhoods, school catchment areas, electoral districts, metropolitan areas, and labor markets with a focus on how these units of observation reflect the distribution of populations in space. After the interview, Chris Beem and Candis Watts Smith discuss whether ideas like ranked-choice voting and multi-member districts can take hold in America's political landscape. Regular listeners of the show will not be surprised to hear that Chris is doubtful, while Candis is optimistic.Additional InformationFowler's Monkey Cage article on redistrictingPennsylvania Redistricting Advisory CouncilRelated EpisodesExtreme maps, extreme politicsOne state's fight for fair maps Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Carol Anderson's book One Person, No Vote was written before COVID-19, but many of the patterns she discussed are more salient than ever as states enact new voting restrictions ahead of the 2022 midterms. In the book and in this conversation, Anderson traces the history of voter suppression since the Supreme Court's 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder, which nullified critical pieces of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.She draws parallels between poll taxes and literacy tests in the Jim Crow era to voter ID laws and other modern-day barriers designed to keep people of color from voting. As Mark Twain famously said, "history doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes." After listening to this conversation, it's hard not to think that's the case with voting. This week is National Voter Education week, an effort to bridge the gap between registering to vote and casting a ballot. Visit votereducationweek.org to learn more about this important effort.Anderson is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of African American Studies at Emory University and author of the bestselling books One Person No Vote: How Voter Suppression is Destroying Our Democracy, White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Nation's Divide, and The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America. Additional InformationAnderson's websiteAnderson on TwitterBrennan Center for Justice on DMV closuresRelated EpisodesLaboratories of restricting democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The problems of disinformation, conspiracies, and cancel culture are probably familiar to many of our listeners. But they're usually talked about separately, including on this show. In his new book, The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth, Jonathan Rauch ties these threads together and shows how they contribute to a larger problem of a departure from facts and truth in favor of feelings and falsehoods. The book reaches back to the parallel eighteenth-century developments of liberal democracy and science to explain what he calls the “Constitution of Knowledge”—our social system for turning disagreement into truth. The institutions that Rauch describes as "reality-based communities," universities, media, government organizations, and the courts, need our support now more than ever as they face attacks from illiberal forces across the political spectrum. But are the problems on the left and the right really the same? Rauch argues they are. Michael Berkman and Chris Beem consider that equivalency after the interview.Rauch is a senior fellow in the Governance Studies program and the author of eight books and many articles on public policy, culture, and government. He is a contributing writer of The Atlantic and recipient of the 2005 National Magazine Award, the magazine industry’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize. He has also authored research on political parties, marijuana legalization, LGBT rights and religious liberty, and more.Additional InformationThe Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of TruthKindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free ThoughtJonathan Rauch on TwitterRelated EpisodesHow democracies can win the war on realityAndrew Sullivan on democracy's double-edged swordJonathan Haidt on the psychology of democracyHow conspiracies are damaging democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

As we've said many times on this show, democracy is long and slow, which is the exact opposite of the ethos that Amazon has pushed into our culture through quick shipping, easily accessible entertainment, its takeover of cloud computing, and more.Amazon's expansion across America, from distribution facilities to data centers, is exacerbating regional inequities and contributing to the unraveling of America's social fabric. Not only that, cities competing for Amazon's new facilities offer tax breaks that prevent funding from going to basic government services. And, the company's takeover of government procurement has taken lucrative contracts away from local businesses.Alec MacGillis, a senior reporter at ProPublica, chronicles these trends in new book Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America. The book chronicles how Amazon contributed to the gap between the country’s winning and losing regions, and how its workplace practices foster isolation and competition, rather than camaraderie and shared goals. Was Amazon deliberately trying to undermine democracy? Or using the existing system to its benefit? We talk with MacGillis about founder Jeff Bezos's political philosophy and how it's impacted the company's decision-making over the years. We also discuss what we as democratic citizens can do to push back against some of these forces. Additional InformationFulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click AmericaAlec MacGillis on TwitterAlec's websiteRelated EpisodesCan corporations be democratic citizens?Reimagining citizenship in a consumer world Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Candis Watts Smith takes a turn in the interviewer's chair this week for a conversation about abortion and American democracy following the passage of SB8 in Texas and the Supreme Court's response to it. Like a lot of things in American democracy, it's complicated.As Candis says in the episode, it isn’t typical for us to discuss “hot topics” or policy matters, per se, on Democracy Works. But, this policy and the Supreme Court’s response to it throws a great number of matters related to democracy into relief, including federalism, the role of the Court to protect and uphold the U.S. Constitution and constitutional rights, state politics as laboratories of democracy and policy innovation, and partisan strategies to create the country in their ideological image. Candis talks with Rebecca Kreitzer, associate professor of public policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an expert on gender and political representation, reproductive health policy and political inequality. Rebecca was one of our first guest on Democracy Works back in 2018 and we're thrilled to have her back for a second appearance on this critically-important topic.Additional InformationRebecca's Monkey Cage article on Texas's heartbeat lawPostscript podcast on abortion from the New Books NetworkRebecca Kreitzer on TwitterRelated EpisodesBehind the scenes of the "year of the woman" - Rebecca's first appearance on the show Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Generational divides in American politics are nothing new, but they seem particularly striking now as the oldest Millennials turn 40 this year. This generation has different lived experiences than its predecessors, but has been sidelines from political power as Baby Boomers live longer and benefit from incumbency advantages. Charlotte Alter has spent the past four years documenting these dynamics and join us this week to discuss.Alter is a senior correspondent at Time magazine and author of The Ones We've Been Waiting For: How a New Generation of Leaders Will Transform America. The book covers national-level politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Elise Stefanik, as well as local leaders like mayors Svante Myrick (Ithaca, New York) and Michael Tubbs (Stockton, California). Alter's reporting defines the class of young leaders who are remaking the nation–how grappling with 9/11 as teens, serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, occupying Wall Street and protesting with Black Lives Matter, and shouldering their way into a financially rigged political system has shaped the people who will govern the future.Additional InformationThe Ones We've Been Waiting For: How a New Generation of Leaders Will Transform AmericaCharlotte Alter on TwitterThinking Is Cool podcastRelated EpisodesWill Millennials disrupt democracy? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We're back after our summer break. Michael, Chris, Candis, and Jenna catch up on what happened over the summer, from COVID vaccine mandates to school board chaos to the refugee crisis in Afghanistan. The underlying theme of it all is one of democracy's central tensions — the collective vs. the individual. The tension between individual liberty and the common good plays itself out in America's COVID response, debates over how race and history are taught in schools, and how we respond to the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. We discuss all of those issues this week and reflect on what our responsibilities are as democratic citizens. Related EpisodesRefugees and the politics of displacementThe clumsy journey to antiracismAdditional InformationChris Beem in The Conversation: Why refusing the COVID-19 vaccine is immoral and un-AmericanCandis Watts Smith in The Fulcrum: Experts fear ban on critical race theory could harm civics educationHurt Your Brain newsletter Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

As redistricting begins across the country, we revisit our conversation with journalist and author David Daley about the consequences for American democracy if gerrymandering happens again this time around. This episode originally aired in January 2021, not long after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.Daley has spent the past decade covering attempts by politicians to draw those maps to their advantage in a practice known as gerrymandering. He's also covered the groups of citizens across the country who pushed back against them to win some major reforms that will make the process look different now than it did in 2010.Daley is a journalist and author of Unrigged: How Citizens are Battling Back to Save Democracy. His work has appeared in the New Yorker, the Atlantic, Slate, the Washington Post, and New York magazine. He is a senior fellow at FairVote, the former editor of Salon, and lives in Massachusetts.Additional InformationDaley's op-ed on democracy deserts in The GuardianUnrigged: How Americans are Battling Back to Save DemocracyDaley on TwitterRelated EpisodesOne state's fight for fair mapsNext-generation democracy: An interview with high school student Kyle Hynes, who won Pennsylvania's citizen mapmaking contest. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Democracy and populism diverge at a single point. It’s like a fork in a road where both traditions depend on a common history, but they split in two. At first it may seem the choice doesn’t matter. You believe that eventually they will both lead to the same destination except they don’t. The choice leads to two different outcomes. Populism uses some of the same language of democracy. It has a similar vocabulary. But as we go farther down its path, the less in common they have with each other.Jan-Werner Müller is among the most recognizable voices on the subject of populism and democracy. This conversation from the Democracy Paradox podcast touches on some of their most challenging aspects from political leadership to majority rule to militant democracy. This conversation explores some of the ideas at the heart of this podcast. Ideas that give definition to the very meaning of democracy.Müller is a professor of politics at Princeton University and author of Democracy Rules and What is Populism? Additional InformationDemocracy ParadoxDemocracy RulesJan-Werner Müller at Princeton Politics Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Some of the most talked-about issues in Congress these days are not about the substance of policies or bills being debated on the floor. Instead, the focus is on the partisan conflict between the parties and the endless debate about whether individual members of Congress will break with party ranks on any particular vote. This behavior allows the parties to emphasize the differences between them, which makes it easier to court donors and hold voter attention.Some amount of competition between the parties is necessary in a healthy democracy, but have things gone too far? Frances E. Lee joins us this week to explain.Lee is jointly appointed in the Department of Politics and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, where she is Professor of Politics and Public Affairs. She is the author of Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Perpetual Campaign and The Limits of Party: Congress and Lawmaking in a Polarized Era with James M. Curry.Additional InformationLee's book, Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Perpetual CampaignHer lecture at Penn State on lawmaking in a polarized eraLee's websiteRelated EpisodesCongressional oversight and making America pragmatic againUnpacking political polarization Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Many of us can recall the experience of scrolling through our phones or streaming TV apps without ever choosing something to focus on. Pete Davis describes this an "infinite browsing mode" and argues that it creates a culture where democracy can't fully thrive. Davis is cofounder of the Democracy Policy Network and author of Dedicated: The Case for Commitment in an Age of Infinite Browsing. His work is grounded in the notion of "long-haul heroes," or the people who show up day in and day out to make progress on the issues they care about while building stronger communities in the process. This could be anyone from the go-to event organizer in your town to people who work on nationwide campaigns for issues like racial equality and LGBTQ rights. This work has always been difficult, but Davis argues it's even harder now because of the constant distractions that our media environment provides, along with the FOMO and related feelings that prevent us from dedicating ourselves to anything in the long term. We unpack all of that in this episode and discuss how Davis is turning his ideas into action through the Democracy Policy Network.Related EpisodesThere is no "I" in democracyAdditional InformationDedicated : The Case for Commitment in an Age of Infinite BrowsingDemocracy Policy NetworkThis is What Democracy Looks Like podcastPete Davis on Twitter Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Three pillars hold up autocracy in Russia, author and New Yorker staff writer Masha Gessen says: media control, sham elections and downright terror. But the opposition movement spearheaded by imprisoned activist Alexei Navalny has struck at the heart of all three. This time on the show, Gessen explains how — and measures the power of democratic aspirations in a country struggling against corruption with hope, against the past with visions of a happier future.Navalny, a lawyer who has become President Vladimir Putin’s chief political rival, leads the Russia of the Future party, whose motto is “Russia will be happy.” In prison, his health failing, and recently off a 24-day hunger strike, Navalny continues to command respect — and a vast YouTube following — in part because he is brave enough to fight the system, even if it costs him his life, Gessen says. It’s a powerful message for a generation from whom many of the tools of critical social analysis have been withheld. Against the odds, Navalny’s resistance is inspiring young people who have grown up with no ruler other than Putin, a former KGB officer who views the totalitarian past with nostalgia.This episode comes from our colleagues at Democracy in Danger, a production of the Deliberative Media Lab at the University of Virginia. Additional InformationDemocracy in Danger podcastSurviving Autocracy by Masha GessenRelated EpisodesWill Alexi Navalny make Russia more democratic? Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Can transparency, oversight, ethics and accountability save American democracy? What can Congress do to create lasting ethics reforms? How would the For the People Act change ethics rules for the legislative, judicial, and executive branches of the U.S. government and are the changes enough? How can the Office of Government Ethics and Office of the Inspector General contribute to democratic accountability? How can Congress get a toe hold into reigning in presidential power?In this episode of the Democracy Matters podcast from the JMU Center for Civic Engagement, hosts Abe Goldberg, Carah Ong Whaley, and Angelina Clapp talk with Walter Shaub, who leads the Ethics and Accountability Initiative at the Project on Government Oversight about what elected and other government officials and the public can do to create and implement long-lasting reforms to shore up the barricades against authoritarianism.Additional InformationDemocracy Matters podcastProject on Government OversightWalter Shaub on TwitterJMU Civic Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Local news and democracy have been intertwined since the days of Alexis de Tocqueville. As we've discussed on this show before, news outlets are one way that people who live in a city or town keep up on what's happening in their local government. However, our guest this week argues the "watchdog" effect of local journalism might be overstated, along with the correlation between local news consumption and political participation.Nikki Usher is an associate professor in the College of Media at the University of Illinois and author of News for the Rich, White, and Blue: How Place and Power Distort American Journalism. In the book and in this conversation, Usher recasts the challenges facing journalism in terms of place, power, and inequality. She questions longstanding beliefs about the relationship between local news and civic engagement and separates observed behavior from myths about American democracy and the media's role within it. This conversation originally appeared on New Books in Journalism, part of the New Books Network.Additional InformationNews for the Rich, White, and Blue: How Place and Power Distort American JournalismNew Books NetworkRelated EpisodesNews deserts are democracy deserts tooFacebook is not a democracy Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Lee Drutman is a senior fellow in the Political Reform program at New America. He is the author of Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America and The Business of America is Lobbying. He is also the co-host of the podcast Politics in Question, and writes for the New York Times, Vox, and FiveThirtyEight, among other outlets. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California.Hear more from Drtuman at a virtual event on "Democracy's Crises and Failure of Imagination" sponsored by The Democracy Group podcast network. Lee will be joined by Carah One Whaley of James Madison University, democracy entrepreneur Turi Munthe, and Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle. Join us Wednesday, July 7 at 2:00 p.m. ET or watch the recording at democracygroup.org. Additional InformationJuly 7 event with The Democracy GroupBreaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in AmericaRelated EpisodesDoes Congress promote partisan gridlock?Primaries, parties and the publicHow the Tea Party and the Resistance are upending politics Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We live in an era defined by a sense of separation, even in the midst of networked connectivity. As cultural climates sour and political division spreads, our guest this week suggests there is no better time to reconsider ideas of unity in democracy.In his book, The Ethics of Oneness, Jeremy David Engels argues that if the lessons of oneness are taken to heart, particularly as they were expressed and celebrated by Whitman, and the ethical challenges of oneness considered seriously, it is possible to counter the pervasive and problematic American ideals of hierarchy, exclusion, violence, and domination. Engels is professor of communication arts and sciences at Penn State and the Barry Director of the Paterno Fellows Program. He's also a yoga and meditation instructor who has spent time studying yoga and philosophy in India. He is the author of The Ethics of Oneness: Emerson, Whitman, and the Bhagavad Gita, The Art of Gratitude, The Politics of Resentment, and Enemyship: Democracy and Counter-Revolution in the Early Republic. Additional InformationThe Ethics of OnenessJeremy's websiteJoin The Democracy Group podcast network on July 7, 2021 at 2:00 p.m. ET for a virtual event on "Democracy's Crises and Failure of Imagination" featuring Lee Drutman of New America, Carah Ong Whaley of James Madison University, and Turi Munthe of Parlia. Register here or visit democracygroup.org to watch the recording. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The New York City mayoral primary is this week and will be the first one to use ranked-choice voting. This week, we revisit an episode that aired not longer after the city's voters approved ranked-choice voting via ballot measure in November 2019. What is ranked-choice voting? How does it work? And, is it more democratic than the single-vote method we’re used to? This week’s guest has answers to all of those questions.Burt L. Monroe is Liberal Arts Professor Political Science, Social Data Analytics, and Informatics at Penn State and Director of the university’s Center for Social Data Analytics. He says ranked-choice voting is generally a good thing for democracy, but not entirely without problems of its own. We also talk about bullet voting, donkey voting, and other types of voting that have been tried around the world.As Michael and Chris discuss, ranked-choice voting falls into a category of grassroots organizing around pro-democracy initiatives like gerrymandering and open primaries. These efforts signal a frustration with the status quo and a desire to make the rules of democracy more fair and equitable.Additional InformationFairvote, an advocacy group for ranked-choice voting and election reformBurt’s Google Scholar listingRelated EpisodesHow to end democracy's doom loopThe case for open primariesOne state’s fight for fair maps Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.