Democracy Works
The Democracy Works podcast seeks to answer that question by examining a different aspect of democratic life each week — from voting to criminal justice to the free press and everything in between. We interview experts who study democracy, as well as people who are out there doing the hard work of democracy day in and day out. The show’s name comes from Pennsylvania’s long tradition of iron and steel works — people coming together to build things greater than the sum of their parts. We believe that democracy is the same way. Each of us has a role to play in...
Mon, March 24, 2025
The problem(s) with platforms
Cory Doctorow coined the term "enshittification" to describe how tech platforms have eroded over time. According to him, the process goes something like this: First, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. Doctorow joins us in a collaborative interview with News Over Noise to discuss how enshittifiation has affected our ability to find information, engage in deliberative democracy, and more. We also discuss what coalitions are necessary to push back against enshittification and how science fiction can help us imagine a more democratic world. Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist and journalist. He is the author of many books, including The Lost Cause, a science fiction novel of hope amidst the climate emergency, and The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Production . Doctorow's blog, Pluralistic Doctorow's lecture on enshittification
Mon, March 03, 2025
Lessons from Charlottesville and January 6
As the lead investigator into both the 2017 racist riot in Charlottesville and the January 6 insurrection, Tim Heaphy has a unique perspective on the cynicism and anger that also fueled Trump’s return to the presidency. All three events, both the violent protests and the peaceful and lawful decisions made at the ballot box in November 2024, reflect an increasing lack of trust in institutions among a growing number of Americans. He reflects on his work and where we go from here in the book Harbingers: What January 6 and Charlottesville Reveal About Rising Threats to American Democracy Heaphy joins us to discuss the divide between people who trust the system and people who don't and make the case for why a disengaged citizenry is the biggest threat to American democracy. We also discuss his reactions to the first few weeks of the Trump administration and the pardoning of people convicted in relation to January 6. Heaphy served as the U.S. attorney for the Western District of Virginia from 2009-14. His previous experience included clerking for Judge John A. Terry of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals and working for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia.
Mon, February 17, 2025
Christianity as a democratic institution
Chris Beem, McCourtney Institute for Democracy managing director and research professor of political science at Penn State, talks with author Jonathan Rauch about why the current crisis in American Christianity is also a crisis in American democracy. In his new book Cross Purposes: Christianity's Broken Bargain with Democracy , Rauch (a lifelong atheist) asks what happens to American democracy if Christianity is no longer able, or no longer willing, to perform the functions on which our constitutional order depends? In the book and in this conversation, Rauch encourages Christians to recommit to the teachings of their faith that align with Madison, not MAGA, and to understand that liberal democracy, far from being oppressive, is uniquely protective of religious freedom. At the same time, he calls on secular liberals to understand that healthy religious institutions are crucial to the survival of the liberal state. This episode is the third in a series of discussions Chris has hosted about religion, liberalism, and democracy. The first was with journalist Tim Alberta about the evangelicals and the MAGA movement; the second was with political theorist Alex Lefebvre about the role of liberalism in our daily lives. Those episodes come together in this conversation with Rauch.
Mon, February 03, 2025
The power of practicing peace
It's easy to feel defeated in the face of political challenges, but this episode shows that everyone has the capacity to create positive change and contribute to a culture of peace in their communities. In her book " Peace by Peace: Risking Public Action, Creating Social Change ," Lisa Silvestri shows how ordinary people addressed issues in their communities form the West Bank to Baltimore. Silvestri found those stories through a process she calls "crowdsourcing hope" and found that deliberately seeking out peace led her to discover more and more of it. The book is grounded in the Ancient Greek virtue phronesis, which Silvestri explains in the interview. We also discuss how not all social action needs to be political — and why it might be better if it's not. After the interview, Cyanne Loyle and Candis Watts Smith discuss the power of using what frustrates you as an impetus for change, and how finding common cause can be more effective at reducing polarization than finding common ground. Silvestri is an associate teaching professor of communication arts and sciences at Penn State. She likes to think, write, and speak about war, peace, politics, social justice, digital culture, democracy and civic life. She has contributed to outlets including The Washington Post andThe New York Times and has spoken at The 92nd Street Y and The South by Southwest Festival. Lisa Silvestri's website Peace by Peace classroom guide
Mon, January 20, 2025
Pushing back against political violence
Instances of political violence around the 2024 election and vote certification on January 6, 2025 did not come to fruition the way some experts feared they would throughout last year. But that doesn't mean that we can forget about threats of political violence until it's time for the next election. In fact, political violence continues to rise in the United States and throughout western Europe. Our guests this week, Rachel Kleinfeld of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Nicole Bibbins Sedaca of Freedom House and the George W. Bush Institute, are two of the leading voices on how to prevent political violence and create a healthier democracy. They join us to discuss what causes political violence and what democracies around the world can do to prevent it by addressing both cultural and structural issues in politics. After the interview, Chris Beem and Cyanne Loyle discuss whether non-violent protest movements can successfully combat political violence amid growing polarization and support for political violence from some elected officials and political leaders. Kleinfeld and Bibbins Sedaca are the authors of the article "How to Prevent Political Violence," which appeared in the fall 2024 issue of The Journal of Democracy. Journal of Democracy article: How to Prevent Political Violence
Mon, January 06, 2025
Democracy reform in 2025 and beyond
The results of the 2024 election — from Donald Trump's victory to the failure of democracy reform efforts like ranked-choice voting and citizen-led redistricting — took some in the pro-democracy movement by surprise. How could voters make decisions up and down the ballot that would weaken democracy? Scott Warren argues that it's because "democracy" has become too closely associated with the Democratic Party. He laid out the case in a Stanford Social Innovation Review article published shortly after the election and joins us on the show to talk about it. Warren is a fellow at the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University. He is currently leading an initiative focused on exploring, researching, and convening a pro-democracy conservative agenda in the US, with a short-term focus on election trust. He founded the civics education organization Generation Citizen and led the organization from 2009-2020. In the interview, Warren discusses how Generation Citizen's funding change after Donald Trump won the 2016 election and how he and his colleagues at SNF Agora are traveling across the country to bring conservatives into the democracy reform movement. Finally, we discuss how to talk about democracy in a way that resonates across the political spectrum — the subject of a Democracy Takes piece Warren wrote with Lilia Dashevsky.
Mon, December 23, 2024
Season finale: Reflecting on a new political era
This episode marks the first time that all five of our hosts (Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, Cyanne Loyle, Candis Watts Smith, and Jenna Spinelle) are together on one episode. It's also the first time we've all been together since the election. We take some time to reflect on changes in America's political party, the decline of liberal democracy in the U.S., and how to harness the good from social media amid growing extremism and misinformation. Along the way, you'll hear from some of the guests who've appeared on the show this year: Joe Wright: How personalist parties destabilize democracy Cassidy Hutchinson: Is there room for Republicans in the Democratic party? Alex Lefebvre: Can democracy exist without liberalism? Matthew Rhodes-Purdy: How populism spreads Cynthia Miller-Idriss: The rise of online extremism V Spehar: Social media as tool for community building From the entire Democracy Works team, best wishes for a happy holiday season! We'll see you in 2025.
Mon, December 09, 2024
Sustaining democracy during wartime
Balazs Trencsenyi, co-director of Invisible University for Ukraine (IUFU), joins us to discuss the university's work to uphold education and democracy in Ukraine amid the country's ongoing war with Russia. IUFU, an initiative of Central European University was founded shortly after the start of the war in 2022. Since then, more than 1,000 students have taken online and in-person courses taught by faculty around the world. Trencsenyi is a professor of historical studies at CEU and and director of the university's Institute for Advanced Studies. He is a historian of East Central European political and cultural thought. He's witnessed Hungary's democratic erosion firsthand and discusses Viktor Orban's rise to power and how he's slowly dismantled the country's democratic institutions. IUFU received the 2024 Brown Democracy Medal from the McCourtney Institute for Democracy. Trencsenyi and IUFU student assistant Nataliia Shuliakova visited Penn State in October to accept the award. Read the 2024 Brown Medal book from IUFU students and faculty Watch the Brown Medal ceremony and lecture
Mon, November 25, 2024
Telling America's story at the National Archives
Colleen Shogan, archivist of the United States, joins us for a conversation about democratizing access to national records and running a non-partisan organization in an increasingly polarized country. Shogan was appointed by President Biden and has been criticized by both sides of the political spectrum for trying to use the National Archives to tell a partisan story about America's history. Shogan is a political scientist by training and talks about making the transition from academia to government and how her background as a scholar of the presidency informs the work she does now. We also discuss the National Archives and Records Administration's efforts to digitize billions of records housed in facilities across the country. We recorded this episode before the 2024 election, but as you'll hear, it takes on new significance in the face of a second Trump administration. Mentioned in this episode: National Archives Citizen Archivist program Wall Street Journal article about Shogan Shogan's response to the Wall Street Journal article
Bonus · Mon, November 18, 2024
Bad Watchdog: The Red Herring
We're excited to bring you an episode from Bad Watchdog , the podcast from the Project on Government Oversight and one of our colleagues in The Democracy Group podcast network. This is the first episode of the show's second season, which takes a deep dive on the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Established in the wake of September 11, the DHS was entrusted with protecting the U.S. from national security threats. Since then, much of the agency’s focus has been on the southern border — with tens of thousands of people held in its detention centers on a daily basis. Host Maren Machles explores how this came to be and delves into what happens to people held in immigration detention centers with the presumption that they may be national security threats. And she asks the question: How does this relate to the way DHS addresses the most dangerous threat currently facing our nation — far-right violent extremism? To find out, host Maren Machles talks with Daryl Johnson, who recounts his work as the former lead analyst for domestic terrorism at DHS. She also speaks with Alejandro Beutel, a criminologist who focuses on domestic terrorism, and Berto Hernandez, who shares their story of being brought into the U.S. as a child and held in detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement years later. Listen to Bad Watchdog Learn more about The Democracy Group
Mon, November 11, 2024
How strong is support for democracy?
We are collecting our thoughts about what's next for democracy following the 2024 election and will take up the question during our end-of-year episode in December. Democracy Works host Michael Berkman, director of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy and professor of political science at Penn State talks with Christopher Claassen , a political scientist at the University of Glasgow, about how to measure support for democracy across countries and across generations. Claassen grew up in South Africa and was 16 when the country held its first democratic elections. His interest in democracy continued through college and into his career as a political scientist. Today, he is a professor of political behavior at the University of Glasgow. One area of his research focuses on how to measure support for democracy. In a recent paper , he and colleagues developed 17 survey questions that cover all eight components of liberal democracy as defined by the V-Dem project in an effort to refine what people mean when they say the support or don't support democracy. Berkman and Claassen also discuss how support for democracy is part of the 2024 U.S. election. Note that this interview was recorded in late October 2024 before the election took place. Referenced in this episode: McCourtney Institute for Democracy Mood of the Nation Poll Episode with Cynthia MIller-Idriss on communities and political extremism
Mon, October 28, 2024
How the Supreme Court could shape the 2024 election
Dahlia Lithwick has covered the Supreme Court since the landmark Bush v. Gore decision in 2000. In that time, she's seen a sea change in the court itself, as well as the way that journalists cover it. We discuss those trends in this episode, as well as how former President Trump's legal team has changed since the 2020 election. Lithwick is the host of Amicus , Slate’s podcast about the law and the Supreme Court, and author of "Lady Justice: Women, the Law, and the Battle to Save America." She has held visiting faculty positions at the University of Georgia Law School, the University of Virginia School of Law, and the Hebrew University Law School in Jerusalem. Referenced in this episode: How Chief Justice Roberts shaped Trump's Supreme Court winning streak - New York Times "Stop the Seal" 2.0 is here and it's scarily sophisticated - Slate We helped John Roberts construct his image as a centrist. We were so wrong . - Slate
Mon, October 14, 2024
Eddie Glaude Jr. on the peril of outsourcing democracy
With just weeks to go before the election, voting and candidates are top of mind of many of us. It's easy to think that once our preferred candidates win, our obligations to democracy are finished until the next election. Scholar and author Eddie Glaude Jr. has spent his career studying the perils of that approach throughout history, particularly when it comes to Black politics and power. Glaude joins us to discuss how he's thinking about the 2024 election, the difference between hope and joy, and why we can't outsource democracy solely to elected representatives. One of the nation's most prominent scholars, Glaude's work examines the complex dynamics of the American experience. He is the author of " We are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For, " " Democracy in Black: How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul ,"and " Begin Again: James Baldwin's America and Its Urgent Lessons for our Own ." He is the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of African American Studies, a program he first became involved with shaping as a doctoral candidate in Religion at Princeton. He is also on the Morehouse College Board of Trustees. He frequently appears in the media, as a columnist for TIME Magazine and as an MSNBC contributor.
Mon, September 30, 2024
Liberalism is a lifestyle
Chris Beem talks with political theorist Alexandre Lefebvre about why liberalism is more than just a political ideas and procedures, and how abiding by liberal principles can enhance your life far beyond politics. In his book Liberalism as a Way of Life , Lefebvre argues that liberalism isn’t just a set of neutral procedures; it’s a comprehensive way of life that shapes the way we live and think and work and love in innumerable ways. He also argues that it’s a way of life worth robustly defending, drawing on examples from pop culture and recent history. Lefebeve is a professor of politics and philosophy at the University of Sydney. He teaches and researches political theory, the history of political thought, modern and contemporary French philosophy, and human rights.
Mon, September 16, 2024
The immigration stories that aren't told
Immigration is a perennial issue in American politics, but the rhetoric we hear from candidates on the campaign trail is often very different than the day-to-day experiences of migrants traveling from central America to the United States and the smugglers who help them make the often dangerous journey to get here. In an effort to better understand this essential yet extralegal billion dollar global industry, anthropologist Jason De León embedded with a group of smugglers moving migrants across Mexico over the course of seven years. The result is the book " Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling ," which we discuss on this episode. The book is a finalist for the 2024 National Book Award ! De León is Professor of Anthropology and Chicana/o Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles with his lab located in the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology and Executive Director of the Undocumented Migration Project , a research, arts, and education collective that seeks to raise awareness about migration issues globally while also assisting families of missing migrants be reunited with their loved ones. He is also a 2017 MacArthur Foundation Fellow and a Penn State alumnus. Finally, we are excited to welcome Cyanne Loyle , associate professor of political science at Penn State, to the Democracy Works team. She was a guest host in the spring and will be joining the permanent lineup with Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, and Candis Watts Smith.
Mon, September 02, 2024
How the National Popular Vote could change presidential elections
We're back from summer break with a deep dive on the National Popular Vote campaign, an effort to render the Electoral College obsolete when states pledge their electors to the winner of the nationwide popular vote. As of August 2024, National Popular Vote has been enacted by 17 states and the District of Columbia, accounting for 209 of the 270 electoral votes needed to make it a reality nationwide. Guests Patrick Rosenstiel and Alyssa Cass have a plan to get to 270 by the 2028 presidential election. Rosenstiel is a senior consultant for National Popular Vote and has visited 45 states on behalf of the campaign. As a Republican political field director, he successfully directed grassroots efforts across the West and Midwest to garner Senate support for U.S. Supreme Court candidates John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Cass is a partner at Slingshot Strategies and founded its communications practice. During the 2022 cycle, she spearheaded the communications strategy for two of New York's most competitive, most watched congressional elections, leading media and messaging strategy for Representative Pat Ryan (in both the NY-19 special election and the NY-18 general election) and Carlina Rivera in New York's 10th Congressional District. After the interview, Chris Beem and Candis Watts Smith discuss whether the National Popular Vote will survive a Supreme Court challenge and how it could change the way elections and campaigns are run.
Mon, July 08, 2024
Making Peace Visible: In search of good conflict
While Democracy Works is on summer break, we bring you an episode from our friends at Making Peace Visible, a podcast that ignites powerful conversations all over the world about how the media covers peace and conflict. This episode features journalist and author Amanda Ripley. We've wanted to have Amanda on the show for a long time and are grateful to the Making Peace Visible team for sharing this conversation with us! After over two decades as a journalist, including ten years covering terrorism and disasters for TIME Magazine , Amanda Ripley thought she understood conflict. But when momentum started to build around the candidacy of Donald Trump, she questioned what she thought she knew. Ripley interviewed psychologists, mediators, and people who had made it out of seemingly intractable conflicts for her book, High Conflict: Why We Get Stuck and How We Get Out . In this conversation with host Making Peace visible host Jamil Simon, she shares insights about how people in conflict can move forward, and how journalists can get at the "understory" of what's beneath any conflict. Order Amanda Ripley’s book, High Conflict: Why We Get Stuck and How We Get Out . Watch Amanada’s talk on High Conflict for The Alliance for Peacebuilding. Follow her column in the Washington Post.
Mon, June 03, 2024
Season finale: Protests, debates, and the "meh" election
We've reached the end of another school year and another season of Democracy Works. Before we go on summer break, Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, and Candis Watts Smith reflect on recent events and what's to come this summer. We do this by taking a look back at some of our previous episodes: The real free speech problem on campus : Penn State's Brad Vivian on the problems with "campus free speech" discourse and media coverage. We discuss how this narrative has been applied to protests about the war in Gaza that happened on some campuses near the end of the spring semester. Follow Brad's Substack for his more recent work on the Gaza protests and more. A different kind of political divide - Yanna Krupnikov from the University of Michigan on the divide between people who follow politics closely and those who don't. We're seeing this divide play out in recent polling that shows support for Donald Trump is higher among people who say they are not politically engaged, while support for Biden is higher among those who follow news and politics more closely. Debating the future of debates : John Hudak from Brookings talks about the value of presidential debates to democracy. We recorded this episode in 2022 after the RNC announced it would not participate in events organized by the Commission for Presidential Debates. Now that two debates are scheduled for the next few months, we discuss whether they'll actually happen and how much they'll matter. This is our last new episode until early September. We'll use the next few months to plan for our fall season. Please send us an email if you have ideas for topics we should tackle or guests we should interview. Have a great summer!
Mon, May 20, 2024
How elected strongmen weaken democracy
Democracies today are increasingly eroding at the hands of democratically-elected incumbents, who seize control by slowly chipping away at democratic institutions. Penn State political science professor Joseph Wright is and his coauthors explore this trend in their new book, The Origins of Elected Strongmen: How Personalist Parties Destroy Democracy from Within . Wright joins Michael Berkman , McCourtney Institute for Democracy director and professor of political science at Penn State, on the show this week to explore how the rise of personalist parties around the globe facilitating the decline of democracy. The book examines the role of personalist political parties, or parties that exist primarily to further their leader's career as opposed to promote a specific policy platform. The Origins of Elected Strongmen will be released June 11 from Oxford University Press. Wright's co-authors are Erica Frantz, associate professor of political science at Michigan State University, and Andrea Kendall-Taylor, senior fellow and director of the Transatlantic Security Program at the Center for a New American Security.
Mon, May 06, 2024
30 years of democracy in South Africa
Please join us in welcoming a special guest host for this episode! Cyanne Loyle is Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at Penn State and a Global Fellow at the Pease Research Institute Oslo. Her research focuses on transitional justice and democratic rebuilding after conflict, which makes her the perfect person to reflect on South Africa's democratic transition. One additional programming note — Chris Beem lost power during this recording so the closing segment is Cyanne and Jenna reflecting on the interview. At the end of April, South Africa marked the 30th anniversary of its first post-Apartheid election — the first in the country where everyone could vote. South African writer and scholar Antjie Krog join us for a look at the state of South African democracy today, the impact of the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and how South Africa has served as a model for other countries in democratic transition. Krog is a South African writer, scholar, and activist. She covered the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for the South African Broadcasting Corporation and wrote about the experience in the book Country of My Skull . She has published more than a dozen volumes of poetry and translated Nelson Mandela's biography into Afrikaans. She is currently a professor at the University of the Western Cape.
Mon, April 22, 2024
David Hogg on leaders we deserve
The shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida happened around the same time Democracy Works launched in 2018. In fact, one of the first episodes featured students who organized a march event in State College, Pennsylvania. At the time, we thought it would be fantastic to get David Hogg on the show. Six years later, he's finally here to talk about what his life has been like since that fateful day in February 2018 and his work to change gun policy at the state and federal level. Hogg also discusses his new project, Leaders We Deserve, which helps young people run for elected office. Finally, we discuss youth voter turnout and waning enthusiasm for Donald Trump and Joe Biden among young people ahead of November's election.
Mon, April 08, 2024
Democracy is the sum of us
Heather McGhee made her career in pushing for economic policy changes at the think tank Demos. But she couldn't help but feel that something was missing from her work. So she embarked on a cross-country road trip to understand what's at the heart of what ails America's economy and our democracy. The result is her book The Sum of Us , which she joins us to talk about in this episode. In the book, McGhee explores what we lose when we buy into the zero-sum paradigm—the idea that progress for some of us must come at the expense of others. She details how public goods in this country—from parks and pools to functioning schools—have become private luxuries; of how unions collapsed, wages stagnated, and inequality increased; and of how this country, unique among the world’s advanced economies, has thwarted universal healthcare. Finally, she offers examples of how this paradigm is changing in communities across the country when people work across differences to achieve a shared goal. At the beginning of the episode, we reference our conversation with Rhiana Gunn-Wright , one of the architects of the Green New Deal.
Mon, March 25, 2024
Cassidy Hutchinson on what comes after January 6
Cassidy Hutchinson, and aide to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows whose testimony captured the nation's attention in the January 6 Congressional hearings, joins us this week to discuss her time in the Trump administration and her new role safeguarding American democracy. Hutchinson was faced with a choice between loyalty to the Trump administration or loyalty to the country by revealing what she saw and heard in the attempt to overthrow a democratic election. She bravely came forward to become the pivotal witness in the House January 6 investigations, as her testimony transfixed and stunned the nation. In her memoir, Hutchinson reveals the struggle between the pressures she confronted to toe the party line and the demands of the oath she swore to defend American democracy. Hutchinson's memoir, Enough , was published in September 2023 and is a New York Times bestseller.
Mon, March 11, 2024
How discontent destabilizes demoracy
If there's one thing that people across the political spectrum can agree on, it's a sense of discontent with the current state of American politics. This week, we explore the origins of that discontent and why it's damaging to democracy. Our guest is Matthew Rhodes-Purdy, an assistant professor of political science at Clemson University and one of the authors of The Age of Discontent: Populism, Extremism, and Conspiracy Theories in Contemporary Democracies . Rhodes-Purdy and his co-authors argue that the most successful populist and extremist movements of the past 20 years have focused largely on cultural grievances, rather than on economic discontent. The book outlines what they describe as the troubling implications of discontent on the long-term compatibility of liberal democracy and free-market neoliberalism. Looking at case studies from around the world, the authors imply that democratic states must renew their commitment to social regulation of markets and to serve as conduits for citizen voice for democracy and market economies are to survive.
Mon, February 26, 2024
A different take on social media and democracy
We've talked about social media a lot on this show over the years — usually focusing on algorithms, echo chambers, polarization, and the other ways it's damaging to democracy. This week, however, we hear a different take from V Spehar , who has more than 3 million followers on the TikTok account Under the Desk News . V built a reputation providing recaps of the daily news for an audience who might not consume news anywhere else. The Under the Desk News audience is politically diverse and V talks about some of the conversations that happen in the comments section. V's also seen how social media can bring people together in real life and encourage people to become civically informed and engaged. Check out V’s new podcast, American Fever Dream .
Mon, February 12, 2024
How to combat political extremism
Cynthia Miller-Idriss, one of America's leading experts on the far right, joins us this week to discuss what draws people to political extremism online and offline — and what we can do to combat it. Miller-Idriss is the director of the Polarization and Extremism Research and Innovation Lab (PERIL) at American University and author of the book Hate in the Homeland: The New Global Far Right . As you'll hear, PERIL takes a public health approach to preventing violent extremism and provides tools and resources to help communities create resilient democracies. In the interview, Miller-Idriss discusses how extremism and political violence are linked to our desire for community. This dynamic means that extremist ideas can pop up in seemingly innocuous places from martial arts groups to online wellness communities. She says understanding this dynamic is key to moving people away from extremist spaces and into constructive communities. Miller-Idriss visited Penn State as part of the Mellon-funded Sawyer Seminar exploring the theme, "Birthing the Nation: Gender, Sex and Reproduction in Ethnonationalist Imaginaries."
Mon, January 29, 2024
A different kind of political divide
As a Democracy Works listener, you probably follow politics pretty closely. And we're going to go out on a limb and say that many of the people in your life do, too. But what about everyone else? People who casually keep up with political news or maybe tune iit out entirely. Scholars Yanna Krupnikov and John Barry Ryan argue that America might not be as polarized as we think because the media and political observers over-index on people who are deeply invested in politics at the expense of those who are not as engaged. They call this phenomenon "the other divide" and it's the subject of their most recent book. Krupnikov and Barry Ryan join us on the show this week to share their research on levels of political involvement and how it translates to media coverage. As Candis Watts Smith says at the end of the episode, we hope that this conversation will inspire some epistemic humility. Krupkniov is a professor of communication and media at the University of Michigan. Barry Ryan is associate professor of political science at the University of Michigan. They are the authors of The Other Divide: Polarization and Disengagement in American Politics .
Bonus · Mon, January 22, 2024
Tim Alberta on evangelicals and Republicans
Chris Beem talks with journalist Tim Alberta about the role that Evangelical Christians play in the Republican Party — and what that means for the future of American democracy. Alberta is a staff writer at The Atlantic and author of the books The Kingdom, The Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism and American Carnage: On the Front Lines of the Republican Civil War and the Rise of President Trump . He's also the son of an evangelical pastor. This conversation covers both books and how the evangelical movement and the Republican party have been corrupted. They also discuss the role that religion should play in politics, and Alberta's answer might surprise you.
Mon, January 15, 2024
How election officials are preparing for the year ahead
The past few years haven't been easy for election officials and their teams. They had to pivot during the pandemic and face ongoing threats that have resulted in unprecedented staff turnover. This turmoil brings more scrutiny of errors that occur when people make honest mistakes. Despite these challenges, Tammy Patrick, CEO for programs at the National Association of Election Officials , is confident that the tens of thousands of people charged with election administrators across the country this year will deliver free, fair, and secure elections. She's also optimistic about their ability to rise above threats and uphold their commitment to democracy. Patrick has been working in the election administration space since 2003, most recently as the Senior Advisor to the Elections Program at Democracy Fund. Focusing on modern elections, she works to foster a voter-centric elections system and support election officials across the country. In this conversation, we dive deeper into what's in store for election workers this year and how Patrick and her team are helping them prepare to stand up against everything from misinformation campaigns to threats of physical violence.
Bonus · Mon, January 01, 2024
Finding hope in 2024
Happy New Year! We're starting off 2024 with a conversation about finding hope in politics. We often hear from listeners that our show brings feelings of hope, and this episode is no exception. Rep. Derek Kilmer of Washington state joins us for a discussion on the Building Civic Bridges Act , a bipartisan bill that would provide funding for service projects aimed at bridging divides and reducing political polarization. We also discuss his work on the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress , which invited experts like Danielle Allen and Lee Drutman to discuss reforms including multi-member districts and increasing the size of the House of Representatives. It's hard to listen to Kilmer without feeling at least a little hopeful about where politics might go in the coming year. We hope this episode will help you start 2024 on a good note.
Mon, December 18, 2023
Year in review: Media, mental health, and threats to democracy
For our final episode of 2023, we revisit some of our episodes from throughout the year and reflect on what's in store for democracy in 2024. We talk about: Mental health and media consumption Bureaucracy and the prospect of Project 2025 The Republican party and threats to democracy Plus, we share some recommendations of the books and TV shows we loved in 2023. Recommendations include: TV: For All Mankind, Fargo, The Gilded Age, and Slow Horses Books: The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War by Jeff Sharlet; Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody, Why We Did It by Tim Miller Thank you to all of our listeners for another great year. We'll see you in 2024!
Bonus · Mon, December 11, 2023
Making Peace Visible: The state of democracy in India
This week, we're bringing you an episode from Making Peace Visible , a podcast that helps us understand the human side of conflicts and peace efforts around the world. The episode explores the how democracy is faring in India after years of democratic erosion by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP. We've covered democracy in India several times on the show, but it's been while and thought this episode was well-timed for a check in. Guest Suchitra Vijayan questioned whether India can still be called a democracy in a recent Time Magazine article. She talks with Making Peace Visible host Jamil Simon about how journalists who have criticized the government have been harassed, detained, imprisoned, and even murdered. As you’ll hear in this episode, today’s Indian government uses complicit media outlets as a weapon against non-violent dissent.
Mon, December 04, 2023
Does mandatory civic education increase voter turnout?
Two of our Penn State colleagues join us this week to discuss their recent findings on the connection between state-mandated civics tests and voter turnout. Jilli Jung, a doctoral student in education policy and Maithreyi Gopalan, assistant professor of education and public policy, recently published the paper " The Stubborn Unresponsiveness of Youth Voter Turnout to Civic Education: Quasi-Experimental Evidence From State-Mandated Civics Tests " in the journal Education Evaluation and Policy Analysis. In the paper, Jung and Gopalan study the Civic Education Initiative, a framework adopted by 18 states since 2015 that requires high school students to take a test very similar to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services Civics test. They found that voter turnout among 18-24 year olds largely did not increase in states that adopted the Civic Education Initiative compared to states that did adopt it. The reason for this, they argue, is that the knowledge of civic facts alone is not enough to motivate someone to vote for the first time. In this episode, we discuss how to structure civic education that could increase voter turnout and lead to more engaged democratic citizens. For more information on this work, check out the CivXNow coalition , which is made up of hundreds of organizations across the country that are working to strengthen civic education. Jung and Gopalan also recommend the following books and papers to anyone who wants to take a deeper dive into the role of civic education in a democracy: Making Young Voters: Converting Civic Attitudes into Civic Action Refocusing Civic Education: Developing the Skills Young People Need to Engage in Democracy I Will Register and Vote if you Teach Me How: A Field Experiment Testing Voter Registration in College Classrooms The Impact of Democracy Prep Public Schools on Civic Participation
Mon, November 20, 2023
A deep look at political loss
Democracy is sometimes described as "a system where political parties lose elections." That's true but doesn't capture the deeper feelings of grief and grievance associated with political loss. We dive into those emotions this week with Juliet Hooker, the Royce Family Professor of Teaching Excellence in Political Science at Brown University and author of Black Grief, White Grievance: The Politics of Loss . Hooker argues that whites as a group are accustomed to winning and feel a sense of grievance when they need to give up political power. Conversely, Black people are expected to be political heroes in the face of grief that comes from setbacks on the road to racial justice. These two forces, black grief and white grievance, have been at the heart of American politics for centuries and remain so today. Black grief, Hooker says, is exemplified by current protests against police violence—the latest in a tradition of violent death and subsequent public mourning spurring Black political mobilization. The potent politics of white grievance, meanwhile, which is also not new, imagines the United States as a white country under siege. This is a very thought-provoking book and conversation about some of the most important issues in American democracy. Black Grief, White Grievance: The Politics of Loss
Mon, November 06, 2023
When populism and democracy collide
Cas Mudde, one of the world's leading experts in the study of populism and far-right politics, joins us this week to discuss the tensions between populism and democracy, and why populism has increased around world in recent years. Mudde is the Stanley Wade Shelton UGAF Professor in the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Georgia and a Professor II in the Center for Research on Extremism (C-REX) at the University of Oslo. His research agenda aims to address the question: how can liberal democracies defend themselves against political challenges without undermining their core values? Mudde visited Penn State in October 2023 to give the keynote lecture at the Populism, Piety, and Patriotism conference organized by the McCourtney Institute for Democracy.
Mon, October 23, 2023
Understanding union voters
In the heyday of American labor, the influence of local unions extended far beyond the workplace. Unions were embedded in tight-knit communities, touching nearly every aspect of the lives of members—mostly men—and their families and neighbors. They conveyed fundamental worldviews, making blue-collar unionists into loyal Democrats who saw the party as on the side of the working man. Today, unions play a much less significant role in American life. In industrial and formerly industrial Rust Belt towns, Republican-leaning groups and outlooks have burgeoned among the kinds of voters who once would have been part of union communities. This episode explores why that's happened and whether new unions coming online at places like Starbucks may change the picture moving forward. Our guest is Lainey Newman, a J.D. candidate at Harvard Law School and co-author with Theda Skocpol of Rust Belt Union Blues: Why Working Class Voters are Turning Away from the Democratic Party . Newman is a graduate of Harvard College and a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Mon, October 09, 2023
A conflict at the heart of our political disagreements
Why do we disagree about the causes of and solutions to social inequality? What explains our different viewpoints on Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, income inequality, and immigration? Penn State professors John Iceland and Eric Silver join us this week to discuss how the discrepancy between social order and social justice impedes political compromise and progress. Iceland and Silver, along with Ilana Redstone of the University of Illinois, are the authors of Why We Disagree about Inequality: Social Justice vs. Social Order . In the book, they show how these competing worldviews are preventing Americans from solving their most pressing social problems. Iceland is Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Demography; Silver is Professor Sociology and Criminology and recently won the Open Inquiry Award for Teaching from Heterodox Academy. In the interview, we discuss how the conflict between social order and social justice played out at different points in history going back to the French Revolutions. Iceland and Silver also offer suggestions for how to move beyond these divisions to find consensus and common ground. After the interview, Chris Beem and Candis Watts Smith discuss whether social order and social justice should have equal footing and how looking to history might not be the best approach for how to break out of these silos. Why We Disagree about Inequality: Social Justice vs. Social Order
Bonus · Mon, September 25, 2023
What can we learn from early democracies?
This week, we're handing the microphone to Penn State student Joey Picarillo for an interview about the rise and fall of early democracies and what lessons we can learn from them today. Joey is a studying political science at Penn State World Campus and has already read many of the most influential books on democracy by Robert Dahl and others. He brought this book to our attention and did a wonderful job with the interview. Historical accounts of democracy’s rise tend to focus on ancient Greece and pre-Renaissance Europe. The Decline and Rise of Democracy by David Stasavage draws from global evidence to show that the story is much richer—democratic practices were present in many places, at many other times, from the Americas before European conquest, to ancient Mesopotamia, to precolonial Africa. Stasavage makes the case that understanding how and where these democracies flourished—and when and why they declined—can provide crucial information not just about the history of governance, but also about the ways modern democracies work and where they could manifest in the future. Stasavage is the Dean for the Social Sciences and the Julius Silver Professor in NYU’s Department of Politics and an Affiliated Professor in NYU’s School of Law. The Decline and Rise of Democracy: A Global History from Antiquity to Today
Mon, September 18, 2023
Building better bureaucracy
Before we get to the show notes, we invite you to take our listener survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works coffee mug! COVID-19 brought the problems with government technology into sharp focus. The systems responsible for delivering unemployment benefits and healthcare were not prepared to mange the influx of requests they received, and the government employees who run those systems were often hobbled by a culture that focuses on regulation and oversight, not innovation and acting quickly. Beyond the day-to-day impacts of these systems not working, the long-term consequences include the erosion of trust in the institutions that comprise our democracy. So, what can we do? Jennifer Pahlka has a few ideas and she joins us this week to talk about them. Pahlka is the author of Recoding America: Why Government Is Failing in the Digital Age and How We Can Do Better. She is the former deputy chief technology officer of the United States and the founder of Code for America, a nonprofit that believes government can work for people in the digital age. Recoding America website More information on Schedule F/Project 2025
Mon, September 11, 2023
Tim Miller on why Republicans stuck with Trump
Before we get to the show notes, we invite you to take our listener survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works coffee mug! Chris Beem talks with former Republican political operative Tim Miller about the party's loyalty to Donald Trump and where it might go in 2024 and beyond. Miller is a writer-at-large for The Bulwark and the author of the best-selling book Why We Did It: A Travelogue from the Republican Road to Hell . He was previously political director for Republican Voters Against Trump and communications director for Jeb Bush 2016. He also appears on MSNBC and The Circus on Showtime. Miller's book is a reflection on both his own past work for the Republican Party and the contortions of his former peers in the GOP establishment. He draws a straight line between the actions of the 2000s GOP to the Republican political class's Trumpian takeover, including the horrors of January 6th. In this conversation, Miller and Beem also discuss alarming trends among young conservatives and how they may continue, or even exacerbate, some of what Miller observed after the 2016 election.
Mon, September 04, 2023
"Democracy '24" on the debate stage
Before we get to the show notes, we invite you to take our listener survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works coffee mug! We're back from summer break and diving into the 2024 election season, Donald Trump's indictments, the spread of election deniers, and more. We also welcome Michael Berkman back from sabbatical and discuss the significance of "Democracy '24" as the backdrop for the first Republican presidential debate on August 23. For our listeners who teach American politics, we've put together a list of episodes designed to be a companion to your courses. Check it out at democracyworkspodcast.com/syllabus . Referenced in this episode: Votebeat piece by Jessica Huseman on Trump indictments
Bonus · Mon, August 07, 2023
When the People Decide: Libraries as civic spaces
We're excited to present an episode from our sister podcast, When the People Decide , about how libraries can be sites of civic engagement and building a new social fabric in America's cities and towns. Librarians have spoken for years about “library faith,” the belief that public libraries are central to democracy because they contribute to an informed citizenry. Today, the idea is gaining even more traction, and even conservative crackdowns on what’s permitted in libraries reinforce the idea that they’re more than just “book warehouses” but centers for community engagement and representativeness. This week, hear from two librarians working to enhance the role libraries of libraries democracy and civic engagement. Shamichael Hallman explains how he brought his experience in tech and faith leadership to bear when he ran a branch of the Memphis Public Libraries, including bringing Civic Saturdays to his community, a program of Citizen University. And public policy advocate Nancy Kranich of Rutgers University shares the high hopes she has that libraries remain crucial institutions that allow us to engage with our government–and each other. Subscribe to When the People Decide
Bonus · Mon, July 24, 2023
A deep dive on parties and political reform
Americans want electoral reforms so that they can have more choice in elections. Recent surveys show that 20 to 50 percent of Americans are open to a new electoral system, while demand for a third party has crept upward since Gallup began asking in 2003. More Americans now call themselves "independent" than identify with either of the major parties, but what happens when Americans try to reform their way out of a two-party system? In More Parties or No Parties , Jack Santucci traces the origins and performance of proportional representation in U.S. cities, the reasons for repeal in all but one case, and discusses the implications of this history for current reform movements at the state and national level. In a two-party system, reform requires appealing to the group that wants to "get the parties out of politics" (or, in modern terms, to "reduce polarization"). This leads to ostensibly nonpartisan reform packages, yet party-like formations emerge anyway, as voters and governments need to be organized. However, such reform is not stable and has tended to make voting difficult for everyday people. This conversation, originally recorded in August 2022, looks back at the history of political reform and current movements like the Forward Party and the adoption of ranked-choice voting in Nevada and other states. As you'll hear, reform is easy to put into a slogan, but much harder to implement in practice. More Parties or No Parties Jack Santucci's website
Bonus · Mon, July 10, 2023
Democracy Paradox: The democratic crisis you haven't heard about
This week, we bring you an interview from the Democracy Paradox podcast about the political crisis in Peru and how it fits into the bigger picture of democratic erosion around the world. Democracy Paradox host Justin Kempf thinks Peru is an extreme case of something that I think will become more common. His guest is Rodrigo Barrenechea, assistant professor of social sciences at the Universidad Católica del Uruguay and a Santo Domingo Visiting Scholar at Harvard University’s David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies. He recently coauthored (with Alberto Vergara) the article " Peru: The Danger of Powerless Democracy " in the Journal of Democracy. Democracy Paradox podcast Democracy Paradox on Twitter
Bonus · Mon, June 26, 2023
Village SquareCast: Can curiosity save us?
This episode from the Village SquareCast is a conversation between Manu Meel, executive director of Bridge USA and Mónica Guzmán, a senior fellow for public practice at Braver Angels and author of I Never Thought of it That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times . Manu and Mónica discuss how to fight back against political division and find the answers you need by talking with people—rather than about them—and asking the questions you want across the divides you want, curiously. Mónica argues that seeing where people are coming from isn’t just possible, it's easier than you think. I Never Thought of it That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times Subscribe to the Village SquareCast
Bonus · Mon, June 12, 2023
Democracy-ish: Can America's democracy be saved?
Political Historian, author and editor Eli Merritt joins #democracyish to provide some historical grounding for the place we find ourselves in America's story. America is at a tipping point, the question is what direction does it fall?!? Danielle and Waj discuss this and more on this episode of democracy-ish. Subscribe to democracy-ish
Mon, May 29, 2023
Democracy needs serious people
Before we take a break for the summer, we wanted to talk about some of the events that have been on our minds lately, and some of what we'll be watching over the summer. Chris Beem and Candis Watts Smith talk about what's happening in North Carolina, what we may hear from the Supreme Court in June, the fight over the debt ceiling, and more. Many of these conversations ultimately boil down to the question of how serious the representatives of our democracy are about protecting the things that make America democratic. We end the episode addressing the question of whether the perverse incentives and the unserious behavior they produce can be overcome — and what it will take to do so. New episodes of Democracy Works will return in late August. In the meantime, we'll be rebroadcasting some older episodes you might have missed and sharing episodes from our partners in The Democracy Group podcast network.
Mon, May 15, 2023
Gen Z's fight for democracy
We've talked about generational politics on the show before with episodes on Millennials and Baby Boomers . This week, we turn our focus to Gen Z, those born from the late 1990s to early 2000s. This generation's formative experiences include school shootings, a global pandemic, and reckonings with racial and economic inequality. In his book Fight: How Gen Z is Channeling Their Fear and Passion to Save America , John Della Volpe argues that Gen Z has not buckled under the weight of the events that shaped them. Rather, they have organized around the issues America has left unsolved, from gun control to racial and environmental justice to economic inequality, becoming more politically engaged than their elders were at their age and showing a unique willingness to disrupt the status quo. Della Volpe joins us this week to unpack what he's learned from thousands of conversations with members of Gen Z and what this generation's growing power means for the 2024 election and beyond. Della Volpe is the director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics, where he has led the institute’s polling initiatives on understanding American youth since 2000. Fight: How Gen Z is Channeling Their Fear and Passion to Save America John Della Volpe on Substack
Bonus · Mon, May 08, 2023
Think Inclusive: Facing the Anti-CRT Movement
This week, we bring you an episode from Think Inclusive , a podcast that builds bridges between families, educators, and disability rights advocates to create a shared understanding of inclusive education and what inclusion looks like in the real world. The episode explores what Critical Race Theory is and what advocates for inclusive education need to know about the Anti-CRT movement. You'll hear from individuals with experience and expertise in CRT: King Williams, a filmmaker, and journalist in Atlanta, GA Alida Miranda-Wolff, a professional in the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging sector in Chicago, IL Eddie Fergus, a professor at Temple University Pete Newlove, a doctoral student at the University of Colorado and current high school English teacher, Referenced in the episode: Cherokee Schools' would-be diversity administrator shares why she stepped down (Cherokee Tribune & Ledger News) Teacher Anti-CRT Bills Coast To Coast: A State By State Guide (Forbes) Plessy v. Ferguson ( History.com ) Conservative-led school board fires superintendent after allegations of private ultimatum, teacher protest (Washington Post) Gov. Kemp opposes 'Critical Race Theory' in letter to state board of education (11 Alive - Atlanta) State Education Board Passes Resolution On Teaching Race (Georgia Public Broadcasting) Teachers Say Laws Banning Critical Race Theory Are Putting A Chill On Their Lessons (NPR)
Mon, May 01, 2023
Is America in a third reconstruction?
Peniel E. Joseph, author of The Third Reconstruction: America's Struggle for Racial Justice in the 21st Century, joins us this week to discuss how the era from Barack Obama's election to George Floyd's murder compare to the post-Civil War Reconstruction and the Civil Rights Movement. Joseph argues that racial reckoning that unfolded in 2020 marked the climax of a Third Reconstruction: a new struggle for citizenship and dignity for Black Americans, just as momentous as the movements that arose after the Civil War and during the civil rights era. However, Chris Beem and Candis Watts Smith are not so sure he's right about that conclusion. We hope you'll listen to the arguments and think critically about where you land on the question of whether America has experienced or is in the midst of a Third Reconstruction. Joseph is based at the University of Texas at Austin, where he holds the following titles:Associate Dean for Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Barbara Jordan Chair in Ethics and Political Values, Professor of History and Public Affairs, and Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy. His career focus has been on "Black Power Studies," which encompasses interdisciplinary fields such as Africana studies, law and society, women's and ethnic studies and political science. He is a frequent commentator on issues of race, democracy and civil rights.
Mon, April 17, 2023
Between democracy and autocracy
Between democracy and autocracy is an anocracy, defined by political scientists as a country that has elements of both forms of government — usually one that's on the way up to becoming a full democracy or on the way down to full autocracy. This messy middle is the state when civil wars are most likely to start and the one that requires the most diligence from that country's citizens to prevent a civil war from breaking out. Barbara F. Walter, author of How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them has spent decades studying civil wars around the world and working with other political scientists to quantify how strong democracy is in a given country. She joins us this week to discuss those findings, how the democratic health of the United States has shifted over the past decade, and more. Walter is the Rohr Professor of International Affairs at the School of Global Policy & Strategy at the University of California, San Diego. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago and completed post docs at the Olin Institute for Strategic Studies at Harvard University and the War and Peace Institute at Columbia University. How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them Barbara F. Walter on Twitter
Mon, April 03, 2023
Living in a fragmented democracy
At the end of March, millions of Americans lost access to Medicaid as pandemic-era expansions to the program were rolled back. At the same time, North Carolina's legislature voted to expand Medicaid, marking a demonstration of bipartisan agreement in these polarizing times. This backdrop makes it a very interesting time to talk with Jamila Michener, who studies both the specific politics of Medicaid and how the political fights over Medicaid illustrate larger issues in federalism and democracy. In this episode, we discuss how receiving government benefits like Medicaid impacts political agency, whether it's possible to square federalism and equality, and more. Michener is associate professor of government at Cornell University and author of Fragmented Democracy: Medicaid, Federalism, and Unequal Politics . In the book, Michener examines American democracy from the vantage point(s) of those who are living in or near poverty, (disproportionately) Black or Latino, and reliant on a federated government for vital resources. Fragmented Democracy: Medicaid, Federalism, and Unequal Politics Michener on Twitter
Bonus · Mon, March 27, 2023
Feet in 2 Worlds: Immigrants in a Divided Country
This week, we bring you an episode from Feet in 2 Worlds and its series Immigrants in a Divided Country, which explores the current political landscape from the perspective of immigrants. In this personal audio essay, writer and audio producer Boen Wang goes looking for answers. He always thought his mom—an immigrant from Mainland China —was brainwashed by the Chinese Communist Party. His mom, on the other hand, thinks he’s been brainwashed by the New York Times and CNN. To break the deadlock Boen interviews his mom about the evolution of her political beliefs—which are on the opposite end of the spectrum from his. As he learns more about his family and himself, Boen discovers the surprising history and etymology of the term “brainwashing”—which goes back to the last Chinese empire and is deeply rooted in American Cold War-era anxieties about the rise of communism. In the end, he emerges with a new understanding of the use and misuse of “brainwashing” and shares his thoughts on how people with opposing views can live with their differences. Episode Transcript
Mon, March 20, 2023
Harnessing the power of juries
Juries have been at the center of some of the most emotionally charged moments of political life, especially in high profile cases like the trial of Derek Chauvin for George Floyd's murder in 2021. This week, we explore juries as a democratic institution. Our guest, Sonali Chakravarti, argues that juries provide an important site for democratic action by citizens and that their use should be revived. She says juries could be a forward-looking institution that nurtures the best democratic instincts of citizens like examining their own perceptions and biases and engaging in dialogue and deliberation. Chakravarti is a professor of government at Wesleyan University and the author of R adical Enfranchisement in the Jury Room and Public Life , published by the University of Chicago Press in 2020. Her work focuses on public participation in legal institutions and the relationship between law and politics. R adical Enfranchisement in the Jury Room and Public Life Chakravarti on the Chauvin trial - The Atlantic How jurors can protect abortion access - Boston Review
Mon, March 06, 2023
Civic learning amid the culture wars
More than ever, civic learning is needed to ensure each and every person across this country has the necessary tools to engage as members of our self-governing society. However, schools are also a growing part of the culture wars. According to a 2022 National Education Association Survey, nearly half of schools reported challenges teaching about race and racism and practices related to LGBTQ students in the classroom. As we've discussed before on the show, book bans , funding cuts , and teacher shortages are also making teaching anything — let alone civics — more difficult. At this critical juncture, Civic Learning Week unites students, educators, policymakers, and private sector leaders to energize the movement for civic education across the nation. This week's episode includes two experts who talk about the theory and practice of strengthening civics education in these polarizing times. Emma Humphries is Chief Education Officer and Deputy Director of Field Building for iCivics, the non-profit founded by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor to reinvigorate civics through free, interactive learning resources. Emma serves as iCivics’ pedagogical expert, ensures its resources evolve to a place of greater equity and deeper learning for all students, and advocates for more and better civic education across the country. Ashley Berner is Director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Education Policy and Associate Professor of Education. She served previously as the Deputy Director of the CUNY Institute for Education Policy and as an administrator at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia. Her most recent book is Pluralism and American Public Education: No One Way to School . Civic Learning Week iCivics poling on bipartisan support for civic education Diffusing the History Wars: Finding Common Ground in Teaching America's National Story
Bonus · Mon, February 27, 2023
Finding the "we" in civic engagement
People who want to improve the world often encounter problems of collective action (how to get many individuals to act in concert), of discourse (how to talk and think productively about contentious matters), and of exclusion. To get things done, they must form or join and sustain functional groups, and through them, develop skills and virtues that help them to be effective and responsible civic actors. Peter Levine, one of America's leading scholars and practitioners of civic engagement, identifies the general challenges that confront people who ask the citizens' question and explores solutions in his most recent book, What Should We Do? A Theory of Civic Life. Democracy Works host Chris Beem also thinks through these questions in his most recent book, The Seven Democratic Virtues: What You Can Do to Overcome Tribalism and Save Democracy. In this conversation, Levine and Beem discuss how their approaches differ and how individual and collective actions can't be separated from each other when it comes to civic engagement. Levine is the Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Lincoln Filene Professor of Citizenship & Public Affairs in Tufts University's Jonathan Tisch College of Civic Life. What Should We Do? A Theory of Civic Life The Seven Democratic Virtues: What You Can Do to Overcome Tribalism and Save Our Democracy
Mon, February 20, 2023
Why politics makes us depressed — and what we can do about it
Many of us can conjure moments when politics made us feel sad. But how often do those feelings translate into more serious forms of depression or other mental health issues? And if politics does make us depressed, what do we do about it? Christopher Ojeda has spent the past few years exploring these questions and joins us this week to talk about the relationship between depression and democracy. Ojeda is an assistant professor of political science at the University of California Merced and author of the forthcoming book The Sad Citizen: How Politics Makes Us Depressed . He visited Penn State to give us a sneak preview of this important work on the relationship between democratic engagement and individual mental health. We discuss how to meet the demands that democracy places on us without sacrificing our mental health in the process.
Mon, February 06, 2023
What will it take to make democracy more representative?
Why has the underrepresentation of women and racial minorities in elected office proved so persistent? Some experts suggest that women lack sufficient ambition to run for office relative to men, while others say that districts with majority white populations do not provide adequate resources or opportunities for minority candidates to succeed. These approaches tend to treat women and racial minorities as parallel social groups, and fail to account for the ways in which race and gender simultaneously shape candidacy. In her book, Nowhere to Run , Christian Dyogi Phillips introduces the intersectional model of electoral opportunity, which argues that descriptive representation in elections is shaped by intersecting processes related to race and gender. The book and this conversation shed new light on how multiple dimensions of identity simultaneously shape pathways to candidacy and representation for all groups seeking a seat at the table in American politics. Phillips is an assistant professor of Political Science at the University of Southern California, and holds affiliations with the USC Institute for Intersectionality and Social Transformation and the USC Dornsife Equity Research Institute. Prior to becoming an academic, Phillips led organizing and political campaigns in the American labor movement. Nowhere to Run: Race, Gender, and Immigration in American Elections Christian Dyogi Phillips on Twitter
Mon, January 23, 2023
Separating news from noise
How much news is too much? Or not enough? News Over Noise, the new podcast from Penn State's News Literacy Initiative explores that question and offers guidance on how to consume news that enhances your participation in our democracy without becoming overwhelmed by all the noise on social media and the 24/7 news cycle. News Over Noise co-hosts Matt Jordan and Leah Dajches join us this week to discuss how the news impacts our mental health, the future of media literacy education, and more. Jordan is a professor of media studies Dajches is a post-doctoral researcher, both in the Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State. Listen to News Over Noise News Literacy Week - January 23-27, 2023
Mon, December 19, 2022
What we learned from our guests in 2022
We've had some incredible guests on the show in 2022. For our final episode of the year, we're taking a look back at what we've learned from them. Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, Candis Watts Smith, and Jenna Spinelle revisit our episodes with: Jake Grumbach Jeffrey Sutton Francis Fukuyama Jamelle Bouie Lilliana Mason Jon Meacham Jessica Huseman Joanna Lydgate A programming note: Democracy Works will be moving to a bi-weekly release schedule in 2023. If you have ideas for people we should be talking to or topics we should cover, please get in touch !
Mon, December 12, 2022
Where do the parties go from here?
A few days after the midterms, a Substack post from Dave Karpf caught our eye. In it, he takes up the question of how the Republican and Democratic parties should move forward after the election. This conversation covers party networks, Karpf's lessons from environmental organizing, and how to craft political messages in a changing social media environment. Karpf is an associate professor in the School of Media and Public Affairs at the George Washington University. His work focuses on strategic communication practices of political associations in America, with a particular interest in Internet-related strategies. You might remember him as the professor who called Bret Stephens a " Bretbug " on Twitter a few years ago. Karpf's Substack, The Future, Now and Then Karpf on Twitter
Mon, December 05, 2022
The real free speech problem on campus
Across op-ed pages and Substack newsletters, college campuses have become fiercely ideological spaces where students unthinkingly endorse a liberal orthodoxy and forcibly silence anyone who dares to disagree. These commentators lament the demise of free speech and academic freedom. But what is really happening on college campuses? In his new book, Campus Misinformation , Penn State professor Brad Vivian shows how misinformation about colleges and universities has proliferated in recent years, with potentially dangerous results. Popular but highly misleading claims about a so-called free speech crisis and a lack of intellectual diversity on college campuses emerged in the mid-2010s and continue to shape public discourse about higher education across party lines. Such disingenuous claims impede constructive deliberation about higher learning while normalizing suspect ideas about First Amendment freedoms and democratic participation. Taking a non-partisan approach, Vivian argues that reporting on campus culture has grossly exaggerated the importance and representativeness of a small number of isolated events; misleadingly advocated for an artificial parity between liberals and conservatives as true viewpoint diversity; mischaracterized the use of trigger warnings and safe spaces; and purposefully confused critique and protest with censorship and "cancel culture." Vivian is a professor of communication arts and sciences at Penn State. His research focuses on public controversies over collective memories of past events. He previously appeared on our show to discuss Confederate monuments following the Unite the Right really and related events in Charlottesville. Campus Misinformation: The Real Threat to Free Speech in American Higher Education Brad's first appearance on the show
Mon, November 21, 2022
Jamelle Bouie makes the case for majoritarianism
Jamelle Bouie's writing spans everything from 19th century American history to 1990s movies, but he's spent a lot of time recently thinking about America's founders, the Constitution, and the still-unfinished work of making America a multi-everything democracy. In that work, he's identified a contradiction that he believes is impeding democratic progress: "Americans take for granted the idea that our counter-majoritarian Constitution — deliberately written to constrain majorities and keep them from acting outright — has, in fact, preserved the rights and liberties of the people against the tyranny of majority rule, and that any greater majoritarianism would threaten that freedom," Bouie wrote . In this interview, we discuss that claim and why he's is looking to Reconstruction as a time that could provides lessons for our current political moment. Bouie is a columnist for the New York Times and political analyst for CBS News. He covers U.S. politics, public policy, elections, and race. Jamelle Bouie at the New York Times Bouie's lecture on "Why the Founding Fathers Still Matter" at Penn State When the People Decide - our series on ballot initiatives and direct democracy
Bonus · Mon, November 14, 2022
Our conversation with Josh Shapiro [rebroadcast]
We talked with Pennsylvania Attorney General (and now Governor-elect) Josh Shapiro back in 2018, at the height of efforts by state attorneys general to block actions from the Trump administration on issues from immigration to opioids. We discuss those efforts in this conversation and the role that Shapiro sees states playing in American democracy — a new meaning to the term "states rights." Looking back, you can hear some early seeds of the themes that would emerge during Shapiro's gubernatorial campaign, particularly around his desire to fight for the people of Pennsylvania and not be afraid to get political when the circumstances demanded. We'll be back next week with a new episode featuring New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie on majoritarianism and counter-majoritarianism in American democracy.
Mon, November 07, 2022
States united for democracy
With hundreds of elections deniers running in the midterms, democracy is on the ballot this fall. The team at the States United Democracy Center is at the forefront of efforts to ensure free, fair, and secure elections in 2022, 2024, and beyond. Cofounders Norman Eisen, Joanna Lydgate, and Christine Todd Whitman join us this week to talk about how they're doing it in states across the country and how everyone can support their efforts. Through legal, policy, and communications work, States United is fighting back empowering state leaders as they defend elections. These officials are the frontline champions in the battle for our democracy. Governors help enshrine voter protection into law, and attorneys general defend those laws—along with election results. Secretaries of state oversee elections, and law enforcement leaders make sure they are safe and free from violence. States United’s mission is to bring these leaders together to protect elections, prevent political violence, fight disinformation, and pursue accountability for those who step outside the bounds of our democracy. Eisen is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, former Ambassador to the Czech Republic, and Special Counsel to the White House for Ethics and Government Reform. Lydgate is the former Chief Deputy Attorney General of Massachusetts. Whitman is the former Governor of New Jersey and was the Environmental Protection Agency Administrator in the George W. Bush administration. They are the recipients of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy's 2022 Brown Democracy Medal. States United Democracy Center States United: A Survival Guide for Our Democracy - Eisen, Lydgate, and Whitman's book written as part of receiving the Brown Democracy Medal
Mon, October 31, 2022
Celebrating democracy's small victories
Amid election deniers and political polarization, it's easy to overlook the times when democracy is actually working. We do that this week in a hopeful conversation about resident-centered government. Elected officials and administrative staff like city planners often have the best intentions when it comes to development and redevelopment, but political and professional incentives push them to pursue projects that lure in outsiders rather than serving people who live in their communities. Our guest this week is Michelle Wilde Anderson, a professor of property, local government, and environmental justice at Stanford Law School and the author of The Fight to Save the Town: Reimagining Discarded America. The book tells the stories of revitalization efforts in Stockton, California, Josephine, Oregon, Lawrence, Massachusetts, and Detroit, Michigan. In each instance, residents organized to fix small problems that turned into large-scale change. It's a model that anyone can replicate and our democracy will be stronger for it. The Fight to Save the Town by Michelle Wilde Anderson
Mon, October 24, 2022
Climate change is everyone's fight
The conversation about climate change has come a long way from the days of polar bears and melting ice caps, but as our guest this week shares, there's still a long way to go in creating truly inclusive climate policy. In order to do that, those who are most impacted by environmental racism need to be involved in the policymaking process. Rhiana Gunn-Wright is the director of climate policy at the Roosevelt Institute and one of the intellectual architects of the Green New Deal. She grew up on Chicago's South Side and talks about how environmental justice shaped her life from an early age — event if she didn't know that's what it was. We also discuss how climate reform is connected to other parts of America's political system and efforts to reform democracy.
Mon, October 17, 2022
Francis Fukuyama on the promise and peril of liberalism
It's no secret that liberalism didn't always live up to its own ideals. In America, many people were denied equality before the law. Who counted as full human beings worthy of universal rights was contested for centuries, and only recently has this circle expanded to include women, African Americans, LGBTQ+ people, and others. Conservatives complain that liberalism empties the common life of meaning. As the renowned political philosopher Francis Fukuyama shows in Liberalism and Its Discontents , the principles of liberalism have also, in recent decades, been pushed to new extremes by both the right and the left: neoliberals made a cult of economic freedom, and progressives focused on identity over human universality as central to their political vision. The result, Fukuyama argues, has been a fracturing of our civil society and an increasing peril to our democracy. Fukuyama isthe Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and a faculty member at Stanford's Institute on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. His previous books include Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment and The End of History and the Last Man. Liberalism and its Discontents
Mon, October 10, 2022
The backbone of democracy is now the face of fraud
This episode is part of the series 2022 Midterms: What's at Stake? series from The Democracy Group podcast network. Think of it as an election administrator vibe check as we head into the midterms. Election officials are the backbone of our democracy, but also increasingly the face of fraud allegations from far-right groups and others who deny the legitimacy of elections that don't go their way. Many of us watched Georgia election officials Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss testify before the January 6 committee about the threats they faced after becoming caught up in conspiracies about the 2020 election. Our guest this week says that stories like this are more common than many of us realize, and that things like erroneous record requests from election deniers are even more common. On top of that, social media platforms are making it more difficult local election offices to share accurate information with voters. Jessica Huseman is the editorial director at Votebeat, a news outlet that does nonpartisan local reporting n elections and voting. She was previously the lead elections reporter for ProPublica, and helped manage the Electionland project for three federal election cycles, sharing information and tips with hundreds of newsrooms across the United States. Votebeat Jessica Huseman on Twitter 2022 Midterms: What At Stake? series from The Democracy Group podcast network Power the Polls - poll worker recruitment nationwide
Mon, October 03, 2022
How Democrats can harness grassroots energy
The Democratic Party saw a surge in grassroots activism after the 2016 election, after George Floyd's murder, and most recently after the Dobbs decision. However, the party seems to be sticking to the same old playbook of fundraising emails and text messages, rather than building long-term organizational power. Our guests this week explore why that is and how the Democratic Party can use grassroots mometum to build and expand coaltions. Lara Putnam is professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh and previously appeared on the podcast ahead of the 2018 midterms. Micah L. Sifry is the founder of Civic Hall and writes The Connector newsletter on Substack. They teamed up for a New York Times op-ed in August and a series of follow-up pieces in The Connector. The New York Times: Fed Up With Democratic Emails? You're Not the Only One The Connector: An Activist Base is a Terrible Thing to Waste The Connector: Connections, Capacity, and Impact
Mon, September 26, 2022
When should the states decide?
Following the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization Supreme Court decision, reproductive rights are heading to ballots in states across the country this fall. Are states the right venue for this and other issues? Our guest this week says yes and makes the case that state courts and constitutions are more democratic than their counterparts at the federal level. In Who Decides? State as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation, U.S. Appellate Court Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton focuses on the constitutional structure of the American states to answer the question of who should decide the key questions of public policy today. We also discuss work by Jake Grumbach in his book Laboratories Against Democracy and the forthcoming Moore v. Harper case in the U.S. Supreme Court, which grapples with what's come to be known as the Independent State Legislature Theory. Sutton is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was previously a partner with the law firm of Jones Day and served as State Solicitor of the State of Ohio. He also served as a law clerk to the Honorable Lewis F. Powell, Jr. (Ret.), the Honorable Antonin Scalia, and the Honorable Thomas J. Meskill. His previous book is 51 Imperfect Solutions, published in 2018. Who Decides: States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation
Bonus · Mon, September 19, 2022
Chris Beem on the seven democratic virtues
This week, we bring you an episode from Future Hindsight. Our own Chris Beem talks with host Mila Atmos about his new book, The Seven Democratic Virtues: What You Can Do to Overcome Tribalism and Save Our Democracy. In the book and in this conversation, Beem argues that American democracy is at a crisis point and to fix our politics, we have to change our culture first. We can all take part in creating a culture that cultivates democratic virtues. Humility, for example, recognizes that all of us are biased and that we will disagree. In fact, anger is an essential emotion in democracy. Hatred, however, is disastrous. When we hate, we cannot operate as a democracy. The Seven Democratic Virtues: What You Can Do to Overcome Tribalism and Save Our Democracy Future Hindsight
Mon, September 12, 2022
Rural broadband and the politics of "good enough"
COVID-19 showed just how essential high-speed Internet is to our everyday lives. It determines how many of us work, learn, and access news and entertainment. Yet, millions of Americans do not have reliable access to broadband and millions more can't afford to pay for the service that's available to them. Christopher Ali, the Pioneers Chair in Telecommunications at Penn State, unpacks these issues in his book Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity and joins us this week for a discussion about market failures, how communities across the country are democratizing Internet access and how the federal government is now starting to step in thanks to funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed in November 2021. We also discuss some of Ali's more recent work on the relationship between broadband deserts and news deserts, and how the combination impacts democratic citizenship. Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity Christopher Ali on Twitter
Mon, September 05, 2022
A deep dive into the administrative state
The passage of the Inflation Reduction Act shines a light on the administrative state. How will the billions of dollars for Medicaid, green energy, and other provisions be spent and turned into policy? With the help of people whose jobs are largely nonpartisan and non-political. Complaints about government bureaucracy are nothing new but has recently moved beyond rhetoric to a concerted attack on policy implementation. Don Moynihan, the McCourt Chair at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown, writes about the administrative state in his newsletter, Can We Still Govern? He joins us this week to discuss the promise of the Inflation Reduction Act, the looming peril of Schedule F, and whether a bipartisan, policy-focused coalition can emerge in 2022 and beyond. Can We Still Govern? newsletter Don Moynihan on Twitter
Mon, August 29, 2022
Reflecting on the January 6 hearings and what's happened since
Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, Candis Watts Smith, and Jenna Spinelle are back after summer break to discuss the January 6 committee hearings, which we previously teased as " democracy's summer blockbusters ." Did they live up to the hype? Did they change public opinion — and does that matter? We also discuss the January 6 hearings and the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago in the context of democratic pedagogy, or behavior that helps us learn what it means to be good democratic citizens. Finally, we discuss some of the summer's primary elections and what to expect in the general election this fall. NBC News poll on threats to democracy as the most important issue facing the country
Bonus · Mon, August 01, 2022
A new approach to breaking our media silos
It's no secret that there's a partisan divide in the media, but thus far, solutions to bridge that divide have been few and far between. Our guest this week had an idea that seems to be taking hold and building a readership across the political spectrum. Isaac Saul is the founder and publisher of Tangle , a non-partisan news and politics newsletter that summarizes the best arguments from across the political spectrum on one issue each day. He a politics reporter who grew up in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, one of the most politically divided places in the United States. In 2020, he created Tangle in an attempt to get people out of their information bubbles. Subscribe to Tangle
Bonus · Mon, July 18, 2022
Laboratories against democracy [rebroadcast]
Jake Grumbach's book "Laboratories against Democracy: How National Parties Transformed State Politics" is out now from Princeton University Press. We were lucky enough to receive and advance copy and are rebroadcasting our conversation with him from earlier this year. As many liberals were saying "thank God for federalism" in the Trump era, Grumbach saw some different — and disturbing — patterns emerging. He 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. Additional Information Laboratories Against Democracy: How National Parties Transformed State Politics Grumbach's website Grumbach on Twitter
Bonus · Mon, June 20, 2022
How positive and negative freedoms shape democracy
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 Information Positive Freedom: Past, Present, and Future Penn State Humanities Institute
Bonus · Mon, June 13, 2022
Introducing: When the People Decide
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 Podcasts Spotify Overcast Podcast Addict Google Podcasts Stitcher Other platforms Learn more about the podcast at thepeopledecide.show and follow us on Twitter @PeopleDecidePod .
Mon, June 06, 2022
Democracy's summer blockbusters
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 Information Candis's recommendation: A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George Saunders Chris's recommendation: Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather Michael's recommendation: The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson Jenna's recommendation: Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel Related Episodes The Federalist Society's ideas have consequences for democracy How national parties are breaking state politics The roots of radical partisanship
Mon, May 30, 2022
Can American democracy have nice things?
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 Information 100% Democracy: The Case for Universal Voting Related Episodes Danielle Allen on achieving democracy's ideals How national parties are breaking state politics E.J. Dionne on empathy and democracy - E.J.'s first appearance on the show in April 2019
Mon, May 23, 2022
Baby Boomers and American gerontocracy
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 Information Generation Gap: Why Baby Boomers Still Dominate American Politics and Culture Kevin Munger on Substack Kevin Munger on Twitter Related Episodes Millennials' slow climb to political power
Bonus · Mon, May 16, 2022
No Jargon: How white Millennials think about race
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 Information Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making All Black Lives Matter Related Episodes The clumsy journal to antiracism
Mon, May 09, 2022
Book bans are never just about books
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 Information PEN America's report on book bans Related Episodes How national parties are breaking state politics Public schools, not government schools
Mon, May 02, 2022
Debating the future of debates
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 Information Hudak's piece for Brookings Hudak on Twitter
Mon, April 25, 2022
What student debt says about democratic institutions
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 of The 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 Information The Debt Trap: How Student Loans Became a National Catastrophe April 2022 loan forgiveness announcement from the Department of Education
Mon, April 18, 2022
Combating disinformation at home and abroad
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 Information Peter's lecture on Ukraine at Penn State Peter's article on Ukraine in Time Peter's article on Ukraine in The Economist
Mon, April 11, 2022
Jon Meacham on creating a more perfect union
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 Information Vanderbilt Project on Unity and American Democracy Hope Through History Fate of Fact The Soul of America His Truth is Marching On
Mon, April 04, 2022
The roots of radical partisanship
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 Information Radical American Partisanship: Mapping Violent Hostility, Its Causes, and the Consequences for Democracy Lilliana Mason on Twitter SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University Related Episodes Sore losers are bad for democracy
Bonus · Mon, March 28, 2022
How democracies can win the war on reality [rebroadcast]
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 Information Register to watch Pomerantsev's lectures Pomerantsev on Twitter This is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality Related Episodes A path forward for social media and democracy Can pranksters save democracy? How conspiracies are damaging democracy
Mon, March 21, 2022
Ro Khanna on dignity and democracy
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 Information Dignity in a Digital Age: Making Tech Work for All of Us Related Episodes How Amazon is disrupting democracy
Mon, March 14, 2022
Russia and Ukraine: How we got here
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 Episodes Will Alexei Navalny make Russia more democratic?
Mon, March 07, 2022
Defending democracy at home and abroad
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 Information Kagan's piece on constitutional crisis Kagan's piece on Ukraine Kagan's lecture at Penn State Related Episodes Sore losers are bad for democracy How national parties are breaking state politics
Mon, February 28, 2022
What academic freedom really means in a democracy
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 Information It's Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy and the Future of Academic Freedom Related Episodes Jonathan Rauch on The Constitution of Knowledge Are land-grant universities still democracy's colleges?
Mon, February 21, 2022
Tracing the rise of illiberalism
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 Information The Rise of Illiberalism Thomas Main on Twitter Related Episodes Sore losers are bad for democracy Daniel Ziblatt on how democracies die
Mon, February 14, 2022
Moving beyond news deserts and misinformation
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 Information Democracy Without Journalism? Confronting the Misinformation Society WBEZ acquires the Chicago Sun-Times Related Episodes News deserts are democracy deserts too Public schools, not government schools How democracies can win the war on reality
Mon, February 07, 2022
How national parties are breaking state politics
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 Information Laboratories Against Democracy: How National Parties Transformed State Politics Grumbach's website Grumbach on Twitter Related Episodes Federalism in uncertain times
Mon, January 31, 2022
Can the courts save civics education?
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 Information Cook v. McKee - the case Rebell and his colleagues are taking to the U.S. Supreme court Center for Educational Equity at Columbia University Flunking Democracy: Schools, Courts, and Civic Participation Related Episodes Public schools, not government schools Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom
Mon, January 24, 2022
When religion and democracy collide
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 Information Faith, Nationalism, and the Future of Liberal Democracy Democracy and the language of faith - article in Democracy Journal
Mon, January 17, 2022
Sore losers are bad for democracy
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 Information Article in Political Research Quarterly Article in The Conversation How Civil Wars Start Related Episodes Understanding domestic terrorism - Piazza's first appearance on the show
Mon, December 20, 2021
On democracy's doomsayers
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 Information Trump's next coup has already begin - The Atlantic Our constitutional crisis is already here - The Washington Post Trump won't let America go. Can Democrats pry it away? - The New York Times Related Episodes American democracy's violent disruption
Mon, December 13, 2021
What does it take to sustain democracy?
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 t hat 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 Information Sustaining Democracy: What We Owe to the Other Side Related Episodes Is it possible to overdo democracy?
Mon, December 06, 2021
Fannie Lou Hamer's fight continues today
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 Information Until I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer's Enduring Message to America Hamer's 1964 Democratic National Convention speech Blain's website Blain on Twitter Related Episodes The ongoing struggle for civil rights Civil rights, civil unrest
Bonus · Mon, November 29, 2021
Andrew Yang and Charlie Dent on the future of America's political parties
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 Information Watch the event on YouTube Forward Notes on the Future of Our Democracy Forward Party Renew America Movement Related Episodes The case for open primaries Your guide to ranked-choice voting How to end democracy's doom loop A roadmap to a more equitable democracy
Mon, November 22, 2021
The soul of democracy
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 Information America's Disenfranchised: Why Restoring Their Vote Can Save the Soul of Our Democracy Let My People Vote: My Battle to Restore the Civil Rights of Returning Citizens Meade's Brown Democracy Medal lecture Florida Rights Restoration Coalition Related Episodes Voter suppression doesn't repeat, but it rhymes Danielle Allen on achieving democracy's ideals
Bonus · Mon, November 15, 2021
Jonathan Haidt on democracy's moral foundations [rebroadcast]
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 Information The University of Austin Heterodox Academy The Coddling of the American Mind Related Episodes A love letter to democratic institutions Andrew Sullivan on democracy's double-edged sword
Mon, November 08, 2021
Why social media is so polarizing — and what we can do about it
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 T errified: How Anti-Muslim Fringe Organizations Became Mainstream. Additional Information Breaking the Social Media Prism The Polarization Lab Bail's website Bail on Twitter Related Episodes A path forward for social media and democracy Facebook is not a democracy
Mon, November 01, 2021
What makes a campaign deplorable?
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 Information Deplorable: The Worst Presidential Campaigns from Jefferson to Trump Mary Stuckey on Twitter Related Episodes Demagogues are more common than you think
Mon, October 25, 2021
Fighting for democracy in the GOP
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 Information Renew America Miles Taylor on Twitter Charlie Dent on Twitter Related Episodes What really motivates Trump supporters Congressional oversight and making America pragmatic again
Mon, October 18, 2021
Tom Nichols on democracy's worst enemy
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 Information Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault from Within on Modern Democracy Tom Nichols on Twitter Related Episodes Primaries, parties, and the public Chris Beem on democratic virtues
Mon, October 11, 2021
Independent commissions alone can't create fair maps
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 Information Fowler's Monkey Cage article on redistricting Pennsylvania Redistricting Advisory Council Related Episodes Extreme maps, extreme politics One state's fight for fair maps
Mon, October 04, 2021
Voter suppression doesn't repeat, but it rhymes
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 Information Anderson's website Anderson on Twitter Brennan Center for Justice on DMV closures Related Episodes Laboratories of restricting democracy
Mon, September 27, 2021
A love letter to democratic institutions
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 Information The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth Kindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free Thought Jonathan Rauch on Twitter Related Episodes How democracies can win the war on reality Andrew Sullivan on democracy's double-edged sword Jonathan Haidt on the psychology of democracy How conspiracies are damaging democracy
Mon, September 20, 2021
How Amazon is disrupting democracy
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 Information Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America Alec MacGillis on Twitter Alec's website Related Episodes Can corporations be democratic citizens? Reimagining citizenship in a consumer world
Mon, September 13, 2021
Abortion is not always a clash of absolutes
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 Information Rebecca's Monkey Cage article on Texas's heartbeat law Postscript podcast on abortion from the New Books Network Rebecca Kreitzer on Twitter Related Episodes Behind the scenes of the "year of the woman" - Rebecca's first appearance on the show
Mon, September 06, 2021
Millennials' slow climb to political power
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 Information The Ones We've Been Waiting For: How a New Generation of Leaders Will Transform America Charlotte Alter on Twitter Thinking Is Cool podcast Related Episodes Will Millennials disrupt democracy?
Mon, August 30, 2021
A summer of the individual vs. the common good
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 Episodes Refugees and the politics of displacement The clumsy journey to antiracism Additional Information Chris Beem in The Conversation: Why refusing the COVID-19 vaccine is immoral and un-American Candis Watts Smith in The Fulcrum: Experts fear ban on critical race theory could harm civics education Hurt Your Brain newsletter
Bonus · Mon, August 23, 2021
Extreme maps, extreme politics [reboradcast]
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 Information Daley's op-ed on democracy deserts in The Guardian Unrigged: How Americans are Battling Back to Save Democracy Daley on Twitter Related Episodes One state's fight for fair maps Next-generation democracy : An interview with high school student Kyle Hynes, who won Pennsylvania's citizen mapmaking contest.
Bonus · Mon, August 16, 2021
Jan-Werner Müller on democracy's rules
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 Information Democracy Paradox Democracy Rules Jan-Werner Müller at Princeton Politics
Bonus · Mon, August 09, 2021
Does Congress promote partisan gridlock? [rebroadcast]
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 Information Lee's book, Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Perpetual Campaign Her lecture at Penn State on lawmaking in a polarized era Lee's website Related Episodes Congressional oversight and making America pragmatic again Unpacking political polarization
Bonus · Mon, August 02, 2021
Pete Davis is dedicated to the hard work of democracy
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 Episodes There is no "I" in democracy Additional Information Dedicated : The Case for Commitment in an Age of Infinite Browsing Democracy Policy Network This is What Democracy Looks Like podcast Pete Davis on Twitter
Bonus · Mon, July 26, 2021
Masha Gessen on the Moscow duel
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 Information Democracy in Danger podcast Surviving Autocracy by Masha Gessen Related Episodes Will Alexi Navalny make Russia more democratic?
Bonus · Mon, July 19, 2021
Walter Shaub on transparency, ethics, and democracy
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 Information Democracy Matters podcast Project on Government Oversight Walter Shaub on Twitter JMU Civic
Bonus · Mon, July 12, 2021
A different take on local news and democracy
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 Information News for the Rich, White, and Blue: How Place and Power Distort American Journalism New Books Network Related Episodes News deserts are democracy deserts too Facebook is not a democracy
Bonus · Mon, July 05, 2021
How to end democracy's doom loop [rebroadcast]
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 Lobbyin g. 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 Information July 7 event with The Democracy Group Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America Related Episodes Does Congress promote partisan gridlock? Primaries, parties and the public How the Tea Party and the Resistance are upending politics
Bonus · Mon, June 28, 2021
Democracy as a way of life
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 Information The Ethics of Oneness Jeremy's website Join 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.
Bonus · Mon, June 21, 2021
Your guide to ranked-choice voting [rebroadcast]
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 Information Fairvote , an advocacy group for ranked-choice voting and election reform Burt’s Google Scholar listing Related Episodes How to end democracy's doom loop The case for open primaries One state’s fight for fair maps
Bonus · Mon, June 14, 2021
Is it possible to overdo democracy? [rebroadcast]
As we enter summer vacation season and emerge from pandemic isolation, Robert Talisse thinks it’s a good idea to take a break from politics. In fact, he might go so far as to say democracy is better off if you do. Talisse is the W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University and author of a new book called Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in Its Place . The book combines philosophical analysis with real-world examples to examine the infiltration of politics into all social spaces, and the phenomenon of political polarization. Talisse's next book, Sustaining Democracy: What We Owe The Other Side , will be out later this year. He's also the host of the Why We Argue podcast. Additional Information Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in Its Place Sustaining Democracy: What We Owe the Other Side Why We Argue podcast
Mon, June 07, 2021
Looking back to move forward
We end this season the way it began, with a roundtable discussion on the state of American democracy. Michael, Chris, and Candis reflect on the January 6 insurrection, the one-year anniversary of George Floyd's death, and the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre. On the one hand, it's easy to be pessimistic about where things are as state legislatures continue to pass restrictive voting measures and Congress seems more polarized than ever. Yet, it's our duty as democrats to persevere despite these challenges and push the limits of our imagination about what democracy can and should be. We've touched on both of those dynamics this season — from journalists David Daley and Chris Fitzsimon talking about state legislatures creating "democracy deserts" to Harvard professor Danielle Allen discussing how we can establish a new common purpose as Americans and Peter Pomerantsev on how to combat misinformation online. If you missed any of those episodes, check out the links below. This is our last new episode with the entire team for the summer. Over the next few months, we'll be airing bonus episodes, rebroadcasts, and episodes from other podcasts we think you might enjoy. Related Episodes American democracy's violent disruption Danielle Allen on achieving democracy's ideals Laboratories of restricting democracy Extreme maps, extreme politics Additional Information The Vital Center podcast On Opinion podcast
Mon, May 31, 2021
The people vs. the bureaucrats in Flint
This week, we explore the questions of who governs in a democracy and what happens when the power is taken away from the people. Ashley Nickels, associate professor of political science at Kent Sate University, examines these questions through the lens of a municipal takeover in Flint, Michigan in 2011 that replaced elected city officials with an emergency manager appointed by the state. Nickels also challenges the notion that policy can be removed from politics and treating it as such has implications for democracy. The focus on austerity and cost cutting set the stage for the Flint water crisis in 2014 and, Nickels argues, left the city's residents with little power to change the situation. Nickels is the author of Power, Participation, and Protest in Flint, Michigan: Unpacking the Policy Paradox of Municipal Takeovers , which won the American Political Science Association's Robert A. Dahl Award in 2020 — an award given to recognize scholarly work in the field of democracy. Michael and Candis discuss how Nickels's work picks up some of the questions that Dahl's landmark work on democracy introduced in the mid-20th century. Additional Information Power, Participation, and Protest in Flint, Michigan: Unpacking the Policy Paradox of Municipal Takeover Ashley Nickels's website Growing Democracy podcast Related Episodes The power of local government Ten thousand democracies
Mon, May 24, 2021
There is no "I" in democracy
Shaylyn Romney Garrett is a writer, speaker and changemaker pursuing connection, community, and healing in a fragmented world. She is the co-author with Robert Putnam of The Upswing: How America Came Together a Century Ago and How We Can Do It Again , which charts what the authors describe as the "I-We-I" curve in American democratic engagement and civic life. In the book and in this interview, Romney Garrett takes us back to the Gilded Age, another time when America was highly unequal and divided. We discuss the reforms that came out of that era and how it led to decades of a "we" culture that got us through war and economic hardship with a reimagined civil society. These trends reversed throughout the 1970s and 80s, but Romney Garrett argues that we could be on the cusp of making a shift back to 'we" — if we're willing to put in the work to get there. As a social entrepreneur, she talks about some of the organizations and projects that she sees as starting down the path toward this transformation. Additional Information The Upswing: How America Came Together a Century Ago and How We Can Do It Again Shaylyn Romney Garrett's website Related Episodes How democracies can win the war on reality Colored Conventions show us where democracy really happens
Mon, May 17, 2021
How democracies can win the war on reality
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. These issues came to a head in the United States last week as Liz Cheney was removed from her leadership position in Congress for not pledging her support to the lies surrounding a rigged 2020 election. Michael and Chris begin with a discussion of this dynamic before the interview. 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 Information This is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality How to Put Out Democracy's Dumpster Fire - article with Anne Applebaum in The Atlantic Peter Pomerantsev on Twitter Related Episodes A path forward for social media and democracy Can pranksters save democracy? How conspiracies are damaging democracy
Mon, May 10, 2021
Conspiracism finds a home on the intellectual right
Chris Beem takes the interviewer's chair this week for a conversation with political theorist Laura K. Field about her recent work that examines how the conspiracism described by Nancy Rosenblum and Russell Muirhead in their book A Lot of People Are Saying has made its way to prominent conservative intellectuals and the institutions that support them. The conversation ends with ways that listeners can take conspiracy-minded arguments with the appropriate grain of salt and perhaps disconnect from politics a little in the process. Field is a senior fellow at the Niskanen Center and scholar in residence at American University. She he writes about current political affairs from a vantage point informed by the history of political thought. Her academic writing spans antiquity and modernity, and has appeared in the The Journal of Politics, The Review of Politics, and Polity. She earned a Ph.D. in political theory and public law from the University of Texas at Austin. Additional Information The Highbrow Conspiracism of the New Intellectual Right: A Sampling From the Trump Years Revisiting "Why Liberalism Failed:" A Five-Part Series Laura K. Field on Twitter The Niskanen Center's podcasts: The Science of Politics and The Vital Center Related Episodes How conspiracies are damaging democracy? Is it possible to overdo democracy?
Mon, May 03, 2021
The Federalist Society's ideas have consequences for democracy
Is the Federalist Society bad for democracy? There's nothing inherently wrong with groups of like-minded people organizing to share and disseminate their ideas — everyone from James Madison to Alexis de Tocqueville would agree on that. However, our guest this week argues that the group's outsized role in the courts has undermined the notion of judicial independence, one of the hallmarks of our democratic experiment. Amanda Hollis-Brusky is an associate professor of politics at Pomona College. She is the author of Ideas with Consequences , which examines the history of the Federalist Society and how it's shaped the courts and their relationship to the other branches of government over the past 40 years. Additional Information Ideas with Consequences: The Federalist Society and the Conservative Counterrevolution Amanda's September 2020 congressional testimony Related Episodes The Supreme Court's politics and power
Mon, April 26, 2021
Colored Conventions show us where democracy really happens
For nearly 100 years, African Americans gathered in cities across the United States to participate in state and national-level political meetings that went far beyond slavery and conventional racial narratives to discuss education, labor, and what true equal citizenship would look like. This rich history went largely unnoticed for decades until P. Gabrielle Foreman and her colleagues formed the Colored Conventions Project to collect and categorize convention records and associated documents. Foreman and Colored Conventions Project Co-Director Jim Casey, both professors at Penn State, join us this week to explain what the Colored Conventions were and how they fit into the larger arc of the Black freedom struggle and the ongoing effort to make the United States a fully-inclusive multiracial democracy. In addition to co-leading the Colored Conventions Project, Foreman and Casey are also co-authors of The Colored Conventions Movement: Black Organizing in the Nineteenth Century, released in March 2021 by the University of North Carolina Press. Additional Information The Colored Conventions Movement: Black Organizing in the Nineteenth Century The Colored Conventions Project P. Gabrielle Foreman on Twitter Related Episodes The long road to a multiracial democracy
Mon, April 19, 2021
Can pranksters save democracy?
Srjda Popovic and Sophia A. McClennen have appeared on our show separately and are now joining forces to apply a research framework to dilemma actions, a nonviolent organizing tactic that works by capitalizing on a belief that's commonly held by the public but not supported by those in power. Rather than simply getting people together to protest in the streets, you organize them to do something that causes a scene, like kissing on a crowded subway platform or planting flowers in potholes that line a city's streets. Authority figures are faced with the dilemma of making themselves look foolish by taking the bait or doing nothing and looking weak. Either way, the pranksters win and can gain media attention, new members for their cause, and in some cases, a much-needed morale boost. Popovic is co-founder and executive director of the Center for Applied Nonviolent Actions and Strategies (CANVAS), an organization that trains nonviolent activists around the world. McClennen is a professor of international affairs and comparative literature at Penn State. She studies how satire and irony impact political actions and behavior. Popovic and McClennen collaborated on the new book Pranksters vs. Autocrats: Why Dilemma Actions Advance Nonviolent Activism, written as part of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy's 2020 Brown Democracy Medal. Additional Information Pranksters vs. Autocrats: Why Dilemma Actions Advance Nonviolent Activism Center for Applied Nonviolent Actions and Strategies (CANVAS) Related Episodes A playbook for organizing in turbulent times Satire is good for more than just a few laughs
Mon, April 12, 2021
Public schools, not government schools
The Trump administration infamously referred to public schools as "failing government schools," illustrating how education has been caught up in the broader attack on the roots of American democracy. While the language is new, Derek W. Black argues the sentiment very much is not. Black is a professor of law at the University of South Carolina and one of the nation’s foremost experts in education law and policy, focusing on school funding and equality for disadvantaged students He is the author of Schoolhouse Burning: Public Education and the Assault on American Democracy. The book traces the legal history of public education, and how the right to education was challenged during Reconstruction, the Civil Rights era, and other pivotal moments in American history. After the interview, Candis and Chris discuss the ways that neoliberalism has impacted public education, the promise and peril of teacher's unions, and how COVID-19 has further complicated our already complex relationship with public education. Additional Information Black's website Schoolhouse Burning: Public Education and the Assault on American Democracy Black's talk for Penn State's Center for Education and Civil Rights This week's featured show from The Democracy Group podcast network: How Do We Fix It? Related Episodes School segregation then and now Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom
Mon, April 05, 2021
Reforming criminal justice from the inside out
Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner joins us to discuss the promise and peril of institutional reform and how he built a coalition of voters who are traditionally overlooked in politics. He spent his career as a civil rights attorney, not a as a prosecutor like his predecessors. He's part of a growing movement of progressive district attorneys who focus on ending mass incarceration, not solely on enforcing law and order. Krasner won in 2017 and increased voter turnout in an off-year election; he is up for re-election this year. He is the subject of the new PBS Independent Lens documentary Philly D.A., which follows his campaign and first three years in office. He is also the author of For the People: A Story of Justice and Power . Both the book and the documentary series will be released April 20. Additional Information Philly D.A. from PBS Independent Lens For the People: A Story of Justice and Power This week's featured show from The Democracy Group podcast network: Let's Find Common Ground Related Episodes What Serial taught Sarah Koenig about criminal justice The world's most punitive democracy
Mon, March 29, 2021
Laboratories of restricting democracy
According to the Brennan Center for Justice, legislators in 43 states have introduced more than 250 bills aimed at restricting access to voting in person, by mail, or both. Chris Fizsimon, director and publisher of States Newsroom, returns to the show to give us a birds-eye view of what's happening on the ground in state legislatures. We discuss how Republican legislators are pushing things like shortened mail-in voting windows, expanded voter ID requirements, and other cumbersome administrative changes under the guise of protecting or restoring election integrity after the 2020 election. After the interview, Michael and Candis reflect on the broader question of voting as a partisan issue and what that means for the future of American democracy. States Newsroom is a nonprofit news organization with newsrooms across the country specifically focused on state politics. Fitzsimon joined us last spring to discuss COVID-19 protests at state capitols. Additional Information States Newsroom Brennan Center State Voting Bills Tracker Chris Fitzsimon on Twitter Leadership Now: How Businesses Can Support Democracy Related Episodes Give me liberty or give me COVID-19? - Fitzsimon's first appearance on the show This Week's Democracy Group podcast network featured show: Our Body Politic
Mon, March 22, 2021
Danielle Allen on achieving democracy's ideals
Danielle Allen is a leader of two large-scale efforts to make democracy truly inclusive and reimagine the way we teach new generations of democratic citizens. She joins us this week to discuss both initiatives and how to build coalitions for effective change Allen is the James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University and Director of Harvard's Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics. She is a leader and spokesperson for Our Common Purpose from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and Educating for American Democracy, a collaboration among dozens of civics-focused organizations and educators. These projects share a theme that democracy is in crisis and the only way out of it is to double down on democratic reforms while wrestling with our complicated past and admitting that the United States has never been a fully inclusive democracy. Allen says that reforms are achievable and desired by many people across the country and across the political spectrum. Getting there won't be easy, however. Chris describes these efforts as the "Manhattan Project for democracy," but Allen says she is a "not an optionalist," meaning that, if we want democracy to succeed, we have no other choice but to push forward despite the naysayers out there. Additional Information Our Common Purpose Educating for American Democracy Allen's lecture for the McCourtney Institute Allen on Twitter Related Episodes Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom Your guide to ranked-choice voting The case for open primaries
Mon, March 15, 2021
Reimagining citizenship in a consumer world
If you're listening to this podcast, you probably don't fit Ethan Porter's definition of a consumer citizen, but you probably know someone who does — someone who tunes out of politics and would rather focus on just about anything else. Porter argues that appealing to consumer behavior might be on way to spark civic engagement among this group. In The Consumer Citizen , Porter also makes the case that Americans would trust the government more if it did a better job of communicating about its services. He has some ideas about how businesses can join the effort to increase civics education for everyone, not just students in school. We cover all of those topics in this conversation, and Michael and Chris offer their reflections — and a healthy dose of skepticism — after the interview. Porter is an assistant professor at the George Washington University School of Media and Public Affairs. He received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Chicago in 2016. He is the author of The Consumer Citizen and the forthcoming False Alarm: The Truth About Political Mistruths in the Trump Er a. Additional Information The Consumer Citizen Ethan Porter on Twitter Related Episodes When the "business of business" bleeds into politics
Mon, March 08, 2021
Understanding — and addressing — domestic terrorism
When the social fabric and institutions the hold a democracy together are weakened, it can create a breeding ground for extremism that radicalization that might eventually lead to acts of domestic terrorism like the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. It's a vicious cycle — weaker democracy breeds more distrust which leads to more extreme actions. As Anne Applebaum reminded us last week, democracy is not inevitable and takes hard work to sustain. This week, we break down what domestic terrorism is and how it largely spread unnoticed for much of the 21st century while the focus was on international terrorism after 9/11. Our guest is James Piazza, Liberal Arts Professor of Political Science at Penn State and an expert on the study of terrorism, including its socioeconomic roots, the role of minority rights, and state repression of terrorist activity. Piazza talks about why it seems to have taken so long for the U.S. to recognize domestic terrorism as a threat and what 20 years of studying international terrorism can teach us about radicalization and deradicalization. Additional Information Piazza's website Piazza in The Conversation on hate speech and political violence McCourtney Institute Mood of the Nation Poll on trust in the FBI
Mon, March 01, 2021
Anne Applebaum on why democracy is not inevitable
Anne Applebaum is a staff writer at The Atlantic, a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, and a senior fellow at The Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. She joined the McCourtney Institute for Democracy for a virtual event on February 17, 2021 to discuss her most recent book, Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism. This episode includes the closing remarks from Applebaum's lecture, followed by a Q&A with Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle that covers the future of the Republican Party, how the Cold War served as a unifier for Republicans and Democrats, and why she believes economic inequality and democratic erosion are not as closely linked as some people think. Additional Information Video of Applebaum's Feb. 17 lecture Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism Applebaum's work in The Atlantic Related Episodes Daniel Ziblatt on How Democracies Die Viktor Orban's "velvet repression" in Hungary Brexit and the UK's identity crisis
Mon, February 22, 2021
The long road to a multiracial democracy
Seizing Freedom is a new podcast from Virginia Public Media that tells the stories of Black Americans during Reconstruction who fought for the everyday freedoms that many of us take for granted, like the right to decide how to make a living or which causes to support. Drawing from host Kidada Williams's research on historical records of formerly enslaved people, the show brings to light voices that have been muted throughout American history. Williams is associate professor of history at Wayne State University, author of They Left Great Marks on Me: African American Testimonies of Racial Violence from Emancipation to World War I, and editor of Charleston Syllabus: Readings on Race, Racism and Racial Violence . Additional Information Seizing Freedom podcast Kidada Williams Related Episodes The clumsy journey to antiracism Civil rights, civil unrest The ongoing struggle for civil rights
Mon, February 15, 2021
A path forward for social media and democracy
Sinan Aral has spent two decades studying how social media impacts our lives, from how we think about politics to how we find a romantic partner. He argues that we're now at the crossroads of a decade of techno-utopianism followed by a decade of techno-dystopianism. How to reconcile the promise and peril of social media is one of the biggest questions facing democracy today. Aral is the David Austin Professor of Management, Marketing, IT, and Data Science at MIT; director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy; and head of MIT’s Social Analytics Lab. He is the author of The Hype Machine: How Social Media Disrupts Our Elections, Our Economy, and Our Health — And How We Must Adapt . In his book and in this conversation, Aral goes under the hood of the biggest, most powerful social networks to tackle the critical question of just how much social media actually shapes our choices, for better or worse. Additional Information The Hype Machine Sinan Aral on Twitter Related Episodes Facebook is not a democracy Free speech from the Founding Fathers to Twitter
Mon, February 08, 2021
Will Alexei Navalny make Russia more democratic?
Alexei Navalny has been a figure in Russian opposition for years, but garnered international attention recently though social media and what's widely believed to be an assassination attempt by the Russian government in the fall. This week, we unpack the complicated nature of Russian democracy and how the U.S. and other countries should respond — or not — to what's happening there now. Michael Kimmage is a professor of history at the Catholic University of America and a non-resident allow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. From 2014 to 2016, he served on the Secretary's Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. Department of State, where he held the Russia/Ukraine portfolio. He is the author of two books on American history and culture, and he has published articles and essays on the transatlantic relationship, on U.S.–Russian relations, and on international affairs in The New Republic, The New York Times, and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Additional Information Kimmage's New Republic article on Russian democracy Kimmage at the German Marshall Fund Out of Order podcast Related Episodes Hong Kong's fight is everyone's fight Brazil's tenuous relationship with democracy
Mon, February 01, 2021
Direct democracy's dark side
From gerrymandering to ranked-choice voting to expanding voting rights, the ballot initiative has been essential to expanding and reforming democracy in recent years. However, the initiative has also been used to constrain minority rights and push the public to act on polarizing issues like the death penalty and immigration. Ted Lascher and Joshua Dyck are the authors of Initiatives Without Engagement: A Realistic Appraisal of Direct Democracy's Secondary Effects . In the book, they develop and test a theory that can explain the evidence that the ballot initiative process fails to provide the civic benefits commonly claimed for it, and the evidence that it increases political participation. Ultimately, they argue that the basic function of direct democracy is to create more conflict in society — something that runs counter to the way initiatives are often framed by scholars and democracy reformers. Lascher is Professor of Public Policy and Administration at California State University, Sacramento. Dyck is Associate Professor of Political Science and Co-Director of the Center for Public Opinion at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Additional Information Initiatives Without Engagement: A Realistic Appraisal of Direct Democracy's Secondary Effects Joshua Dyck on Twitter Related Episodes The democracy rebellion happening in states across the U.S. Winning the "democracy lottery" Extreme maps, extreme politics
Bonus · Mon, January 25, 2021
Check out our partners in The Democracy Group
We'll be back with a new episode of Democracy Works next week. In the meantime, we invite you to check out our partner podcasts in The Democracy Group podcast network. Here's a small sampling of what the network's shows have covered recently: Politics in Question examines the future of the Republican Party with the author of a new book on the Tea Party and insurgent factions in American policies. How Do We Fix It? explores free speech and big tech with former ACLU president Nadine Strossen. Future Hindsight discusses the link between Christianity and white supremacy in United States history. Another Way by Lawrence Lessig shines a light on what political reform lessons the United States can draw from Alaska. Democracy Matters from James Madison University explores the history of insurrection and section in the United States with a panel of faculty experts. 70 Million explores the push for criminal justice reform in jails throughout the United States The Science of Politics from the Niskanen Center explores the politics of homeschooling Out of Order from the German Marshall Fund of the United States takes stock of Germany’s Presidency of the Council of the European Union, which recently ended. Learn more about the network and subscribe to its newsletter for updates at democracygroup.org .
Mon, January 18, 2021
Extreme maps, extreme politics
Despite ongoing threats of violence, the wheels of democracy continue to turn, and in 2021, that means redistricting. States will draw new electoral maps this year using data from the 2020 Census. Our guest this week 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. David 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 Information Unrigged: How Americans are Battling Back to Save Democracy David Daley on Twitter Fair Districts PA on judicial gerrymandering Related Episodes One state's fight for fair maps Next-generation democracy : An interview with high school student Kyle Hynes, who won Pennsylvania's citizen mapmaking contest.
Mon, January 11, 2021
American democracy's violent disruption
Democracy Works hosts Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, and Candis Watts Smith reflect on the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and what it says about the condition of American democracy. They also discuss whether it's possible to learn from this moment and what guideposts they'll be looking for to determine whether all the talk about protecting and restoring democracy we've heard since the attack will translate into action. This episode was recorded on Friday, January 8, 2021. Additional Information Statement from Michael Berkman and Chris Beem on January 6, 2021 attack Related Episodes Andrew Sullivan on democracy's double-edged sword What really motivates Trump supporters Daniel Ziblatt on "How Democracies Die"
Bonus · Mon, January 04, 2021
What neoliberalism left behind [rebroadcast]
Neoliberalism is one of those fuzzy words that can mean something different to everyone. Wendy Brown is one of the world’s leading scholars on neoliberalism and argue that a generation of neoliberal worldview among political, business, and intellectual leaders led to the populism we’re seeing throughout the world today. But is it mutually exclusive to democracy? Not necessarily. Brown joins us this week to help make sense of what neoliberalism is, and where things stand today. We were lucky enough to get an advance copy of her book, In the Ruins of Neoliberalism, which will be released in July. It’s a follow up to her 2015 book, Undoing the Demos , and you’ll hear her talk about how her thinking has changed since then. Brown is the Class of 1936 First Chair at the University of California, Berkeley, where she teaches political theory. Additional Information Wendy’s books: In the Ruins of Neoliberalism , Undoing the Demos Wendy’s website Our episode with David Frum
Bonus · Mon, December 28, 2020
How conspiracies are damaging democracy [rebroadcast]
From Pizzagate to Jeffrey Epstein, conspiracies seem to be more prominent than ever in American political discourse. What was once confined to the pages of supermarket tabloids is now all over our media landscape. Unlike the 9/11 truthers or those who questioned the moon landing, these conspiracies are designed solely to delegitimize a political opponent — rather than in service of finding the truth. As you might imagine, this is problematic for democracy. Democracy scholars Russell Muirhead and Nancy Rosenblum call it “conspiracy without the theory” and unpack the concept in their book A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy. Russell is the Robert Clements Professor of Democracy and Politics at Dartmouth. Nancy is the Senator Joseph Clark Research Professor of Ethics in Politics at Harvard. As you’ll hear, the new conspiricism is a symptom of a larger epistemic polarization that’s happening throughout the U.S. When people no longer agree on a shared set of facts, conspiracies run wild and knowledge-producing institutions like the government, universities, and the media are trusted less than ever. Additional Information A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy
Mon, December 21, 2020
Did democracy work in 2020?
This episode was recorded on December 15, 2020, the day after the Electoral College voted to confirm Joe Biden as the next United States President. However, some Republicans refuse to accept the result and vow to continue fighting the result until Inauguration Day. Michael, Chris, and Candis discuss what these challenges mean for the long-term health and legitimacy of American elections and American democracy. They also discuss damage to the institutions that comprise America's liberal democracy and what it will take to repair them moving forward. Finally, they touch on increasing polarization and whether a generational shift will change the dynamics over time. This our final new episode of the year. We'll be on a winter break for the next few weeks, during which time we'll be rebroadcasting some episodes from our back catalog that you might have missed. If there are any guests or topics you would like us to cover in 2021, please email democracyinst@psu.edu to share your ideas. Thank you to our colleagues at WPSU for helping us produce the show every week — Andy Grant, Emily Reddy, Kristine Allen, Anne Danahy, Jen Bortz, Chris Kugler, and Mark Stitzer. From our team to your and your family, best wishes for a happy holiday season!
Mon, December 14, 2020
The people want pot
Lee Hannah and Dan Mallinson have been studying marijuana policy for several years and watching as initiatives pass in states across the country. We discuss how the process of organizing around a ballot initiative has changed as the marijuana industry grows, and whether the growing number of states legalizing marijuana will lead to changes at the federal level. Hannah is associate professor of political science at Wright State University and Mallinson is assistant professor of public policy and administration at Penn State Harrisburg. Both received their Ph.Ds from Penn State, where they worked with Democracy Works host Michael Berkman. This episode hits many of the items on the Democracy Works bingo card — federalism, states as laboratories of democracy, ballot initiatives, social justice, and more. Additional Information Hannah and Mallinson's article on federalism and marijuana legalization for the London School of Economics Hannah on Twitter Mallinson on Twitter Related Episodes The democracy rebellion happening in states across the U.S. Using the tools of democracy to address economic inequality
Mon, December 07, 2020
What really motivates Trump supporters
John Hibbing is the Foundation Regent University Professor of Political Science at the University of Nebraska. He studies the manner in which these biological variations mitigate the way in which individuals respond to politically relevant environmental occurrences. His latest book is The Securitarian Personality: What Really Motivates Trump's Base and Why It Matters for the Post-Trump Era. The book draws from an original national survey that includes over 1,000 strong Trump supporters and Hibbing's own experience at a Trump rally in the Midwest. Hibbing argues Trump's base is driven by the desire for security, not fear or authoritarianism as others claim. In the book, and in this interview, Hibbing also provides insight into the approaches likely to increase levels of political civility in the future. Additional Information The Securitarian Personality: What Really Motivates Trump's Base and Why It Matters for the Post-Trump Era Hibbing's University of Nebraska faculty page Hibbing on Twitter We are conducting a listener survey in partnership with our colleagues in The Democracy Group podcast network. Take a few minutes to help us learn more about how we can make epodes that will better serve you in 2021 and beyond and receive a Democracy Group notebook. Take the survey . Related Episodes Journalist Salena Zito on Trump voters and her book "The Great Revolt" Jonathan Haidt on psychology and political polarization
Mon, November 30, 2020
The myth of the "Latino vote"
We are conducting a listener survey in partnership with our colleagues in The Democracy Group podcast network. Take a few minutes to help us learn more about how we can make epodes that will better serve you in 2021 and beyond and receive a Democracy Group notebook. Take the survey . Geraldo Cadava is a professor of History and Latina and Latino Studies at Northwestern University. His book,"The Hispanic Republican: The Shaping of an American Political Identity from Nixon to Trump," examines little-understood history of Hispanic Americans with a cultural study of how post–World War II Republican politicians actively courted the Hispanic vote. In the book and in this interview, Cadava offers insight into the complicated dynamic between Latino liberalism and conservatism, which, when studied together, shine a crucial light on a rapidly-changing demographic that will impact American elections for years to come. Additional Information The Hispanic Republican: The Shaping of an American Political Identity from Nixon to Trump Cadava's lecture for Penn State Latinx Studies Cadava's website Cadava on Twitter Related Episodes Latino immigrants and the changing makeup of American democracy Street-level bureaucrats at the border
Bonus · Mon, November 23, 2020
Can corporations be democratic citizens?
Dawn Carpenter is the creator and host of What Does It Profit? - a podcast that explores how we can reconcile capitalism’s demand for profit with the long term well-being of people and the planet, She is a former investment banker who had a mid-career pivot to studying applied ethics, the nature work, and the responsibilities of wealth. Dawn and Jenna discuss the rights and responsibilities corporations have to both shareholders and stakeholders, and how those dynamics have evolved from the postwar Keynsian period through the neoliberal era to the crossroads we seem to be at today. We'll be back with a full episode next week. In the meantime, Happy Thanksgiving from our team to yours and we hope you enjoy this interview. Additional Information What Does It Profit? Related Episodes What neoliberalism left behind When business bleeds into politics
Mon, November 16, 2020
Is common ground hiding in plain sight?
Will Friedman is president of Public Agenda, a national, nonpartisan, nonprofit research and public engagement organization that strives to strengthen democracy and expand opportunity for all Americans. One of the organization's major projects is the Hidden Common Ground Initiative, which challenges the increasingly dominant narrative of a hopelessly-divided America by identifying and elevating the areas and narratives where Americans agree on solutions to politically-polarized issues, and by fostering productive dialogue on those areas where we truly disagree. This work, along with the Hidden Tribes initiative, Common Ground Committee, and others begs the question — if this common ground is already prevalent in our society and our democracy, then why is it hidden? We explore that question in this episode and ask how to work toward common ground in a way that does not simply maintain the status quo. Additional Information Hidden Common Ground Initiative Related Episodes Trust, facts, and democracy in a polarized world Does Congress promote partisan gridlock?
Mon, November 09, 2020
When four threats to democracy collide
Lieberman is co-author with Suzanne Mettler of the book "Four Threats: The Recurring Crises of American Democrac y ." He is the Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. Political polarization, racism and nativism, economic inequality, and excessive executive power—alone or in combination—have threatened the survival of the republic, but it has survived—so far. What is unique, and alarming, about the present moment in American politics is that all four conditions exist. By revisiting how earlier generations of Americans faced threats to the principles enshrined in the Constitution, Lieberman sees the promise and the peril that have led us to today and, in this conversation, we chart a path toward repairing our civic fabric and renewing democracy. Additional Information Four Threats: The Recurring Crises of American Democrac y Robert Lieberman on Twitter Related Episodes A brief history of "people power" The ongoing struggle for civil rights Using the tools of democracy to address inequality
Mon, November 02, 2020
Wynton Marsalis on democracy as jazz and The Ever Fonky Lowdown
The Ever Fonky Lowdown from Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra addresses the timeless cycle and methods used by the elite to exploit their fellow citizens in order to acquire, expand and maintain power. In the words of Mr. Game himself, ”We are here tonight, but this is an international hustle. It has played out many times across time and space, and is not specific to any language or race. It takes on different flavors according to people’s taste, but always ends up in the same old place.” Clips from The Ever Fonky Lowdown are used with permission from Blue Engine Records. Additional Information The Ever Fonky Lowdown - Jazz at Lincoln Center store The Ever Fonky Lowdown libretto , written by Wynton Marsalis The Sound of Democracy - virtual event for Penn State's Center for the Performing Arts Related Episodes How music transcends political polarization
Mon, October 26, 2020
News deserts are democracy deserts, too
The connection between local news and democracy goes back to the Founding Fathers and particularly to Alex de Tocqueville. We explore the rise, fall, and potential rebirth of local news this week with Jennifer Lawless, Commonwealth professor of politics at the University of Virginia and co-author with Danny Hayes of the forthcoming book News Hole: The Decline of Newspapers and the Future of American Democracy . In the golden age of newspapers, the "news hole" was the section of the paper not taken up by advertising — aka where the stories, photos, sports scores, TV listings, weather, and everything else lived. Though that dynamic still exists, the term news hole has taken on a whole other meaning that's literally a hole in a community without a local news organization. This conversation is critically important in the height of election season as people across the U.S. vote for the more than 500,000 local elected positions across the country. As we heard from Mirya Holman in the Sheriffs 101 episode, it can often be difficult to find accurate, credible information about these candidates without local news organizations. Additional Information Resources for finding local news in your area: Institute for Nonprofit News LION Publishers States Newsroom (for state government coverage) UNC research on news deserts Jennifer Lawless on Twitter Is that a fact? podcast from the News Literacy Project Related Episodes Sheriffs 101 Defending the First Amendment and the Fourth Estate Fake news, clickbait, and the future of local journalism
Mon, October 19, 2020
The Supreme Court's politics and power
A lot of people are thinking about the Civil War era these days, whether it's asking questions about whether we're in a second civil war now, or thinking about what happened during the election of 1876. In addition to our discussion of the Supreme Court, we talk about both of these things with Rachel Shelden, associate professor of history at Penn State and director of the George and Ann Richards Civil War Era Center. If it sounds like we covered a lot in this episode, it's because we did. Like any good historian, Shelden does not use her knowledge of history predict the future, but she does offer some very useful insights for how the past can help all of us frame and interpret what's happening now. Related Episodes The perfect storm for election disaster A brief history of "people power" Additional Information Shelden's article in the Washington Post Stanford's Jonathan Gienapp on originalism and history Penn State Richards Civil War Era Center
Mon, October 12, 2020
The perfect storm for election disaster
In this episode, we review the mechanics of how election results are certified and the work of the Electoral College between Election Day and Inauguration Day. Most of their work has historically happened behind the scenes, but it could become very public this fall if results are contested. We also look at what elections in 2000 and 1876 can tell us about what might play out over the next few months, and why the act of conceding an election is important for democratic legitimacy. Our guest is Lawrence Douglas, the James J. Grosfeld Professor of Law, Jurisprudence and Social Thought at Amherst College. He is the author of seven books and a regular contributor to The Guardian. Additional Information Will He Go? Trump and the Looming Election Meltdown in 2020 Lawrence Douglas in The Guardian Related Episodes The people who choose the President Andrew Sullivan on democracy's double-edged sword The constitutional crisis episode
Mon, October 05, 2020
The 2020 election from WPSU's Take Note
We really enjoy collaborating with the team at WPSU on Democracy Works and were happy to give the interviewer's chair to WPSU News reporter Anne Danahy for an episode that also aired on the station's interview show Take Note. This interview was recorded on Tuesday, September 30, 2020, before the first presidential debate and President Trump's diagnosis with COVID-19.
Mon, September 28, 2020
Hong Kong's fight is everyone's fight
In some ways, the fight for democracy in Hong Kong is unique to the region and its relationship with China. However, the protests also feel familiar to anyone who's been watching the Black Lives Matter protests in the U.S. or what's happening in countries like Hungary and Brazil. This week, we examine what's driving Hong Kongers into the streets, the generational divides that are emerging over issues like universal suffrage and income inequality, and what Hong Kong's relationship with China might look like moving forward. Our guest is On-cho Ng, head of the Asian Studies Program at Penn State and Professor of History, Asian Studies, and Philosophy. He is a native Hong Konger and received both his undergraduate and master's degrees from the University of Hong Kong. Related Episodes China's threat to democracies around the world Viktor Orban's velvet repression in Hungary Populism is not a monolith Inside the world's largest democracy
Mon, September 21, 2020
Sheriffs 101
Our guest is Mirya R. Holman is an associate professor of political science at Tulane University. She was drawn to researching sheriffs after growing up in rural Oregon, where sheriffs were the only type of law enforcement, and identifying a lack of research about them once she got to graduate school. In this conversation. Holman discusses what sheriffs do, how those responsibilities have changed in light of COVID-19 and ongoing civil unrest, the difference between sheriffs and police, and where to go to find information about sheriff elections that might be happening in your city or town this fall. Additional Information Holman's website Holman on Twitter
Mon, September 14, 2020
Students learn, students vote
Nancy Thomas is director of the Institute for Democracy and Higher Education, an applied research center at the Tisch College of Civic Life at Tufts University. Over the past decade, the IDHE has worked to understand how college students vote and make recommendations to university leaders about both short-term voting challenges and long-term obligations to creating democratic citizens. This conversations covers both of those areas, as well as what role faculty can play in fostering democracy and civic engagement in their courses. Additional Information Institute for Democracy and Higher Education National Voter Registration Day Faculty Network for Student Voting Rights Campus Election Engagement Project All In Campus Democracy Challenge Related Episodes The promise and peril of early voting Are land-grant universities still democracy's colleges? Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom
Mon, September 07, 2020
A dark side to "laboratories of democracy"
Virginia Eubanks examines the relationship between technology and society in her book Automating Inequality: How High-Tech tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor and joins us this week for a discussion about who matters in a democracy and the empathy gap between the people who develop the technology for social systems and the people who use those systems. Eubanks is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University at Albany, SUNY. She is also the author of Digital Dead End: Fighting for Social Justice in the Information Age; and co-editor, with Alethia Jones, of Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith . Her writing about technology and social justice has appeared in Scientific American , The Nation , Harper’s, and Wired . She was a founding member of the Our Data Bodies Project and a 2016-2017 Fellow at New America. Additional Information Automating Inequality: How High-Tech tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor Eubanks will present a lecture on her work for Penn State's Rock Ethics Institute on October 1, 2020 at 6:00 p.m. The event is free and open to anyone. Register here . Related Episodes A roadmap to a more equitable democracy Will AI destroy democracy? Facebook is not a democracy
Mon, August 31, 2020
A fall preview — with a new cohost!
In this episode, Michael, Chris, and Candis discuss: The dynamics at play in national, state, and local elections this fall How politics impacts the Census Bureau and other organizations Whether all politics are really local What we've learned since 2016 about how democracy functions We are excited to welcome Candis to our team. As you'll hear, she doesn't always agree with Michael and Chris and brings some important perspectives to the table. Related episodes The clumsy journey to antiracism Breaking down Black politics Public health depends on the Census Free and fair elections during a pandemic Episode credits This episode was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Mark Stitzer, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, August 24, 2020
YIMBYs and NIMBYs in a democracy
Many of us are spending more time at home these days than we ever have before. In the United States, owning a home has come to symbolize the American Dream and homeowners have more political capital than those who don't. Over the past decade or so, this has led to showdowns at local government meetings between YIMBYs, who want more housing, and NIMBYs, who do not. Dougherty covers economics and housing for the New York Times and is the author of "Golden Gates: Fighting for Housing in America." The book focuses on San Francisco, but as you'll hear Dougherty say, he could have written it about just about any major city in the U.S. We also discuss the role that ballot initiatives play in the fight for housing, particularly in California. Born during the Progressive era to give more power to the people, Dougherty they've become co-opted by money and other influences that plague other areas of our democracy. Related Episodes The power of local government Ten thousand democracies Additional Information Golden Gates: Fighting for Housing in America Dougherty's work in the New York Times
Mon, August 17, 2020
After 100 years, there's still no "woman voter"
In their new book A Century of Votes for Women: American Elections Since Suffrage , Christina Wolbrecht and Kevin Corder examine women’s (and men’s) voting behavior, and traces how women’s turnout and vote choice evolved across a century of enormous transformation overall and for women in particular. The work shows that there is no such thing as ‘the woman voter. Instead, there is considerable variation in how different groups of women voted in response to changing political, social, and economic realities. The points Wolbrecht makes in this interview about how women are perceived by pundits and scholars alike are worth reflecting on as we celebrate the 100th anniversary of suffrage and prepare for an election this fall. Wolbrecht is Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame and Director of the Rooney Center for the Study of American Democracy. Her areas of expertise include American politics, political parties, gender and politics, and American political development. Additional Information A Century of Votes for Women: American Elections Since Suffrage Rooney Center for the Study of American Democracy Christina Wolbrecht on Twitter Related Episodes Behind the scenes of the "year of the woman" The connective tissue of democracy
Bonus · Mon, August 10, 2020
She Votes! — Susan B. Anthony and "voting while female"
This episode examines the arrest, trial, and conviction of suffragist Susan B. Anthony for the crime of "voting while female." Rather than sitting on her heels, Anthony launched a campaign to raise awareness about voting rights for women that would set the stage for the next 50 years of work through the passage of the 19th Amendment. You might be familiar with parts of this story, but you've never heard it quite like this — Anthony is voiced by actress Christine Braranski in this episode. She Votes! is hosted by Ellen Goodman, a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Boston Globe and founder of The Conversation Project, and Lynn Sherr, a longtime correspondent for ABC News and author of "Failure is Impossible: Susan B. Anthony in Her Own Words." The 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment is coming up at the end of August and we're planning an episode of Democracy Works on a century women's voting on August 24. You can find more episodes of She Votes at shevotespodcast.com or in any podcast app. Thank you to the Wonder Media Network for sharing this episode with us.
Mon, August 03, 2020
Reason in politics and hope for democracy
"Hope for Democracy" recognizes the primary problems that plague contemporary democracy and offers a solution. It tells the story of one civic innovation, the Citizens' Initiative Review (CIR), which asks a small group of citizens to analyze a ballot measure and then provide recommendations on that measure for the public to use when voting. It relies on narratives of the civic reformers who developed and implemented the CIR and the citizens who participated in the initial review. Coupled with extensive research, the book uses these stories to describe how the review came into being and what impacts it has on participants and the public. In this episode, we also discuss the ways that deliberative democracy challenges existing power structures and how it can change participants' thoughts on civic engagement and how they can impact government outside of partisan politics. Gastil is Distinguished Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences and Political Science and Senior Scholar in the McCourtney Institute. Knobloch is Assistant Professor in the Communication Studies Department at Colorado State University and Associate Director of the university's Center for Public Deliberation. Additional Information Hope for Democracy: How Citizens Can Bring Reason Back Into Politics McCourtney Institute for Democracy Virtual Book Club on Hope for Democracy - August 31, 2020, 4 p.m. ET Citizens Initiative Review Related Episodes From political crisis to profound change Winning the democracy lottery
Mon, July 27, 2020
The people who choose the President
At the end of its 2020 term, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling on what might seem like an obscure question in Constitutional law, but could have huge ramifications in elections this November and beyond. We dive into the ruling on "faithless electors" in this episode from The Democracy Group podcast network. Democracy Works podcast host and producer Jenna Spinelle leads a discussion with: Lawrence Lessig, Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School, founder of Equal Citizens, and host of the podcast Another Way by Lawrence Lessig. Lessig and Equal Citizens Executive Director Jason Harrow argued before the Supreme Court on behalf of the electors in Washington and Colorado. Meredith McGehee, executive director of Issue One and one of the nation’s foremost experts on Congress and ethics in politics. Issue One was part of an amicus brief filed by the Campaign Legal Center on behalf of the states. Michael Baranowski, associate professor of political science at Northern Kentucky University and host of The Politics Guys, a bipartisan American politics and policy podcast. Baranowski is an expert on political institutions and discusses the practical implications of the Supreme Court's decision with Lessig in the second half of the episode. The first half of the episode focuses on the Supreme Court's decisions in Chafalo v. Washington and Baca v. Colorado. Lessig and McGehee explain what led them to get involved in the cases and have a spirited discussion about the role special interests could play in the Electoral College. Then, Lessig and Baranowski discuss the Supreme Court's opinion written by Justice Elena Kagan, and how to make the Electoral College more democratic though measures like the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. A huge thank you to The Democracy Group Network Manager Katie DeFiore for editing this episode! Note: Severe thunderstorms hit Washington, D.C. when we recorded this episode on July 22, 2020 and Meredith McGehee lost power halfway through. We were not able to get her back on the line before the end of the recording session. We apologize and are grateful for the time she was able to join us! Additional Information Equal Citizens Issue One The Democracy Group podcast network The Politics Guys podcast
Bonus · Mon, July 20, 2020
Broken Ground: Robert Bullard on environmental justice
This week, we're bringing you an episode from another podcast we think you might enjoy, Broken Ground from the Southern Environmental Law Center. Broken Ground digs up environmental stories in the South that don’t always get the attention they deserve, and giving voice to the people bringing those stories to light. While the show focuses on the South, the conversations — including the one in this episode — resonate far beyond the region's confines. In the latest season, the podcast explores how Southerners living along the coast are navigating sea level rise as they race against the clock. How will people on the front lines protect themselves from the immediate and impending threats of rising tides? This episode features a conversation with Dr. Robert Bullard, widely considered the father of environmental justice. He talks with Broken Ground host Claudine Ebeid McElwain about how communities of color are disproportionally impacted by climate change, pollution, and environmental destruction. Bullard was scheduled to visit Penn State in April and organizers are hopeful that he'll be able to make the trip in April 2021. If you enjoy this episode, check out Broken Ground wherever you listen to podcasts. Additional Information Broken Ground website Dr. Bullard's website Southern Environmental Law Center Related Episodes Michael Mann's journey through the climate wars Changing the climate conversation The ongoing struggle for civil rights
Mon, July 13, 2020
The world's most punitive democracy [revisited]
We're digging into the archives this week for another episode on race and criminal justice. Peter K. Enns, associate professor in the Department of Government at Cornell University, Executive Director of the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, and author of Incarceration Nation: How the U.S. Became the Most Like the conversation with Frank Baumgartner last week, we look at how public opinion around criminal justice has changed over the past two years and how that translates into public policy. Enns argues that, while public opinion around criminal justice continues to shift, we still don't have anything close to a clear picture about what's happening inside correctional institutions. That, he says, makes it tough for the public to fully grasp the gravity of how incarcerated people are treated and inhibits progress toward a more just, rehabilitative system. We also talk about whether it's possible to both deal with COVID-19 in prisons and jails while also pushing for long-term structural change — and how making conditions healthier and safer benefits everyone. Additional Information Incarceration Nation: How the U.S. Became the Most Punitive Democracy in the World Peter K. Enns on Twitter Roper Center for Public Opinion Research The Marshall Project - nonprofit journalism on criminal justice Related Episodes Suspect citizens in a democracy Civil rights, civil unrest A roadmap to a more equitable democracy
Mon, July 06, 2020
Suspect citizens in a democracy [revisited]
This week marks the beginning of our summer break here on Democracy Works. We are going to be rebroadcasting a few episodes from our back catalog — with a twist. In fall 2018, we did two episodes on police, criminal justice, and race that are directly relevant to what’s happening today. We caught up with those guests recently to talk about what’s changed in the past two years and how they think about the research in our current moment. First up is Frank Baumgartner, Robert J. Richardson Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. He directed the team that analyzed the data published the book Suspect Citizens: What 20 Million Traffic Stops Tell Us About Policing and Race. In the book and in our initial conversation, Bamgartner makes the case that an empathy gap exists between people with political and social power and the people who are most likely to be pulled over. The result is that segments of the population who are already disenfranchised become even more distrustful of the police and the government and less likely to vote and otherwise engage with democracy. During our follow-up conversation in late June 2020, Baumgartner reflected on whether the empathy gap has closed over the past two years and how common-sense police reform can work — even in the midst of a pandemic. Additional Information Suspect Citizens: What 20 Million Traffic Stops Tell Us About Policing and Race Frank’s profile on the Scholars Strategy Network Related Episodes The full episode with Frank from October 2018 What Serial taught Sarah Koenig about criminal justice The clumsy journey to antiracism
Mon, June 29, 2020
The second annual Democracy Works listener mailbag
Michael, Jenna, and Chris in the studio in summer 2019. Before we take a short summer break, Michael and Chris answer your questions about democracy in our current moment. Thank you to everyone who sent in questions; they were excellent! Some of the things we talk about in this episode include: The difference between federalism and the federal government The definition of an institution How media coverage of the 2020 election will compare to 2016 What mask wearing says about the health of American democracy What the U.S. can learn from other democracies Why the “hard work of democracy” is that way For the next few weeks, we’ll be revisiting some of the episodes in our back catalog (with a twist) and bringing you episodes from other podcasts that we think you’ll enjoy. We’ll be back with new episodes before the end of August. If you have suggestions for episodes topics or guests for us to tackle in the fall, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. We would love to hear from you. Contact us Related Episodes Last summer’s listener mailbag A democracy summer reading list Federalism in uncertain times Free and fair elections during a pandemic Episode Credits This episode was recorded on June 18, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Jen Bortz, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, June 22, 2020
How to end democracy’s doom loop
As we bring this season of Democracy Works to a close, we’re going to end in a place similar to where we began — discussing the role of political parties in American democracy. We started the season discussing the Tea Party and the Resistance with Theda Skocpol and Dana Fisher, then discussed presidential primaries with David Karol and the role of parties in Congress with Frances Lee. All of those episodes looked at the party system as it currently stands. This week’s conversation invites all of us to imagine how we can break out of the status quo and create something very different. 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 Lobbyin g, and winner of the 2016 American Political Science Association’s Robert A. Dahl Award, given for “scholarship of the highest quality on the subject of democracy.” He has a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley. Drutman 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. We have one more new episode next week before we take a summer break. We’ll close the season with the second annual Democracy Works listener mailbag. Additional Information Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop audiobook Politics in Question podcast Political Reform at New America Uniting for Action America – registration deadline July 31 Related Episodes Does Congress promote partisan gridlock? Primaries, parties and the public How the Tea Party and the Resistance are upending politics</
Mon, June 15, 2020
The clumsy journey to antiracism
This week, we are bringing you another interview that we hope will give some context to the discussions about racism and inequality that are happening in the U.S. right now. We’re joined by Tehama Lopez Bunyasi, assistant professor at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University and Candis Watts Smith, associate professor African American Studies and political science at Penn State. She was recently named the Brown-McCourtney Early Career Professor in the McCourtney Institute for Democracy. Bunyasi and Smith are coauthors of a book called Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making all Black Lives Matter , which looks at the history of structural racism in the U.S. and gives people information and tools to become antiracists. We talk about the clumsiness associated with changing patterns of thinking and behavior and how that’s playing out across our online and offline lives and among both individuals and companies. We also discuss the inherent messiness of the Black Lives Matter movement and why that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Additional Information Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making all Black Lives Matter Three Myths about Racism – Candis’s TEDxPSU talk from February 2020 24 podcasts that confront racism in America – list from the Bello Collective Related Episodes Breaking down black politics Civil rights, civil unrest A roadmap to a more equitable democracy The ongoing struggle for civil rights Episode Credits This episode was recorded on June 9, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Jen Bortz, and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy.
Mon, June 08, 2020
Civil rights, civil unrest
As protests continue throughout the U.S. in the wake of George Floyd’s death, we’ve been thinking a lot about comparisons to the Civil Rights era and whether the models for demonstrations created during that era are still relevant today. As we’ve discussed on the show before, public memory is a fuzzy thing and we’re seeing that play out here amid discussions of how peaceful protests should be. Our guest this week is uniquely suited to speak to questions of civil rights and civil unrest. Clarence Lang is the Susan Welch Dean of Penn State’s College of the Liberal Arts and professor of African American Studies. He is a scholar in African American urban history and social movements in the Midwest and Border South. He is the author of Grassroots at the Gateway: Class Politics and Black Freedom Struggle in St. Louis, 1936-75 , and Black America in the Shadow of the Sixties: Notes on the Civil Rights Movement, Neoliberalism, and Politics . In addition to his scholarly work, Lang also has a personal connection to what’s happening right now. He grew up on Chicago’s South Side and a family member who was a police officer. He’s a humanist at heart who believes that our country can pull together and overcome these trying times. Additional Information Lang’s website Grassroots at the Gateway Black America in the Shadow of the Sixties Between The World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates A list of podcasts about racism and inequality from the Bello Collective Uniting for Action: America Related Episodes The ongoing struggle for Civil Rights School segregation then and now What neoliberalism left behind Episode Credits This episode was recorded on June 2, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Jen Bortz, and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy.
Wed, June 03, 2020
Aaron Maybin on doing the hard work of democracy [rebroadcast]
We are working on an episode about the social and democratic context for the protests taking place around the U.S. after George Floyd’s death; we’ll have it for you on Monday. In the meantime, we are going to share a few episodes from our archives that we hope can provide context for our current moment. One voice we want to lift up during this time is Aaron Maybin, a former Penn State and NFL football player who is now an artist, educator, activist, and organizer in Baltimore, which is where we interviewed him in August 2019. Maybin has been a tireless advocate for Baltimore’s black community long before protests over the death of George Floyd hit the city. His work will continue long after the protests end — whenever that might be. He believes that the hard work of democracy happens when the cameras and outsiders go away and community members can be empowered to fight for the change they want to see. He also seeks to move people through his art and his work as an art teacher in some of the city’s most underfunded schools. His perspective is worth listening to, or perhaps even revisiting if you’ve already heard it, as we all make sense of what’s going on and how we can do our part to confront structural inequalities and racism in the U.S Learn more about Aaron’s work on his website or by following him on social media: Twitter Instagram Facebook Finally, our colleagues at the Bello Collective also put together a list of 20 podcasts that confront racism in America. You can find it here .
Mon, June 01, 2020
Free speech from the Founding Fathers to Twitter
This is another episode that we recorded in our final days together in the office before COVID-19. However, the topic is just as relevant — if not more so — in our new reality. The topic is free speech and our guest is Stephen D. Solomon, Marjorie Deane Professor at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University and founding editor of First Amendment Watch. He is the author of Revolutionary Dissent: How the Founding Generation Created the Freedom of Speech. Stephen lays out how the Founding Fathers, particularly James Madison, thought about free speech, free press, and the freedom to assemble. The ways we communicate have changed drastically in the past 250 years, but the concerns about protecting the free expression of ideas remains the same. We also discuss free speech on college campuses and how social norms around speech can be just as powerful as laws in place to protect it. It’s too soon to tell how the virtual environment will impact this dynamic, but it will be interesting to watch as colleges prepare for whatever the coming academic year has in store. Additional Information Stephen’s website Revolutionary Dissent Uniting for Action: America Related Episodes Defending the First Amendment and the Fourth Estate Facebook is not a democracy Jonathan Haidt on the psychology of democracy
Fri, May 29, 2020
Bonus: Mayors and bipartisanship during COVID-19
Today we’re bringing you a special episode produced by Nicole Gresen , our intern on Democracy Works during the spring 2020 semester. Nicole spoke with Bob Buckhorn , who was mayor of Tampa, Florida from 2011-2019, about the role that mayors have played during COVID-19 and how they have to put partisans allegiances aside during times of crisis. As Bob says, people look to mayors for empathy and solidarity in the face of uncertainty — whether it’s a natural disaster or a pandemic. Bob also talks about his history in politics, which began not long after he graduated from Penn State. Under his leadership, Tampa became known as a city on the rise for startups and economic development. Though he’s no longer mayor, he continues an active role in the city’s government. Nicole graduated from Penn State in May and is currently pursuing career opportunities in digital media. We really appreciate all of her help behind the scenes on the show over the past few months and wish her success in her career.
Mon, May 25, 2020
The people vs. the experts — and those caught in the middle
These days, it can feel like some politicians are working against experts in public health and other fields when it comes to actions surrounding COVID-19. There’s always been a tension between populism and expertise, but our media landscape and strong partisan polarization are pushing that tension to its breaking point — or so it seems, anyway. As with many issues we’ve covered on this show, there’s more to it than meets the eye, and we are digging into the relationship between expertise and democracy this week in a collaborative episode with our colleagues at Penn State’s Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences. The Huck Institutes produce The Symbiotic Podcast, a show that explores how scientists are collaborating in new ways to solve complex global problems. In this episode, you’ll hear Symbiotic Podcast host Cole Hons and Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle in conversation with Taylor Scott, associate director of the Research-to-Policy Collaboration, and Democracy Works host Michael Berkman. We discuss how organizations like the Research-to-Policy Collaboration seek to promote engagement between researchers and legislators and what both groups can do to make the relationship stronger. We also talk about why expertise is important in a democracy and what happens when it is undermined. Don’t forget, we are still taking questions for the second annual Democracy Works listener mailbag episode. We’ll read your questions on the show and choose three submissions to win Democracy Works mugs. Submit your question here . Additional Information The Symbiotic Podcast Research-to-Policy Collaboration Listener mailbag questions Related Episodes Does Congress promote partisan gridlock? How conspiracies are damaging democracy Michael Mann’s journey through the climate wars Episode Credits This episode was recorded on May 6, 2020. Thank you to Cole Hons of The Symbiotic Podcast for engineering the recording session. The episode was edited by WPSU’s Mark Stitzer and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy.
Mon, May 18, 2020
China’s role in the COVID-19 infodemic
As if the COVID-19 pandemic wasn’t enough to deal with, the World Health Organization says we’re now in an infodemic alongside it. We’ve seen this play out as misinformation and conspiracy theories move from digital to mainstream media and cast a shadow of doubt about information coming from the government and public health experts. Our guests this week have been tracking China’s role in this infodemic and argue that Beijing is taking a few pages out of Russia’s playbook for interfering in the 2016 U.S. election and its broader efforts to undermine democracy around the world. Jessica Brandt and Bret Schafer are part of the Alliance for Securing Democracy, which tracks online information manipulation through its Hamilton 2.0 dashboard. Early on in the pandemic, they saw an uptick in tweets from Chinese diplomats and embassies that were amplifying conspiracy theories about the virus’s origin and casting doubt on information from the World Health Organization and other official sources. The goal is not necessarily to have people believe these claims, but to stir up enough doubt to discredit democratic norms and institutions. If you enjoy this episode, we recommend checking out the Out of Order podcast, produced by the German Marshall Fund of the United States and part of The Democracy Group podcast network. Finally, it’s time for the second annual Democracy Works listener mailbag episode! In a few weeks, we will record an episode answering your questions before we take a summer break. Send us your question about democracy and we’ll answer it on the show, plus you’ll have the chance to win a Democracy Works mug. Additional Information Jessica and Bret’s article on China’s COVID-19 disinformation efforts Hamilton 2.0 Out of Order podcast The Democracy Group podcast network Listener mailbag question submission Related Episodes Protecting democracy from foreign interference <a href="https://www.democracyworkspodcast.com/how-conspiracies-are-d
Mon, May 11, 2020
A roadmap to a more equitable democracy
COVID-19 has exposed longstanding racial and economic inequalities in American life, which is evident in the fact that communities of color are being hit the hardest by both the medical and the economic impacts of the virus. Our guest this week argues that now is the time to empower those communities to have a stake in building a better future for themselves and making our democracy stronger in the process. Our guest this week is K. Sabeel Rahman, president of Demos and co-author of the new book Civic Power: Rebuilding American Democracy in an Era of Crisis . He is also an associate professor of law at Brooklyn Law School, where he teaches constitutional law, administrative law, and courses on law and inequality. His last book, Democracy Against Domination , won the Dahl Prize for scholarship on the subject of democracy. Rahman argues that the old ways of thinking about and participating aren’t working for under-represented groups. His book lays out a framework for how to make democracy reform more inclusive and how to balance liberalism and democracy by making institutions more representative of the communities they serve. The book was written before the pandemic hit, but feels even more relevant today. After the interview, you’ll hear an ad for Future Hindsight, one of our fellow podcasts in The Democracy Group podcast network. The show’s new season on misinformation and democracy launches Friday, May 15. Additional Information Civic Power: Rebuilding American Democracy in an Era of Crisis Demos Future Hindsight The Democracy Group It’s time for the second annual Democracy Works listener mailbag episode! Send us your question about democracy and we’ll answer it on the show. Related Episodes Civic engagement, social distancing, and democracy reform Doing the hard work of democracy in Baltimore The ongoing struggle for civil rights Episode Credits This episode was recorded on April 16 and May 5, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Jen Bortz, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, May 04, 2020
Trust, facts, and democracy in a polarized world
This episode was recorded before COVID-19 changed everything, but many of the themes we discuss about public opinion polling and the importance of trust and facts to a democracy are perhaps more relevant now than ever before. We talked with Michael Dimock, president of the Pew Research Center, about how the organization approaches polling in a world that increasingly presents competing partisan visions of reality. Trust in the media and government has been declining for years, if not longer, and may be exacerbated by COVID-19. What’s more concerning for democracy, Pew’s Trust Facts, and Democracy project found, is that our trust in each other is also declining. People don’t trust their peers to use good judgement when comes to evaluating information or making political decisions — especially when it comes to people from the opposing political party. Polling done as part of Trust, Facts, and Democracy found that about 60% of adults said they have little or no confidence in the wisdom of the American people when it comes to making political decisions. What does that mean for democracy? Dimock doesn’t shy away from talking about the grim realities of our current political climate, but does offer a few glimmers of hope from the Trust, Facts, and Democracy work. Additional Information Pew’s Trust Facts and Democracy project Pew polling on COVID-19 After the Fact podcast from the Pew Charitable Trusts The McCourtney Institute for Democracy’s Mood of the Nation Poll The McCourtney Institute for Democracy is starting a virtual book club! Our first selection will be How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. Join us for online meetings May 20 and 21. Visit democracy.psu.edu/book to learn more and RSVP. Episode Credits This episode was recorded on March 10, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Jen Bortz, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Fri, May 01, 2020
Bonus: Civic engagement, social distancing, and democracy reform
Democracy is very much a group activity. Inside, we come together to debate, discuss, do the work of government, and make laws. Outside, we protest and hold rallies. But much of this is not possible. Social distancing presents a tremendous challenge. In this episode from The Democracy Group podcast network , we look at the barriers and the opportunities as we all deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. “COVID, the pandemic … has really brought to bear not just the inequities and the inequalities, but also the necessity to have a much more active sense of democracy as a verb — democracy as an action that we can all be part of.” -Juleyka Lantigua-Williams, 70 Million Host Richard Davies Co-host, How Do We Fix It? @DaviesNow Guests Mila Atmos Host, Future Hindsight @milaatmos Juleyka Lantigua-Williams, Founder and CEO of Lantigua-Williams and Co. Creator and Executive Producer, 70 Million @JuleykaLantigua Carah Ong-Whaley, Associate Director at James Madison Center for Civic Engagement at James Madison University Co-host, Democracy Matters @CarahOng Lee Drutman, Senior Fellow at New America Co-host, Politics in Question @leedrutman
Mon, April 27, 2020
Give me liberty or give me COVID-19?
From Maine to California, people across the country have gathered at their state capitols over the past few weeks to protest stay at home orders issued by their governors in response to COVID-19. Protest is a hallmark of any democracy, but what happens when doing so comes with health risks? What is motivating people to take to the streets? How should media organizations cover the protests, and how do the people protesting feel about the media? Joining us this week to explore some of those questions is Chris Fitzsimon, director and publisher of States Newsroom , a collective of nonprofit news sites that cover state politics in many of the places where the “reopen” protests have occurred. Fitzsimon talks about what his organization’s reporters have observed on the ground and the challenges that states face in deciding when to lift stay at home orders and restart economic activity. We also discuss how this movement came together and whether it might have staying power beyond the immediate concerns related to COVID-19. Additional Information States Newsroom Visit ratethispodcast.com/democracy to leave a rating or review for Democracy Works. The McCourtney Institute for Democracy is starting a virtual book club! Our first selection will be How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. Join us for online meetings May 20 and 21. Visit democracy.psu.edu/book to learn more and RSVP. Related Episodes Federalism in uncertain times COVID-19 exposes democracy’s tensions Tracing the past, present, and future of protests How the Tea Party and the Resistance are upending American politics Episode Credits This episode was recorded on April 22, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Chris Kugler, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Fri, April 24, 2020
Bonus: COVID-19 and Democracy with The Democracy Group
We are excited to collaborate with our partners in The Democracy Group podcast network to bring you a bonus episode on how COVID-19 is impacting democracy in the United States and around the world. COVID-19 brings together several issues that have long been talked about separately — political polarization, misinformation, international cooperation, democratic norms and institutions, and many others. We dive into some of those issues in this episode and discuss how we can all work together to protect, and even strengthen, democracy as we emerge from the first wave of the pandemic. For more information about The Democracy Group podcast network, visit democracygroup.org . Thank you to Democracy Group Network Manager Katie DeFiore for producing this episode! Host: Jenna Spinelle, Communications Specialist at the McCourtney Institute for Democracy Host, Democracy Works @JennaSpinelle Guests: Luke Knittig, Senior Director of Communications at the McCain Institute Host, In The Arena @LukeKnittig Jeremi Suri, Mack Brown Distinguished Professor in the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas Austin Host, This is Democracy @JeremiSuri Rachel Tausenfreund, Editorial Director at the German Marshall Fund of the United States Host, Out of Order @thousandfriend Weston Wamp, Senior Political Strategist and Consultant at Issue One Host, Swamp Stories @westonwamp
Mon, April 20, 2020
Federalism in uncertain times
With each passing day, the relationship between states and the federal government seems to grow more complicated. States are forming coalitions and working together to chart a path out of COVID-19, while sometimes competing with one another for resources. A lack of clear guidance from the federal government will likely lead to a fragmented return to business and social life state by state in the coming weeks and months. This situation is unique in many ways, but brings to light the complexities of American federalism — our topic of discussion this week. Charles Barrilleaux, Leroy Collins Professor and Political Science Department Chair at Florida State University, is an expert on American federalism and joins us to discuss the relationship between states and the federal government, and how that manifests itself during the response to COVID-19. The episode begins with Michael and Chris explaining the history of federalism and what powers the Constitution gives states and the federal government. Related Episodes COVID-19 exposes democracy’s tensions When states sue the federal government Episode Credits This episode was recorded on April 13, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Chris Kugler, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, April 13, 2020
Will COVID-19 create a one-issue campaign?
The general election is going to happen in November, and candidates still need to figure out ways to get their messages out to voters. COVID-19 has changed everything about the way candidates communicate with potential voters and how they position themselves in relationship to the virus. This episode addresses the nuts and bolts of campaigning during a pandemic, but we also discuss a broader question — should we even be talking about politics at a time like this? Our guest this week makes an interesting case about why the answer is always “yes.” John Sides is a professor of political science at Vanderbilt University and publisher of the Monkey Cage, a political science blog published by the Washington Post. Sides talks about the novel coronavirus has impacted campaigns up and down the ballot, and why it’s valuable to consider it as a political problem apart from a public health issue. Note: You’ll hear a reference to Bernie Sanders during the interview. We recorded on April 6, before Sanders announced he was dropping out of the race. Additional Information John’s website The Monkey Cage A look at ethics of campaigning during COVID-19 Related Episodes Free and fair elections during a pandemic COVID-19 exposes democracy’s tensions Primaries, parties, and the public Episode Credits This episode was recorded on April 6 and 7, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Mark Stitzer, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, April 06, 2020
Public health depends on the Census
The COVID-19 outbreak in the U.S. intensified just as the 2020 Census was getting underway in earnest. As Americans fill their days with news about the new coronavirus, the Census Bureau is doing everything it can to spread the word about completing the Census online while grappling with how to do critical in-person follow up during a time of social distancing. As our guest this week explains, the consequences of an undercount directly impact public health in significant ways. Jenny Van Hook is the Roy C. Buck Professor of Sociology and Demography at Penn State and a former member of the Census Advisory Board. She was an expert witness in the legal fight over the efforts to add a citizenship question to this year’s Census and has written about the Census in The Conversation and other outlets. Census Day was April 1, but there’s still time to complete your Census online at 2020census.gov . This episode begins with an ad for Lyceum, a new app that’s specifically for educational podcasts. Learn more and join the conversation with other listeners at lyceum.fm . Related Episodes It’s good to be counted – our interview with Jenny from May 2018 Episode Credits This episode was recorded on March 31, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle, edited by Chris Kugler, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, March 30, 2020
Free and fair elections during a pandemic
As COVID-19 intensifies throughout the U.S., questions about the future of the remaining primary elections and the general election in November are beginning to surface. The last thing you want are large groups of people standing in line near each other for long periods of time. At a time when seemingly everything in life has gone remote, states are starting to think about what a remote election would look like, too.Our guest this week is one of the people helping them figure it all out. Charles Stewart III, Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor of Political Science at MIT and a contributor to the Election Updates blog, a partnership between MIT and the California University of Technology. He’s spoken with election officials across the country and about how to implement voting by mail and change processes to make in-person voting safe. Voting by mail does not come without its problems in terms of election security and electoral integrity. We explore those with Charles and discuss how planning now can help mitigate those risks in the fall. Democracy Works is proud to be part of Lyceum, a new platform dedicated to educational audio. The app includes curated lists of shows around topics like climate change, linguistics, and ancient history, as well as opportunities for listeners to connect with podcast creators and with each other. Visit lyceum.fm to learn more. Additional Information Election Updates blog Ted Recommendations to Ensure a Healthy and Trustworthy 2020 Election – a piece Charles c0-wrote for Lawfare Related Episodes The promise and peril of early voting How states are working to keep you vote safe Episode Credits This episode was recorded on Wednesday, March 25, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle and edited by WPSU’s Chris Kugler, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, March 23, 2020
COVID-19 exposes democracy’s tensions
As we’ve seen over the past weeks and months, democracies and authoritarian countries respond to pandemics very differently. There are balances to be struck — liberty and community, human rights and disease mitigation — that every country’s government and culture handle a little differently. We dive into that this week with our first ever all-remote episode as we adjust to the new normal of life during COVID-19. Our guest is Nita Bharti, assistant professor of biology at Penn State and faculty member in the university’s Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics. Nita’s research focuses on the interactions between social and biological processes as underlying determinants of human health — making her the perfect person for us to talk to about the response to COVID-19. There are no silver bullets when it comes to outbreak mitigation, but there are lessons we can take from other outbreaks about how information affects behavior and how the government can help or hinder that process. As Nita says, we’re likely only beginning to see what the new normal looks like in the U.S. Additional Information Nita’s article on COVID-19 in The Conversation The Bharti Lab of Human Infectious Diseases The Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics at Penn State is taking questions about the Coronavirus pandemic at askciddpsu@psu.edu . Each week, experts will answer your most commonly asked questions, anonymously. They will attempt to provide the most current accurate information, informed by scientific evidence. Episode Credits This episode was recorded on Thursday, March 19, 2020. It was engineered by Jenna Spinelle and edited by WPSU’s Jen Bortz, and reviewed by Emily Reddy.
Mon, March 16, 2020
Populism is not a monolith
We know that there are a lot of episodes about COVID-19 out there right now. We’re working on one of our own that we hope to bring to you soon, but in the meantime, consider something different to focus on while you practice social distancing this week. We’ve talked a lot on this show about the rise of authoritarian leaders around the world — from Viktor Orban in Hungary to Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil. We sometimes tend to paint these countries with same brush, often referring to the book How Democracies Die. While the book remains of our favorites, this week’s episode is a reminder that populism does not look the same everywhere. We welcome back Penn State’s Vineeta Yadav to look at some of the forces that are pushing back against populism around the world, and how those efforts look different in each place. She joined us last fall to discuss the rise of Narendra Modi in India. We reusume that conversation in this episode, but also touch on what’s happening in Turkey and Brazil. Michael and Chris also give an important overview of the difference between liberalism and democracy — and how the two work together to form the system of government practiced in many countries around the world today. Stay tuned to the end of the episode for more information about Ways&Means , a podcast produced by the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke. The show’s current season is taking a deep dive into the relationship between politics and policy, covering topics like reparations and the decline of local news. Related Episodes Inside the world’s largest democracy – Vineeta Yadav’s first appearance on Democracy Works Brazil’s tenuous relationship with democracy How Democracies Die author Daniel Ziblatt on the “grinding work” of democracy Episode Credits This episode was recorded at WPSU’s studios and engineered by Cole Cullen. It was edited by Chris Kubler and reviewed by Emily Reddy. Additional support from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane.
Mon, March 09, 2020
Swamp Stories: Cashing In
It’s spring break at Penn State this week and we’re going to take a brief hiatus to bring you an episode from a new podcast that’s part of The Democracy Group, our new podcast network. Swamp Stories is produced by Issue One, a group that takes a cross partisan approach to democracy reform. The podcast follows the host — millennial Republican and former candidate for office, Weston Wamp — as he shines a light on the swampiest practices in Washington that repulse Republicans and Democrats alike: Slush funds in Congress, dark money in elections, gerrymandered districts, foreign interference in our elections, dialing for dollars on Capitol Hill, and more. The show debuted at the end of January and we are sharing its first episode with you. There are five others available if you want to binge them while we’re away. We’ll be back with a new episode of Democracy Works next week. Additional Information Swamp Stories website You can find Swamp Stories and all of our other network shows at democracygroup.org
Mon, March 02, 2020
The promise and peril of early voting
Super Tuesday is this week, but voters in many states have already cast their ballots for races happening this week and throughout the rest of the primary season. From Florida to Pennsylvania, states are expanding access to early and absentee voting to give people more options to make their voices heard in our democracy. Sounds great, right? However, early voting is not without its problems for candidates, election officials, and even voters. Daniel Smith, one of the country’s leading elections experts, joins us this week for a look at the pros and cons of early voting, and how it might improve voter turnout among young people specifically. Smith is Professor and Chair of Political Science at the University of Florida and President of ElectionSmith, Inc. He is a nationally-recognized expert on direct democracy, campaign finance, and voting rights in the American states. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Wisconsin – Madison and his B.A. in History from Penn State. Stay tuned to the end of the episode for more information about another great higher ed podcast, Ways & Means from the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. The show’s fifth season launched Feb. 19 and covers issues in politics and policy ahead of the 2020 election. Additional Information Dan’s website: ElectionSmith Ways & Means podcast Related Episodes What should voting look like in the 21st century? Primaries, parties, and the public Episode Credits This episode was recorded at WPSU’s studios and engineered by Andy Grant. It was edited by Mark Stitzer and reviewed by Emily Reddy. Additional support from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane. Interview Highlights [5:40] What is early voting? There are a lot of different definitions of early voting. The one that Pennsylvania still does not have, and about a dozen states don’t have any form of this, is allowing voters to come in before election day to some type of polling location. It can be at the county level, multiple locations, it might just be the county seat. It allows you to come in, you don’t have to request an absentee ballot, and you prove your identity one way or the other, and are able to vote a regular ballot. The ballot looks just like a ballot you would do on election day in your own local precinct. Those windows might be as much as a month before Election Day. [7:55] How do states decide to adopt early voting? It could be just the culture that you have the idea that let’s make voting easier, and we’re going to see about making it more convenient for voters so they don’t have to come on that first Tuesday
Mon, February 24, 2020
Breaking down Black politics
As the South Carolina primary approaches, all eyes are on the African American vote. This week, Michael Berkman is taking over the interviewer’s chair for a roundtable discussion on black politics with Ray Block and Candis Watts Smith, who are associate professors of African American studies and political science at Penn State. Ray is the author of Losing Power: Americans and Racial Polarization in Tennessee Politics. Candis is the author of Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making All Black Lives Matter and Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics. They discuss the history of black politics and how it’s evolved in the years since the Civil Rights movement, how President Trump and the Democratic presidential candidates are received by African Americans, and how the Civil Rights movement and Black Lives Matter are informed by broader social and generational trends. With so much punditry going on around appealing to black voters, we hope you’ll enjoy the opportunity to take a step back from the punditry and look at the broader issues in black politics and how they relate to things like representation and inequality. Additional Information Ray’s book, Losing Power: Americans and Racial Polarization in Tennessee Politics Candis’s books Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making All Black Lives Matter and Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics Candis’s website Ray’s website Related Episodes School segregation then and now The ongoing struggle for civil rights Episode Credits This episode was engineered by Craig Johnson at the WPSU studios, edited by Chris Kugler, and reviewed by Emily Reddy. Additional support comes from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane.
Mon, February 17, 2020
Does Congress promote partisan gridlock?
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 forthcoming The Limits of Party: Congress and Lawmaking in a Polarized Era with James M. Curry. As you’ll hear at the beginning of the episode, we are excited to announce that we are starting a podcast network! We are thrilled to bring together some of our favorite podcasts in democracy, civic engagement, and civil discourse in The Democracy Group. Visit democracygroup.org to learn more about our member shows and sign up for our mailing list to receive updates with new episodes, deep-dive playlists, and more. Additional Information Frances’s book, Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Perpetual Campaign Her lecture at Penn State on lawmaking in a polarized era Frances’s website Related Episodes Congressional oversight and making America pragmatic again Unpacking political polarization Episode Credits This episode was recorded at WPSU’s studios and engineered by Andy Grant. It was edited by Chris Kugler and reviewed by Emily Reddy. Additional support from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane. Interview Highlights [8:28] How did we get to the current situation Congress? So we are in a remarkably competitive period in terms of our two-party politics. Now, we’ve been in this era for a long time so that people have sort of come to take it for granted that this is how Congr
Mon, February 10, 2020
How states are working to keep your vote safe
Elections are the bedrock of any democracy. Without confidence in the process or the results, confidence in democracy itself is vulnerable. With the primary season underway and the general election just a few months away, conversations about election security are starting to enter the public conscience. We saw this firsthand in Iowa last week as conspiracy theories about results hacking swirled despite no evidence of malicious interference in caucus results. Since 2016, states have taken measures to add paper trails, intrusion detection, audit systems, and other measures to safeguard the voting records from voting interference. However, elections are conducted county by county, which means resources are spread thin, and large-scale efforts can be difficult to coordinate. Adding this additional layer of security might also mean longer wait times at the polls on Election Day at a time when turnout is already expected to be high. Our guest this week is Bill Theobald, a senior writer at The Fulcrum , a news site devoted to covering democracy-related issues. He covers election security and frequently talks with both election officials and security experts about how they are working together to safeguard the voting process and ensure a process the public can trust. If you enjoy Democracy Works, please take a minute to visit ratethispodcast.com/democracy and leave us a rating in your podcast app. Additional Information The Fulcrum’s story on election security in swing states Related Episodes Protecting democracy from foreign interferance What should voting look like in the 21st century? Episode Credits This episode was engineered by Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle, edited by WPSU’s Chris Kugler, and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy. Additional support from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane. Interview Highlights [8:20] What do we know about the extent of hacking of voting in the 2016 election? I believe the public thinks that a lot more happen than really did happen. I think it was so shocking that somebody tried to do this, that the fact that they were unsuccessful sort of gets lost. There are really only two things that we know about in which they actually broke into some particular system. One is the Illinois voter registration rolls and apparently they downloade
Mon, February 03, 2020
Primaries, parties, and the public
The 2020 primary season officially begins today with the Iowa caucuses, followed by the New Hampshire primary on February 11 and Nevada and South Carolina later this month. It’s easy to forget that the primaries have not looked like they do now. In fact, it was not until 1968 that things really began to morph into the system of state-by-state contests that we know today. Before that, nominees were largely chosen by party leaders in preverbal smoke-filled back rooms. While the parties once ruled the primary process, they seem to have lost some of that control, particularly in recent years. Donald Trump, a candidate the Republican Party opposed for much of his candidacy, received the nomination in 2016. Bernie Sanders one of the top candidates in this year’s Democratic candidate field, even though he is officially an independent. What does this change mean for democracy? We explore that question this week. David Karol is an associate professor in the Department of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland. He is an expert on primaries and the role that the political parties play in them and join us this week to help make sense of how we got here and where things might go moving forward. Additional Information David’s website David’s book, The Party Decides: Presidential Nominations Before and After Reform Related Episodes The case for open primaries Your guide to ranked-choice voting How Democracies Die author Daniel Ziblatt on the “grinding work” of democracy Episode Credits This episode was engineered by Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle, edited by WPSU’s Chris Kugler, and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy. Additional support from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane. Interview Highlights [7:30] What did the primary process used to look like? The first candidates were chosen by an informal congressional caucus, they had no legal authority, just more like a kind of a parliamentary arrangement. The members of Congress from a party selected the candidate and by the middle of the 19th century that conventions that we know today existed, but the delegates to those conventions were chosen at meetings that were not necessarily so well publicized and the participation while incorporating many more people than the congressional caucus did, it was a relative
Mon, January 27, 2020
The connective tissue of democracy
The Women’s March 2020 was held in cities across the country on January 18. What began as a conversation on social media has evolved into a network of groups and organizations that are united in opposition to the Trump administration. From 2017-2019, Dana Fisher and her research team interviewed participants at Washington, D.C. protests, including the Women’s March, March for Our Lives, and the People’s Climate March. They asked protesters about their motivations and how marching in the streets translates into longer-term political action. Fisher argues that the groups in the Resistance are the “connective tissue of democracy,” bringing together people who are working to make their voices heard and advocate for the environment, reproductive rights, and other causes. But will the connective tissue hold through the election in November? What about beyond that? Fisher shares her thoughts based on her research on the Resistance and collective organizing more broadly. Fisher is Professor of Sociology at the University of Maryland and author of American Resistance: From the Women’s March to the Blue Wave , which chronicles the birth and growth of the anti-Trump resistance following the 2016 election. This episode is a nice follow up to our conversation with Theda Skocpol last week about how the Tea Party transformed Republican politics. Additional Information Dana’s book, American Resistance: From the Women’s March to the Blue Wave Dana’s website Related Episodes How the Tea Party and the Resistance are upending American politics Grassroots organizing to reboot democracy Tracing the past, present, and future of protests Episode Credits This episode was engineered by Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle, edited by WPSU’s Chris Kugler, and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy. Additional support from Democracy Works interns Nicole Gresen and Stephanie Krane. Thank you to Meredith Howard at Columbia University Press for sending us a copy of American Resistance and helping arrange an interview with Dana. Interview Highlights [8:25] How do you define the Resistance? I think of the resistance as a counter-movement to the Trump regime. So, it involves people working individually and through organizations to challenge the Trump administration and its policies. And because it’s spe
Mon, January 20, 2020
How the Tea Party and the Resistance are upending politics
Since 2008, the Tea Party and the Resistance have caused some major shake-ups for the Republican and Democratic parties. The changes fall outside the scope of traditional party politics, and outside the realm of traditional social science research. To better understand what’s going on Theda Skocpol, the Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Strategy at Harvard and Director of the Scholars Strategy Network, convened a group of researchers to study the people and organizations and at the heart of these grassroots movements. Skocpol joins us this week to discuss their findings and the new book Upending American Politics: Polarizing Parties, Ideological Elites, and Citizen Activists from the Tea Party to the Anti-Trump Resistance. Her work in particular focuses on the Tea Party and includes interviews with Tea Party members across the country. We also discuss the Resistance and whether these oppositional forces to the party in power are likely to continue after November’s election. Additional Information Upending American Politics from Oxford University Press Skocpol on the Scholars Strategy Network Related Episodes Grassroots organizing to “reboot” democracy Salena Zito’s deep dive into Trump’s America When states sue the federal government The democracy rebellion happening in states across the U.S. Episode Credits This episode was engineered by Democracy Works host Jenna Spinelle, edited by WPSU’s Chris Kugler, and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy. A huge thank you to Abby Peck in Theda Skocpol’s office for arranging the interview and providing technical support. Interview Highlights [6:45] How did we arrive at our current moment in American politics? Well, I was surprised in the early Obama presidency by the sudden emergence of the Tea Party and perhaps I wasn’t surprised for exactly the same reason that a lot of other people were. First there were some demonstrations, but then there were hundreds of regularly meeting local groups of tea partiers and that attracted our attention because we realized that since the 1960s a lot of the organizing on the civic side in the United States had taken the form of national advocacy groups and maybe some local things, but usua
Mon, January 13, 2020
A 2020 preview
This week, we begin a new year and a new season with a look ahead what 2020 will mean for democracy in the United States and around the world. We know that there will be a Census and an election, but will they be carried out in a democratic way? The escalating conflict with Iran is another unknown, but one that will no doubt have ramifications for democracy in the U.S. and abroad. We also look at how political polarization has changed since 2016 and the implications of that change on just about every aspect of our lives. From impeachment to Iran, we see that Americans are more divided than ever. It’s unclear what that will mean as tensions with Iran escalate. Underlying some of this polarization is our media environment. Little about the way Americans consume news on social platforms has changed since 2016. Disinformation and fake news are already starting to spread in advance of the 2020 election. Note: You’ll hear some discussion in this episode about Facebook and deepfake videos. After we recorded, Facebook announced that it would begin taking steps to remove videos that have been manipulated using artificial intelligence, making exceptions for satire, parody, and videos that have been edited solely to omit or change the order of words. Related Episodes A few of the episodes we reference in this one: Protecing democracy from foreign interference It’s good to be counted Facebook is not a democracy The complicated relationship between campaign finance and democracy Will Millennials disrupt democracy? How conspiracies are damaging democracy Episode Credits This episode was recorded at the WPSU studios and engineered by Craig Johnson. The episode was edited by Mark Stitzer and reviewed by WPSU News Director Emily Reddy. Finally, don’t forget to leave a rating for Democracy Works if you enjoy what you hear on the show. Visit ratethispodcast.com/democracy to give us some stars in your favorite podcast app.
Mon, January 06, 2020
Grassroots organizing to “reboot” democracy [rebroadcast]
Happy New Year! Our winter break continues with a rebroadcast from fall 2018 with Lara Putnam on grassroots organizing in suburban America. This episode was recorded before the 2018 midterms, but many of the trends we discuss bore out in the election. Putnam is a Professor and Chair of the History Department at the University of Pittsburgh and co-author with Theda Skockpol of the article “Middle America Reboots Democracy.” in Democracy, a Journal of Ideas and a new book called Upending American Politics . She argues that grassroots work is happening behind the scenes in “purple” suburbs, areas that are ignored in the red state/blue state and urban/rural media narratives. Grassroots groups like those Putnam observed in western Pennsylvania are mixing traditional organizing tactics with social media to raise awareness and push for change at the local and state levels, far away from the divisions that bog down national politics. To borrow a line from the article, “If your question is how the panorama of political possibility has shifted since November 2016, your story needs to begin here.” Finally, you’ll hear Michael and Chris talk at the end about”giving us some stars.” Over the holidays, we came across a new site that makes giving us a rating very simple. Visit ratethispodcast.com/democracy to get started. Additional Information Middle America Reboots Democracy in Democracy: A Journal of Ideas Upending American Politics – a new book with two chapters by Putnam Related Episodes The “democracy rebellion” happening in states across the U.S. Salena Zito on understanding Trump’s America Interview Highlights [5:28] As a history professor, how did you come to write about a political movement? Lara: After the 2016 election, I looked around at local politics to see where I could make a change. Based on the national political coverage, I expected to see high levels of energy and organization for progressive politics in the city and little in the suburbs. However, what I found was actually that I was missing the real story. What I saw in these smaller towns was people engaging again in the political process through organization. This wasn’t getting covered nationally. This is where I kicked into historical gear. We know that large scale changes nationally have their roots in lo
Mon, December 30, 2019
E.J. Dionne on making America empathetic again [rebroadcast]
While we enjoy a holiday break, we are rebroadcasting an episode with E.J. Dionne that was recorded in March 2019. The McCourtney Institute for Democracy brought Dionne to Penn State for a talk on “protecting free expression and making America empathetic again.” After spending some with him, it’s clear that he walks the walk when it comes to empathy. Dionne has the unique perspective of studying the horse race and the big picture of American politics. He writes a twice-weekly column for the Washington Post and appears regularly on NPR, but he’s also a senior fellow at Brookings and professor in Foundations of Democracy and Culture at Georgetown University. We talked with him about the relationship between partisan politics and democracy, the need for empathy across the political spectrum, and a few policy ideas to help make America more democratic. We could have talked all day and hope to return to some of these topics in future episodes. Additional Information Dionne’s Washington Post columns Dionne’s lecture at Penn State Dionne’s paper on universal voting for Brookings Chris Beem’s TED talk on how young people can improve democracy Interview Highlights [3:52] In One Nation After Trump , you wrote that a partisan response was required to protect democratic values. What did you mean by that? Trump had done something to our politics that was very dangerous and needed to be reversed, and given that the Republican Party had chosen almost to a person (with a couple of exceptions in Congress) to support Trump, the only way to hit back, to create any sense of accountability, was to give at least one house of Congress to Democrats. There a lot of people out there who aren’t necessarily partisan Democrats, who aren’t necessarily liberals or lefties, who believe that there are abuses here that need to be checked, and that there is a threat to democracy that needs to be reversed, and that’s exactly what happened after the 2018 midterms. [5:19] Should that approach continue heading into 2020? My view is that the Republican party has moved to a point where it needs a real rebuke in order to look inside itself and analyze where they want to continue to be. [6:54] ]What happens to the people who are conservative but don’t may be aligned with where the Republican party is currently? I think there are still a lot of conservatives who made a deal that they think is still wort
Mon, December 23, 2019
Is it possible to overdo democracy?
As we enter the holiday season, Robert Talisse thinks it’s a good idea to take a break from politics. In fact, he might go so far as to say democracy is better off if you do. Talisse is the W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University and author of a new book called Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in Its Place . The book combines philosophical analysis with real-world examples to examine the infiltration of politics into all social spaces, and the phenomenon of political polarization. In the middle of an impeachment inquiry and with a presidential election looming on the horizon, this might seem like precisely the wrong time to try to balance your political engagement with other things. But Talisse argues developing that sense of “civic friendship” through a sports league, book club, cooking class, or just about any other type of activity that’s not political, can help you see past the partisan identity that’s so prevalent these days. If you’re looking for a New Year’s resolution, this episode might be a good place to start. We also discuss deliberative democracy and efforts to bring people from across the political spectrum together to find that sense of common ground. This is our last new episode for 2019. We are going to do a few weeks of rebroadcasts and return in mid-January with a look ahead at what 2020 will have in store for democracy — we have a feeling there will be no shortage of things to discuss. Listener Survey As we head toward the end of the year, we are conducting a listener survey to find out how we can make the show even better in 2020. Complete the survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works mug. We’ve already sent one batch of mugs to our listeners around the country and will do another one after the holidays. Additional Information Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in Its Place Talisse’s TED talk on putting politics in its place Talisse’s website Related Episodes Unpacking political polarization The closing gap between business and politics <a href="https://www.democracyworkspodcast.com/is-it-time-to-reviv
Mon, December 16, 2019
Chris Beem on democratic humility and virtues
Earlier this fall, our own Chris Beem traveled to Notre Dame to appear on With a Side of Knowledge , a podcast produced by the university’s Office of the Provost. The show is recorded over brunch, and this happened to the last meal served at campus institution Sorin’s. Bacon and eggs aside, Chris talks with host Ted Fox about his most recent book, Democratic Humility: Reinhold Niebuhr, Neuroscience, and America’s Political Crisis, and his current work on democratic virtues. They discuss why democracy runs counter to the way we’re wired, and why it’s so difficult to sustain. This episode is a cool collaboration for a few reasons: Chris is a Notre Dame alumnus — we won’t tell you what year he graduated Ted Fox, the host of With a Side of Knowledge, and our own Jenna Spinelle have become podcast kindred spirits since they met earlier this year. Tracy and Ted McCourtney are generous supporters of both Penn State and Notre Dame. In many ways, this collaboration would not have been possible without them. We’ll return to our normal format next week for one final episode in 2019 before taking a holiday break. Listener Survey We we head toward the end of the year, we are conducting a listener survey to find out how we can make the show even better in 2020. Complete the survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works mug — the perfect holiday gift for the democracy enthusiast in your life. Additional Information With a Side of Knowledge Democratic Humility: Reinhold Niebuhr, Neuroscience, and America’s Political Crisis
Mon, December 09, 2019
Next-generation democracy
Credit: Rachel Franklin Photography/Draw the Lines PA One of the things we heard in our listener survey (which there’s still time to take, by the way) is that we should have more young people on the show as guests. It was a great suggestion and, after having this conversation, we’re so glad to have received it. Joining us this week is Kyle Hynes, a junior at State College Area High School and a true advocate for democracy. He is the statewide champion in the youth division of the Draw the Lines PA mapping competition and winner of the Future Leader in Social Studies from the Pennsylvania Council for the Social Studies. Kyle is an expert on the ins and outs of gerrymandering, but he also has interesting perspectives impeachment, political engagement among his peers, and the generational divide in American politics. We’ve had a lot of guests tell us that they put hope in Generation Z to solve some of the challenges we face. If Kyle is any indication, that hope is in the right place. Listener Survey We we head toward the end of the year, we are conducting a listener survey to find out how we can make the show even better in 2020. Complete the survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works mug — the perfect holiday gift for the democracy enthusiast in your life. Additional Information Draw the Lines PA Pennsylvania Council for the Social Studies Related Episodes One state’s fight for fair maps What can Pennsylvania voters do about gerrymandering? Generation Z and the future of democracy Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom Interview Highlights [3:05] How did you become interested in redistricting? I’ve always been really interested in math. I’ve also been interested in politics for quite a while, and so I’m really interested in the areas where they intersect, where math and politics come together. I feel like gerrymandering is one of those places. Redistricting is a logistical puzzle and you try to put it together. So I’ve always thought this is really interesting, and then when I saw that there was a competition, you can draw your own map
Mon, December 02, 2019
The democracy rebellion happening in states across the U.S.
Hedrick Smith is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of bestselling books The Russians , Who Stole the American Dream? and many others. Over the course of his nearly 60 years in journalism, he’s interviewed some of the biggest politicians and power brokers on the national and international stage. Now, his reporter’s curiosity has led him to places like Sioux Falls, South Dakota and Hartford, Connecticut to report on efforts to end gerrymandering, remove money from politics, and fight corruption through grassroots organizing. Smith joins us this week to talk about what he learned from these organizers while filming his latest project, a documentary called The Democracy Rebellion: A Reporter’s Notebook with Hedrick Smith that will air on PBS this January. He says that the grassroots are not nearly as polarized as politicians and political insiders, as evidenced by the fact that many of these pro-democracy ballot initiatives passed with large bipartisan majorities. Smith also reflects on the state of the media today and why grassroots movements can’t seem to capture the attention that horse race politics do. It’s part of the reason why he’s still out there pounding the pavement as a reporter and getting out of his home in Washington, D.C. to meet people doing the hard work of democracy every day. Listener Survey We we head toward the end of the year, we are conducting a listener survey to find out how we can make the show even better in 2020. Complete the survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works mug — the perfect holiday gift for the democracy enthusiast in your life. Additional Information Hedrick’s website, Reclaim the American Dream Related Episodes One state’s fight for fair maps Winning the “democracy lottery” The complicated relationship between campaign finance and democracy Interview Highlights [8:26] How did the story of democracy reform come onto your radar? It’s a great story nobody else is covering and that’s always interesting to me. I wrote a book some years ago called, Who Stole the American Dream? that was really about how we got to the terrible economic inequalities we have today, and to the dysfunctional political system we have today. And a
Mon, November 25, 2019
A roundtable on impeachment, institutions, and legitimacy
This week’s episode is a conversation between Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, and Michael Baranowski of The Politics Guys, a podcast that looks at political issues in the news through a bipartisan, academic lens. Baranowski is an associate professor of political science at Northern Kentucky University. His focus is American political institutions, public policy, and media — which makes him a great match for our own Michael and Chris. They discuss impeachment from the standpoint of political institutions and the legitimacy of our democracy. Regardless of what happens with the current impeachment inquiry, some of our government’s norms and institutions may be irreversibly damaged, while others may develop in response to the Trump administration. They also touch on the growing epistemic divide we discussed with Nancy Rosenblum and Russell Muirhead in our episode on conspiracies. The Politics Guys is a bipartisan show, but Baranowski increasingly feels like he and his colleagues are talking past each other rather than having meaningful discussions. Listener Survey As we head toward the end of the year, we are conducting a listener survey to find out how we can make the show even better in 2020. Complete the survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works mug — the perfect holiday gift for the democracy enthusiast in your life. Additional Information The Politics Guys Related Episodes Understanding impeachment — from the Federalist Papers to the whistleblower Checking the President’s power How conspiracies are damaging democracy
Mon, November 18, 2019
Your guide to ranked-choice voting
Ranked-choice voting has been in the news a lot lately. It was adopted in New York City’s November 2019 election, used for the first time in U.S. Congressional elections last year, and will be the method by which at least a few states choose a Democratic primary candidate in 2020. But, what is it? 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. If you enjoy our show, please take a minute to leave a rating or review in your podcast app. Thank you! Additional Information Fairvote , an advocacy group for ranked-choice voting and election reform Burt’s Google Scholar listing Related Episodes The case for open primaries One state’s fight for fair maps Interview Highlights [6:52] What is ranked-choice voting? Ranked-choice voting is used to describe a lot of different systems, but mostly what people mean is something that’s usually referred to as instant run-off. In a traditional runoff election, you vote as you normally would and if no one gets a majority, everybody but the top two is eliminated and you come back in four weeks or six weeks or eight weeks and vote again and somebody has a majority. Ranked-choice voting does that all at one time. Voters rank the candidates in a pure system from first choice to last choice and the votes are tallied based on the first choices and if no one has a majority, then the last place candidate is eliminated and the voters who had voted for that candidate first, their vote is transferred to their second candidate. And it goes on and on until there’s a majority. [8:33] Does a voter have to rank all candidates on a ballot? The only place I know of that requires you to rank everybody is Australia, which uses it for their national elections. In most places you can rank as few as you want. If you rank only one, that’s called bullet voting. Most of the U.S. variations of this, you can on
Mon, November 11, 2019
Latino immigrants and the changing makeup of American democracy
We’ve talked about immigration several times on this show with good reason. The role that people coming to the United States play in our democracy is an important question and something states, cities, and towns across the country will continue to grapple with as demographics shift. This week’s guest offers a historical perspective that sets the stage for the debate about immigrants we hear so often today. A.K. Sandoval-Strauss is director of the Latina/o Studies program at Penn State and author of the new book Barrio America: How Latino Immigrants Saved the American City . In the book, and in this conversation, he argues that immigrants moved into cities like Dallas and Chicago and revitalized downtowns that were beginning to hollow out because of white flight and discriminatory practices designed to keep African-Americans out. The same thing, he says, is happening again as Latino immigrants move into smaller cities and towns from Hazleton, Pennsylvania to Sioux City, Iowa — bringing economic and cultural vitality to places industry left behind. We also discuss the role that Latinos played in the Civil Rights movement, and how that ties into their complicated identity during the 1950s and 60s, as well as what the future looks like as the Latino population increases while other ethnic groups decrease. Additional Information Barrio America: How Latino Immigrants Saved the American City A.K.’s op-ed in The Washington Post Our sponsor: Penn State World Campus Related Episodes Immigration enforcement at the border Immigration, refugees, and the politics of displacement Interview Highlights [8:12] Latino immigration really started to grow in the 1950s and 60s? How did immigrants at that time view themselves? Did they see themselves as part of the Civil Rights movement? At that point, under American law, they were technically white. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo of 1848, specified that they were full citizens. However, in actuality they rarely enjoyed full citizenship rights. At the grassroots, there were certainly some sense of commonality in the face of discrimination, but sadly the main Mexican-American civil rights organizations really clung to their status as technically white and often tried to a
Mon, November 04, 2019
Inside the world’s largest democracy
More than 600 million people voted in India’s most recent election, but that does not mean all is well with democracy there. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP recently won re-election on a platform based on Hindu nationalism. As we’ve seen with other countries experiencing democratic erosion, the people and parties coming to power do not value the liberalism that’s essential to liberal democracy. But, as our guest this week argues, what’s happening in India is not exactly the same as what we see in places like Hungary and Brazil — or even the United States. Vineeta Yadav is an associate professor of political science and affiliate faculty in the School of International Affairs at Penn State. She studies politics and democracy in India. Vineeta visited India over the summer and talks about what she saw when Modi and the BJP eliminated Article 370 of the Indian Constitution, which granted special status to the Muslim-majority state. She also discusses India’s strong civil society and how it’s pushing back against the BJP’s illiberal tendencies. Additional Information Vineeta’s website More on Kashmir and Article 370 Related Episodes Viktor Orban’s “velvet repression” in Hungary Brazil’s tenuous relationship with democracy Yellow Vests and the “grand debate” in France Brexit and the UK’s identity crisis Interview Highlights [6:40] How did India come to be a democracy and how do Indians view democracy? India didn’t really exist as a country before 1947. The British colonized that part of Asia for about 200 years. And when they left that territory was divided up into India and Pakistan. Their leaders gained experience with elections and a Parliamentary system under British colonial rule. And so that was adopted in India in 1950 and India has kept the same constitution and Parliamentary system through its entire post-independence period. One of the unique things about India is that voter turnout is actually higher in rural areas and not just in urban areas. And that tells you something about how deeply democratic values, norms, and practices have really sunk into ordinary citizenry. [8:50] What does India’s commitment to democracy look like today? I think it’s definitely part of this
Mon, October 28, 2019
Changing the climate conversation
Climate change is perhaps the most pressing issue of our time, but it’s so big that it can be difficult to imagine how you as an individual can make an impact — or even know how to talk about it with other people in a meaningful way. This episode offers a few creative suggestions for addressing both of those things. Our guest is Graham Bullock, associate professor of political science and environmental studies at Davidson College. His work covers everything from public policy to deliberative democracy, and the ways those things interact when it comes to climate and sustainability. He’s used some innovative methods to break out of traditional modes of argument and encourage his students to think differently about climate and citizenship. We hope this episode inspires you to do the same, whether you are a teacher or simply looking to broach difficult topics like climate change with friends, family, or colleagues. We also talk with Graham about what it means to be a responsible climate citizen and how that manifests itself in everything from buying sustainable products to attending climate rallies. Related Episodes Michael Mann on climate activism Peter Buckland on local government and climate change Forrest Briscoe on corporate action and corporate social responsibility Additional Information More on duty-based vs. engaged citizenship Graham’s book- Green Grades: Can Information Save the Earth? The Responsible Consumers Club Penn State’s Mark Kissling, who joined us last year to talk about civics education, has a new article out on how climate and citizenship are taught in K-12 social studies classrooms.
Mon, October 21, 2019
From political crisis to profound change
October 21, 2019 Last week, we heard from Andrew Sullivan about the challenges facing the future of democracy in the United States and around the world. This week’s episode offers a glimpse into what can happen when a country emerges from a political crisis with stronger democratic practices in place. About 10 years ago, Ireland found itself facing an economic recession, distrust in government, and polarization about how to move forward. Our guests this week, David Farrell of University College Dublin and Jane Suiter of Dublin City University, proposed using deliberative democracy to bring citizens and politicians closer together. The approach worked, and it’s garnered attention from other places around the world who want to do the same thing. Farrell and Suiter are the winners of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy’s 2019 Brown Democracy Medal, which recognizes new and innovative work in democracy. We are now seeking nominations for next year’s medal; please email democracyinst@psu.edu if you know someone who might be a good fit.Thank you to our sponsor, Penn State World Campus. Learn more about their Master of Professional Studies in the Psychology of Leadership at worldcampus.psu.edu/leadership . Additional Information Farrell and Suiter’s project, We the Citizens Democracy R&D – highlighting deliberative democracy efforts around the world Farrell and Suiter’s book, Reimagining Democracy: Lessons in Deliberative Democracy from the Irish Front Line Brown Democracy Medal lecture video Interview Highlights [7:12] What was the political climate like leading up to the Citizens Assembly Project? Farrell: It was bad. It’s hard to imagine almost a decade later just how bad things were, but it was a severe economic crisis. Almost overnight our unemployment doubled, our national debt just went through the roof, our banks, all our banks collapsed, all international banks just left. Buildings were being boarded up, public employees had their pay cut, private employees lost their jobs, emigration went through the roof, and then major protests against governments. Trust in government plummeted. So this was about as existential a crisis as you can get. [9:13] What was the reaction when you introduced the idea of a citizens assembly? Farrell: What we were saying at that time, it sounded quite bizarre. We were saying, “Imagine a
Mon, October 14, 2019
Andrew Sullivan on democracy’s double-edged sword
This is one of the most pessimistic episodes we’ve done, but it’s worth hearing. Andrew Sullivan, New York magazine contributing editor, Daily Dish founder, and former editor of The New Republic , is a longtime observer of American politics who does not shy away from controversial opinions. In this episode, we discuss the tension between liberalism and democracy, and how that tension manifests itself around the world. The way Sullivan sees it, the “us vs. them” rhetoric and attitudes in our culture have gone so far that the moderating values and virtues of liberalism will no longer be able to intervene. We also discuss the relationship between dignity and identity politics, and the parallels between the United States and the United Kingdom. Thank you to our sponsor, Penn State World Campus. Learn more about their Master of Professional Studies in the Psychology of Leadership at worldcampus.psu.edu/leadership . If you like what you hear on this show, please take a minute to share it on social media or text it to a friend, family member, or colleague who might enjoy it, too. More from Andrew Sullivan New York magazine column His lecture at Penn State on “American Democracy in the Age of Trump” Interview Highlights [6:18] How do you think about democracy in your work? There are two core types that I think about, liberal democracy and illiberal democracy. Democracy itself I think is a two-edged sword. Pure democracy, Plato would tell you and so would Aristotle, is extremely unstable and the founders certainly believed that as well. They were very cognizant of what happened to the Rome of Republic. Liberal democracy requires certain virtues. It requires the ability to have a deliberative conversation to use reason, as well as emotion, but reason is the core function of it, and openness to other ideas and toleration of radical different world views than you, within the same culture. And that’s hard. It’s really, really hard. It’s harder than we think. [7:56] Of those things, what concerns you most right now? I think that it is human nature in fast changing societies and fast changing economies and the world is changing extremely fast, to seek security. Democracy’s promise is not ultimately security, it’s freedom. And there are moments in history where freedom is more popular than non-freedom. And I think the massive migrations across the world and the globalizing of the economy has created the seeds for the need for not having every view represented and not being tolerant of everything. And actually stopping things that might otherwise be associated with
Mon, October 07, 2019
The case for open primaries
In about a dozen U.S. states, the only people who can vote in primary elections are those who are registered with a party. Republicans vote in the Republican primary and Democrats vote in the Democratic primary. This leaves out independents, who make up a growing share of the electorate. This week’s guest argues that’s problem for democracy. Jeremy Gruber is the Senior Vice President at Open Primaries . He is a lawyer, writer, and internationally recognized public policy advocate who has helped enact more than 60 state, federal and international laws and regulations. He joins us to make the case for why all primaries should be open, and how our democracy will be stronger because of it. But what happens to the parties in an open primary system? We’ve talked on the show before about the role they play as gatekeepers in our democracy and revisit some of that discussion in this episode. ICYMI, we are holding an event at the National Press Club on October 22. It would be great to meet some of our listeners in the area. More information at democracy.psu.edu/dc . Finally, thank you to our brand new sponsor, Penn State World Campus. Learn more about Penn State’s online The Master of Professional Studies (MPS) in Psychology of Leadership degree at worldcampus.psu.edu/leadership . Additional Information Open Primaries website Interview Highlights [6:10] How do open primaries work? Every state has different election laws, and in most states the primary election, which is the first round of elections that voters have an opportunity to participate in is often times in most cases run by the parties. Even though the tax payers pay for the elections and you, as a voter, experience those elections the same way you do as the general election, the parties are the gate keepers of the primary elections, and they can decide who can and can’t participate. In a closed primary state, only members of the parties may participate in the primary. In an open primary state, Independents, unaffiliated voters, can participate in the primaries. In some states, like California, Washington, Nebraska, they have a nonpartisan primary system where the parties don’t run the primaries. The state runs the primaries the same way it runs the general election. [8:35] How many states have open primaries? 38 states have some form of open primary, and that can vary state by state. Most of those states have a traditional open primary, where you as Independent choose a ballot line. Not every primary election in those states are necessarily open, but at least some of the elections a
Mon, September 30, 2019
Understanding impeachment — from the Federalist Papers to the whistleblower
We bring you special episode of Democracy Works this week that’s all about impeachment. Michael Berkman takes the lead on this episode and talks with Michael Nelson, the Jeffrey L. Hyde and Sharon D. Hyde and Political Science Board of Visitors Early Career Professor in Political Science and affiliate faculty at Penn State Law. Michael and Michael discuss the constitutional framework for impeachment and what the Framers had in mind when they set it up. They also discuss how impeachment is a unique cooperation between the three branches of government, where the inquiry launched last week against President Trump is likely to go, and what it all means for our democracy. We recorded this episode on Friday, September 27, 2019. Everything we talk about is accurate as of that recording. Episode Highlights [1:20] Impeachment in the Constitution [2:35] “High crimes and misdemeanors” [6:21] Impeachment in the Federalist Papers [10:30] Impeachment vs. “beyond a reasonable doubt” in criminal law [11:25] The role each branch of government plays in impeachment [12:15] Separation of powers [15:30] The rules of the Senate, and how those rules change [19:03] John Roberts and Supreme Court [21:40] What could an impeachment proceeding look like? [23:30] Political motivations for launching an impeachment inquiry [24:53] Why the Ukraine phone call is important to democracy [28:10] Comparing Trump to Nixon
Mon, September 23, 2019
Street-level bureaucrats at the border
Immigration is one of the most complex issues of our time in the United States and around the world. Enforcing immigration law in the U.S. involves a mix of courts and executive agencies with lots of opportunities for confusion, miscommunication, and changes in approach from administration to administration. While these things are nothing new, they take on a new dimension when the lives of undocumented immigrants and asylum seekers are at stake. Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhia, Samuel Weiss Faculty Scholar and Founding Director of the Center for Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at Penn State Law in University Park, is an expert in immigration law and joins us this week to discuss how discretion, checks and balances, and the rule of law figure into immigration enforcement — particularly in the Trump administration. Her new book, Banned: Immigration Enforcement in the Time of Trump , includes interviews with former immigration officials and people impacted by the Trump administration’s immigration policies. This episode is a nice compliment to our conversation earlier this year with Jan Egeland, chair of the Norwegian Refugee Council, about the politics of immigration. Additional Information Shoba’s book Banned: Immigration Enforcement in the Time of Trump Our interview with Jan Egeland of the Norwegian Refugee Council Interview Highlights [6:15] How does the law define immigrants and asylum seekers? Immigrant refers to someone who is seeking admission to the United States permanently. Non immigrant is a label we use to apply to someone seeking admission to the U.S. temporarily. For somebody who is without an immigration status, that person might be labeled as undocumented. However, the status is constantly changing. It’s possible for someone to have entered the United States without papers or cross the border and too many years later be a U.S. citizen. In terms of where asylum seekers fall into the mix, that’s also a little complicated because you could be in a lawful status and apply for asylum. You could also be undocumented and apply for asylum. [8:50] How much discretion exists in immigration enforcement? There are a lot of different ways that the law can be enforced. It can be enforced to arrest somebody, interrogate, place somebody in detention, or place somebody in removal or deportation proceedings. So that might be how immigration enforcement happens on an individual level. And then there are these macro decisions that can be made about immigration enforcement. For example, if the enf
Fri, September 20, 2019
Out of Order: A conversation with Mitch Landrieu and Margaret Carlson
Today we’re bringing you a bonus episode from Out of Order , a podcast produced by the German Marshal Fund of the United States. Out of Order is a podcast about how our world was, is, and will be ordered. How do we save democracy, rule of law and global cooperation? Why do some people not want to? Much-maligned experts try to come up with answers here. The Out of Order podcast brings together different international experts from the German Marshall Fund of the United States and beyond to talk about politics, economics, technology and everything else that might help us understand our disordered world. With election season ramping up and political divisions on display, two veterans of U.S. politics — Margaret Carlson, columnist at The Daily Beast, and Mitch Landrieu, the former mayor of New Orleans and founder of E Pluribus Unum — joined Out of Order for an insightful conversation on the state of U.S. political discourse, how society became so fractured and where some solutions might be found. Above all: Is there a way out of this mess? You can find Out of Order at gmfus.org or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Mon, September 16, 2019
China’s threat to democracies around the world
Larry Diamond joins us this week to talk about the threat China’s model of authoritarian capitalism poses to liberal democracy in the United States and around the world. Economics drives politics, and it’s easy to admire China’s growth while looking past things like increasing surveillance and lack of respect for norms and the rule of law. We’ve wanted to do an episode on China for a long time, and we are very excited to have Larry Diamond with us to discuss it. China plays an integral role in his new book, Ill Winds and he’s studied the region and its politics for decades. Larry is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. For more than six years, he directed the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law at Stanford, where he now leads its Program on Arab Reform and Democracy and its Global Digital Policy Incubator. He is the founding co-editor of the Journal of Democracy and also serves as Senior Consultant at the International Forum for Democratic Studies of the National Endowment for Democracy. Additional Information Larry Diamond’s book, Ill Winds: Saving Democracy from Russian Rage, Chinese Ambition, and American Complacency Interview Highlights [6:15] How does China pose a threat to liberal democracy? China is increasingly trying to become, I think, the dominant power in Asia, the dominant economic, power in the world, the technological leader of the world, and, the geopolitical shaper of the future direction of the world. China is becoming more authoritarian even neo-totalitarian with its social credit system, it’s intense repression of religious and cultural minorities, its tightening repression and concentration of power under Xi Jinping and it’s domineering claims to the South China Sea and other Asian countries buying up ports and, and infrastructure and frankly politicians as well. I think all of these trends have gone from being concerning to being alarming. [11:24] Why might other countries find China’s model appealing? I think what appeals to people around the world, our public opinion data show, is China’s rapid economic growth, not it’s suppression of religious freedom, freedom of expression, the internet and so on. There’s no way you can sell that to ordinary people as an appealing model, that they want to live under themselves. But the allure is that, somehow, if countries can achieve China’s rapid economic growth and if China can downplay, minimize or mask, which it is certainly trying to do, the intensely authoritarian and in the technological elements I’d say, Orwellian aspects of it’s increasingly authoritarian
Mon, September 09, 2019
One state’s fight for fair maps
Pennsylvania is one of several states trying to ensure fair congressional maps are drawn after the 2020 Census. As we say in the episode, redistricting is one of democracy’s thorniest problems. It’s easy to say you want a map that’s fair, but far more difficult to determine what that actually looks like. The Keystone State received a new congressional map in 2018 following a decision from the state Supreme Court. However, that was a temporary fix designed to counter partisan gerrymandering that occurred after the 2010 Census. Since then, several groups have been working to implement a more permanent change for the next map drawing in 2021. One of those groups is a bipartisan Redistricting Reform Commission chartered by Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf. Penn State’s Lee Ann Banaszak, a professor of political science, was part of that commission and joins us this week to talk about how they tackled the question of fairness, and what they learned at public hearings throughout the state earlier this year. Following in the footsteps of states like Arizona and California, the commission recommended that Pennsylvania create an independent 11-member citizens’ commission to develop maps that would be submitted to the legislature for approval. The Pennsylvania House State Government Committee will hold a public hearing on the commission’s Sept. 18 at 9 a.m. in the Irvis Office Building in Harrisburg. One more thing: We are hosting an event at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, October 22 and we would love to meet our listeners in the Washington area! The featured speaker is Penn State’s Abe Khan, the guest on our very first episode . He will be discussing the “Renaissance of the Activist Athlete.” More information and registration at democracy.psu.edu/dc . Additional information Redistricting Reform Commission report Our interview with the Committee of Seventy’s Chris Satullo Draw the Lines PA Fair Districts PA Interview Highlights [7:09] Why is redistricting important to democracy? In our electoral system, we elect people via a process of voters in a district vote for one person in that district. In the course of setting up those districts you determine a lot of how that legislature looks. What you have now in some places are the people who are being elected selecting their vot
Mon, September 02, 2019
How music transcends political polarization
Last week, we heard from Aaron Maybin about the ways visual art relates to his conception and practice of democracy. This week, we are going to look at the relationship between art and democracy through the lens of music. Music has always been political, but what that looks like changes based on the culture. Joining us to unpack it is Adam Gustafson, associate teaching professor of music at Penn State Harrisburg. As you’ll hear, Adam is a certified music nerd who thinks deeply about how artists and the music they create influences politics and culture. He’s written about Prince, Ella Fitzgerald, and Aretha Franklin — just to name a few. In this episode, we talk about everything from disco to bluegrass to EDM and how collaborations between artists and fans coming together at concerts counter some of the narratives we hear about polarization in our lives. We also look at how the ways we consume music has changed — or not — the statements that musicians make through their art. Additional Information Adam’s articles in The Conversation
Sun, September 01, 2019
Doing the hard work of democracy in Baltimore
You might remember Aaron Maybin from his time on the football field at Penn State or in the NFL. These days, he’s doing something much different. He’s an artist, activist, and educator in his hometown of Baltimore and talked with us about the way that those things intersect. Celebrities and philanthropists often want to help places like Baltimore, but do so without understanding the needs of the local community. Aaron is in an interesting position because he can talk the talk and walk the walk. To him, organizing is about much more than weighing in on the latest Twitter outrage or showing up at a protest to take a photo for Instagram. The real work begins once the cameras go off and the attention fades away. Aaron has a really unique— and really inspiring — perspective that might change the way you think about places like Baltimore. A huge thank you to WYPR in Baltimore for letting us use their studio for the interview. Additional Information Aaron’s website Art-Activism book Interview Highlights [6:25] How did you transition from athlete to activist? From the beginning, my work here in the city of Baltimore wasn’t always a big priority for me. I’m so appreciative of everything that the game has given me in my life, what it’s given my family. But I think that I’m prouder now of the work that I’m doing and the impact that I’m having in people’s lives and on my city in general. I’m proud of then that, that anything that I ever did as an athlete. [8:41] How does teaching fit into your art and activism? I was doing art workshops and programming at schools all across Baltimore starting in 2009. By 2010, 2011, I realized how naive I was as like a 20-year-old coming into the League thinking that like this contract I’ll get will be enough for me to fix all the problems in my city. It sounds crazy to say, but when you’re that young and ambitious you’re really ignorant enough to believe that you’re gonna be able to do that yourself. So I said, “All right, I’ve got to find a school, one school, that I can plant myself in and actually hammer out this curriculum and see over the course of a year, two years, you know, what we can accomplish with the same group of kids over an extended period of time.” [14:45] What’s the difference between organizing on social media and the deeper-level work you try to do? If there’s a topic that’s trending, everybody wants to weigh in on it. But at the end of the day, how much do you really think this tweet is getting you? Not much unless you are actually showing up to meetings and getting boots on the ground and staying informed about what’s going
Sun, September 01, 2019
How conspiracies are damaging democracy
From Pizzagate to Jeffrey Epstein, conspiracies seem to be more prominent than ever in American political discourse. What was once confined to the pages of supermarket tabloids is now all over our media landscape. Unlike the 9/11 truthers or those who questioned the moon landing, these conspiracies are designed solely to delegitimize a political opponent — rather than in service of finding the truth. As you might imagine, this is problematic for democracy. Democracy scholars Russell Muirhead and Nancy Rosenblum call it “conspiracy without the theory” and unpack the concept in their book A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy. Russell is the Robert Clements Professor of Democracy and Politics at Dartmouth. Nancy is the Senator Joseph Clark Research Professor of Ethics in Politics at Harvard. As you’ll hear, the new conspiricism is a symptom of a larger epistemic polarization that’s happening throughout the U.S. When people no longer agree on a shared set of facts, conspiracies run wild and knowledge-producing institutions like the government, universities, and the media are trusted less than ever. This is not one of our optimistic episodes, but it’s one worth listening to. Additional Information A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy A look at the science of conspiracy theories from The University of Chicago’s Big Brains podcast Interview Highlights [5:30] What is the new conspiracism and how does it differ from what we’ve seen in the past? Nancy: In the past we’ve had conspiracy theory. That is an explanation that works the way any explanation works which is in terms of evidence and dots and patterns that often try to make the unbelievable believable and the unconceivable conceivable. What we have now is conspiracy without the theory. That is the two things have become decoupled. And we have claims of a conspiracy that come without the dots, without the patterns, without the evidence, without the argument. [6:23] When did you begin to see this pattern emerge? Russell: As scholars of parties, we-we kind of take an interest in conspiracism and conspiratorial thinking. Parties were-were thought of as conspiracies before the idea of a legitimate opposite took hold. That’s how parties were-were conceived. We began to notice that um, that today’s conspiracism involves are assertion, like a one-word accusation like rigged, onstead of an effort to carefully explain the world as it is. It’s more of an effort to impose um, a kind of unreality and idiosyncratic understanding of the world on others, rather than to describe the world as it is. [10:24] What’s the goal of the new conspira
Mon, August 12, 2019
Defending the First Amendment and the Fourth Estate
We are back with new episodes this week, and we’re starting with an interview that we recorded in New York City earlier this summer. David McCraw is the Deputy General Counsel of the New York Times and author of Truth in Our Times: Inside the Fight for Press Freedom in the Age of Alternative Facts . The First Amendment and a strong Fourth Estate are essential to a healthy democracy. McCraw spends his days making sure that journalists can do their work in the United States and around the world. This includes responding to libel suits and legal threats, reviewing stories that are likely to be the subject of a lawsuit, helping reporters who run into trouble abroad, filing Freedom of Information Act requests, and much more. Additional Information David’s book: Truth in Our Times Interview Highlights [3:30] There was a lot of speculation about the future of the First Amendment after the 2016 election. How are things holding up today? We have a free press if the people want it. It really, in the end, depends on having an engaged citizenry. Donald Trump has talked about changing the libel laws. That doesn’t really worry me a lot. I think it’s a long process, and it’s probably not going to happen. What really is important is whether people, average voters, are going to make use the free press we have. [5:00] How often does someone threaten a libel suit vs. actually filing one? It’s a really important point, because when we talk about libel, it was originally intended to fix people’s reputations. Somebody says something about you that’s untrue, hurts your reputation, you go to court, you get that fixed. And, that really hasn’t changed much. We get a lot of threats. Not a lot of threats, but we get threats. We get very few lawsuits. But, those threats are really designed to use litigation, the threat of litigation, to get us to say something other than what we think should be said to the American people. [6:28] How does the New York Times v. Sullivan case impact press freedom? At the end of the day, Times versus Sullivan is really, a fairly simple concept. And that is, a publisher has a right to make a mistake. That if a publisher gets something wrong, and actually, even if that statement hurts somebody’s reputation, that person, if that person’s a public figure or public official, can’t win a libel suit unless the person can prove that the statement was made with actual malice. [10:40] Where does social media fit into this picture? One of the things that I find very curious about the President is that, in the recent years, when he’s been involved in libel suits, it’s because he’s been sued. And, he’s been sued for things he’s said on Twitter. When he starts criticizing the libel laws, he’s completely lining up on the wrong side of the ball. He should be siding with me, because he needs those defense
Mon, August 05, 2019
Standing up for science and fighting the climate wars [rebroadcast]
For the last of our summer rebroadcasts, we are revisiting the conversation with Penn State’s Michael Mann, a world-renowned climate scientist. We’ve just finished the warmest month in global recorded history, so it felt like a good time to share this episode. We talk with Mann, a Nobel Prize winner and Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Science at Penn State, about his journey through the climate wars over the past two decades and the role that experts have to play in moving out of the lab and into the spotlight to defend the scientific process. Doing so is more important now than ever, he says, as corporation-funded think tanks continue to churn out information that deliberately sows skepticism among the public about our role in climate change. But it does beg the question: How do you reconcile the fact that, in a democracy, everyone’s vote is equal but everyone’s opinion is not? Mann was part of the team that created the now-infamous hockey stick graph that showed how quickly the rate of warming on the planet had accelerated during the latter half of the 20th century. In the 20 years since graph was published, he’s had his email hacked, been called to testify before Congress, and been hounded by Internet trolls long before social media existed. He chronicled those experiences in his 2012 book The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars . Despite it all, he’s more passionate than ever about spreading the good word about science and cautiously optimistic that things might turn out ok after all. Additional Information Michael Mann on Twitter Michael’s books: The Madhouse Effect The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars
Mon, July 29, 2019
Tracing the past, present, and future of protests
Since we started this show, we’ve had the opportunity to speak with several organizers, from Joyce Ladner in the Civil Rights movement to Srdja Popovic in Serbia to the students involved with the March for Our Lives. Today, we think of protests as a pillar of democratic dissent, but things didn’t necessarily start out that way. L.A. Kauffman is a longtime organizer and author of the book How to Read a Protest: The Art of Organizing and Resistance . She traces the history of the modern protest movement since the March on Washington in 1963 and joins us to talk about what has — and has not — changed since then. If you are an organizer or have ever attended a protest, we think you’ll find L.A.’s insights interesting. Additional Information L.A.’s book, How to Read a Protest Our episodes on protest and organizing: Civil Rights activist Joyce Ladner Srdja Popovic of the Serbia’s Otpor! movement Interview Highlights [2:49] How was the 1963 March on Washington organized and what made it something that organizers today still look to? This book and the 1963 march is about a particular kind of protest above all, which are mass mobilizations where huge numbers of people come together out in the streets. I hadn’t quite realized that before 1963, we never had anything on this scale in American history. It ended up bringing 250,000 people. One of the ways that the organizers compensated for those fears was by going on overdrive with an organizing model. We think of this as a high water point in American democracy, and yet the messages were so controlled, there was no room for individual voices there. [6:00] What was it about that moment that lead to such a large event? Were there efforts to try something similar prior to that? There was a march that was threatened during During World War II, but it never happened. The threat of a civil rights march over discrimination in the military forced FDR’s hand and led to desegregation. The scale of protests at the time were more like 25,000 or 50,000 people. No one had ever dreamed of an event that could bring together these large numbers of people. [8:12] What compromises were necessary to make the march happen? The very first idea of the 63 march in Washington was it was going to not just be a march, but it was also going to be an occasion for nonviolent civil disobedience. I mean, it was going to represent a real tactical escalation. And those plans got dropped almost immediately, as soon as the org
Mon, July 22, 2019
A conversation about conversation [rebroadcast]
This week, we are revisiting another episode from the Democracy Works back catalog. This discussion is a nice companion to our episode with Timothy Shaffer on civility. Laurie Mulvey This episode seeks to answer one simple, but very important, question: Why is it so hard for people to talk to each other? There are a lot of easy answers we can point to, like social media and political polarization, but there’s another explanation that goes a bit deeper. Laurie Mulvey, executive director of World in Conversation , is the perfect person to help us explore this question. World in Conversation has facilitated more than 10,000 dialogues over the past 15 years. They bring people from all walks of life together to have dialogues about important issues from climate change to race relations. In the process, they break down the misconceptions and preconceived notions that often get in the way of one person understanding — and relating to— someone else. Of course, most dialogues do not happen in a controlled environment with a facilitator in the room. Laurie shares some advice for how to handle your next family dinner or other situation where things might get a little heated. She also shares how the World in Conversation is preparing the next generation of democratic citizens to overcome the partisan divides that bog down political discourse. As we say in the episode, Laurie raises the optimism quotient of this podcast quite a bit.
Mon, July 15, 2019
Politics and Polls: Blue state federalism
Democracy Works summer break 2019 continues with an episode from Politics and Polls, a podcast produced by the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton. The show’s hosts are Sam Wang and Julian Zelizer. If you enjoyed our conversation with Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro about states suing the federal government, you’ll want to check out this episode that dives deeper into the concept of federalism. In recent history, federalism has been favored by the Republican party, while Democrats have aimed to nationalize certain policies. But given Republicans’ current control of the federal government, progressive Democrats may need to aim to achieve their policy goals at the state level. Daniel Hemel joins this episode to discuss what he calls “blue state federalism” and how states themselves can be “laboratories of democracy.” Hemel, a law scholar, explains how states can set precedents for the federal government with regard to social issues. For example, Massachusetts did this by legalizing gay marriage and through adopting Romney-care, a precedent to the Affordable Care Act. Hemel is assistant professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School. His research focuses on taxation, nonprofit organizations, administrative law and federal courts. Additional Information Politics and Polls podcast Our conversation with Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro Share Tweet Google Plus Share The post Politics and Polls: Blue state federalism appeared first on Democracy Works podcast .
Mon, July 15, 2019
The Pledge: Are you scared of the cafeteria lady?
Our summer break continues this week with an episode of The Pledge, a podcast about people who are taking an active role in improving democracy in the U.S. The show’s first season features a group of women working in grassroots political organizing in Alabama. This episode tells the story of Oni Williams. As a resident of one of Birmingham’s poorest neighborhoods, Oni regularly visits barbershops and strip clubs to speak with members of the community, inform them of their rights, and encourage them to speak out. She is a stellar example of what democracy in action looks like. Since this episode was recorded, Oni announced that she’s running for Birmingham City Council in a special election to be held October 8. Listen to the rest of The Pledge at thepledgepodcast.com . For more on the impact of grassroots organizing on democracy, listen to our conversation with the University of Pittsburgh’s Lara Putnam on how middle America is rebooting democracy. Share Tweet Google Plus Share The post The Pledge: Are you scared of the cafeteria lady? appeared first on Democracy Works podcast .
Mon, July 08, 2019
How Democracies Die author Daniel Ziblatt on the “grinding work” of democracy [rebroadcast]
Our summer break continues this week with a rebroadcast of one of our very first episodes, a conversation with How Democracies Die author Daniel Ziblatt. He spoke at Penn State in March 2018. Both the book and the conversation are worth revisiting, or checking out for the first time if the episode is new to you. Ziblatt has done a lot of interviews since the release of How Democracies Die , the bestselling book he co-wrote with Steven Levitsky. But we asked him a question he’d never gotten before — about a line toward the end of the book when he refers to democracy as “grinding work.” The idea that democracy isn’t easy is a central theme of this podcast. As How Democracies Die illustrates, it’s much easier to succumb to the power of an autocratic leader than it is to stand up and protect the institutions that serve as the guardrails of democracy. Ziblatt, a professor of government at Harvard, talks about how the book came about and the impact it’s had since it was released.
Mon, July 01, 2019
A democracy summer reading list [rebroadcast]
Democracy Works is taking a few weeks off for the summer. While we do, we are going to share some older episodes you might have missed, along with a few from other podcasts we think you’ll enjoy. First up is our democracy summer reading list, which we recorded last summer but holds up well today. Since we recored this, we’ve been lucky to have a few of the authors on the show — David Frum, Salena Zito, and E.J. Dionne. Here’s the rundown of the books we discuss: How Democracies Die (Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt) The People vs. Democracy: Why Our Freedom is in Danger and How to Save It (Yascha Mounk) The Retreat of Western Liberalism (Edward Luce) Devil’s Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the Presidency (Joshua Green) The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics (Salena Zito and Bradd Todd) Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic (David Frum) One Nation After Trump: A Guide for the Perplexed, the Disillusioned, the Desperate, and the Not-Yet Deported (E.J. Dionne Jr., Norman Ornstein, Thomas Mann) Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and the Election of Donald Trump (Michael Isikoff and David Corn) The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels (Jon Meacham) The Monarchy of Fear: A Philosopher Looks at Our Political Crisis (Martha C. Nussbaum) And here are a few others we’ve read since last summer that are also worthy of your time: Anti-Pluralism: The Populist Threat to Liberal Democracy (William Galston) Palaces for the People: How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization, and the Decline of Civic Life (Eric Klinenberg) Cyberwar: How Russian Hackers and Trolls Helped Elect a President (Kathleen Hall Jamieson) Finally, if you enjoy Democrac
Mon, June 24, 2019
Answering your questions about democracy
Is the United States really a democracy? What will the EU look like in 50 years? What should 2020 candidates be doing to demonstrate civility? Those are just a few of the questions we received from Democracy Works listeners around the country and around the world. We close our third season by answering some of your questions about democracy and the topics we’ve covered on the show. We’ll be on summer break for the next few weeks. New episodes resume August 12. In the meantime, we’ll be rebroadcasting some of our older episodes you might have missed and sharing episodes from other podcasts we think you’ll enjoy. Additional Information The Market as Prison article by Charles Lindblum – for more on the relationship between democracy and plutocracy Books we recommend reading this summer: Uncivil Agreement by Lilliana Mason The Last Palace by Norman Eisen In the Ruins of Neoliberalism by Wendy Brown Truth in Our Times by David McCraw Episodes mentioned: Jonathan Haidt on the psychology of democracy Using the tools of democracy to address inequality Immigration, refugees, and the politics of displacement A playbook for organizing in turbulent times Breaking the silence in Syria The ongoing struggle for civil rights School segregation then and now
Mon, June 17, 2019
Congressional oversight and making America pragmatic again
We tend to think about congressional oversight in very academic terms — checks and balances, the Framers, etc. But what does it actually look like on the ground in Congress? To find out, we’re talking this week with Charlie Dent, who served Congress for more than a decade until his retirement in 2018. He argues that amid all the talk about subpoenas, impeachment, and what Congress is not able to do, we’re losing sight of the things they can do to hold the executive branch accountable. Dent is a lifelong Republican, but one that does not fit in with the direction the party’s taken under Donald Trump. We talk with him about why so few Republicans are willing to speak out against the Preisdent, and what the party’s post-Trump future might look like. He also talks about the difference between separation of parties and separation of powers — and where he thinks we are right now. Dent was the chair of the House Ethics Committee and a member of the Homeland Security Appropriations committees. These days, he is a CNN political analyst and senior policy adviser at DLA Piper. He was a recipient of the 2019 Penn State Distinguished Alumni Award, which is the university’s highest honor presented to alumni. Additional Information Charlie Dent on Twitter Discussion/Reflection Questions Is there still room for moderates in politics? If so, where can they have the most impact? What do you make of Charlie’s argument that the U.S. now operates like a Parliamentary system? What do you think the Republican Party will look like post-Donald Trump? Interview Highlights [6:00] Can you describe the district you represented and your decision to leave office? I represented a district in eastern Pennsylvania largely the Lehigh Valley for my first four terms and for my, my last three terms, the district included parts of south central Pennsylvania. It was what we’d call a swing or marginal district, had a pretty good mix of urban, suburban, rural communities. It was, in many respects, a bellwether for the country in terms of how it performed from an election standpoint. dI anticipated early on that House Republicans would be in the minority in the new session of Congress that they’re in now. The current administration was also a factor. Just dealing with the never ending drama and chaos. [9:44] Now that you’ve had some time away, are there things you wish you would have done differently to speak out against things like increasing polarization? I think about that quite a bit. There’s only so much you can do as one person to change the direction that the herd is moving in. Increasingly, Republicans in Congress are hesitant to speak out against Pres
Mon, June 10, 2019
Will AI destroy democracy?
Jay Yonamine Some political scientists and democracy scholars think that it might. The thinking goes something like this: inequality will rise as jobs continue to be automated, which will cause distrust in the government and create fertile ground for authoritarianism. Jay Yonamine is uniquely qualified to weigh in on this issue. He is a data scientist at Google and has a Ph.D. in political science. He has an interesting perspective on the relationship between automation and democracy, and the role that algorithms and platforms play in the spread of misinformation online. In some ways, this conversation makes the counterargument to our conversation with Penn State’s Matt Jordan about the relationship between social media and democracy. The conversation with Matt is worth revisiting for two perspectives on some of the most complicated questions facing democracy today. Additional Information Episode with Matt Jordan: Facebook is not a democracy Profile on Jay from Sync Magazine The Fourth Age by Byron Reese – a look at the relationship between technology, humanity, and democratic values Yuval Noah Harari on the relationship between technology and tyranny in The Atlantic Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you see as the relationship between AI and democracy? Should Google and other platforms regulate the contact that users see? Do you feel that you have control over the content you see on Google and other sites? Are you concerned about AI’s impacts on democracy? Interview Highlights [3:40] How do you define AI? AI is has to be something that’s not just a human brain relying on itself. Most of the time, when folks think about AI, what they mean is computers, which is to say a computer is doing the thinking or doing the analysis as apposed to a human brain. How I think of intelligence is the ability to make nontrivial, falsifiable, accurate predictions. I think most folks would agree that the act of a robot by itself is not necessarily artificial intelligence, but the AI aspect of a robot would actually still be the, sort of computer engine that interprets the world and makes predictions [6:25] What is the relationship between AI and democracy? A few things have happened simultaneously that might not be as causal as maybe we might believe. There’s definitely been an in
Mon, June 03, 2019
The 2019 version of Democracy in America
Lindsay Lloyd. Photo by Grant Miller If Alexis de Tocqueville visited America today, what would he have to say about the condition of our democracy? We hear a lot in the news and on Twitter about how support for democracy is waning. We’re perhaps even a little guilty of it on this show. But, what do everyday Americans think? Some of the biggest names in politics from across the ideological spectrum teamed up to find out. The Democracy Project, an initiative of the George W. Bush Center, Penn Biden Center, and Freedom House, found that people support the ideal of democracy, but worry that the United States is not living up to that ideal in practice due to factors like economic inequality and the decline of civics education. Lindsay Lloyd, director Bush Center’s Human Freedom Initiative and part of The Democracy Project, joins us this week to discuss the report and what its findings mean for citizens across the United States. We’ve collaborated with the Bush Center on several projects in the past few months and highly recommend checking out their podcast, The Strategerist. Additional Information The Democracy Project report Our episodes on economic inequality and civics education The Strategerist podcast from the Bush Center Discussion/Reflection Questions How does your perception of democracy align with The Democracy Project’s findings? What do you make of the report’s recommendations for action? Do you agree with Lindsay that there is strong support for democracy-based initiatives in Congress? What role should the U.S. play in promoting democracy in other countries? Have your feelings about democracy changed since 2016? Or 2018? Interview Highlights [5:19] What is the Democracy Project and how does it relate to the Bush Center’s mission? The Bush Center opened in 2009 and one of the areas we work in is democracy and human rights. Historically, it’s been focused outside the United States. A few years ago, we noticed that something was happening in American democracy regarding partisanship and wanted to see what we could do about it. We partnered with the Penn Biden Center and Freedom House and launched a public opinion project related to American democracy. We did focus groups with constituent groups around the country, as well as a national public opinion poll.
Mon, May 27, 2019
What neoliberalism left behind
Neoliberalism is one of those fuzzy words that can mean something different to everyone. Wendy Brown is one of the world’s leading scholars on neoliberalism and argue that a generation of neoliberal worldview among political, business, and intellectual leaders led to the populism we’re seeing throughout the world today. But is it mutually exclusive to democracy? Not necessarily. Brown joins us this week to help make sense of what neoliberalism is, and where things stand today. We were lucky enough to get an advance copy of her book, In the Ruins of Neoliberalism, which will be released in July. It’s a follow up to her 2015 book, Undoing the Demos , and you’ll hear her talk about how her thinking has changed since then. Brown is the Class of 1936 First Chair at the University of California, Berkeley, where she teaches political theory. You might also recognize her from Astra Taylor’s documentary, What Is Democracy? If you enjoy this episode, we recommend checking out the Political Theory Review podcast, produced by Jeffrey Church at the University of Houston. Additional Information Wendy’s books: In the Ruins of Neoliberalism , Undoing the Demos Wendy’s website Our episode with David Frum The Political Theory Review podcast Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you see as the relationship between neoliberalism and democracy? Do you think it’s possible for two to coexist? What do you see as the future of neoliberalism? Will Millennials and Generation Z move in a different direction? Interview Highlights [5:45] How do you define neoliberalism and how is it related to democracy? North Americans are a little bewildered by the term, and we don’t have it as part of our everyday lexicon although I think it’s finally beginning to seep in. But having said that, I also want to suggest that we understand it at a social and political level and not just an economic level. We recognize it as the undoing of the Keynesian welfare state and the substitution of free market policies, low taxes, everyone’s responsible for themselves and getting rid of all the social supports except for a bare minimum safety net, but I want to add that it’s also a whole from of governing reason. [7:45] How does neoliberalism relate to authoritarianism? One of the things I felt compelled to understand with our hard right turn in the West over the last several years with Trump and Bolsonaro and Brexit and so forth was the connection of that to neol
Mon, May 20, 2019
Demagogues are more common than you think
Patricia Roberts-Miller When you think of the word “demagogue,” what comes to mind? Probably someone like Hitler or another bombastic leader, right? Patricia Roberts-Miller is a rhetoric scholar and has spent years tracing the term and its uses. She joins us this week to explain a new way of thinking about demagoguery and how that view relates to democracy. She also explains what she’s learned from what she describes as years of “crawling around the Internet with extremists.” Patricia is a Professor of Rhetoric and Writing and Director of the University Writing Center at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of two new books on demagoguery. Demagoguery and Democracy is a short book in the style of On Tyranny that covers the basics of her argument in about 100 small ages. Rhetoric and Demagoguery is a longer, more academic book for those looking for more on the rhetorical roots of demagoguery and its relationship to democratic deliberation. Additional Information Patricia’s books: Demagoguery and Democracy , Rhetoric and Demagoguery Patricia’s website Episode on civility with Timothy Shaffer of Kansas State University Discussion/Reflection Questions After listening to Patricia, do you feel better equipped to notice demagoguery in media you consume, or even in your own language and writing? What do you see as the relationship between demagoguery and democracy? Do you see parallels between the increase of demagoguery and the decline of civility we discussed with Timothy Shaffer? Can you think of a time when you’ve tried to appreciate the other side’s point of view in a conversation or something you read? Did doing so change your perspective? Interview Highlights [5:18] How do you define demagoguery and why is it bad for democracy? It’s useful to think about it as reducing all political issues or even all issues to questions of identity. And specifically in-group versus out-group. And it’s oriented toward providing a lot of certainty and reducing nuance. When you have a culture that is reasoning about everything in that way, you can’t actually explore multiple solutions. What I have to say about demagoguery in politics is pretty similar to what people will say about how a business should come up with a good business plan or how people should make decisions about health. It’s just better decision making. [7:04] How does the media lands
Mon, May 13, 2019
What does the Mueller report mean for democracy?
Laura Rosenberger By now, you’ve no doubt head all about the report issued by Special Counsel Robert Mueller and the drama in Washington that’s ensued in the time since its release. But, if you only focus on the information about collusion and obstruction in the Trump administration, you are missing a whole other part of the story about Russian interference in democracy leading up to the 2016 election. Laura Rosenberger and her colleagues at the bipartisan Alliance for Securing Democracy have been working to raise awareness about this threat since the 2016 election. Laura joins us this week to discuss what she learned from the report, and where the efforts to combat Russian interference stand. She is our first repeat guest on the podcast. We last spoke with her in the fall of 2018, just before the midterm elections, during a live event at the National Press Club. Additional Information Alliance for Securing Democracy Our conversation with Laura in fall 2018 Discussion/Reflection Questions Whose should be taking the lead on combating Russian interference in our democracy? What role does the government have to play? Social media platforms? Everyday citizens? Do you think that Russian interference will influence the outcome of the 2020 presidential election? Interview Highlights [5:15] What did you learn from the Mueller report? I think it is one of the most important things to remember is that Special Counsel Mueller was appointed to investigate a number of different things. One of them was Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. We learned through the course of his investigation, including through some indictments that he brought against Russian officials and entities, some of what he was finding, but the report definitely added to that. In many ways, I would say his report and the investigation that he led really built on what we found and saw from the findings of the intelligence community and its own assessment of the Russian interference operations, as well as investigations by a number of bipartisan committees in Congress. [9:58] Are you seeing any evidence that calls to respond to Russian interference are being heeded? I think we have seen some incremental steps. I think that maybe we are in a slightly better position than we were in 2016, but I think that we have a whole lot of progress that we still need to make if we’re actually going to better protect our democracy against the threats that we face. I think the social media companies need to do a whole
Mon, May 06, 2019
School segregation then and now
It’s been 65 years since the Brown v. Board of Education changed public schooling throughout a large portion of the United States. In his opinion, Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote that public education was important to democratic society and the “very foundation of good citizenship.” Integrated schools, the Court argued, would expose children to new cultures and prepare them for an increasingly diverse world. How do you balance the public good against the inherent desire every parent has to do what’s best for their children? It’s a question that schools across the country are still wrestling with today. To help us understand the history of integration and the Brown decision’s impacts on public policy, we’re talking this week with two experts at Penn State. Crystal Sanders is an associate professor of history and African American studies and director of the Africana Research Center. She’s an expert on 20th century African American history. Erica Frankenberg is a professor of education and demography and director of the Center for Education and Civil Rights. She is an an expert on the connection between school segregation and public policy. Crystal and Erica co-chaired a conference at Penn State on the 65th anniversary of the Brown decision. Additional Information Brown@65 Conference Brown v. Board of Education opinion Our episode on school boards with Robert Asen of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Interview Highlights [5:52] What was the political climate when the decision of Brown v. Board of Education was made There were many people on the ground; black teachers, black principals, black parents who had been organizing for generations for quality educational opportunities for their students. Decades prior March 1954, black parents were mobilizing to ensure that their students had the resources to ensure that their students to get to school. [7:43] How was the Brown decision received? There was a massive resistance at the beginning. The reason because Dwight Eisenhower in 1957 for sending troops to Little Rock was essentially because the rest of the world was watching and laughing at us. We see white parents taking their kids out of public schools, we see entire school system shutting down, as was the case in Prince, Edward County, Virginia. It takes a very long time before we even began to see real implementation. We are seeing now a widespread re-segregation across the country. [9:37] What are some of the factors that are causing re-segregation? One of the things that most people might not be aware of is that more than 25 s
Mon, April 29, 2019
What Serial taught Sarah Koenig about criminal justice — recorded live at Penn State
Sarah Koenig spent a year inside Cleveland’s criminal justice system for season three of the Serial podcast. Along the way, she met some interesting people and had a birds-eye view of what justice (and injustice) look like for lawyers, judges, defendants, police officers, and the countless others who pass through the building’s courtrooms each day. It’s once thing to study criminal justice empirically, as many academics do, but something else entirely to be embedded within the system as Koenig and her team were in Cleveland. We invited Koenig to Penn State for an on-stage conversation with Democracy Works host and McCourtney Institute for Democracy Director Michael Berkman. They discuss community policing, the lack of data about what works and what doesn’t, and where college students should focus their energy if they’re looking to reform the criminal justice system. Additional Information Serial podcast Cornell’s Peter Enns about the U.S. as the world’s most punitive democracy UNC’s Frank Baumgartner on race and policing A note to our listeners in the New York City area: Jenna Spinelle will be participating in a panel called “ Podcasts to the Rescue! An Emerging Medium for Learning About Civics, Government, and the Social Contract ” on Thursday, May 30 at the Metropolitan New York Library Council. The event is free and open to the public. We would love to meet you! Discussion/Reflection Questions If you’ve listened to Serial season 3, what did you find most surprising? Which part of the criminal justice system do you think is most in need of reform? How should that part of the system change? How much discretion should judges have when it comes to sentencing? What kind of data is needed to understand how to reform the criminal justice system? What is the relationship between law and justice? Interview Highlights [2:45] What about this season of Serial do you think captured people’s attention? We tried to do what we know how to do, right? Which is to know how to make it narrative, as narrative as we could, and to introduce difficult concepts kind of slowly and not overload you with information. It’s become a topic that people are talking about and caring about in the last however many years and that’s personally a thrill to me, but I think that helps. The timing of it helped. [3:54] Does season 3 relate to season 1? A lot of people after season 1 were like “Well, what does this mean
Mon, April 22, 2019
Is it time to revive civility?
Timothy Shaffer There are a lot of calls these days to “revive civility” in politics. While there are plenty of examples of uncivil behavior, there’s far less agreement about what civility should look like in 2019. Timothy Shaffer joins us this week to talk about work being done to create a new definition of civility and a playbook to put that definition into practice. Shaffer is an assistant professor in communication studies at Kansas State University, assistant director of the Institute for Civic Discourse and Democracy, and principal research specialist at the National Institute for Civil Discourse. He is the editor of a new book called A Crisis of Civility? Political Discourse and its Discontents . Additional Information Kansas State University Institute for Civic Discourse and Democracy National Institute for Civil Discourse Timothy’s book: A Crisis of Civility? NPR story on civility in politics Our episode on the Citizens Initiative Review Our “conversation about conversation” episode Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think we are in a crisis of civility? If so, does the crisis exist among citizens, politicians, or both? What do you see as the relationship between civility and democracy? What do you think is the best approach for making political discourse more civil? Who do you look to as a model of civility in politics? What is the right balance between deliberative democracy and policy changes? Interview Highlights [3:50] How do you define civility? There is no one single notion of civility. In our book, the first chapter puts forward two ways to think about it: civility as politeness and civility as responsiveness. As someone who studies this work and engages it in practical situations and settings, it’s important that we think about civility as being more than just kind of minding your manners or abiding by the rules or the expectations of kind of a dominant society. [5:48] Given that definition, what does it mean to “revive” civility as we’ve heard people call for lately? I would say somewhat of an analog to that is the language of civic renewal, which gets used quite a bit. If we’r
Mon, April 15, 2019
E.J. Dionne on empathy and democracy
E.J. Dionne has the unique perspective of studying the horse race and the big picture of American politics. He writes a twice-weekly column for the Washington Post and appears regularly on NPR, but he’s also a senior fellow at Brookings and professor in Foundations of Democracy and Culture at Georgetown University. We talked with him about the relationship between partisan politics and democracy, the need for empathy across the political spectrum, and a few policy ideas to help make America more democratic. We could have talked all day and hope to return to some of these topics in future episodes. Additional Information E.J.’s Washington Post columns E.J.’s lecture at Penn State E.J.’s paper on universal voting for Brookings Chris Beem’s TED talk on how young people can improve democracy Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you agree with E.J.’s notion that a partisan response was required to protect democracy? Have you noticed a difference in political argumentation over the past few years? Is it more difficult to have arguments now than it was a few years ago? What do you see as the relationship between civil society and democracy? How could one help the other? What do you make of the National Fair Vote Interstate Compact and universal voting? Interview Highlights [3:52] In One Nation After Trump , you wrote that a partisan response was required to protect democratic values. What did you mean by that? Trump had done something to our politics that was very dangerous and needed to be reversed, and given that the Republican Party had chosen almost to a person (with a couple of exceptions in Congress) to support Trump, the only way to hit back, to create any sense of accountability, was to give at least one house of Congress to Democrats. There a lot of people out there who aren’t necessarily partisan Democrats, who aren’t necessarily liberals or lefties, who believe that there are abuses here that need to be checked, and that there is a threat to democracy that needs to be reversed, and that’s exactly what happened after the 2018 midterms. [5:19] Should that approach continue heading into 2020? My view is that the Republican party has moved to a point where it needs a real rebuke in order to look inside itself and analyze where they want to continue to be. [6:54] ]What happens to the people who are conservative but don’t may be aligned with where the Republican party is currently? I think there are still a lot of conservatives who made a deal that they think is still worth mak
Mon, April 08, 2019
No Jargon: Who controls the states?
We are excited to bring you an episode from No Jargon, a podcast from the Scholars Strategy Network. Much like Democracy Works, No Jargon aims to break down some of the biggest issues in politics and society in a way that’s not partisan and not punditry. New episodes are released every Thursday, and we hope you’ll check it out if you enjoy this conversation. We like to think that state governments make decisions based on their particular situations. But it turns out, often that’s not the case. In fact, three large conservative groups have gained massive influence in state houses across the country, working to pass legislation in line with their views and corporate sponsors. In this episode of No Jargon, Columbia University’s Alexander Hertel-Fernandez explains their rise and strategies, why state governments are so susceptible to their influence, and what this all means for American democracy. Additional Information No Jargon website Alex Hertel Fermandez’s book, State Capture The McCourtney Institute’s John Gastil on No Jargon discussing the Citizens Initiative Review
Mon, April 08, 2019
The ongoing struggle for civil rights
Joyce Ladner was at the forefront of the Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi in the 1950s and 60s as a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). She was mentored by Medgar Evers, expelled from Jackson State University for participating in a sit-in, and failed Mississippi’s voter literacy test three times. She discusses those experiences with us, along with the disconnect between learning the principles of civics education knowing that some of them didn’t apply to her. Joyce also describes how Emmett Till moved her generation to action, and how Trevon Martin is doing the same for a new generation of organizers. She visited Penn State to deliver the annual Barbara Jordan lecture, hosted by the Africana Research Center. Additional Information Penn State Africana Research Center Interview Highlights [4:44] What was the catalyst for you to get involved in the Civil Rights Movement? The catalyst for us was the lynching of 14-year-old Emmitt Till in Mississippi [5:15] How did that make you feel and how you did you translate those feelings into your actions? I remember feeling very very powerless back then. Sort of visceral reaction came when I saw the photograph of Emmett Till on the cover of Jet Magazine. That photograph made me feel that I had to one day do something. [9:42] Did you see any changes or any integration efforts following Brown v. Board of Education No, what happened to the Deep South was that the Southern states immediately after the Brown decision came down rushed to build new schools for black children, so we got a new school. [14:42] What do you think is missing from how civics education and democracy are being taught today? I took high school history and social science civics to become good citizens. We were informed with a knowledge base in ethics and values, and about what democracy was. I think that one of the worst things that’s happened in subsequent years is the decline of civics education. A lot of social science type courses have suffered tremendously. [16:55] What do you think about Black Lives Matter Movement? Black Lives Matter is to this generation what’s SNCC was to my generation, and also Trayvon Martin is to this generation what Emmett Till was to mine. Here you have a case of a young man who was just shot and murdered and the response to it is a national outpouring of anger and eventually that anger was channeled by young people (college students and non-college students). I should say is the case in a manner that was very similar. I was so excited to see that finally we have some movement activity. [20:16] What was the process to become a registered voter? I tried to register to vote three times in Harrisburg, but I failed the voter register literacy test because all black people who went to register were failed. At the same time all white peopl
Mon, April 01, 2019
Immigration, refugees, and the politics of displacement
Jan Egeland From Brexit to Hungary to the U.S. border wall, many of today’s political conflicts center around immigration. Moving people from one place to another is easier said than done, and as we’ve seen around world, there are inherent tensions between people who want to enter a country and the people who are already there. On top of that, climate change will continue to create situations where people are displaced from their homes. Jan Egeland doesn’t have all the answers to these issues, but he’s committed to figuring them out. He is the Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council and former Special Adviser to the UN Special Envoy for Syria. Despite the challenges that immigration poses, he remains optimistic about the progress the world has made and the power of democratic governments to find solutions. Jan visited Penn State as guest of the Center for Security Research and Education. Additional Information Norwegian Refugee Council Penn State Center for Security Research and Education Discussion/Reflection Questions How should governments and organizations address immigration? What’s the relationship between immigration and democracy? Did hearing Jan’s interview change the way you think about migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers? How will climate change affect migration? Interview Highlights [4:58] What do the terms migrant and refugee mean and how they might differ? Migrants are everyone who leaves a country and goes to another place. Refugees are people who flee from persecution. It could be political, religious, or cultural. [6:38] What is the Norwegian Refugee Council and how this organization works with these various groups? The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) is a humanitarian organization working for both refugees and the internally displaced people providing them relief in the in the form of shelter (housing, water, sanitation, and food). We also provide legal help and legal advice, including civil documentation. There are two main solutions that we seek. The first one is to return the person, but this solution is very difficult when a war is going on. The other one is local integration. It could be that little by little they would be integrated, get their get jobs and education and maybe even citizenship, and the third solution is relocation to another place. Traditionally the United States generously receives more than a 100,000 refugees, but most of the rich industrial countries have become colder places for refugees. [9:00] When did that that transition start and how has it evolved since then? It’s always been there really in Europe, in the United State
Mon, March 25, 2019
A playbook for organizing in turbulent times
Srdja Popovic 20 years ago, Srdja Popovic was part of a revolution — literally. He was a founding member of the Otpor! movement that ousted Serbia Slobodan Milsovic from power in 1999. It’s easy to characterize social movements as a bunch of people rallying in the streets, but successful movements require a lot of planning and a unified vision around a singular goal — things that are often easier said than done. Srdja joins us this week to discuss why Otpor! was successful and anyone can use the same principles of what we describes as “laughtivism” to fight for change. He is the director of the Center for Applied Nonviolent Action and Strategies (CAVNAS) and author of Blueprint for Revolution: How to Use Rice Pudding, Lego Men, and Other Nonviolent Techniques to Galvanize Communities, Overthrow Dictators, or Simply Change the World. At the end of the episode, Michael and Chris compare Srdja’s discussion of anger and fear with some of the results we’ve seen from our Mood of the Nation Poll. Srdja visited Penn State as a guest of the Center for Global Studies, the same organization that hosted Syrian journalist Abdalaziz Alhamza in the fall. Our episode with him is a nice companion to this conversation with Srdja. Additional Information CANVAS website Srdja’s book: Blueprint for Revolution A book Srdja references in the interview: The Dictator’s Learning Curve: Inside the Global Battle for Democracy Another Democracy Works episode you might enjoy: Breaking the silence in Syria – Abdalaziz Alhamza Discussion/Reflection Questions How did the Otpor! movement achieve its goals? How should a social movement balance its members individuals goals and views against the larger goals? How do you see the apathy and fear Srdja described playing out in today’s political climate? Do you think Otpor!’s approach could be successful in a place like Hungary or Brazil? What are some recent examples of laughtivism? Are they effective? Interview Highlights [4:20] What was the the political climate in Serbia when the Otpor! movement began? We started with large students protests. We were occupying campuses and all the intellectuals were there. The first large-scale demonstrations started in Serbia and we figure out that in fact, we can win local elections if opposition is united, but we lost. After three months on the streets every day
Mon, March 18, 2019
Jonathan Haidt on the psychology of democracy
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. One last thing: This week marks the first anniversary of Democracy Works! We are thrilled that the show has caught on with listeners around the world and are excited to bring you even more great episodes in year two. If you’d like to give the show a birthday present, consider sharing it with a friend or leaving a rating or review in your podcast app. Additional Information Jonathan’s books: The Coddling of the American Mind The Righteous Mind The Happiness Hypothesis OpenMind Heterodox Academy New York Times article on free play and democracy Discussion/Reflection Questions Why is democracy so difficult to sustain? Does hearing about the moral foundations of politics change the way you perceive people from another political party? What can each of us to do make better decisions and resist the tem
Thu, March 14, 2019
Future Hindsight: Ian Bremmer on the failure of globalism
We are closing out our series on democracy around the world with a bonus episode from Future Hindsight, a show that features deep conversations with guests who are engaged in strengthening our society. This episode is a discussion with Ian Bremmer, author of Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism . Ian is a political scientist and president of the Eurasia Group, a political risk advisory and consulting firm. In this episode, Ian talks with Future Hindsight host Mila Atmos about populism, authoritarianism, and some of the other trends we’ve heard about over the past few weeks. Think of it as a 30,000-foot view of what we’ve covered in individual countries like Hungary and Brazil. Future Hindsight is in its fifth season and available at futurehindsight.com or wherever you listen to podcasts. Here are the episodes from our series about democracy around the world: Hungary France Brazil UK/Brexit
Mon, March 11, 2019
Brexit and the UK’s identity crisis
Sona Golder We’re just a few weeks away from the deadline for the UK to reach an agreement on its plan to leave the European Union. Nearly three years after the infamous Brexit vote, things appear to be as murky as ever. Rather than trying to predict the future, we invited Penn State’s Sona Golder to join us for a conversation about how Brexit originated, and the pros and cons of putting the decision directly in the people’s hands. Sona is a comparative politics scholar and co-editor of the British Journal on Political Science. Listen through to the end of the episode for information about the Big World podcast, produced by American University’s School of International Service. Additional Information Sona’s website For more on UK politics, check out The Guardian’s Politics Weekly podcast. Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think that Brexit should have been decided via referendum? If a second referendum happens, how would you phrase the question and the options people vote on? Do you see similarities between Brexit and Donald Trump’s election? Or with the rise of authoritarian leaders in places like Hungary and Brazil? How do you think Brexit will end? How do you feel about the state of democracy around the world after listening to the past four episodes? Has you opinion changed since the beginning of the series? Interview Highlights [4:45] How did the original Brexit referendum come about in 2016? When it comes to important EU initiatives, it’s not unusually to have a referendum. There were referenda in at least three countries back in 1992 when they were trying to get everyone to agree to the Maastricht Treaty. France’s treaty just barely passed and was known as the little yes. In the UK, various leaders have proposed having a referendum on whether to remain in the EU over the years but never followed through on it. Given that history, I don’t think it seemed out of place to the citizens of the UK. [5:52] What was it about 2015-2016 that finally allowed the referendum process to happen? Ever since the Maastricht Treaty was signed, there’s been a group of people in Parliament who are Euro-skeptical. That’s been going on for decades. More recently, countries from throughout Europe joined the EU. The UK was the only country that did not set restrictions on how people could move into the country so the UK ended up with a lot migrants that no one expected. On top of that, the financial crisis happened in 2008. David Cameron, the Prime Minister at the time, went into it thinking he was going to get a better deal from the EU and then there would be
Mon, March 04, 2019
Brazil’s tenuous relationship with democracy
Gianpaolo Baiocchi To say Brazil has had a complicated history with democracy is a understatement. The country has bounced in and out authoritarian regimes for hundreds of years, with democracy never having quite enough time to really take hold. Following the election of Jair Bolsonaro in October 2018, many are wondering whether the cycle is about to repeat itself again. Gianpaolo Baiocchi is a professor of individualized studies and sociology at NYU, where he also directs the Urban Democracy Lab. He’s from Brazil and has written extensively about the country’s politics and social movements. He joins us this week to talk about Bolsonaro’s appeal, the use of misinformation on WhatsApp during the election, and why Bolsonaro is often called the “Trump of the tropics.” We also discuss Brazil’s history of activism under authoritarian governments and whether we’ll see it return now. Next week is our final episode about democracy around the world. We’ll be talking with Penn State’s Sona Golder about all things Brexit. Additional Information Gianpaolo’s website Urban Democracy Lab Brazil’s unraveling political institutions – article by Gianpaolo in Democracy Journal Discussion/Reflection Questions What is the role of social movements in Brazil? Do you think Brazil will retreat from democracy under Bolsonaro? What is the role of the military in Brazil? How is Brazil politically involved with other Latin American countries? Interview Highlights [3:07] What is the history of democracy in Brazil? Brazil, a very unequal country, has had this relatively short and checkered history with democracy. Brazil was the last country to abolish slavery in the world. In 1964, Brazil had a military coup that lasted with a military regime that lasted until 1985. Social movements really played a very important role in the transition to democracy, but also in helping build the institutions of democracy. Brazil’s constitution of 1989 has some very progressive elements in it, has things about direct democracy, has gestures and participation municipalities, and have a lot of power. [7:08] Where did social movements in Brazil come from? Social movements comes in the mid-1980s. There are urban movements, the movement for the right transport, the movement against poverty, student movements, a lot of movements to the progressive church, so kind of Liberation theology, we have movements very important of patients and users of the health system. [10:38] Who is Jair Bolsonaro and why was he appealing?<
Mon, February 25, 2019
Yellow vests and the “grand debate” in France
Cole Stangler This episode is the second in our series looking at democracy around the world. France is the focus this week. Our guest is Cole Stangler, an independent journalist based in Paris who covers French politics. The yellow vest movement, named for the safety vests that all drivers are required to carry in their cars, began in late 2018 over rising gas prices. The movement succeeded in having the gas tax repealed, but the protestors still took to the streets around the country every weekend. Why? Like a lot of social movements, it’s complicated. Cole has been on the ground covering the movement and joins to discuss its origins, the reaction from President Emmanuel Macron, and where things might go from here. Next week, we’ll focus on Brazil for a discussion about the appeal of Jair Bolsonaro, who has been called Brazil’s Donald Trump. Additional Information Cole’s website Interview with Cole about French politics on the Commonweal podcast Story from The Atlantic on the “Grand Debate” Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you think will be the future of the yellow vest movement? Will the “grand debate” be effective? What are some of the challenges associated with large-scale movements like this one? How can the movement overcome those challenges? Interview Highlights [5:03] How did the debate from Yellow Vest Movement in France come about? And what is President Macron looking to accomplish by doing it? This great national debate was rolled out as one of many concessions that was designed for the yellow vest protest movement. In addition to the government canceling the fuel tax, in response to these mass protests the government also increased a state wage subsidy and some other more modest measures. One of the big measures they design here to deal with that is to meet with Mayors. The government is going to take into account the results of what they’re hearing from from citizens and what they’re hearing from Mayors. [6:39] France has very high voter turnout levels. Do you think that that level of participation will carry over into this great debate? I don’t think so. In general in France in terms of elections participation is much higher than in United States and over 70 percent was a big deal last year. People are worried about participation dropping below 70 percent, but it was still much higher than that in the United States. [15:45] What type of backgrounds do protesters have? That’s the huge question because even in F
Mon, February 18, 2019
Viktor Orbán’s “velvet repression” in Hungary
This episode begins a four-part series examining the state of democracy around the world. First up is Hungary, a country that’s often referred to in a group of countries in central and Eastern Europe that are seeing authoritarian leaders rise to power. You might have heard of Viktor Orbán or know that the country is in some way associated with George Soros, but beyond that, it’s not a place many of us spend a lot of time thinking about. We could not have found a better guest to help us make sense of what’s happening there. John Shattuck is the former President and Rector of Central European University, which Hungary’s Prime Minister recently forced out of the country. He is currently Professor of Practice in Diplomacy at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. In this episode, John discusses Viktor Orbán’s rise to power, how he is waging war on democratic institutions, and what people in Hungary are doing to fight back. Additional Information How Viktor Orbán degraded Hungary’s weak democracy – John’s article in The Conversation Discussion/Reflection Questions What impact has Viktor Orbán has on democracy Hungary? Is there anything that the rest of the world can do to constrain Orbán’s actions? What does the future of democracy in Hungary looks like? Do you notice any similarities between democratic erosion in Hungary and other countries? Interview Highlights [6:18] Can you start off by telling us a little bit about Hungary? Hungary is a small country of about 9 million people in the middle of Europe. It’s been for centuries kind of prize for Invaders; Mongols, Turks, Russians, Germans, Habsburgs and the Soviets. It was a strong economy during the Communist period for 40 years. It had a communist government dominated by the Soviet Union and was a member of the Warsaw Pact. It has almost no history of democracy. There have been many people coming in from outside who are mixed with Hungarians, but it’s also fairly monochromatic homogeneous that language of Hungarian is extremely difficult, spoken pretty much only by Hungarians, and are very few people outside of the country who speak it. In 1989, it emerged from the Soviet era the Communist era and became at least initially a democracy and a market economy. And it was performing quite well in the early days of the post-cold war within 15 years that had joined NATO and also became a member of the European Union. [10:42] Who is Viktor Orbán? Viktor Orbán is a Hungarian politician and was Hungary’s Prime Minister from 1998 to 2002. He did not have a very succ
Mon, February 11, 2019
A brief history of “people power”
In his book Can Democracy Work? A Short History of a Radical Idea from Ancient Athens to Our World, James Miller encapsulates 2500 years of democracy history into about 250 pages — making the case that “people power” will always need to be at the heart of any successful democracy. James is a professor of politics and liberal studies at the New School for Social Research. in New York City. He is the author of Examined Lives: From Socrates to Nietzsche , Flowers in the Dustbin: The Rise of Rock and Roll, 1947–1977, and Democracy Is in the Streets: From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago . He was recommended to us by Astra Taylor , and you’ll hear some similarities between how James and Astra view democracy and our role within it. Starting next week, we’ll be expanding our focus to look at the state of democracy around the world, starting with Hungary. We’ve talked in broad strokes about how democracy is on the decline outside the United States and are excited to dive into what’s happening in a few specific countries. Additional Information Can Democracy Work? A Short History of a Radical Idea from Ancient Athens to Our World Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you make of the notion that democracy is “people power?” Based on the definition James provides, is the United States a democracy? What are the origins of democracy? Where do the ideas of democracy comes from? What can affect democracy or democratic processes? Interview Highlights [4:50] In your book you talk about the ideal of democracy survives. What that ideal is and where it comes from? The term democracy comes from ancient Greek and it’s not just cuddly abstract power. It really connotes people who have weapons in their hands and you have to respond to them. A literal translation of the word democracy in the English would be “people power.” [8:34] What can history tell us about trying to marry this the ideal of democracy with what what it ends up being in practice? It’s very misleading to try to draw direct lessons from history because so much in politics is situational. It depends on the context, on the culture, on the level of development of the people or a group that’s trying to become self governing. In the modern period the democracy is an idea and as an ideology, it’s inherently unstable because there’s a core ambiguity about to what extent it can be realized in practice and there’s a further ambiguity and that it’s proven to be a very powerful legitimating mechanism as an ideologies, and you
Mon, February 04, 2019
The power of local government
No matter where you live, chances are that your local government is filled with things like feasibility studies, property tax assessments, and endless meetings governed by Robert’s Rules of Order. It’s difficult to keep track of, but yet could fundamentally impact your day-to-day life in ways that few state or national-level decisions do. This week’s guest says that citizens and the governments themselves have a role to play in changing the conversation. Peter Buckland is the Chair of the Board of Supervisors in Ferguson Township, Pennsylvania. You’ll hear him describe the area and the structure in the interview, but really Ferguson Township could be just about any municipality in America. He outlines three ways that citizens and local government can work together to create more informed and more vibrant democracy at the local level: Citizens should pay attention to meeting agendas. Municipalities should use a variety of communication tools to let constituents know what’s happening. Everyone should support local media so it can do its job of reporting on local government. All of the small places add up and Peter shows how local governments working together can have a big change on national or global issues. Peter lead an effort to adopt a resolution calling for carbon neutrality in Ferguson Township by 2050. It’s easy for a cynic to say that one municipality of 20,000 people can’t change anything, but as you’ll hear, the idea is already starting to catch on. Additional Information Peter’s op-ed in the Washington Post about Ferguson Township’s carbon neutrality resolution Ferguson Township, Pennsylvania Two local government podcasts we enjoy: GovLove and Building Local Power Discussion/Reflection Questions What is the importance of the local government? Why people would be aware of what’s happening in their local government? Which are the challenges local governments face? How are local governments related to democracy? What can people do to be more involved in local government decision making? Interview Highlights [5:22] Can you tell us who you represent and your municipality fits into the larger structure of state government? I serve as the chair of the Ferguson Township Board of Supervisors and we represent the roughly nineteen to twenty thousand people who live in about 50 square miles west of State Coll
Mon, January 28, 2019
Using the tools of democracy to address economic inequality
Democracy and inequality have been at odds for as long as democracy as has existed. As the gap between rich and poor widens, so too does trust in political institutions and faith in democracy itself. Chris Witko, associate director of Penn State’s School of Public Policy and author of The New Economic Populism: How States Respond to Economic Inequality, argues that states can step in to address economic inequality while the federal government is embattled in political polarization. Witko argues that democracy and capitalism will never fully be reconciled, but lessening economic inequality will go a long way toward strengthening democracy. Additional Information The New Economic Populism: How States Respond to Economic Inequality The Conversation : States are on the front lines of fighting inequality Penn State School of Public Policy Discussion/Reflection Questions What is the relationship between democracy and economic inequality? Whose responsibility is it to address inequality? What policies should be taken in order to reduce inequality? Do you think that individual states are doing enough to reduce inequality? Do you think that multiple states adopting politics like minimum wage increases will spur federal action? Interview Highlights [6:02] Why are income inequality and democracy closely linked? We are going to have some inequality in a capitalist system, but when we are in a democratic capitalist system that assumes some level of equality, there is a concern when you have extreme levels of extreme inequality. [6:53] Talking about problems of Democracy in United States, do you agree with the statement that we can’t start to fix what is wrong with democracy until we address the issue of inequality? Yes. When you see the extremes of wealth and inequality, you see that wealthy people can use their money for politics, so that generates an unequal political influence. [7:50] Whose job to fix the problem of inequality? In the United States we tend to think that the public is not concerned about inequality and that’s relatively true in comparison with Europe, but according to survey data, the public is really concerned about inequality and they want the government to do something to fix it. [10:15] If public opinion really does supports action on inequality, why isn’t it moving forward? The polarization is preventing anything getting done, and when you have big interests and the wealthy has gib influence in politics, that makes it really hard to get any chance of getting any egalitarian policy in Washington DC. [13:09] How can we u
Mon, January 21, 2019
What is democracy? A conversation with Astra Taylor
We begin our third season with a fundamental question: What is democracy? Astra Taylor grapples with this question in a documentary of the same name and a forthcoming book. We talk with her this week about what she learned from traveling the world and talking with people from all walks of life. As you’ll hear, she did not set out to make a documentary about democracy, but kept coming back to that question. Taylor is a writer, documentarian, and organizer. In addition to What is Democracy?, her films include Zizek! , a feature documentary about the world’s most outrageous philosopher, and Examined Life , a series of excursions with contemporary thinkers including Slavoj Zizek, Judith Butler, Cornel West, Peter Singer, and others. A companion book, Democracy May Not Exist, But We’ll Miss It When It’s Gone , was released May 7. Her writing has appeared in The Nation, the London Review of Books, n+1, the New York Times, The New Yorker, The New Republic, and elsewhere. She is the editor of Examined Life, a companion volume to the film, and the coeditor of Occupy!: Scenes from Occupied America. Her 2015 book, The People’s Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age , won an American Book Award. Additional Information What Is Democracy? Democracy May Not Exist, but We’ll Miss it When It’s Gone The Debt Collective Discussion/Reflection Questions What does democracy mean to you? Does it matter that people have different views of what democracy is? What do you see as the relationship between equality and democracy? How do you practice democracy in your day-to-day life? Interview Highlights [5:36] Why did you want to make a film about democracy? I kept coming back to democracy and I think for me the big takeaway of making this film and writing the companion book that goes with it is that I’ve actually become more of us, more democrat. It’s sort of inspired a deep conviction in the concept, in the practice, and things that bothered me about the term, it’s a vagueness? What does it mean? All sorts of people say that they believe in democracy. I mean North Korea uses the word “democratic,” but it is a vague use of the word. There’s a sense that democracy was corrupted, that it was synonymous with bureaucracy so I would have been more attracted to words like freedom, equality and justice and even socialism, a revolution. Things are really changing, we are in a very different political moment. We are in a moment when people are feeling we are in a political crisis and democracy we had for granted is declining, and people’s reaction is “I better pay attention to
Mon, January 14, 2019
Trump on Earth: The Red State Paradox
We’ll be back with new episodes starting next week. This week’s episode comes to you from our friends at Trump on Earth , a podcast that’s taking a closer look at all the changes coming out of Washington on the environment — from what’s happening at the EPA to how our public lands will fare under the Trump administration. This episode features an interview with sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild about her book Strangers in their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right , which chronicles her time with conservatives in Louisiana. Hochschild found people there who had become sick from industrial pollution or lost their homes due to an industrial catastrophe yet were resentful of the federal government. Trump on Earth is produced by The Allegheny Front , a public media outlet based in Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania. All of their episodes can be found at trumponearth.org .
Mon, January 07, 2019
It’s good to be counted [rebroadcast]
For this week’s rebroadcast, we revisit an episode on the U.S. Census that originally aired in May 2018. New episodes return January 21 when we talk with “What is Democracy?” director Astra Taylor. Jennifer Van Hook The next census won’t start until 2020, but the U.S. Census Bureau is already hard at work on preparing to count the more than 325 million people in the United States. The census is one of the few democratic norms that’s required by the Constitution, and the data collected has wide-ranging uses. The normally routine process has been disrupted this year by Trump administration, which is pushing for the reintroduction of a question about citizenship. As you may have heard, there’s a debate going on about whether this question is appropriate, and whether the resource-strapped Census Bureau will have time to implement it before 2020. Jennifer Van Hook , Roy C. Buck Professor of Sociology and Demography at Penn State, served on the Census Advisory Board from 2007 to 2011 and is an expert on how census data is collected, how it’s evaluated, and how it’s used. She talks about the process for creating and testing new questions, the implications of asking about citizenship, and some of the ways you might not realize census data is used. Additional Information Jennifer’s piece about the Census in The Conversation 2020 Census website Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think it is necessary for a democracy to have this sort of information that the census gathers? How often do you think the census should be performed? Do you think the citizenship question should be added to the census? Why or why not? If you could add a question to the census, what would it be? Do you plan on participating in the 2020 census? Why or why not? Interview Highlights [6:06] What do you see as the role the census plays in a democracy? Jennifer: It is fundamental for a representative democracy. The United States was actually the first nation in the world to require that a census be conducted. This was done because they wanted to distribute power according to population within the states. The number of representatives each state gets in the House is proportionate to the population. Therefore, the census is very important. [7:28] In addition to determining representation in Washington, what are some of the other purposes of the census? Jennifer: One of the other uses is the civil rights legislat
Mon, December 31, 2018
When states sue the federal government [rebroadcast]
Our holiday break continues this week as we bring you an episode with with Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro that originally aired in October. Happy New Year! It seems like every few weeks, we see headlines about states banding together to block actions taken by the federal government. You might even remember former Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott quipping that he goes to the office, sues the federal government, then goes home. How do those lawsuits take shape? How does a state decide whether to join or not? How does that impact the balance of power between federal and state governments? This week’s guest is uniquely qualified to answer all of those questions. Since taking office in January 2017, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro has been involved with more than a dozen suits brought against the federal government on matters ranging from family separation at the border to EPA emissions regulations. Though Shapiro is a Democrat, he says his chief motivation in joining these suits is the rule of law and a commitment to do what’s right for people of Pennsylvania. Whether or not you agree with Shapiro’s politics, he does present an interesting take on the role that states play as a check on the federal government. This power is a unique part of the American experiment and speaks to the power of democracy in the states. Before the interview, Chris and Michael dive into the origins of federalism, including Federalist 51, the 10th Amendment, and the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution. Additional Information Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General Federalist 51 Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you think should be the balance between the states and federal government in terms of power? Do you think states should be active in legal action against the federal government? Do you think that state attorneys general are becoming too political? Do you see state as a shield to protect a state’s residents against federal overreach? Interview Highlights [5:12] When you took this office, did you expect yourself to be this active on federal issues? Shapiro: I said when I was sworn in that if someone was going to try to mess with Pennsylvania that they would have to go through me. I see the constitution as giving the states broad authority. States rights isn’t something progressives have pointed to, but it is something I value. If someone in the federal system is doing something to undermine our rights, I’m going to stand up to take action. [6:32] How do one of these suits against the federal government get started? Shapiro: The first question is whether the action comports with the rule of law. I put aside what I agree or disagree with personally and instead focus on the law. Once w
Mon, December 24, 2018
Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom [rebroadcast]
While we take a holiday break, we are going back into the archives to rebroadcast a few of our favorite episodes from earlier this year. This one originally aired in September. Mark Kissling As a piece in The Atlantic recently noted, democracy is not natural. Becoming a democratic citizen involves a set of behaviors that need to be learned and practiced over time. One of the first places for that conditioning to happen is in the classroom. Beyond reading, writing, and STEM skills, students have an opportunity to engage in dialogue and debate facilitated by their teachers and learn what it means to be part of a democracy. The term most often used to describe this is civics education, which probably brings back memories of learning about the branches of government how a bill becomes a law. As you’ll hear this week, true civics education is about so much more than that. In in a polarized political climate, are teachers afraid to engage controversial subjects? How should they address things like citizenship and patriotism? How do they have time to engage in these wide-ranging discussions given the constraints they face to prepare students for standardized tests? Mark Kissing helps budding teachers find their way — strengthening their commitments to democracy so they can pass that spirit along to their students. Mark is an assistant professor of social studies education at Penn State. His work focuses on citizenship education, or the practice of preparing civic-minded individuals. We’ve recently seen the importance of civics education play out in the months since the shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Our look at Generation Z and the future of democracy earlier this year is worth revisiting as proof that what Mark and his colleagues are teaching is having an impact. Recommended Reading Mark’s post about the National Anthem ritual on the McCourtney Institute blog Americans Aren’t Practicing Democracy : Yoni Appelbaum in The Atlantic Discussion/Reflection Questions What was your civics education like? Does anything you learned still stick with you today? What role should the formal education system play in creating civically engaged and aware young people? How should teachers and the field of education in general react to concepts such as “fake news” and alternative fa
Mon, December 17, 2018
2018: The year in democracy
Michael Berkman From gerrymandering to record voter turnout, it’s been a busy year for democracy. This doesn’t mean that everything has been positive, but there’s certainly plenty to reflect on. This week, Michael Berkman and Chris Beem take a look a look back at some of the biggest democracy-related stories of the year and look at what’s in store for next year. Chris Beem Thank you to everyone who supported Democracy Works this year. The show has been more successful than we ever imagined. If you like what you’ve heard this year, please take a minute to leave us a rating, review, or recommendation wherever you listen to podcasts. We are excited to bring you more great discussions about all things democracy in 2019. New episodes will begin in mid-January. If you have suggestions for episode topics or guests, we would love to hear them! Email us at democracyinst@psu.edu or complete our contact form . Related Episodes Checking the President’s power What can Pennsylvania voters do about gerrymandering? Generation Z and the future of democracy Facebook is not a democracy Share Tweet Google Plus Share The post 2018: The year in democracy appeared first on Democracy Works podcast .
Mon, December 10, 2018
The complicated relationship between campaign finance and democracy
Caroline Hunter In the United States, voting is a very private act. You step into the booth alone and, for a lot of people, it’s considered taboo to tell someone who you voted for. Campaign donations, however, are a different story. The Federal Election Commission, an independent regulatory agency established after Watergate, collects donor infomration from candidates, makes it available to the public, and enforces federal campaign finance laws. Anyone can go online and look up records to see who gave money to a particular candidate — to a point, anyway. In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled in Citizens United v. FEC that political spending was protected under the First Amendment. The decision opened the door to “dark money” groups that allow corporations and other organizations to give to a Political Action Committee (PAC) that in turn backs a candidate. Much of this spending is not publicly disclosed and it added up to more than $500 million in the 2018 midterms. FEC Chair Caroline Hunter joins us this week to explore the relationship between campaign finance and democracy. Hunter has been on the commission since 2008 and has seen the impact of the Citizens United ruling firsthand. She makes an interesting connection between PACs and political polarization — and how it all ties back to democratic participation. Caroline is a Penn State alumna and, prior to joining the FEC, she worked for the Republican National Committee. The FEC is a bipartisan commission with three Republicans and three Democrats, though two positions are currently vacant. Caroline talks about how that bipartisan nature might expand to other parts of the government and who reads FEC filings. Additional Information Federal Election Commission website Citizens United v. FEC Discussion/Reflection Questions What impact do you think the Citizens United ruling had on campaigns in America? Should people be able to donate to a particular issue group without their names being made public? Would the public sharing of donors names prevent you from giving to a particular campaign? Are you worried about “dark money?” What changes, if any, would you like to see made to campaign finance regulation? Interview Highlights What is the mission of the FEC? Hunter: Many think that the Federal Election Commission has control over election administration, which it does not. State elections are run by state and local governments. What does the day to day work of the commission look like? Hunter: It receives many complaints from the public about things people see in campa
Thu, December 06, 2018
Capturing the nation’s mood
Eric Plutzer We end almost every episode of the show with four questions that come from the McCourtney Institute for Democracy’s Mood of the Nation Poll . Rather than simply addressing people agree agree or disagree with a particular point of view, the poll uses open-ended responses to understand why people feel the way they do. Every poll asks respondents to describe in their own words what makes them angry, proud, worried, and hopeful about politics and current events. We interview a lot of smart people on this show and it’s not surprising the they have interesting and thought-provoking responses to these questionsl. We revisit some of those responses in this episode and hear from Eric Plutzer, the poll’s director, about how what our guests say matches up with what everyday citizens say in the poll. Responses in this episode Anger [2:30] Rebecca Kreitzer, University of North Carolina [5:02] Brad Vivian, Penn State Pride [8:14] Forrest Briscoe, Penn State [10:19] David Frum, The Atlantic Worry [13:42] Robert Asen, the University of Wisconsin [16:24] Lara Putnam, the University of Pittsburgh Hope [20:10] Sophia McClennen, Penn State [20:43] Michael Mann, Penn State Additional Information Mood of the Nation Poll
Mon, December 03, 2018
Are land-grant universities still “democracy’s colleges?”
Land-grant universities were once known as “democracy’s colleges,” places where people who were not wealthy elites could earn the education necessary to make better lives for themselves and contribute to the greater social good in the process. The The United States does not have a national university, but the Morrill Land-Grant Acts of 1862 and 1890 established a public university in each state. Penn State, Pennsylvania’s land-grant university, is the home of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy and this podcast. We invited Nick Jones, the University’s Executive Vice President and Provost, to join us this week for a conversations about the tension between staying true to the land-grant mission and ensuring that the university remains financially stable as funding from the state remains flat or declines. We also talk about the the skills needed to be good democratic citizens and the skills needed to obtain a high-paying job — and why land-grant universities in particular must pay attention to both. Recommended Reading Chronicle of Higher Education article on the role of universities in a democracy Land-Grant Universities for the Future Land-grant universities as “democracy’s colleges” Why doesn’t the United States have a national university? Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you see as a university’s key responsibilities? How do you think the role of university has changed over time? Do you think schools have done a good job making their case as to the importance of higher education? What do you think is contributing to the trend of many seeing higher education as being less valuable than it once was? Do you fear that universities will be poisoned by the level of political polarization that we’ve seen take hold of so many institutions over the last few years? How can universities address the problems pointed to in the last two questions? If you are either a current student or a college graduate, do you think you’re getting a good return on your investment? Interview Highlights Land grant universities have often been referred to as ‘schools for the people’ in the sense that they’re accessible to the pubic. To what extent do you think this label still applies to such institutions? Nick: I absolutely believe th
Mon, November 26, 2018
Norman Eisen’s love letter to democracy
As we’ve previously discussed, there are a lot of books about democracy filling book store and library shelves right now. Norman Eisen could have written a book in the vein of Daniel Ziblatt and Steven Levitsky’s How Democracies Die or David Frum’s Trumpocracy , but chose to go in a different direction. In The Last Palace , he tells the story of the Petschek Palace, where he lived while serving as U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic. The palace and its residents sought to defend liberal democracy throughout both world wars and the Cold War. The book, which one review calls a “love letter to liberal democracy,” also shows the ways in which ambassadors do the hard work of democracy abroad. Eisen describes the cycles of democracy that occurred as public support waxed and waned over the years. He says that we are now an inflection point that will determine support for liberal democracy moving forward. Ever the optimist, he’s confident that democracy will come through this seemingly dark period to triumph once again. Eisen is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at Brookings and chair of Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington . Prior to becoming ambassador, he advised the Obama administration on ethics — a job that earned him the unofficial title “ethics czar.” Additional Information Norman Eisen’s book The Last Palace: Europe’s Turbulent Century in Five Lives and One Legendary House Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you think is the role of an ambassador? What impact do you think corruption has on democracy? Where do you see democracy being harmed by corruption around the world? There have been claims that corruption is harming democracy here at home. Do you agree? During the interview, Norman Eisen spoke to the ability of democracies to be strong and fight back against corruption. Do you think the United States is in a good position to be able to fight back against efforts to undermine our democracy both at home and abroad? What do you make of the large number of vacant ambassadorships currently in America? Interview Highlights [5:20] What made you want to tell the story that you tell in your book The Last Palace? Eisen: There were multiple objecti
Mon, November 19, 2018
Winning the “democracy lottery”
Robin Teater It’s not the Powerball or the Mega Millions, but this democracy lottery does give people the chance to directly impact information that appears on the ballot in their state. Like a lot of things we talk about on this show, the Citizens Initiative Review (CIR) is not easy, but as you’ll hear from this week’s guests, is work worth doing. CIRs, which organizers called the “democracy lottery,” bring together groups of voters in an intensive four-day, jury-like setting to research the basic facts of initiatives and referenda on the ballot. These citizen panels draft joint statements that provide clear, concise, and accurate information to their fellow voters, removed from campaign messaging and financial influence. It’s been implemented in Oregon, Arizona, and California, and is currently in a pilot phase in Massachusetts. Our guests have been at the forefront of making this process happen. John Gastil Robin Teater is the Executive Director of Healthy Democracy, an organization that designs and coordinates innovative deliberative democracy programs. The organization helped implement the CIR process and remains committed to helping it expand across the United States. John Gastil is a Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences and Political Science at Penn State and an expert on deliberative democracy. He’s studied CIRs throughout the United States and Europe. His research gauges how effective CIRs are at making voters more informed, and how being part of a CIR impacts participants. This is our first show on deliberative democracy. It’s a topic we hope to return to soon. Additional Information Healthy Democracy John Gastil’s work on the Citizens Initiative Review Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think the Citizens Initiative Review is an effective way to educate people about complicated or numerous ballot initiatives? Would you prefer to read the measure yourself or have a summary provided for you? Do you trust the process as described as being non-partisan or free from the influence of interest groups? Could the CIR process work in your state or country? Why or why not? What other applications do you think this program could have beyond its current use in the area of ballot initiatives? Interview Highlights [5:00] What is a Citizens Initiative Review? Robin: It involves a randomly selected group of registered voters between the ages of twenty and twenty four. They’ll spend rough
Mon, November 12, 2018
From soldier-statesman to the warrior ethos: Gen. Wesley Clark on the military and democracy
Gen. Wesley Clark We observe Veterans Day this week, a time when people across the United States remember and thank those who have served in the military. While the military remains one of the most respected institutions in the U.S., it’s also one of the most misunderstood. Active duty service members represent less than one percent of the U.S. population and service has increasingly become something that is limited to the communities that surround military bases and the families who live there. As the military’s makeup has shifted, so too has it ideology — to one that is increasingly focused on combat rather than diplomacy.Things didn’t always used to be this way. Up until the end of the draft in the early 1970s, service provided an economic opportunity for millions of Americans and shined a light onto what it meant to serve the country with duty and honor. With more than 30 years in the military and a subsequent career in politics, Gen. Wesley Clark has a unique perspective on this transformation, and some ideas about how to bridge the empathy gap between soldiers and civilians. We also talked with him about veterans running for political office, his support of Colin Kaepernick, and whether democratic dissent has a place in the military. Clark visited Penn State to promote Renew America, a new nonpartisan organization aimed at reducing polarization and ideological divides in America. Recommended Reading Warriors & Citizens: American Views of Our Military — by Kori Schake and Jim Mattis Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think military service has changed in America? If so, do you think that change is good or bad? Do you think it’s a problem that a vast majority of our military comes from a shrinking portion of society compared to when a draft was in place? General Clark speaks about the importance of all young people being involved in the protection of the nation or service in some way. Do you think this is something we should require from young people? General Clark also speak about the need for national service in terms other than military. Can you think of any way to implement such a program? Do you agree with General Clarks’s stance on this and his support of Kaepernick? During the episode, the issue of a “warrior ethos” is brought up where the military is becoming more combat minded. What do you think about this? What changes would you make to the military today to improve it? Interview Highlights [4:30] What inspired you about Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s “Duty, Honor, Country” speech? General Cl
Mon, November 05, 2018
Protecting democracy from foreign interference — recorded live at the National Press Club
Laura Rosenberger With the midterms this week, all eyes are on the threat of election hacking and interference. Electoral integrity is important, but as you’ll hear in this week’s episode, the threats to American democracy go much deeper than that to the very basis of information and conversation. Laura Rosenberger has been one of the most important voices in the efforts to combat this interference and ensure that democracy becomes even stronger and more resilient. Laura is the director of the Alliance for Securing Democracy and a senior fellow at The German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF). Before she joined GMF, she was foreign policy advisor for Hillary for America, where she coordinated development of the campaign’s national security policies, messaging, and strategy. Prior to that, she served in a range of positions at the State Department and the White House’s National Security Council (NSC). She describes the lack of response to foreign interference prior to 2016 as a “failure of imagination” and, through her work at the German Marshal Fund, is determined to ensure that imagination does not fail again. Laura is a Penn State alumna and a member of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy’s Board of Visitors. This week’s episode was recorded live at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Additional Information Hamilton 68: Tracking Russian Influence Operations on Twitter Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you believe that Russia and other foreign entities are trying to interfere with our democratic norms and institutions? Why or why not? How much damage do you think these attacks can have on our country? Do you think you’ve come across any Russian “bots” on social media? During the interview, Laura stated that she wants social media companies to take more action to prevent these attacks. Do you think they have a responsibility to take action? If so, what should they be doing? Are you concerned that in an effort to limit the effectiveness of these attacks we might infringe upon our own rights such as freedom of speech? Do you think our institutions will survive these attacks going forward? Interview Highlights [3:25] What are you hoping to accomplish with the Alliance for Securing Democracy? Laura: It is a bipartisan effort founded a little over a year ago. Some are surprised to see a volunteer for Hillary Clinton and a volunteer for Marco Rubio work together in an organization like this. My response to that is that if we can’t work together to defend democracy, then we’ve really lost a lot. We disagree on many issues, but i
Mon, October 29, 2018
Will Millennials disrupt democracy?
Stella Rouse From cooking to shopping to getting around town, disruption is the name of the game for Millennials. Will they do the same thing to democracy? Millennials, or those born between 1981 and 1996, are now largest generational group in the United States. There’s been a lot of talk lately about whether these 20 and 30-somethings will vote in the 2018 midterms. This episode touches on that, but also explores some of the reasons why Millennials feel disengaged from voting and other traditional forms of political engagement. Our guest this week literally wrote the book on this topic. Stella Rouse is co-author of The Politics of Millennials , which draws upon existing data about Millennials, as well as surveys and focus groups that Stella and co-author Ashely Ross conducted. They found that events like 9/11 an the 2008 financial crisis profoundly shaped the way Millennials view the world and their place within it — views that run counter to older generations and their views of democratic engagement. Stella is an Associate Professor in the Department of Government and Politics, Director of the Center for American Politics and Citizenship, and Associate Director of the University of Maryland Critical Issues Poll at the University of Maryland. Additional Information The Politics of Millennials Can young people revive civic engagement? A conversation with Peter Levine of The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think Millennials are politically active? If so, do you see them engaged more traditionally in campaigns and voting or non-traditionally in the form of protests? How do you think Millennials world views will translate into public policy? If you are not a Millennial, what is the biggest difference you see between this younger generation and your own? Also, what similarities do you see? What do you think the political views of this generation will look like in 20 years? Interview Highlights [4:49] How do you define a millennial and what about them made you interested in studying their generation further? Stella: Generally the accepted timeframe is those from the late 80’s to the late 90’s. Millennial are those who grew up mostly around the turn of the century. [5:30] What are the identity characteristics of this generation? Stella: It’s composed of a number of factors. Most notably, it is a very diverse generation in American history. They’ve lived around different races and e
Mon, October 22, 2018
David Frum on developing the habits of democracy
Around the McCourtney Institute, we like to say that we’re “partisans for democracy.” We can think of few people who better embody that notion today than David Frum. He was among the first people to talk about the Trump administration’s impact on democracy and remains one of the loudest voices defending democratic norms in the United States. David is a longtime contributor to The Atlantic and author of Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic . The book was part of our democracy summer reading list and we invited him to speak at Penn State earlier this fall. In many ways, this conversation speaks to the very idea of this podcast. Democracy, no matter where it’s happening in the world, is most successful when people come together to build something greater than the sum of its parts. As you’ll hear, David is a strong advocate for joining organizations that require deliberation and working with people who might hold different political beliefs than you do — in person and away from social media. The gradual shift away from those habits of democracy is one of the things that paved the way for the Trumpocracy that David writes about in his book. Rebuilding those habits, he says, is part of the cure for what ails democracy and must happen in tandem with voting to restore faith in democratic institutions and reduce polarization. For more on democratic erosion, listen to our interview with How Democracies D ie author Daniel Ziblatt . Additional Information Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic David Frum’s writing at The Atlantic Interview Highlights [6:06] Was Trump’s candidacy the reason you started righting about the state of democracy in America? David: It was a catalyst in the sense that a catalyst triggers a response between elements that were already present. In the spring of 2015 I was doing a story in Hungary where fascism has been on the rise. However, that story was cannibalized due to the fact that what we had observed over there was starting to happen here. I was sort of ready for what we’re seeing now. [7:29] Can you explain your journey from being a well known conservative to someone who voted for Hillary Clinton? David: I remain a very conservative person today. When the question next comes up in an election, people might be surprised to see me retain those conservative views. However, these values have to be able to play out in a stable democratic framework. The lessons of Europe should teach us that the institutions that we see today
Mon, October 15, 2018
When states sue the federal government
It seems like every few weeks, we see headlines about states banding together to block actions taken by the federal government. You might even remember former Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott quipping that he goes to the office, sues the federal government, then goes home. How do those lawsuits take shape? How does a state decide whether to join or not? How does that impact the balance of power between federal and state governments? This week’s guest is uniquely qualified to answer all of those questions. Since taking office in January 2017, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro has been involved with more than a dozen suits brought against the federal government on matters ranging from family separation at the border to EPA emissions regulations. Though Shapiro is a Democrat, he says his chief motivation in joining these suits is the rule of law and a commitment to do what’s right for people of Pennsylvania. Whether or not you agree with Shapiro’s politics, he does present an interesting take on the role that states play as a check on the federal government. This power is a unique part of the American experiment and speaks to the power of democracy in the states. Before the interview, Chris and Michael dive into the origins of federalism, including Federalist 51, the 10th Amendment, and the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution. Additional Information Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General Federalist 51 Discussion/Reflection Questions What do you think should be the balance between the states and federal government in terms of power? Do you think states should be active in legal action against the federal government? Do you think that state attorneys general are becoming too political? Do you see state as a shield to protect a state’s residents against federal overreach? Interview Highlights [5:12] When you took this office, did you expect yourself to be this active on federal issues? Shapiro: I said when I was sworn in that if someone was going to try to mess with Pennsylvania that they would have to go through me. I see the constitution as giving the states broad authority. States rights isn’t something progressives have pointed to, but it is something I value. If someone in the federal system is doing something to undermine our rights, I’m going to stand up to take action. [6:32] How do one of these suits against the federal government get started? Shapiro: The first question is whether the action comports with the rule of law. I put aside what I agree or disagree with personally and instead focus on the law. Once we deem that an illegal a
Mon, October 08, 2018
How “if it bleeds, it leads” impacts democracy
Peter Enns The problems with the prison system in the U.S. have been well documented, but what’s not talked about nearly as often is how things got this way. Why does there seem to be such enthusiasm for putting people in jail? One answer might be the shift toward “risk management policing” that Frank Baumgartner described in last week’s episode , but there’s something else at play — and that’s what we explore this week with Peter Enns. Peter is an associate professor of Government at Cornell University and author of Incarceration Nation: How the United States Became the Most Punitive Democracy in the World . Peter argues that, since the 1970s, media coverage has shaped public opinion about incarceration, which lead to an increase in people going to prison even as the crime rate went down. This created a vicious cycle of people seeing news about crimes, becoming more supportive of punitive measures, and a shift away from viewing prison as a rehabilitative experience. Much like we heard from last week about the empathy gap in policing, a similar gap exists between the people going to jail and the people watching or reading news stories about the criminal justice system. Peter taught in Cornell’s prison education program and saw firsthand what daily life looks like for inmates and the possibilities that exist for prison reform programs. One final note: We added a new voice into the mix this week. Andy Grant, our audio engineer, had some questions for Peter that you’ll hear toward the end of the interview. Additional Information Peter’s book, Incarceration Nation Cornell Prison Education Program Discussion/Reflection Questions Why do you think the general public has largely supported more punitive measures over the last several decades? Do you think the saying ‘if it bleeds, it leads’ holds true? What role do you think media has here? What other changes would you make to the current criminal justice system? Is it antithetical to a democratic society to have so many people incarcerated? We have a very high recidivism rate. This means once you’ve been to jail, you’re likely to end up going back due to a parole violation or another violation. How do you think the system can better prepare convicts to get out and stay out? Going forward, do you think our incarceration rate will decrease? Interview Highlights [4:58] Why do so many people in the United States want others to face jail time? Peter: A Key to this study is noting how public o
Mon, October 01, 2018
A story about democracy, told through 20 million traffic stops
The lights flash in your rearview mirror as the police car comes up behind you. A sinking feeling forms in the pit of your stomach as the officer approaches. Sound familiar? However, this is where the story can differ greatly depending on who you are and where you live. If you’re African-American or Latino, you are much more likely to be searched or have your vehicle searched — and much more likely to be pulled over in the first place, according to research conducted by analyzing data from millions traffic stops in North Carolina over more than a decade. Frank Baumgartner, Robert J. Richardson Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, lead the team that analyzed the data published the book Suspect Citizens: What 20 Million Traffic Stops Tell Us About Policing and Race.” In the book, Frank and his colleagues make the case that an empathy gap exists between people with political and social power and the people who are most likely to be pulled over. The result is that segments of the population who are already disenfranchised become even more distrustful of the police and the government and less likely to vote and otherwise engage with democracy. We’ve long heard that racially-motivated police violence is the result of a few “bad apple” officers. However, the data from North Carolina show a much more pervasive suspicion from police officers about young men of color. Combined with a move toward what Frank describes as “risk management” policing, the result is a clear pattern of behavior that has direct implications on democratic participation. P.S. A huge thank you to everyone who supported us in the 2018 Podcast Awards . We are incredibly humbled and grateful to have won during our first year. More Information Suspect Citizens: What 20 Million Traffic Stops Tell Us About Policing and Race Frank’s profile on the Scholars Strategy Network Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you believe that there is racial bias in policing in America? Based on your own experience with law enforcement, do you trust the police? Do your interactions with law enforcement impact your view of the government and your willingness to engage in democracy? Do you think the aim of police should be to solve crime or try to prevent crime? Do you think policing in America is getting better? Why or why not? Interview Highlights [3:41] How did you come about the data for this book? Frank: An investigative reporter in North Carolina cond
Mon, September 24, 2018
Breaking the silence in Syria
We’ve talked before on this show about the importance of a free press, but this week’s episode brings a whole new meaning to the term. In 2014, Abdalaziz Alhamza and his friends started social media accounts to document the atrocities being committed by ISIS in their city of Raqqa. They called themselves Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently (RBSS) and their work quickly grew into a website and a social movement that garnered international attention. RBSS brought the work of citizen journalists to a global audience and helped provide a counter to increasingly sophisticated ISIS propaganda. Their work was chronicled in the 2017 documentary City of Ghosts. Aziz visited Penn State for a screening of the film sponsored by Penn State’s Center for Global Studies, which is lead by friend of our podcast Sophia McClennen. ISIS was removed from Syra last year, but that does not mean life in Raqqa has improved. Aziz and his colleagues are now working to report on the Asad regime and militias who are trying to take power from it. They are also working to empower citizen journalists in other countries and help defend the free press at a time when “fake news” has become a rallying cry for authoritarian leaders around the world. Additional Information Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently City of Ghosts documentary Discussion/Reflection Questions How significant do you think groups like Aziz’s were in pushing back ISIS? Given their access to information locally in the city, do you think they are a better new source than a foreign outlet such as CNN? What was your initial reaction with Aziz mentioned that friends and family had been killed while trying to do their work as citizen journalists? Does what they went through and are still going through change your view of journalists? Does listening to the struggles of Aziz and his organization change your perception of democracy in America? Would you be willing to take on the challenges and risks of covering the actions of ISIS if you were in Aziz’s situation? Interview Highlights [5:50] What has happened in Raqqa since the end of the film? Aziz: A campaign began to defeat ISIS. However, this brought with it a lot of violence. Nearly 80% of the city has been destroyed. Most of the people have been displaced. The media stoped paying attention once ISIS was pushed out of the city. This is why we kept out campaign going to continue to share information about the city. There are still a lot of things happening in the city. For example, people are still being killed every day. They are still finding bombs in the city. Also, th
Mon, September 17, 2018
Citizenship, patriotism, and democracy in the classroom
As a piece in The Atlantic recently noted, democracy is not natural. Becoming a democratic citizen involves a set of behaviors that need to be learned and practiced over time. One of the first places for that conditioning to happen is in the classroom. Beyond reading, writing, and STEM skills, students have an opportunity to engage in dialogue and debate facilitated by their teachers and learn what it means to be part of a democracy. The term most often used to describe this is civics education, which probably brings back memories of learning about the branches of government how a bill becomes a law. As you’ll hear this week, true civics education is about so much more than that. In in a polarized political climate, are teachers afraid to engage controversial subjects? How should they address things like citizenship and patriotism? How do they have time to engage in these wide-ranging discussions given the constraints they face to prepare students for standardized tests? Mark Kissing helps budding teachers find their way — strengthening their commitments to democracy so they can pass that spirit along to their students. Mark is an assistant professor of social studies education at Penn State. His work focuses on citizenship education, or the practice of preparing civic-minded individuals. We’ve recently seen the importance of civics education play out in the months since the shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Our look at Generation Z and the future of democracy earlier this year is worth revisiting as proof that what Mark and his colleagues are teaching is having an impact. Recommended Reading Mark’s post about the National Anthem ritual on the McCourtney Institute blog Americans Aren’t Practicing Democracy : Yoni Appelbaum in The Atlantic Discussion/Reflection Questions What was your civics education like? Does anything you learned still stick with you today? What role should the formal education system play in creating civically engaged and aware young people? How should teachers and the field of education in general react to concepts such as “fake news” and alternative facts? When a significant current event happens, should teachers and professors take time away from the structured curriculum to address it? Given the access that students have to informatio
Mon, September 10, 2018
Behind the scenes of the “Year of the Woman”
Rebecca Kreitzer One of the biggest headlines to emerge heading into the 2018 midterms is the record number of female candidates in local, state, and national races. While it’s easy to point to this a post-Trump reaction, there’s much more that goes into persuading women to run and helping them raise the money and build the relationships needed to make it into office. Rebecca Kreitzer, an assistant professor of public policy at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill has been studying the groups that exist to help elect women into office. She and Tracy Osborn from the University of Iowa have counted more than 400 groups around the country modeled in the tradition of Emily’s List. Much like the groups Lara Putnam described , this is grassroots-level politics in action with women working to promote each other and make their voices heard. As you’ll hear Rebecca describe, there are several reasons why it’s important for women to have a voice in the legislature. However, with so many groups operating at the same time, there are bound to be conflicts and missteps, which Rebecca has also studied. This interview was recorded at the 2018 American Political Science Association State Politics and Policy Conference, which was held at Penn State in June. Discussion/Reflection Questions How important is diversity in a legislature for a democracy? How (if at all) do you think our democracy would change if there were more women in office? Rebecca mentioned that female candidates are a harder time raising money. Why do you think this is? What do you think is the best way to elect more women into office? According to Rebecca, many group that support female candidates use abortion as a litmus test to determine whether or not to endorse someone. What do you think about this policy? Beyond women, are there other groups you feel need to have a higher level of representation in elected office? Interview Highlights [4:09] Why do these groups exist for female candidates? Rebecca: Around the world, there are structure in place to ensure a share of female representation in office, such as quotas. However, that doesn’t exist in the United States. In addition, you have other factors, such as the fact that women tend to have lower levels of political ambition. They also need to be encouraged to run for office. Unfortunately, elected officials are less likely to encourage women to run for office. These groups are all around the country. Some of them are feder
Mon, September 03, 2018
The democrats in public sector unions [Labor Day rebroadcast]
Paul Clark This week, we are rebraodcasting our conversation about public sector unions from earlier this year with Paul Clark, director of the School of Labor and Employment Relations at Penn State. Paul talks about how these unions exist at at all levels of government — from bureaucrats to bus drivers. Many could find higher wages in the private sector, but are drawn to civil service out of a desire contribute to the public good. Public sector union participation is higher than it is in the private sector, but in some cases the bargaining power those unions have is limited. Despite that, Paul says that these union members are finding creative ways to make their voices heard, which one of the fundamental elements of a democracy. This episode was recorded before the J anus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Supreme Court decision in late June. In a 5-4 decision, the Court ruled that public sector unions that collected dues from non-members were violating the First Amendment by doing so. The impacts of the ruling mostly have yet to be seen, but as Paul explains, the loss of revenue could further weaken unions moving forward.
Mon, August 27, 2018
Middle America, Part 2: Grassroots organizing and rebooting democracy
Last week, we heard from Salena Zito about the segments of middle America who supported Donald Trump after voting for Barack Obama. This week, we talk with another Pittsburgh resident, Lara Putnam , about a different version of Middle America — the college-educated, middle-aged suburban women who have dusted off the organizing skills honed through decades of volunteering to affect change in their communities. Lara is a Professor and Chair of the History Department at the University of Pittsburgh and co-author with Theda Skockpol of the article “Middle America Reboots Democracy.” in the journal Democracy . She argues that grassroots work is happening behind the scenes in “purple” suburbs, areas that are ignored in the red state/blue state and urban/rural media narratives. Grassroots groups like those Lara observed in western Pennsylvania are mixing traditional organizing tactics with social media to raise awareness and push for change at the local and state levels, far away from the divisions that bog down national politics. To borrow a line from the article, “If your question is how the panorama of political possibility has shifted since November 2016, your story needs to begin here.” Thank you to WESA and WYEP in Pittsburgh for allowing us to use their community studio to record this interview with Lara. Additional Information Middle America Reboots Democracy in Democracy: A Journal of Ideas Discussion/Reflection Questions What is the relationship between social engagement and political engagement? How does the populism Salena Zito described differ from the populism behind the groups Lara observed? Lara argues that local grassroots groups have been overlooked by the media and national political parties. Do you agree? If so, why do you think it’s happening? Both Republican and Democratic grassroots appear to want to make America great again. Can both visions of America coexist? Is there a possibility that these two less ideological groups merge into a new political coalition? Lara said that many of the grassroots groups she observed are lead by middle class women. Do you think the tone or activities of these groups would be different if they were run by younger women? Or by men? Interview Highlights [3:28] As a history professor, how did you come to write about a poli
Mon, August 20, 2018
Middle America, Part 1: Populism and the Trump Voter
In the effort to understand the people who voted for Donald Trump in 2016, a style of reporting has emerged that Chris Hayes recently described as “ Trump pastoral .” You might not know the phrase, but, but you’ve probably read a piece or two like this in the past few years: Salena Zito A reporter from a national media outlet based in a big city visits a small town in a rural community and spends a little bit of time there trying to understand the people who live there and why they are attracted to Trump. That sounds great in theory, but the life of an urban media professional and a small town working-class person can be pretty different, which makes it difficult to build the trust needed for a true window into emotions and motivations. Salena Zito is trying to change that. She grew up in Pittsburgh and splits her time between small-town events and CNN’s airwaves. Along the way, she’s learned a thing or two about what caused parts of the country to vote for Donald Trump after voting for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012. She captures those stories in a book called The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics , which was part of our democracy summer reading list episode. We traveled to Pittsburgh to talk with Salena about how she gets to know people and what everyone can learn about trying to understand those who live different lives than we do. The lessons she’s learned apply far beyond journalism. We also talked about the coalitions that Salena and co-author Brad Todd argue helped Donald Trump become president, and whether they will remain in tact moving forward. This is the first episode of two that will look at what’s going on in “Middle America.” Next week, you’ll hear from Lara Putnam, a professor at the University of Pittsburgh, who offers a different take. Additional Information Salena Zito’s book, The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics Discussion/Reflection Questions Many of the voters Salena interviewed said that the 2016 election was about something more than Donald Trump. What were those bigger ideas? Did Trump create the new coalition Salena describes, or was he in the right place at the right time? What does the new coalition Salena describes say about the future of political parties in the U.S.? Think about a time when you went outside of your comfort zone to
Mon, August 13, 2018
Facebook is not a democracy
Matt Jordan We have access to more information now than at any other time in history, but we trust that information less than ever before. A Gallup survey recently found that 58 percent of respondents felt less informed because of today’s information abundance. As with a lot of things in life, too much of a good thing might not be so good after all. If you’ve followed any of the recent news about Facebook — from Mark Zuckerberg’s comments about Holocaust survivors to the decision to ban InfoWars — you’ve probably heard the company make claims about giving its community a voice and other things that sound very democratic. However, as Matt Jordan explains in this episode, that is not the case at all. At the end of the day, Facebook is a company and its goal is to make a profit. The result of that, Matt argues, is an algorithm-fueled avalanche of information that mixes news with opinion and fact with fiction to reinforce existing thoughts and feelings rather than exposing us to new ideas and perspectives. Matt has also spent time studying the history of the term fake news and found that it goes back much farther than Donald Trump. He talks about how fake news in 2018 looks different than it did in 1918 and what responsibility journalists and news consumers have to push back against it. Matt is an associate professor of media studies at Penn State and co-director of the Social Thought Program. For a look at how journalists are working in this media landscape, check out our interview from last season with Halle Stockton of PublicSource, a nonprofit news organization in Pittsburgh. Note: This episode was recorded before Alex Jones and InfoWars were banned from Facebook, YouTube, iTunes, and other platforms. Recommended Reading Matt’s article on the history of fake news How can democracy thrive in the digital age? From the Knight Foundation Commission on Trust, Media, and Democracy Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think that Facebook’s mission of building community is a cover up for collecting and selling data? Have the scandals surrounding Facebook and other social media over the past year changed your view of the platforms or how you use them? What role should social media play in a democracy? Do you think we’ll ever move away from a scenario where people use social media as
Mon, August 06, 2018
How will we remember Charlottesville?
This weekend marks the one-year anniversary of the Unite The Right rally and counter protests in Charlottesville, Virginia that claimed the life of Heather Heyer and set off a firestorm around President Trump’s remarks about who was to blame for the violence. One year later, the Robert E. Lee statue at the center of the controversy is still there, and it seems the conversation about what it stands for has stalled. Brad Vivian The Lee statue is part of a complicated public memory about the south’s Confederate past. These shared stories of the Civil War and what it means make it difficult to change the conversation and have a productive dialogue about how to move forward. Joining us to unpack the public memory around Charlottesville is Brad Vivian . He is the director of the McCourtney Institute’s Center for Democratic Deliberation and a professor of Communication Arts and Sciences at Penn State. Brad studies public memory, particularly around Confederate iconography. He also grew up in the Charlottesville area and recounts some of his experiences there during the interview. We are excited to begin the second season of Democracy Works with such an important and timely topic. If you like what you hear, make sure to rate and review us wherever you get your podcasts. Recommended Reading Brad’s op-ed about Charlottesville and democracy in the Philadelphia Inquirer Vinegar Hill neighborhood, by the Virginia Foundation for Humanities History of Market Street Park, now known as Emancipation Park Brad’s book, Commonplace Witnessing: Rhetorical Invention, Historical Remembrance, and Public Culture Discussion/Reflection Questions What are your memories of the events in Charlottesville in the summer of 2017? Do you think that the national narrative following the events was focused on the right issues? What do you think leads to the development of an inaccurate memory of past events? Especially ones that tend to look at past actions through rose colored glasses? How do you think the concept of public memory relates to democracy? What do you think we can do to ensure that the story of past events maintains more truth over the years? Interview Highlights [
Mon, July 09, 2018
A democracy reading list
If you’ve been to a book store or the library lately, then you’ve probably seen at least a few books on democracy on the shelves. The 2016 presidential election spurred a lot of conversation about the current state of our democracy and where things go from here. These books are not what most people would call beach reading, but they are important to understanding what’s happening in the U.S. and around the world right now. We know you probably don’t have time to read all of them. Hopefully this episode will help you choose one or two to tackle. Here’s the rundown of the books we discuss: [2:51] How Democracies Die (Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt) [5:35] The People vs. Democracy: Why Our Freedom is in Danger and How to Save It (Yascha Mounk) [11:36] The Retreat of Western Liberalism (Edward Luce) [16:32] Devil’s Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the Presidency (Joshua Green) [21:40] The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics (Salena Zito and Bradd Todd) [30:23] Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic (David Frum) [35:36] One Nation After Trump: A Guide for the Perplexed, the Disillusioned, the Desperate, and the Not-Yet Deported (E.J. Dionne Jr., Norman Ornstein, Thomas Mann) [39:44] Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and the Election of Donald Trump (Michael Isikoff and David Corn) [43:04] The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels (Jon Meacham) [45:37] The Monarchy of Fear: A Philosopher Looks at Our Political Crisis (Martha C. Nussbaum) And here are a few others we recommend but didn’t have time to discuss in this episode: The List: A Week By Week Reckoning of Trump’s First Year (Amy Siskind) The Common Good (Robert Reich) Suicide of the West (Jonah Goldberg) Daring Democracy: Igniting Power, Meaning, and Connection for the America We Want (Frances Moore Lappe and Adam Eichen) Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism (Ian Bremmer) Can It Happen Here? Authoritarianism In America (Cass Sunstein) Ratf**ked: Why Your vote Doesn’t Count (David Daley) <
Thu, July 05, 2018
Bonus: A dose of optimism about the future of democracy
If you need a sense of hope about the future of democracy, you’ve come to the right place. Stephanie Keyaka, editor-in-chief of The Underground and one of the McCourtney Institute’s Nevins Fellows , is spending the summer interning for Zeke Cohen on the Baltimore City Council. She believes Baltimore is on the cusp of something big and is doing everything she can to help bring that change to fruition. Stephanie’s spent her summer canvassing in support of an amendment that will give the council and the city’s residents more control over its budget and answering calls from city residents who are looking for help for problems ranging from the serious to the mundane. During the course of those conversations, she’s had the chance to deliver some optimism about the city’s future. The Underground is an all-digital news platform at Penn State that covers campus and community events through a multicultural lens. Stephanie sees firsthand the power of the free press in a democracy and tries to instill a sense of passion and tenacity in the reporters she oversees. Stephanie, like all of our Nevins Fellows, is extremely bright and very well spoken. It’s hard not to feel at least a little hopeful about the future of democracy with people like her poised to take the reins.
Mon, July 02, 2018
The constitutional crisis episode
This is one we’ve been wanting to do since we started the podcast. The term constitutional crisis is frequently used but often misunderstood. Like democracy, it’s hard to define but you know it when you see it. If anyone can provide a definition, it’s Jud Mathews , an associate professor of law at Penn State. He has a law degree and a Ph.D. in political science. Jud says we’re not in a constitutional crisis yet, but that constitutional norms — much like democratic norms — are eroding more and more each day. Jud also cautions against using the term constitutional crisis too loosely because of the “boy who cried wolf” problem that we’ll become so desensitized that we won’t recognize one when it actually occurs. Beyond being a legal scholar, he has made the Constitution his life’s work. He’s passionate about what it represents and understandably upset to see its force as a roadmap for the country called into question. If there’s one bright spot to take from this conversation, it’s that there are many dedicated public servants throughout the government who are committed to upholding constitutional norms and preventing a crisis from occurring. Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think were currently in a constitutional crisis? If so, what role do you think citizens play in solving it? In a situation similar to that described above where one branch ignores the constitutional order of another, how should we go about enforcing the rule of law? Are you concerned that the pace at which current events develops today will prevent us from either identifying a constitutional crisis or being able to handle it when we spot it? What role do you think the rising polarization of politics will have in being able to handle and correct a constitutional crisis if one were to develop? Interview Highlights [3:00] What is a constitutional crisis? Jud: You can think of the constitution as a road map. One way to think about a constitutional crisis is that the government is going off the road or off the rails. Such a situation could be the fault of the public or it could be the fault of the document itself. For example, we might face a situation that the constitution does provide guidance for. Fortunately, this doesn’t happen very much in our system. It is also possible that the constitution does provide clear guidance, but we have a single actor who simply refused to follow this guidance and do what they want. [4:30] Are there examples where we’ve been in such a situation in the past? Jud: I think the biggest example that people would look at would be the secession preceding the Civil War. The constitution doesn’t really tell us what to do when a state wants to leave. This ar
Mon, June 25, 2018
Unpacking political polarization
Polarization is a term that’s thrown around among political pundits as one reason for the decline of American democracy — often without an explanation of what it really means. We’re even guilty of it on this show. To set the record straight, we talk with Boris Shor , an assistant professor at the University of Houston and an expert on political polarization. Boris breaks down what polarization means, and how it looks different in the legislature and in public opinion. This is an important distinction that is often lost in the efforts to frame the narrative in a tweet or a soundbite. He also argues that polarization is not always an negative, especially at the state level, and that it might not be time to blow up the entire party system just yet. While we hear a lot about polarization in the media and from politicians (who themselves are polarized), the rest of the country might be more in the middle than you think. This conversation was recorded at the 2018 State Politics and Policy Conference , which was hosted by the McCourtney Institute for Democracy and brought more than 100 political science scholars to Penn State. Discussion/Reflection Questions Have you seen politics become more polarized where you live? Do you think one side has become more polarized than the other? Do you think this is a dangerous trend in politics? Have you either questioned or changed your party identification recently due to increased polarization? What do you think is responsible for the increase in political polarization in American politics? Do you think this problem will get worse in the years to come? Interview Highlights [4:00] What is political polarization? Boris: Primarily, it is an ideological separation between two sides. This can also mean that the division within a particular party is decreasing. This means that the party is becoming more homogenous in terms of ideology. The internal division of ideology within parties goes away as polarization becomes more severe. [5:50] Do we see this pulling apart happening within the political parties? Boris: We are seeing this happen in the legislature. IT has been happening for a while now. It is less clear if this is happening in public opinion. In the area of public opinion, we are seeing people be more set in their parties. For example, those who may have been republicans but shift over to the Democratic Party are now much more likely to remain in the Republican Party. [7:00] What does this polarization mean for democracy? Boris: We’re concerned specifically because of how many veto points there are within our system. At many
Mon, June 18, 2018
What should voting look like in the 21st century?
Across the U.S., the process to register to vote and cast a ballot is different in every state. And we’re not just talking about minor details. The entire registration process and timeline can vary widely from one state, as do the regulations surrounding campaign finance and electoral maps. Pennsylvania tends to fall on the more restrictive side of things, and Governor Tom Wolf is trying to change that. Earlier this year, he announced the 21st Century Voting Reform Plan , which includes same day voter registration, changes to the absentee ballot process, as well as campaign finance reform. Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar traveled to each of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties to build consensus the plan. We talked with her about using technology to increase voting access without compromising voter data in the process, and about the criticism from Pennsylvania Republicans that the voting reform plan is a convenient tactic for a Democratic governor in an election year. While this episode talks specifically about Pennsylvania, the compromises that must be made across counties and municipalities exists everywhere and is indicative of why states are sometimes referred to as “laboratories of democracy.” It’s also an insight into the hard work that it takes to make large-scale change to one of the most fundamental parts of democracy. Discussion/Reflection Questions Are there any problems that you’ve noticed in your state’s voting procedures? If so, what improvements would you like to see your state enact? As voting systems move more towards technological advancements, are you worried about data security? Do you think the systems we currently use have been influenced by foreign entities? Do you think there is a political motivation behind the efforts in Pennsylvania to changing voting procedures including the redistricting campaign? Interview Highlights [4:30] What do you think of when you hear the term “electoral modification”? Kathy: We have a chance to advance both our technology as it relates to voting, as well as enabling more people to get to the polls. One example is the replacement of our aging voting machines. Also, we want to improve the way in which we register people to vote. [5:40] Can you talk a little about how the governor’s voting plan came about? Kathy: The governor is dedicated to ensuring that everyone has access to vote. Globally, we actually have a very low level of voter turnout. This plans includes not just the effort to increase vote turnout but also to address campaign finance reform and redistricting efforts. So there is a lot of work t
Mon, June 11, 2018
When the “business of business” bleeds into politics
What is the role of a corporation in a democracy? If you asked Milton Friedman, the answer would be none at all. He famously said in the 1970s that the only corporate social responsibility a company has is to turn a profit for its shareholders. Forrest Briscoe Some 40 years later, the answer to that question looks very different. Companies are increasingly stepping up to fill what they perceive to be a void left by polarized and paralyzed government. In the past year, we’ve seen Patagonia advocating to protect national parks from the Trump administration and Dick’s Sporting Goods banning the sale of assault weapons after the Parkland shooting. These organizations wield a lot of power, both financially and in swaying public opinion. Forrest Briscoe , a professor of management in Penn State’s Smeal College of Business , has been studying the gradual closing of the gaps between business, government, and civil society and talks with us about what it means for employees, for companies, and for consumers. The echo chambers we experience among our friends and our media may be bleeding over into the workplace — which has some serious implications for democracy. In a tight job market, a company’s political beliefs may even be a deciding factor when someone is considering multiple job offers. The space between business, government, and civic life is closing faster than you think. We argue that it’s not necessarily a bad thing, but something that we should be aware of as workers, consumers, and democratic citizens. Interview Highlights [5:00] How have we gone through this change of corporations being single minded on profit to now being concerned with activism? Forrest: We’ve come from a time where the idea of business doing something other than business would detract from their efforts of profit. A key characteristic which has changed over time is the fact that business and government aren’t these completely separated spheres like they used to be years ago. [6:36] What are the factors that would impact a businesses decision to get involved with a certain cause? Forrest: Sometimes companies will be forced to change because they’re being targeted by activists. However, we’re now seeing those at the top of companies wanting to actually reach out to these social movements. So we’re seeing effects work in both directions. Also, companies might see profit opportunities by embracing a certain cause or campaign. Another persuasion tactic is this use of benchmark competition that some movements have tapped into. For example, we see that LBGTQ groups have created rankings of the most friendly companies to their cause. This touches upon an driving interest amongst busine
Mon, June 04, 2018
Michael Mann’s journey through the climate wars
This episode is not about climate change. Well, not directly, anyway. Instead, we talk with Nobel Prize winner and Penn State Distinguished Professor of Meteorology Michael E. Mann about his journey through the climate wars over the past two decades and the role that experts have to play in moving out of the lab and into the spotlight to defend the scientific process. Doing so is more important now than ever, he says, as corporation-funded think tanks continue to churn out information that deliberately sows skepticism among the public about our role in climate change. But it does beg the question: How do square the idea that in a democracy, everyone’s vote is equal but everyone’s opinion is not? Mann was part of the team that created the now-infamous hockey stick graph that showed how quickly the rate of warming on the planet had accelerated during the latter half of the 20th century. In the 20 years since graph was published, he’s had his email hacked, been called to testify before Congress, and been hounded by Internet trolls long before social media existed. He chronicled those experiences in his 2012 book The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars . Despite it all, he’s more passionate than ever about spreading the good word about science and cautiously optimistic that things might turn out ok after all. Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think we have a problem in America with having rational and logical fact based discussions? If so, why do you think this has grown to be a problem? Do you think your political affiliation impacts your opinion on this issue and whether or not you’re willing to change your position on it? Can someone subscribe to an ideology yet disagree with that ideology on this particular issue or any particular issue? Interview Highlights [6:00] In 2012, you wrote a book where you expressed cautious optimism that we were heading in a positive direction on climate change. Do you still have that same level of optimism? Michael: Even today when there is cause of pessimism in the area of climate science, we are seeing progress on this issue at the state and local level. Also, we’re seeing progress on this issue of climate science in the private sector where corporations are taking it upon themselves to improve their practices. For example, when Trump pulled out of the Paris agreement, state and local leaders joined a pledge signifying there were still on board with the initiative. Given all of these efforts, we would still likely meet the goals under the initiative regardless as to whether we officially leave the agreement or not. However, meeting the Paris agreement is not enough to control global temperatur
Tue, May 29, 2018
Can young people revive civic engagement?
Peter Levine is one of the country’s leading scholars in the area of civic engagement. He is the Associate Dean for Research and Lincoln Filene Professor of Citizenship & Public Affairs in Tufts University’s Jonathan Tisch College of Civic Life and author of “ We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For: The Promise of Civic Renewal in America .” The very idea of civic engagement has changed drastically in the past decade or so as communities form online instead of in person. Does this mean young people are more likely to become engaged in civic and political issues? And, will that engagement translate into votes? Peter and his colleagues study these questions and will be watching closely heading into November’s election. The interview with Peter also touches on what today’s young people can learn from their predecessors 50 years ago. We heard from Tommie Smith about the struggles he faced in 1968; Peter reflects on how civic engagement looks different today and how students today can keep activism alive. For more information on Peter’s work, visit the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at civicyouth.org or his website at peterlevine.ws . Interview Highlights [7:00] What do you think about the activism of Generation Z? Peter: I am excited about what they’re doing. I would attribute a lot of this to good civil education. I also think its relevant that they’re coming to age in an era of political energy and engagement. While I wouldn’t say this is exactly the dawning of generation z, I would say it is the beginning of a very interesting time in American history. [8:15] How can people find a common ground to facilitate discussions on difficult topics? Peter: I wish I had a good answer for this. For example, the gun debate is a good one to have but I’m not sure how much change it can lead to. I think the kids protesting for gun control have the right to do that. However, they shouldn’t be carrying the burden to do so. Also, it isn’t their responsibly to lead a balanced debate on the topic. They are allowed to advocate for their specific stance on the issue. [11:00] We are in a very important anniversary year of 1968. What can youth activists learn from their predecessors fifty years ago who found themselves in a contentious time? Peter: The most inspiring stories to me are the high points of the civil rights movement during that time. There is also a lot to be learned from that movement. For example, it’s important to tea
Thu, May 24, 2018
Bonus: Democracy In Action #1
We love talking with scholars and thought leaders on Democracy Works, but we’d also like to bring you the everyday stories of democracy in action. This the first installment in that series. We visited the central Pennsylvania chapter of Moms Demand Action and heard how they are using the power of conversation to reframe the gun debate and reinvigorating a sense of civic engagement among members. A recent meeting also included a “government 101” presentation that covered the basics of how a bill becomes a law and the best way for someone to contact an elected official. In this mini episode, you’ll hear from Lori Wieder, who is a founding member of the central Pennsylvania Moms Demand Action Chapter, and from Katie Blume, deputy political director for the Pennsylvania Democratic Party. Both Katie and Lori are firm believers — as we are — in the power that can come from everyone exercising their power as small-d democrats regardless of political affiliation. Do you have a story of democracy in action? Drop us a line at democracyinst@psu.edu ; we’d love to hear about it and consider it for a future Democracy Works episode.
Mon, May 21, 2018
A conversation about conversation
This week’s episode seeks to answer one simple, but very important, question: Why is it so hard for people to talk to each other? There are a lot of easy answers we can point to, like social media and political polarization, but there’s another explanation that goes a bit deeper. Laurie Mulvey, executive director of World in Conversation , is the perfect person to help us explore this question. World in Conversation has facilitated more than 10,000 dialogues over the past 15 years. They bring people from all walks of life together to have dialogues about important issues from climate change to race relations. In the process, they break down the misconceptions and preconceived notions that often get in the way of one person understanding — and relating to— someone else. Of course, most dialogues do not happen in a controlled environment with a facilitator in the room. Laurie shares some advice for how to handle your next family dinner or other situation where things might get a little heated. She also shares how the World in Conversation is preparing the next generation of democratic citizens to overcome the partisan divides that bog down political discourse. As we say in the episode, Laurie raises the optimism quotient of this podcast quite a bit. Interview Highlights [6:06] Why is it so difficult for people to engage in dialogue today? Laurie: What I think happens is that we end up needing facilitators. Just like in sports we need referees. Here they would be dialogue referees. [6:55] What are the elements of a good dialogue? Laurie: Candidness and disagreement with respect is important. Having mutual respect is especially important. When we don’t talk with an understanding of each other’s positions they aren’t as productive and they don’t show us as much. [14:00] What impact do you think social media has had on our ability and willingness to engage in dialogue? Laurie: Personally, I don’t notice much of a difference. We actually have a lot of conversations. However, they’re either with like minded people or they are a “hit and run” type conversation with people who don’t think like us. The only change that social media has brought is that we’re doing this with people from our living rooms. [15:40] We have seen our culture become more polarized politically. Have you seen this reflected in the conversations you lead? Laurie: We try to find polarizing topics and get different sides represented in our conversations. Therefore, I’m not sure if we see an increase in the extent of the polarization. Actually, we try to get people in our conversations to say the things that are controversial. At this point, the polarization becomes appare
Fri, May 11, 2018
Ten thousand democracies
One of the things we talked about in our episode with How Democracies Die author Daniel Ziblatt is the “grinding work” that it takes to make a democracy function. School board meeting rooms around the country are some of the places where that happens at the grassroots level. If you’ve ever been to a school board meeting, you know that they’re not always exciting. However, the work that these boards do directly impacts the schools, the children who attend them, and the community at large. Board positions are not full-time and the people who hold them are rarely career politicians. Rather, they’re everyday citizens who want to make an impact — exactly the type of people come together to make democracy work. We talk about the role that school boards play in a democracy with Robert Asen , a professor of rhetoric, politics, and culture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Asen is the author of Democracy, Deliberation and Education , which is based on a yearlong study of three school boards in Wisconsin. While the examples he references are specific to Wisconsin, it’s easy to hear the conversations and deliberations playing out at schools across the country. Asen visited Penn State to deliver the 2018 Kenneth Burke lecture in the McCourtney Institute’s Center for Democratic Deliberation . Interview Highlights [6:00] What are the factors that motivate people to join a school board? Robert: What connects people to these groups are often times their own experiences, including those with their children. There were others who didn’t have children at the school, but saw the school board as an opportunity to get involved with their community. [7:30] Did you find that people joined the school board because there was a particular change they wanted to see? Robert: It wasn’t the case for everyone, but there were some who wanted to see particular policy be passed. Across the districts we looked at, there was a more general sense of bringing about change in an effort to improve the schools. They were more focused on improving the lives of students rather than any one particular issue. [8:40] While these board members are voted on, they are not what we would think of as politicians. How does this play out? Robert: One of the things that separates these governing boards from other types of elected positions is that these members are not politicians. They don’t have dedicated staff or resources. Many of these members also worked
Tue, May 08, 2018
It’s good to be counted
Jennifer Van Hook The next census is just around the corner 2020, and the U.S. Census Bureau is already hard at work on preparing to count the more than 325 million people in the United States. The census is one of the few democratic norms that’s required by the Constitution, and the data collected has wide-ranging uses. The normally routine process has been disrupted this year by Trump administration, which is pushing for the reintroduction of a question about citizenship. As you may have heard, there’s a debate going on about whether this question is appropriate, and whether the resource-strapped Census Bureau will have time to implement it before next year. Jennifer Van Hook , Roy C. Buck Professor of Sociology and Demography at Penn State, served on the Census Advisory Board from 2007 to 2011 and is an expert on how census data is collected, how it’s evaluated, and how it’s used. She talks about the process for creating and testing new questions, the implications of asking about citizenship, and some of the ways you might not realize census data is used. Additional Information Jenny’s piece about the Census in The Conversation 2020 Census website Discussion/Reflection Questions Do you think it is necessary for a democracy to have this sort of information that the census gathers? How often do you think the census should be performed? Do you think the citizenship question should be added to the census? Why or why not? If you could add a question to the census, what would it be? Do you plan on participating in the 2020 census? Why or why not? Interview Highlights [6:06] What do you see as the role the census plays in a democracy? Jennifer: It is fundamental for a representative democracy. The United States was actually the first nation in the world to require that a census be conducted. This was done because they wanted to distribute power according to population within the states. The number of representatives each state gets in the House is proportionate to the population. Therefore, the census is very important. [7:28] In addition to determining representation in Washington, what are some of the other purposes of the census? Jennifer: One of the other uses is the civil rights legislation that has been passed since the 60’s. This helps tell us if certain groups are under represented. This information can show us if certain groups are being discrimintated against within society
Tue, May 01, 2018
Satire is good for more than just a few laughs
Political satire has been around nearly as long as politics itself and can provide a much needed laugh in times of crisis. But, as you’ll hear from our guests this week, it’s much more than that. Satire is a check on people in power and helps to engage the public around issues that might otherwise go unnoticed — both of which are essential for a healthy democracy. But, are we reaching a place where the comedy has become the news? The success of Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and most recently John Oliver suggest that we might be heading in that direction. What about fake news? It’s all fun and games until you can’t tell the real news from the satire, and that’s concerning. On the bright side, people who consume satire tend to be more well-informed about politics than those who do not, suggesting that one needs a solid foundation of what the news actually is in order to get the jokes that are being made about it. We discuss the current state of political satire and where it might be heading with Sophia McClennen and Steve Brodner. Sophia, a Professor of International Affairs and Comparative Literature at Penn State, writes regularly for Salon and recently appeared on StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson. Steve is a cartoonist at caricaturist who has drawn every president since Ronald Regan. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, and The Washington Post just to name a few. Interview Highlights [7:02] What is the role of satire in a democracy? Sophia: It doesn’t have that big of a role because it usually comes into the picture when things aren’t going that well. Satire emerges in moments of crisis. Today it is playing an extremely big role. Largely because the news media has shifted in how it informs the public. [8:01] What about the nature of a crisis makes satire more popular and come out more in political conversations? Sophia: Satire tends to come about when people are faulty or are doing stupid things. Satire is typically a contrarian position. [8:42] What are creators of satire trying to accomplish? Sophia: Satire is typically used to get the audience to think critically. The idea is to get people out of the binary option mindset. Many see the satirist as someone trying to tell them what to think. However, what they’re actually doing is trying to call out the way in which a conversation it being framed and recommend a change to that. [10:05] What do we know about the types of people who consume satire? Sophia:
Tue, April 24, 2018
Tommie Smith: From sharecropper to Olympic protester
Tommie Smith is a true living legend. He won a gold medal in the men’s 200 meter event at the 1968 Olympics, setting a world record in the process. When he took the medal stand in Mexico City that day, he made history again by raising a black-gloved fist during the National Anthem. As you’ll hear, Tommie didn’t grow up in a political family and didn’t see himself as an activist when he enrolled at San Jose State University. That changed when he met Dr. Harry Edwards and became involved with Olympic Project for Human Rights, where he found his voice and used it to speak out against racial segregation in sports and elsewhere. When Tommie and teammate John Carlos raised their fists on the podium in Mexico City, many interpreted the gesture as a symbol of the Black Power movement. However, as Tommie says, the action was not necessarily about one cause or movement. Rather, it was a symbol of a broader struggle for power and equality. Tommie visited Penn State as part of a yearlong look at the events of 1968 organized by the College of the Liberal Arts. For more on the relationship between athletes and protests, check out our episode with Abe Khan , who has studied this topic extensively and draws comparisons between Smith and modern-day athletes like Colin Kaepernick. Interview Highlights [5:10] What was your family like? Did you come form a political family? Did you talk politics at dinner or attend political rallies? Tommie: No, Just the opposite. My family was a sharecropper background. My father actually had no education. My parents met in Texas and we were just sharecroppers. We had no political background, but there were issues in society and the system that we knew nothing about because of where we were. We worked from grass roots up until I got to the junior or senior year of high school, and that is the time social change began. I was just in time to see it. Before I read about it, I lived it. When I read about it, I remember those times. Not in the south, but in California which shadowed the south in terms of the field work. [6:52] Were you drawn there (San Jose State) because of Dr. Edwards? How did all of those pieces come together? Tommie: There were many colleges looking to recruit me. The last two colleges out of about thirty six were San Jose and USC. I visited USC. It was a little big. They shouldn’t hav taken me to Disney Land. It scared the heck out of me. I’m used to two story buildings and that was really high up. I’m from the area of cabins and not buildings. They put me on a blind date which was a no-no. San Jos
Tue, April 17, 2018
Generation Z and the future of democracy
Over the past few months, the members of Generation Z have combined the tenets of traditional social movements with the power of social media to reimagine what it means to protest in a democracy. That energy was on display during the March for Our Lives events held around the world on March 24. Kayla Fatemi speaks at the State College March for Our Lives event. We interviewed several students from State College, Pennsylvania (where our podcast is based) who attended March for Our Lives events locally and in Washington, D.C. They speak passionately and articulately about what they believe in and how they’re working to carry forward the energy they’ve create In this episode, you’ll hear from: Kyra Gines and Kayla Fatemi, high school students who organized the March for Our Lives in State College. Lilly Caldawell and Lena Adams, who organized a walk out at their middle school. Hannah Strouse and Cian Nelson, who attended the March for our Lives in Washington, D.C. If what we saw and heard from these students is any indication, the future of our democracy looks very bright. Interview Highlights [6:34] Kyra on activism and motivation for the march for our lives event. With everything happening this year, it felt natural to set up these events and continue to make our voices heard. I want to do what I can within my constraints. I can’t vote for a number of years, but I can work with those who can and who set up events like this I can go up there, I can make a speech, and I can make my voice heard. I will continue to do so until I can hear and see change. [7:48] Kayla on activism and the movement towards creating change. One good thing about the United States in the right to free speech and the right to express ourselves and to vote. Democracy for us is voting in those who will be advocating for our lives. This was something I felt I had to do. I think many other students had the same feeling after watching the Parkland students who are our peers. We are a different generation than the millennial generation. We are a lot more vocal and a lot less afraid. We’ve seen a lot of things happen (school shootings) and if something is going to happen we are going to have to do it ourselves. Our generation is finally becoming old enough where we can go out there and do these sort of things. We are continuing to work on voter registration. We also have another school walkout scheduled for April 20th, which is not sponsored by the school. [10:19] Lena Adams from Delta Middle School on how students created a similar march at their school. We worked really har
Tue, April 10, 2018
How Democracies Die author Daniel Ziblatt on the ‘grinding work’ of democracy
Daniel Ziblatt has done a lot of interviews since the release of How Democracies Die , the bestselling book he co-wrote with Steven Levitsky. But we asked him a question he’d never gotten before — about a line toward the end of the book when he refers to democracy as “grinding work.” The idea that democracy isn’t easy is a central theme of this podcast. As How Democracies Die illustrates, it’s much easier to succumb to the power of an autocratic leader than it is to stand up and protect the institutions that serve as the guardrails of democracy. Ziblatt, a professor of government at Harvard , talks about how the book came about and the impact it’s had since it was released earlier this year. This episode also starts a new feature on the podcast, where we end with a lightning round featuring our Mood of the Nation Poll questions. The poll is open-ended and allows Americans to respond in their own words to questions related to American politics. Some questions vary based on what’s going in the world, but we always ask these four: What makes you angry? What makes you proud? What makes you worry? What gives you hope? We were very fortunate to speak with Daniel and encourage everyone to pick up a copy of How Democracies Die. Interview Highlights [5:40] How did this book come about? Steve and I, we teach together, we’ve taught lots of courses together, graduate courses on democracies and crisis, democratic breakdown and democratization around the world, I work on Europe and he works on Latin America. We haven’t primarily focused on the United States in our work, but during the course of the 2015-2016 campaign season, really the republican nomination process, we kept running into each other and talking about the tenor of the political rhetoric. [7:02)] Where does Donald Trump fit into all of us? Did this process of democratic erosion that you describe in the book, did it start before Trump? Or was he kind of a symptom of it? In many ways I think that there’s a tendency to focus on Donald Trump, the spectacle of Trump and the latest offensive Tweet and whatever people respond to, but really one of the points of our book is to say that these dynamics long preceded President Trump. [8:14)] What role do you see parties playing in this process of democratic decline? Parties are really at the center of the story for us. One of the lessons from the book is that throughout American history there’s been around, at least in the 20th century period for which we have opinion poll data, there’s been around 30% of the American electorate that supports de
Tue, April 03, 2018
What can Pennsylvania voters do about gerrymandering?
Chris Satullo Pennsylvania received a new congressional map earlier this year, closing the books on what was widely considered one of the most egregious examples of partisan gerrymandering after 2010 census. Chris Satullo sees that decision as winning the battle against gerrymandering, but not the war. Satullo, a civic engagement consultant for the Committee of Seventy , is involved with several initiatives to sustain the changes that were enacted this year and ensure that a fair map is drawn after the 2020 census. The Committee of Seventy works closely with two organizations, Fair Districts PA and Draw the Lines PA . Fair Districts is a nonpartisan grassroots advocacy group working to ensure that the map doesn’t revet back to a gerrymandered state in 2021, while Draw the Lines aims to “fix the bug in the operating system of democracy” by empowering students and other groups to draw new maps. We talked with Chris about how Pennsylvania’s map became so gerrymandered, what drove the desire to change it, and how people across the Keystone State can get involved with the effort to create a better map. In many ways, this effort embodies the essence of Democracy Works — people coming together build something that’s greater than the sum of its parts. For more from Chris, check out his podcast, 20 by Seventy . Interview Highlights [5:50] What are Committee of 70, Fair Districts Pennsylvania, and Draw the Lines Pennsylvania, and how do those groups work together? The Committee of 70 is a non-profit that is Pennsylvania’s oldest “good government group” founded more than 100 years ago in Philly. Fair Districts PA is a grassroots organization that was formed about a year and a half, two years ago, to work specifically on the redistricting, anti-gerrymandering front. Draw the Lines PA is a new initiative of us here at Committee of 70 which looks to connect with and support and sustain the work of Fair Districts PA. [8:04] Why did it take so long for this effort to come to fruition, to get the map changed? What changed dramatically in the last twenty years is the advent of computer technology and big data. Mapping software and big data about individual voters buying habits, not just election and political habits. [9:44] If the 2016 election had gone a different way, would we be sitting here talking about this right now? I’d like to assure you that Committee of 70, and I personally would’ve been talking about this issue beca
Tue, March 27, 2018
Fake news, clickbait, and the future of local journalism
Can philanthropy save local journalism? Are the calls of “fake news” from Washington impacting the work of journalists in other parts of the country? We discuss those questions and the role of the free press in a democracy with Halle Stockton , managing editor of PublicSource in Pittsburgh. Halle Stockton PublicSource is a nonprofit journalism organization in the style of ProPublica, funded primarily by Pittsburgh’s foundation community. Halle talks about how PublicSource’s funding model impacts its reporting, ways that the organization is breaking the fourth wall to engage with readers, how the team responds to allegations of “fake news” while doing in-depth reporting, and why they’ll never write clickbait. Halle is a Penn State alumna and was the 2018 Hearst Visiting Professional in the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications . Interview Highlights [6:00] What is PublicSource and what is your role there? Public Source is a non-profit independent, digital first media organization, so in human speak that means that we are focused on in depth and investigative journalism in the Pittsburgh region. [7:37] How does PublicSource fit into Pittsburgh’s media landscape? Public Source is fitting in in a way that people are seeing it as a more straightforward platform for the type of news that they’re not getting elsewhere and the type of voices they’re not getting elsewhere. [8:48] What role does the community itself play in that, in terms of feedback you get? We engage with the community quite a bit via social media but also in person. A couple of the ways that we interact with people, are one, through educational events we call citizens tool kits. [13:35] How do you strike the balance between catching people’s attention and writing hard-hitting stories? We’re never going to fall victim to clickbait. That’s just something that we’ve decided we cannot do. We firmly believe that people’s stories, seeing other people going through things is catchy enough. [14:50] Are you and your team feeling the impact of the attacks agains the media that are coming from Washington? Surprisingly enough, even in Pittsburgh, it started off as sources kind of laughing about it like “oh are you the fake news?” but even in the past few months when we’ve had some really important stories drop, those institutions who we’ve pressured in those stories through our reporting, we have heard rumors about them trying to cast us as fake news. [16:38]
Tue, March 20, 2018
Checking the President’s power
From Watergate to Benghazi to Robert Mueller, U.S. history is full of congressional hearings. You’ve no doubt heard about them in the news, but do you know what those House and Senate committees actually do and what their role is in a democracy? Doug Kriner We address those questions and more with Doug Kriner , professor of Government at Cornell University and co-author of Investigating the President: Congressional Checks on Presidential Power . Doug studies the impact of congressional investigations as a check on the executive branch, and how committee activity differs when the government is united and divided. Following the interview, Michael and Chris discuss how congressional investigations tie back to separation of powers and why the ability for one branch to check another is critical to democracy. Interview Highlights [7:46] Your research shows that there were 12,000 days of these investigative hearings. What were they doing during that time? Sometimes they were listening to themselves talk, which is what we often sort of derive from when we watch these things. It’s supposedly questions, and mainly the member talking for most of their time, and they get a little bit of response from the witnesses. But I think that’s almost exactly what they’re for. [9:00] How much leeway do these committees have? Committees have very significant leeway to investigate almost anything they want, which is why the Benghazi investigation is a great example. [10:31] Can you give us some examples of when those checks by the legislative to the executive have been successful? So back in the 1970’s, we were having a policy debate that’s immediately relevant to what’s going on right now. This was the Church committee, which was founded to investigate abuse in the intelligence agencies. [12:00] Why should my taxpayer dollars go to fund these things as opposed to things that might have a more direct impact on the average citizens day to day life? We know what Congress’s approval rating is, it’s abysmal, and it’s almost always been abysmal. It’s almost always been lower than either of the other two branches. So what is the public view on investigations? We went into the field with another survey in which we basically just asked the question about whether Congress should investigate, and whether people support this idea. [15:18] Why would there be a need for the House and the Senate to both investigate the same issue? Inter-chamber rivalry, right? The fact that “I’m a member of the Hou
Wed, March 14, 2018
Is Colin Kaepernick a good democrat?
Abe Khan No matter how much of a sports fan you are, you probably remember seeing Colin Kaepernick kneeling during National Anthem. President Trump took the debate to a whole new level when he said that anyone who does not respect the National Anthem and the flag should be fired. Kaepernick and those who followed him are the most recent example of athletes using their sports as a means to protest, but history is filled with others who have come before them. In this episode, we talk with Abe Khan , assistant professor of Communication Arts and Sciences and African-American Studies at Penn State, about the impact Kaepernick’s actions had on NFL culture and the broader role that protest plays in a democracy. Michael Berkman and Chris Beem draw parallels between modern-day sports protests and Dr. Martin Luther King’s civil rights protests, and discuss the public’s feelings on protests as reported in the McCourtney Institute’s Mood of the Nation Poll . Interview Highlights [6:28] Help us remember what happened with Colin Kapernick and where the issues have gone from there: Kapernick’s first kneel came at the end of August in 2016, it was actually at the end of a preseason football game. It actually didn’t start as a kneel. He used two phrases that came, at least in my mind, to define the substance of the protest. One is, bodies in the street.And the other is people getting away with murder. [8:54] How did the protest spread after Kapernicks initial demonstration? So I’ll admit to being surprised about how quickly the Kapernick situation spread, but the number of athletes included 48 NFL players, 8 NBA teams, 14 WNBA players, including the entire squad of the Minnesota Links, a gold medal swimmer, 45 high school teams, 22 colleges, a middle school, and a youth football team in Beaumont Texas. 34 states, 4 countries. [10:10] To wrap up this section about the history of the protest, where do things stand now? One thing that emerged immediately after this was of course huge outrage, especially among NFL players. Where were at is essentially a split in the players coalition, because I think that the NFL saw that the players coalition as an opportunity to co-op the force of the protest. Eric Reid (one of the earliest players to join Kapernick) and Michael Thomas (player for the Miami Dolphins) left the players coalition after the NFL promised to spend 100 million dollars promoting an agenda on criminal justice reform. This was seen as a bribe. [12:03] Let’s talk about that, NFL culture. Sports
Trailer · Mon, March 12, 2018
What is Democracy Works?
From the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State, this is Democracy Works. In this episode, hosts Michael Berkman and Chris Beem take a few minutes to explain why we wanted to start this podcast and what we hope to achieve through our interviews and conversations. They also explain the meaning behind the name Democracy Works. It’s about people coming together to build things that are greater than the sum of their parts. Much like workers throughout Pennsylvania’s history built ships and trains at iron and steel works, each of us has a role to play in building and sustaining a healthy democracy. Building and sustaining a democracy is hard work. It’s not glamorous and often goes unnoticed in the daily news cycle. On Democracy Works, we talk to people who are out there making it happen and discuss why that work is so important. Each episode include an interview about an issue and discussion about what that means for democracy. We are excited about launching this podcast and hope you’ll join us to see what’s in store.
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