S05E07: Craig Cal­houn on the Cur­rent Cri­sis of Amer­i­can and Glob­al Democ­ra­cy and Poten­tial Remedies

U.S. Amer­i­can democ­ra­cy is exhibit­ing symp­toms of decline or even of degen­er­a­tion giv­en the con­tin­u­ing denial of the results of the last pres­i­den­tial elec­tion by many in the Repub­li­can Par­ty and par­ti­san efforts to cur­tail vot­ing rights in the Unit­ed States. How alarmed should one be about leg­isla­tive cap­ture and vot­er sup­pres­sion by an increas­ing­ly com­bat­ive Repub­li­can Par­ty, which could sig­nif­i­cant­ly alter the very nature of Amer­i­can democ­ra­cy? Do we need to re-eval­u­ate our deep-seat­ed faith in the irre­versibil­i­ty of demo­c­ra­t­ic achieve­ments in the face of soft author­i­tar­i­an rulers all over the world becom­ing ever more pop­u­lar? Is it time to recon­sid­er issues of socioe­co­nom­ic inequal­i­ty and of class to revive a strong sense of col­lec­tive pur­pose and sol­i­dar­i­ty that may indeed be indis­pens­able for a defense of democracy?

Guests fea­tured on this episode:

Craig Cal­houn, Uni­ver­si­ty Pro­fes­sor of Social Sci­ences at Ari­zona State Uni­ver­si­ty and Cen­ten­ni­al Pro­fes­sor at the Lon­don School of Eco­nom­ics and Polit­i­cal Sci­ence. He has writ­ten on the strug­gle by stu­dents for democ­ra­cy in Chi­na, a book titled “Nei­ther Gods nor Emper­ors.” He has co-authored the vol­ume, “Does Cap­i­tal­ism Have a Future?” with Immanuel Waller­stein and oth­ers. His lat­est book, “Degen­er­a­tions of Democ­ra­cy,” writ­ten with Charles Tay­lor and Dilip Gaonkar, notes the signs that  U.S. Amer­i­can democ­ra­cy exhibits symp­toms of decline or even of degen­er­a­tion, and inspires our con­ver­sa­tion in this episode.