Good evening and welcome to the second James A Thurber dialogue on American Democracy, a series of conversations with prominent thought leaders about the growing threats to democracy, and what we can do about it. I'm David Barker, the director of the Center for congressional and presidential studies here at AU, and I'll be your host tonight. Our mission at the center is to strengthen the democratic square through research public events and hands on training programs, and we're proud to co sponsor this event with a US government department. The Kennedy political Union and the United States historical capital Historical Society, these dialogues celebrate the illustrious career of our beloved colleague, distinguished University Professor James A. Thurber Jim is transitioning to a emeritus status the summer after 47 illustrious years studying American democracy, contributing to it, and enlightening others about it. He's quick to point out that he is not actually retiring however he is under contract for two books. After all, among other things. Our guest tonight, much to our delight is the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and historian Anne Applebaum, one of the world's foremost experts on the rise of authoritarianism around the globe. She's a staff writer for The Atlantic and a senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, or she co directs arena, a program on disinformation and 21st century propaganda. In previous lives she was a longtime columnist columnist and editorial board member for The Washington Post, the political editor of the Evening Standard of correspondent for The Economist, and many other things. She's the author of six highly acclaimed books, including most recently twilight of democracy. The seductive bluer of authoritarianism at any point during the dialogue between dr Thurber and miss that bone, feel free to post a question in the q amp a box will reserve about 10 or 15 minutes at the end to get through as many of these questions as we can. Please remember to keep your questions civil to skip the ideological grandstanding, and to honor Alex Trebek I posed in your question, as an actual question. Okay, now I will hand the virtual microphone to my colleague, distinguished professor Jeff Gill, who also just so happens to have been a student of Dr Thurber is once upon a time, he will formally introduce Dr Thurber, who will then begin talking to Ms. Applebaum. Take it away, Jeff. Thank you, David. Good evening to everybody. It is my pleasure to an honor to introduce Distinguished Professor James A. Thurber tonight. He is a distinguished colleague in every way. He has greatly affected the lives careers and trajectories of countless American university students, including me, his PhD seminar in American politics was literally the first political science course I ever took, and I for one lecture, I was hooked. Thank you for that Jim, I don't want to take too much time from the fascinating program we have tonight but I do want to highlight one brief thing about his scholarship that I've always admired the hallmark of Professor Thurber study of politics and political systems is that events are critically driven by the characteristics of the political actors involved. For example, campaigns to do not just when because of effective strategy theme and message. They also win because the specific people making those decisions. Matter is studies of individuals who studies administrative legislative interaction demonstrates the character and personalities of presidents, members of Congress and the people who serve them vitally determined political outcomes and Washington and I could go on and on about this point I won't do that.
could go on and on about this point I won't do that. He has seen and communicated the process behind the data his entire career. And I learned a lot from that. Anyways, with these brief remarks, I will turn the virtual microphone over to Dr. Thank you, Jeff, and thank you David also and Anne, welcome. You are an international treasure in the sense that you sometimes you're in Poland sometimes you're in London sometimes you're in Berlin, various places but we're lucky you're in Washington DC now so we're not in a six timezone problem today, and I really enjoyed twilight of democracy the seduction seductive lower of authoritarianism This is the book I want everybody if they haven't purchased it yet, go out and buy it for all of your friends and yourself it's great, it's a book that's unique in the sense that it starts out and ends with a party in Poland at your place in Poland and the, the book, sorry there's something going on with my camera. The book really discusses this guy discusses the democratic decline the rise of right wing populism with authoritarian tendencies in three main cases, Poland, UK, and the United States. This also includes hungry I've been to Hungary several times I know some of the reformers there so I found that very interesting also But back to the party. You had a New Year's Eve party in 1999. And you had friends and acquaintances, that attended and they were sort of center right proponents of democracy and free market liberals and you trace their evolution to the modern day in terms of changes have attitudes and behaviors and so I'd like to start with that. By asking you what happened to the attitudes and behaviors of these guests over time. They were they seduced by the lower of authoritarianism some of them. First of all, thank you very much for inviting me. I grew up around the corner from au and when I was in high school I used to work in the AU library, and actually even in some interim years, I've gone back there. When I was working in like gulag book I want spent a summer in Washington and sat in the, in the steps there so so I wonder. I feel right at home with with you. Well I'm glad you do. So thank you and I and I should also say I wish I was there physically and right not just virtually but maybe we'll maybe we'll get to that. Right. So yes, the book does begin with a party, and it begins that way, not because I'm some kind of great hostess or because I give a lot of parties, but because the party was given in 1999. On New Year's Eve. Eve of the millennium, and about 20 years later, 19 8019 years later I started to think about the party and I realized that about half the people there were not people who I know anymore. But these were just normal personal feelings out or people drifting away from each other I realized that about half of the party, no longer spoke to the other half of the party. And that was because what had been a meal you kind of center right anti communist, you could say Thatcherite although that's an awkward use in Poland, but you could say free market you could say pro democracy group that had been an end user mostly younger younger people nobody there was very significant or famous. But these were, you know, these are people who you could have characterized as being having one set of political views. Two decades later, we're not at all. maybe we can talk about that I think makes, once you start making political choices things change, but there was another group who went off in a very different direction, and became what is, what can only be described as the radical right i mean they became a, they became most of these were journalists and political strategists and some some some politician some in peace, and most of them are now affiliated with a kind of nationalist Catholic political party that's the current ruling party in Poland, and who, which has since it first one and election in 2015, since it first took full power in 2015 has very consciously and actively chipped away at many of the fundamental building blocks of democracy so attacking port independence they ended immediately did an unconstitutional court packing move as soon as they took office. A replace the civil service with got rid of experts of all kinds, replace them with party hacks, make big changes in the cultural and educational sphere, and it also began to chip away at the independence of the media mostly through strategies like, you know, announcing high taxes on anybody who advertises in independent media, while at the same time pumping huge amounts of money into state media, and making state media into something that's very hard to describe actually outside of Poland, but it's a very very extremist propaganda channel I mean there it's it's the, you know, the national TV channel, something like 30% of the country it's the only TV channel they get they also of course have radio stations and other other other forms of communication and it's now very extreme right. It's homophobic it's xenophobic it's sometimes anti semitic, and it's of course very, very biased and its coverage of of politics and they've, they and this is kind of package of moves that they've carried out, and some of the people who I used to know are now part of that. Part of that and they've gone in that direction. Sorry. Yes. Yeah, so you talk about the building blocks of democracy. I don't think there's a consensus of exactly about what democracy is and I'd like you to talk about that a bit. Especially since we've had this, the lowering of the status of our democracy in the United States recently in this national ranking. And if there's no consensus about about democracy Let's jump to Biden right now and Biden statement just this week when he said in his address to the Munich Security Conference last week Biden said stress the importance of partnerships with allies in Europe, we quote we are in the midst of fundamental debate about the future and direction of our worlds, a contest between democracy and attacker say we don't have a clear definition from our government in the United States, what the democracy is, how, how can his mission, be pursued if there's no clear definition of democracy and what's your definition of democracy, sure there's no clear definition of democracy I mean I think we've all moved beyond the you know the idea that it's just elections, I think we, I think there's a general understanding that democracy requires not just elections, but it requires some kind of or some elements of a of an even playing field so that there are some kinds of neutral institutions that can ensure the rule of law, regardless of who wins the election, and also that there's some kind of consensus. So, in a way, of course democracy is very it's almost anti human nature and what it really requires is that, you know, when you win an election, you have to then agree to keep certain pillars of the system in place so that your enemies can defeat you, in four years time if they win, and all the better if you lose an election, you have to agree that the other party is allowed to rule, or you can say majority rule the consent of the governed yeah free and fair elections, but also protection of minority rights. Well the thing I mean there have to be there there, you know, and I don't want to be too. You know too prescriptive because there are a lot of different kinds of democracies and as you know well enough mean they're presidential democracies parliamentary democracies and majority Attarian democracies and consensus democracies and they, they all function in different ways you know and have their advantages and disadvantages. But they have some things in common and as I said one of them is the, the rulers change with, you know, following a vote, and the other is that there are institutions in place that ensure the protection of minorities that ensure certain, you know, in a freedom of speech, freedom of association freedom of the press, and that make it possible for elections to be conducted in some kind of free and fair manner so I'm not sure that the mean there is of course a question around the edges, you know who counts as a democracy and who doesn't. And I hope that the bite administration isn't going to get bogged down in that which ok so the the economic intelligence unit in London, in London, just came out with the ranking of democracies and we've gone from a full democracy to a flawed democracy, and from your writing you may agree with this I think that it's directly related to the president that we had Trump and what he did over the last four years and what he did after the election. beyond the US though there's. It seemed like a terrible year for democracies if you've read the report. They included all the elements that you had and a few other elements in terms of their definition of democracy and that, quote, the lower the seductive lower of authoritarianism seems to be moving in many nations throughout the world. And so then the central question that you address in your book is, what is that subject seductive floor and, and why do they. Why do they intellectuals and upper class many times go along with it in these countries, including Poland. Right. So, first of all, just one little point is that I think Trump was the was the product of a deterioration of American democracy that had been going on for a while. Yes, we can just leave that leave. I think there's consensus about that but yeah but but the, the law of authoritarianism is something that I think we in America long underestimated. And the, you know, the idea that there could be unity, the idea that there could be just one voice. The idea that the nation could pull together that there wouldn't be these petty squabbles. This is something that appeals to a lot more people than, then we then we normally want to acknowledge including people in our own country. But I think if you ask me what unifies the you know the intellectuals and and and and others and journalists who find this, these kind of movements attractive and I, the topic of my book I look at them across different countries. Right. I would say that they're unified by a sense of disappointment that they are variety of different reasons disappointed with how democracy has turned out in their country. Either they, they don't like the direction that the country is going demographically don't like the kind of country it's becoming. They don't like the morality of the country, sometimes it's personal. You know they don't like the role that they have been assigned or they I mean I one of the characters in my book is a Polish polish. He's now the editor of steady state TV channel that I described and he as a teenager was a solidarity activist he was an edgy communist activist and he became very angry in post communist Poland by the fact that he felt he should be playing a bigger role that he had been assigned and he became resentful of the system and angry that it had promoted itself. That was part of his that's clearly part of his motivation because you're right about that in your book, and it's yeah persuasive. Motivation but but the the sense of disappointment either personal or political or philosophical that this isn't what I wanted this isn't what I bargained for. This is the, this is the sense that leads people to demand radical change, because once you no longer like or admire your own country, then the idea that you should change it with some, you should smash it up, you should, we should you know we need some, you know, violent or or dramatic change begins to become when this is of course the source of radicalism of the left and the right. It's just that the writing radicalism has had more energy in the last several years. So you in what you've just stated, but in your book, you cover this you didn't really talk about economics, what was the impact of the great recession of 2008. On this movement towards authoritarianism and in Europe, so I think it was, I think it was very important although not not normally in the way that economists think so in other words, it wasn't just that people suffered economically although they did. But it was also that the the the economic crisis, reduced the faith that people had in the Democratic leadership, be all over the world actually, you know this idea that somehow Americans know what they're doing you know that even, you know, America you know those bankers know what they're doing, you know the the Treasury Department that Western countries have a hold on this very complex world of international economics and can make sense of it the sight of that failure. I think was truly undermining of not just American but Western prestige and it had a very clear impact on people. And it's important that that's understood because I mean, for example in a country like Poland Poland is not a country that suffered particularly from that crisis, nor is it a country that has had a bad economic experience over the last 30 years on the contrary to Poland is the story of is continually economic says success growth, you know, high growth rates. Know doubling and tripling living standards. Well, did we oversell democracy did we oversell capture capitalism did we have unreasonable high expectations in Central European countries. When we push that app to the wall and down the United States and and and Western Europe. No, actually, I mean, I genuinely believe that what's happening in Eastern Europe is not very different from what's happening in Western Europe, and it's not very different from what's happening in the United States. In other words, you know you can point to Poland and Hungary as particularly bad cases of this, you know they're they're both run by these authoritarian populist political parties. But I don't think that the nature of that problem is very different from what you have in the United States. And it sounds, it always sounds strange particularly Americans you know Americans like to talk about their own history we look back to the Civil War to the failures of reconstruction to my lawn now and that's that's true. But it's also true that much of what's happening in the United States, isn't that different from what's happening in other places so I think you need to point to some deeper. You know, some deeper and broader problems that that afflict all of us and I'm happy to talk about some of those. Okay, so related to that, you know, Patrick Davies book the great American delusion, it's related to this he he asks whether the myth of American exceptional exceptionalism blinded the US from the serious political, social and economic problems it faces. With all the challenges both domestic and foreign will the United States be able to lead. Now, if we don't take care of what's going on in the United States, the divisions within the United States. Oh I think very, very, very much agree with that analysis that it's very important for America to heal itself to be able to lead, although I do think that a part of America healing itself is America reestablishing close links with other democracies, and rebuilding the idea that we as a nation are committed to this idea of democracy. You know what one of the mistakes I think we made in thinking about our particular relationship to Europe over the last several decades is that we were helping them, you know, we were, we were there in Europe to build up and protect European democracy and that's what we were doing there that's what that long post war post Second World War commitment was about. There also in more and more when you look back on the, on the last several decades, it's pretty clear that that that Alliance also helped protect and defend democracy inside the United States, because it was our national project because it was what our leaders spoke about, because it was part of who we were and how we define ourselves around the world, that made the idea of democracy very, you know, strengthen it inside the United States as well and I actually genuinely believe that there's a link between American foreign policy and American domestic policy in that sense as well and I think it's not a coincidence that the first president to outwardly reject the European Alliance and also the alliances with Asian democracies and other democracies around the world is also the first, you know has, has caused the biggest crisis in, in, in America's confidence in their own democracy, you know, certainly since, you know, certainly since the Second World War and maybe since the Civil War. And so he obviously was a populist that that really put his arm around polarization sorting, in the United States that was going on and much of that was related to race, and one of your cases in the United States you discuss race, but it's kind of hard not to really drill down on the phenomena of race and and slavery and its impact. Today, and for, you know, 400 years on this continent. with race. That doesn't seem to be the case anywhere in Europe, race is not an issue maybe immigrants, but not race like the United States, what's your reaction to that. I mean of course no countries exactly like the United States and our situation, racial situation is unique in many ways, there's no equivalent to the formerly enslaved population that, that, that we have here are no historical reckoning quite of that kind. Nevertheless, if you if you think about it in a slightly broader category if you talk about fear of demographic change. And, and anxiety about the survival of a certain definition of the nation. Whether it's, you know, an idea of white Christian America, or whether it's an idea of white Christian Hungary. You can find some similarities and, and you can find some, some stuff here the idea that we are losing that are something traditional is disappearing that something about our nation is changing being lost forever, which is a, which is a, which is a kind of reactionary sentiment you can hear in in parts of white America, and you can also hear in Europe. Had they do have some relation but yes I but I do think, you know, I don't want to, you know, while I'm saying that there are these problems that you can connect to all of us of course the Americans situation is remains very specific and and the solutions here will be different from the ones in Europe and elsewhere. So you remind me of hunter Thompson's fear and loathing on the campaign trail. Very interesting book written on drugs. But he, but he tapped into this. The anger and the distrust of government and elites in that book but back. Let's, let's go back to you, to what you really know well you know it all well but Poland and Hungary. As you know, I've taught in in Brussels, over the last 16 years. So I'd sort of, watch what was happening there and I this basic question. Will the EU, at any point, come to grips with Poland and Hungary with respect to its authoritarian tendencies and especially corruption. There's a great deal of corruption related to the two regimes. At this point in my opinion. Maybe you disagree and i know i don't know i mean i would be cautious about calling Poland new regime I don't think Poland is a dictatorship yet I mean that's that's not quite where we are, but. But the trouble for the European Union and this is a, this is not that different actually from the, from the political problem that now faces by when dealing with these countries more of course American allies particularly pulling a close military ally. The problem is is that there are no the EU has no mechanisms, it wasn't set up to police its members and that way you know to, you know, there's no mechanism for kicking people out. I mean funding if there are a lot of mechanisms for monitoring, economic, you know whether you're spending too much or too little and so on. But there are mechanisms to monitor or punish countries for defying rules about democracy. And so well there, there is now the kind of proto mechanism that might come into use in the next year or so it's not really clear how it works. Both Poland and Hungary, but especially hungry play roles in the broader European party system and so it's been very difficult you know they both have influence in different ways in different parts of the European Union is very difficult thing to do. do. It is actually the my hope that exactly the issue that you raised which is that over this issue of corruption. We might be able to make some progress in other words, particularly hungry has been is clearly using you funds to enrich people around the around the ruling party and around the prime minister and it may be that that you can approach this problem through that, and I'm also is, I'm hoping very much that the Bible administration also begins to focus on this issue of transnational corruption, money laundering black money in politics dirty, dark money in politics. You know, and the way in which authoritarian countries use Western countries and corrupt Western countries actually through their use of our banks or our offshore systems, because one of one of the things that the US and Europe, do together, that could could both have an impact on Poland and Hungary, but more importantly a big impact on Russia and maybe even to some extent China and other authoritarian states would be to crack down on these mechanisms that are being used by by authoritarians I mean focusing on kleptocracy, you know, getting the, the old Western Alliance maybe the western lions plus the Asian democracies, getting them to focus on this problem, and shut it down. Would, first of all, give democracy some of the back some of the prestigious democratic camp I should say, some of the prestige that it's lost in places like Russia where people say well you know we're corrupt but so are they I mean look, they take our leaders money and you know they let them build apartment buildings in Manhattan with it. You know, you know they talk about human rights but then they they let all this money filter through their system, it would give us back a certain amount of of prestige and it would also I think genuinely constrain the autocracies which are, you know, living off, you know, essentially Western Western corruption so that's a, that's, which we could refocus the Democratic Alliance, so I'm glad you mentioned this Frank Vogel I'm glad you mentioned this Frank Vogel who's one of the co founders of Transparency International has a book right now about laundering money from a variety of authoritarian regimes around the world to buy real estate in Manhattan, and he has some prescriptions prescriptions about how to stop that. So we're proud of. Part of the problem, we're allowing that to happen through our banking system and real estate system, so I'm glad that you mentioned that I didn't mean to say that Poland was that corrupt, but I do know about hungry and using EU funds for farms that people close to, to their government have purchased dirt cheap and have expanded. So, there is the social media. Okay. In all of these places very hard to control, we're seeing that in Russia. My Mr. It looks like they're shutting things down but but what's authority authoritarians have not controlled social media in many cases they're not really controlling it and hungry for example. You touch on it. But I'm sure that you've studied it and you have some opinions on it, how, you know, how can authoritarian stay in power if they can't control the social media. So first of all, I mean, to be clear when a point I made earlier which I, you know, which we should probably, you know, I wanted to bring in which is that I do think that the, the internet and social media and the way in which our entire information system has been completely transformed. In the last really since I suppose since the invention of the iPhone, which I think is 2007 is a part of the explanation for the decline of trust and democracy and also for the polarization and all of our societies. And so there are different ways to talk about this problem. Before Attarian states have found ways to use to use social media and to use the tools that are, that, that, that the internet brings to keep themselves in power so if you look at China. China has created essentially an authoritarian internet where there's the values of surveillance. And, you know, are baked into the system and and and and and the state has eyes on everybody and uses. You know uses the you know the many of the tools invented actually in Silicon Valley to control its population to push ideas, and to monitor what's going on so actually they found a very, you know, they use it quite, quite effectively. The Russians have also found a way to use social media and the end to take advantage of the chaos of modern information in other words, they deluge their, their population with information, offering massive contradictory explanations of difficult stories I mean the most famous one was one of the MH 17 the plane crashed the plane that was flying from the Netherlands to Malaysia in 2014 crashed over eastern Ukraine. After was shot down by Russia missiles. You know what, what did the Putin regime do it put up dozens of messages about this crash told everybody something different about it, you know. And the result was they created a kind of confusion so people feel, there was it interview that was done on the time with people on the street in Moscow and they all said well we have no idea why this plane crash and we will never know it's not possible to find out the truth anymore so Putin Russian Russian just information has actually been used to create the sense of chaos that nothing can really be known. Everybody's isolated from everybody else. There's no truth, you know, we have no idea what's going on. And of course this is the tactic that the Russians brought to the US and also us and, you know, very prominently and freely in other European democracy, other democracy especially European democracies as well using these, you know, using confusing messages conflicting messages impersonation as they did in the 2016 election and as they continue to do and in other places so they've actually weaponized social media to be of advantageous to cursing and we didn't let me finish. One of the really main issues you know if you take kleptocracy is one, one of the main issue is confronting democracies at the moment is that we don't have an answer to that, you know, we don't have a democratic internet, which reflects our values that we can point to you know the values of openness and transparency, you know where the rules promote civilized discourse. We have exactly the opposite we I don't know how you describe our internet so kind of. It's a kind of oligarchy or an oligopoly, but the you know where the rules are made on transparently by a small group of people in Silicon Valley and and the, you know, even decisions like whether President Trump can have a Twitter account or made you know by by an unnamed group of people at a private company. All of those kinds of decisions need to be brought into the democratic process. It may be that the algorithms that are used to govern conversation and just set the rules were what people here, most of us at the moment it's mostly things that are very emotional very angry that that may should become a public of part of public conversation may also be that we need to start talking about alternative forms of social media public interest social media where the you know where consensus is a value rather than conflict and I've just written something about this, it'll be published soon and all of these things are technically possible so this isn't not dreaming number, making them up but having this conversation about how we alter social media so that it reflects our values is it really important. So, are you behind your statement Are you are you suggesting that the FCC or some other commission should make decisions about what should go on and what shouldn't go on. No, this is, this isn't just about monitoring content is about the structure of the system itself. Yeah. You know how do the algorithms work, you know, who gets to decide that. Right. You know, should there be a, should there be court, you know, should there be some kind of court system attached to the internet and other words, if you're thrown off, should you be able to appeal to somebody. Right, right. You know what, you know, we need to begin thinking about how, you know, we do govern speech in some ways in real life, and and we do mean, you know, you know we you know we have some accepted rules about libel and about, you know, shouting fire in a crowded theater and so on. Some of those rules and some of the way of thinking that we're used to using to govern discourse, we need to think about how to make it work online it's not going to be exactly the same and we made new kinds of institutions, but we are at the beginning of a process of thinking that through certainly that came up in the impeachment of Trump in the discussion in the Senate, about the linkage between his speech and what happened. And you've. You know you've written twilight of democracy but also the American crisis, what went wrong and how we recover some of it before January, 6, and you were very hopeful. In those books about where we're going, I will not quote you at this point. But I was helpful after reading at you but I. are you still hopeful after what's happened on January six. So thanks to the American crisis for those who don't know is actually a collection of stories from the Atlantic yeah well I wrote the afterward, and the afterward asks, you know where what previous periods of American history can we look to for some, you know, for some something to cheer ourselves up. I just talk a little bit it's a very brief essay. I talked a little bit about the Progressive Era and about the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, as opposed to Franklin who is usually the one who gets talked about at these contexts, and the way in which he took a step back and he asked you know is, is the system working for everybody is American capitalism working, what are the ways that we can regulate it and think about it differently. This was of course the Europe trust busting the creation of antitrust laws and his, his goal was not to smash the American system not to not to destroy it, you know, as some radicals at the time wanted, but how do we make it more humane how do we make it work for people. And it actually it is my argument that if you know we can you know if we were capable of changing the rules then, you know, thinking of a different way for our society to be run. Then why can't we do it now and actually the regulation of social media is exactly that I mean once again we're talking about big monopolies that that are controlling our information space, and it may not be that any trust laws the right answer to them and I. But, but thinking big about how we regulate them, how we how we want to what's the positive that you know not just what do we want to take down off the internet. What, what, you know what, how do we want to communicate in the 21st century that we have, you know, we've had these major eras of reform before you know you can look at Theodore Roosevelt you can look at Franklin Roosevelt. You can look at the civil rights movement and the legislation that followed that you know, we do we are a nation that has changed itself in the past. And so there are reasons why we should, you know we could we can, we can hope to be able to change ourselves in the future. So let me share the quote that stuck with me with the audience, quote, there have been moments in our history and the history of other nations when intelligent leadership healed equally profound divisions. Without resulting in violence. Well we had violence on January six and you gave me hope that you know maybe we can move forward with reform. It was a shock to all of us that happened, that we usually spend violence in the United States but usually we solve things through the courts through elections, through getting new people into office. I mean that's that's the promise of democracy that's the one advantage of democracy. It has over other systems is that you can make changes without violence and you can. The war, a camp campaign means war, the campaigns allow you to make change without killing people. Right. Ultimately, so let me change the topic a little bit and and look at authoritative authoritarian regimes throughout the world, but ones that you know Well, it seems to me that. That ones who have strong economic growth seem to be getting away with taking freedoms away from their people. And, you know, there's crony capitalism is prevalent in many of these regimes And in a way, China is there also. And certainly, Russia, but maybe Poland, maybe, maybe hungry. Why is this the case is it that the elite, in a society that that gain economically from what's going on will look the other way. When freedoms are taken away in a way. Many Main Line conservative Republicans were looking away from what Trump was doing for example because they got a tax break a D regular regulatory regime. I got things that they wanted and they really didn't stand up and criticize him for a variety of other behaviors vile behaviors by, by him, related to race and a lot of other things is, do they buy into having freedom taken away when they are gaining economically in these societies. I mean I feel somewhat awkward making a direct link between the Chinese Communist Party and the republican party. They're different enough that you know maybe they should be answered no they're different, but certainly it's the case that the source of China's legitimacy of the ruling parties legitimacy is their ability to move forward, you know it to develop the country and to achieve economic growth, and that therefore, the you know the real threat to their legitimacy will come the moment when that's no longer true whenever, whenever it does come, and it's really that rather than admiration for the Chinese system that has that gives China, a lot of influence around the world, whether it's in Africa or in other parts of Asia you know the Central Asia. You know the countries that are now seeking to align themselves with China, or are doing so because they hope to achieve some kind of economic success themselves and it's in some way that you know the contrast between the failure of the perceived failure of the West in 2008 and nine, and the Chinese success, particularly in for developing countries that I think is has has, has, has given you know has taken away a lot of prestige for American democracy, but your other point is also well taken. I mean one of the things that we learned in the United States in the last four years was that a big players in our political system but voters but also leaders inside the system, we're, we're willing to ignore attacks or assaults on democracy. If, in exchange for other kinds of political goals. They talk themselves into believing that there was a balanced to be done about one thing they could get an advantage another way some of these were political advantages sometimes they were economic advantages to their voters, you know and and what an illustrated was that the value of democracy itself was not as strong as we believed it. And the things that seemed that everybody had assumed it would be absolutely beyond the pale ways of speaking ways of, of, you know, ways of governing were accepted by, I would say, if you look particularly at the senior level in the Senate and in some members of cabinet made the conscious decision to ignore assaults on American democracy and our American democratic norms in exchange for either personal or political power and I would connect this actually back to the question you asked me at the very beginning, which is why people, you know why my friends in Poland were attracted to, you know, an authoritarian political party it's similar kinds of reasons that they, they see either personal or political gain to be had. And they decide those things are more important than democracy. You, this brings up the topic of our party system we have two strong parties, and some few states we have multiple parties but we have to strong parties. It's really important. In my opinion, and I think you believe this to to have two fairly strong parties competing with each other over how they will govern what they will do for the comments for the people, the Republican Party is a in a major battle right now between the Trump people, and then people like Portman and others who are fiscally conservative they believe in free pre trade, other things they're really, I think, solid public officials are leaving. They're leaving the Senate. And there's a battle that's going to go on for the heart of the Republican Party, in my opinion, my question is, How can we meet the challenges of our democracy that are going on right now if we've got a party. That's totally split and doesn't exactly agree with the conservative basis of the republican party. The classic conservative base of the Republican Party, seems like they believe in a person personality. Trump, rather than a philosophy that has driven the party for many years. So there are different ways to answer that question i mean i think the. Maybe I'll answer by saying that both historically and also recently, one of the solutions to far right extremism, has been the strengthening of the center right. And you can see this, this have played itself out recently in Austria where a centering of charismatic young center right Christian Democratic Leader beat out the rising far right, partly by stealing their issues, but also by finding ways to isolate and, and, and, you know, and just credit them. And what do you know in the US, we don't have the, in some ways, good fortune of having a multi party system. Because of the way our, our Constitution is written in our rules of voting Don't, don't, don't make that easy. But the battle inside the Republican Party really is now a battle, you know, Canada center right you know of whatever philosophy, whether it's a, whether it's, whether it's focused on free markets or whether it's focused on social conservatism or whether it's focused on, you know whatever piece of, of the old center right. You know, you know constellation of ideas that wants to wants to use, whether that center right can draw people away from the authoritarian populism represented by Trump, and by some of his followers who are still in the party. And so, you know, unfortunately for people outside the, the party we have little influence over that. You know I'm a republican voter for many decades ago I don't count myself as one anymore, but if you live in Washington DC. You've got a problem. If you're a Republican. right i mean i mean that's one way to look at the problem. Another question, which is a slightly different one, is what do the rest of us do about that part of the republican party that no longer accepts our voting system, you know that no longer accepts that our political system works and that's not the whole party that's, that's the people who are at the Capitol on January six, and there's something like 20% of people who have said they support the assault on the capital. Yes, but it's not, maybe it's not really 20% maybe it's 15 or 10. Either way, it's a very large problem of the 47% that voted for Trump about in some polls and you know it's it's only a couple of them, 80% of them, agreed with his, his analysis that that that the election was stolen now maybe that's changed since January, six, etc. You know, we really have 50 Republican parties and and the republican party to a great extent is dying in the northeast, and it's alive in the cowboy states the southern states, the rural states. And so the battle will go on, not from a national viewpoint, in my opinion, but it'll go on in those local parties and those local parties, many of them. They're censoring these people in the House of Representatives that that voted for impeachment. And the Republican Party they're really they're really taking over the local Party and the local republicans the business people and others. They're just not engaging and I think that may be a problem. What is your reaction, then everything depends on who votes for the question then is, is that is that ideology popular among Americans and and and how successful will it be because of course that also will determine how these things play themselves out and, you know, in the meantime, as I said, there's this structural issue for the rest of us, which is how do we cope with this anti systemic group, you know who remember that the assault on the capital was not that wasn't republicans against Democrats. That was a group of people who are trying to disrupt the operation of Congress, and prevent the selection of the next president, that they were anti systemic they were they were, they you know they were going to hang Mike Pence. You know that wasn't wasn't about that wasn't just partisanship that was something a little bit different. Yeah, it wasn't it wasn't a core of the republican Republican Party leadership at all i you know i don't think that it's an important minority and it's something that we need to we need to think how we speak to it of course the lessons from other countries here. Are you know are pretty clear you know that one of the, one of the tasks for the bite administration is going to be find ways to change the subject. In other words, find ways to engage those people in some kind of conversation about something important, where we don't talk about Trump, or we don't talk about whichever are the big culture more issues that divide us we didn't focus on whether it's abortion or immigration but instead we talk about rebuilding the country we talk about under the vaccines, and that the by demonstration find some way to engage that group. You know well well well not forcing everybody into a room to argue it out because that that argument might not succeed I mean we may discover that in in the in the next several years we don't have much in common. And so that makes it all the more imperative that both national politics and state politics, and local politics actually that leaders, find other other other things that we can engage on other other ways that we can communicate and other topics that we can discuss. So where do you and George Will and all of the republican leaning columnists go in the future. So I don't qualify as a Republican leaning columnist anymore. And I really had no problem voting for you I know that you endorse Hillary, I should tell everybody that I know I endorsed Hillary because I was I identified Trump, from the very beginning, as an authoritarian populist, and much of what he was saying reminded me of things that I knew that I'd heard in Europe. And I also felt that his Russian connection also very early on was creepy and required some required some explanation. But, but, you know, I I'm the person who really put me off the Republican Party was Sarah Palin and that was some time ago so yeah okay sorry, I didn't mean to push you into that box. This would be, this would be a great time to go ahead and jump in if you guys don't mind and try to answer a few of these excellent questions that we have had come in from the q amp a. And so it could I interrupt for just a second. Let and know that we, we have students all around the world I have several from Ukraine. And I've been there several times to help them with their reform efforts. And so some of these questions may be coming from around the world, Ukraine, Italy, Kazakhstan variety of places. Sorry, David, go ahead. No, that's great, the list doesn't tell us where they're coming from, but the first one that I have for you is from Cornelia by Jay Scott. She asks, or she says, thank you for this excellent discussion, and then asks, How do democratic regimes push against the allure of authoritarianism if democratic countries also need those authoritarians to deal with multiple global problems like climate change. Excellent question. I mean I think we can walk and chew gum at the same time so we managed with the soap, you know in in the long ago Cold War years we managed to have productive arms negotiations with the Soviet Union wall criticizing their human rights record, and even while active actively helping Soviet dissidents and speaking to them through Radio Free Europe and other Radio Liberty and other other methods so you know I don't see any reason why we can't engage with China on the subject of climate change, while at the same time, you know making out, you know, for example reinforcing international institutions that were set up long ago, to, to, to hold governments to account, and to criticize them for abuse of power. Many of those many of those organizations institutions have declined. I don't see why we can't do both at once. I you know I don't see why we can't, you know offer alternatives to Chinese propaganda. You know in the countries where it active. I don't see why we, you know why we can't compete with China ideologically, you know, while at the same time, you know, looking for things we can work with them together on a given away the international version of what I just said about domestic politics. It may be that we find there's a whole area of things we can't talk to China about, and we will ever be able to. But, you know, that doesn't mean we need to go to war with them and it also doesn't mean that we can't also, at the same time to talk about climate changes in China's interest also to speak about climate change. And so, that seems to be a, you know, you know, an excellent, you know, an excellent description of a place where we can, where we can talk to maybe not not everything. Not everything has to be linked I mean this is an old argument going back and foreign policy related or should they relinquish or not. And maybe we need to revisit some of those thoughts and ideas for this new era. Could I add something to that David very quickly, it's related to democratization. How can we push for democratization when people look at our problems of race and, and mal distribution of wealth and access to the ballot and a variety of other things, isn't it kind of difficult. I'm sorry I didn't I didn't hear what you, what you just said, Well, it wasn't posed as well as it should be. And I'm sorry. It's that something blinked off, I apologize. That's right. So we, you know, going back to Biden statement but also we as a nation is pushed for democratization human rights and other issues and institutions the building blocks of democracy, how can we do that when people around the world turned back and say, Well, wait a minute, you've got a whole lot of things that are wrong with your democracy and we saw clearly with with Trump, but also now with limits to access to the ballot in the United States efforts to limit people getting to the ballot. Isn't that kind of hard. I mean I, again, I think it's I think it's something that we can do with others. I don't think we can stand up and say, we're promoting democracy because we're so great. I do think that together with European democracies with Asian democracies with Latin American and African democracies. I think that we can you know we can we can speak jointly to some of these problems. And we can, as I said, we can also offer constructive strategies. So again it's not, you know, I think there's this misunderstanding that democracy promotion is something the United States should do by itself and it should do it through fighting wars I mean this was never historically, what what the United States ever did, it's a it's a real aberration. But, but speaking finding ways to speak as a group with other democracies. Finding a strategy that you know that will last over the long term focusing on the reform of the information space the reform of kleptocracy offering people some, you know, better solutions. I mean, you know people who are living in swamped by information chaos in their countries. You know if we can point them towards something better, you know, then we're making it you know then we're offering them something real so i mean i don't think it's a. I don't think it's about America's power of example, you know, we don't have that we used to have more, you know, we used to have more of a power for example now we have less than one. But I do think there are other ways in which we can we can be a positive force to promote democracy around the world, right, thank you. And we had a certain amount of arrogance about what we were until what happened recently, David Sorry, go ahead with another question. Thanks, that's what I'm trying to get through a couple more here I Dennis Landis asks would stronger educational systems, I suppose you could just talk about any kind of educational reforms you'd like. Reduce the allure of magical thinking, and a talker. So certainly I mean this is a this is a, you know, because people mean so many broad things by education I mean there are two things that we could certainly use more of. One is something that's called media literacy, helping you know as a subject in school, helping people understand how to young people, how to navigate the internet, helping them understand what the internet does I mean many of them are beginning to understand and understand this intuitively better than older people actually but understanding that you know the reason you're seeing this series of images and stories is because the algorithm thinks that's what you want to see and understanding that you should be able to have more control over over what you want to see and this by the way is one of the other reasons I want to reform the internet is that I want people to have more agency in deciding what it is they want to see and read. And the second area, obviously is civic education. And this means such a wide things to so many people that you know that you know that you can get very bogged down in this too but thinking about civic education is an ongoing lifelong, you know it's not just something you do in some dusty social studies classroom in eighth grade you know but again that's built into American history exams into AP history, but it's built into curricula, and that there are maybe it's something that NGOs should do maybe it's something state or local governments could do, but that their ongoing online campaigns I mean the way that we fight against smoking or drunk driving through, through campaigns I mean campaigns to teach people and remind them, how institutions are supposed to work. Remind them how they should be using local government here's what your member of Congress his office does. Here's how you can be in touch with it. I'm giving people some, some you know better tools, you know, to allow them to access the access democracy and also I mean that there's a there's a flip side of that which is that voters and, and ordinary people of all kinds actually also I think need to step up to the plate and begin to understand that, you know, democracy is not like water coming out of a tap, you know that you can just ignore it and let it run and you know it'll always be there when you want it you know it might be that it's more like water and well and you might have to go and get it and drag it out and you know sterilize it, and that being involved in your local community or in state politics or in a party or in an NGO or supporting something, financially, you know, supporting you know one of the great democracy groups that us democracy groups that have sprung up in recent years. This might now be part of being a citizen and we all need to be active so it's not just, it's not so much education, per se, it's you know focusing on these things that would help people be better and more active citizens. Thanks a lot. So, David Simpson wonders if you know given the rise of authoritarianism and contradistinction to democracy. If the old. You know distinctions between left and right and liberal and conservative are still as as useful as they used to be. So this is a theme I've been writing about for a long time that I, I do think that a lot of the old party divisions, you can see this very clearly in Europe where you have multi party systems, the old center left versus center right division you know Social Democrats and in Europe it's critical Christian Democrats. It really doesn't make sense anymore It doesn't reflect the range of issues that concern people. And you can see it in systems that are more flexible than ours, you can see it by the rise of Green Parties. Actually, the rise of far right and for left parties you know you can see that there are there are issues that aren't that just aren't covered. Traditionally, I mean in the US, this is we've often you know the way it's sort of an issue that has to be dealt with inside parties because our system is inflexible and it's very difficult to achieve it for a third party to, to make headway. And this is, you know, we've already discussed the argument going on inside the republican party but there's similar kinds of arguments. Inside the Democratic Party as well. And and yes I do think we'll see a realignment around different issues, you can already see it happening right economics, you know you you know that the, the things that separated us and the things that that we thought were most important part going to to be the most important going into the future and that I do hope that the party system begins to reflect this I do think that one of the reasons for the decline of respect for democracy or the loss of interest that happened over the last several decades in both Europe in the US but also around the world, was the fact that the parties became very ossified, they began to seem like you know professional organizations run by professionals for the sake of professionals, and they really lost their contact to ordinary people I mean if you think of where social democracy originally came from a meeting sprung out of the trade union movement. And it was you know and the trade union movement was real people having real issues in the party was a product of that I mean once, but as the trade union movement declined social democracy became less relevant to people so it may be that reorientation re, you know re rethinking of who's a party or how party should be maybe it should be a coalition of organizations, is you know we're really right for that now. But and, you know, we're a pluralist system. We have a lot of NGOs a lot of organization outside the party, trying to influence the party but also directly. And there is a hypothesis that when you have big pieces of legislation like the Affordable Care Act, you needed a whole lot of groups outside pressuring you know the docks the hospitals the even the health insurance people, they are P. All of these are very important and go, sort of against the thesis of Bowling Alone, there are a lot of people that belong to these organizations and they do have an impact. But it's outside the party. And so we should not forget that they're around and they will have an influence and they, and I think Biden gets it. By the way, and he's bringing in the leaders from a variety of viewpoints from these groups that represent power outside the party many yeah and those groups also offer a way to be active for people who don't feel particularly sympathetic with either the partners, right right way of being engaged in politics. Yeah. So I'm going to ask just one more question. And this is from my, my old colleague from long ago, Bert Rachman who I'm happy to see is with us here. So it's a long setup here but bear, bear with me for a second. Although in the US, much of the attention regarding authoritarianism has been at the federal level, the states and regions have become increasingly politically homogenous much of the subversion of democratic press practices especially access to voting has been at this level where one party ism dominates. In addition, the focus on control the courts by one party or the other implies that didn't diminution of democratic culture. To put it another way, our politics seems to be increasingly zero sum much like the onset of the Civil War. Any suggestions as to what is within the realm of possibility to defuse this sense of zero some winning or losing it so first of all yes of course So first of all, yes of course it's a very astute observation that you know much of this is used in some in some cases it's even worse at the state level, and you know some of the some of the solutions to this or, you know, not very original to me, you know, could we could we begin you know the voting new voting rights act, a you know some, you know, national federal level rules, you know that would change gerrymandering and make it more. You know, you know, making me make it much more difficult for states for parties that win at the state level to, to ensure their eternal victory. And so there are some you can think of some legislative ways to be active at the state level, but I think actually much of what I said about the federal level also applies down there and again it's these questions of. Is there enough civic engagement is there, you know, are people involved in voter registration campaigns I mean we just saw how, how, how, how important civic groups were an activist in Georgia in in changing the nature of politics of a, you know, have a state that had been, you know, very monolithic for a long time. And it seems to me that you know looking, looking at the grassroots for health and making those changes as well as talking about legal and regulatory changes we could make it the federal level I think the combination of those two is the best solution behind your statement you argue that there needs to be some competition and in many cases there's no competition. You know the real election is the primary election and that's where the battle will be between in the republican party with the dumpsters and other people. Competition does create people coming to the middle. Which, you know you were saying, you know, doesn't happen anymore going back to Anthony downs, you know, economic theory democracy we say you know that's good we go in the middle and we get everything we want, but it's it's better than people on the far the far right and far left you, you in your, in your book talk about the growth of the far right and far left and I have colleagues, David from Oregon on the line I'm from Oregon, and they have really had had it with the far right in the far left in Portland. Surely they are radical centrists like me. And it seems that that is growing in the state of Washington. Also, and other places. I'm worried about that are you yeah well there's a phenomenon that I wrote about this year called cumulative extremism, you know, in which the extremists have a one side provokes extremism on the other side and then gradually sucks moderates in I mean groups as well so it's a I mean there is no question that that they they feed off one another and they, you know, and they and they encourage one another, I mean one of the things I was most worried about had dropped been reelected is that would have absolutely the you know the go the green light for a real far left to you know to get going in the United States because you know they're there was Trump, you know, the kind of caricature, you know, of what of what the left most hates about America in power and reelected and we would then have had, I think the growth of a lot more extremism there too so one of the chances we now have with Trump losing is that we can damp down some of the anger and the you know the tendency to violence on both sides. Yeah, right. So David, I think we're out of time. Right, right. We are out of time and I just want to thank thank you and for for this fascinating discussion. I know that I've learned a lot from it and, and thank you Jim as well. I just want to give you both a virtual hand here. And otherwise, we I want to, I want to thank and to and also encourage everybody to go out and buy this book. It is not like political science that will put you to sleep.
