A review of The Struggle for a Decent Politics: On Liberal as an Adjective Review by Justin Kempf The Values of Liberalism In this week's episode of the podcast I talked to Michael Walzer. We talked about his recent book The Struggle for a Decent Politics: On Liberal as an Adjective. In the Preface he explains... Continue Reading →
By Zak Schneider Some Fundamentally New and Radical Assumptions On a blustery day in late June of 1963, President John F. Kennedy spoke in front of a rapturous crowd in the streets of the American quarter of the partitioned city of Berlin. With American flags billowing in the background, he said, “freedom has many difficulties,... Continue Reading →
By Takis S. Pappas Describing Political Systems Say you want to construct an all-encompassing typology of political systems in the world. Now, since most knowledge is mediated by words, you had better start with establishing a clear vocabulary. Fine, but you are already stumbling upon the unclear and confusing terms used by such well-respected sources... Continue Reading →
By Justin Kempf Autocratic Ambiguity The precise line between democracy and autocracy was never entirely clear. Part of the problem was the inability of autocratic government to govern autocratically. Even the most capable autocrats rely on advisors and civil servants to carry out their wills. Moreover, they find it necessary to delegate significant authority to... Continue Reading →
Emilee Booth Chapman is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Stanford University. Her most recent book is Election Day: How We Vote and What It Means for Democracy. Become a Patron! Make a one-time Donation to Democracy Paradox. There is this idea on the one hand of this mass collective participation, but on... Continue Reading →
Lisa Disch is a professor of political science at the University of Michigan and an elected member of the Ann Arbor City Council. She is the author of the book Making Constituencies: Representation as Mobilization in Mass Democracy. Become a Patron! The tension in what we want from democratic representation is that we... Continue Reading →
Become a Patron! Representation and Democracy Perhaps the most widely cited book on democracy is Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition by Robert Dahl. Despite its widespread influence in the literature on democracy, very few writers refer to polyarchy. Instead, it’s become replaced with the more common term liberal democracy. Of course, I’m aware some find a... Continue Reading →
Bilal Baloch is the Co-Founder and COO of Enquire, formerly GlobalWonks. He is also a non-resident visiting scholar at the Center for the Advanced Study of India at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of When Ideas Matter: Democracy and Corruption in India. We have core ideas that form a part of our worldview, but... Continue Reading →
Zeynep Pamuk is an assistant professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego and the author of the book Politics and Expertise: How to Use Science in a Democratic Society. Science is never offering the whole truth. It may be offering us something accurate. Scientific findings may be reliable for... Continue Reading →
Science in a Democracy In the classic work Democracy and its Critics, Robert Dahl said Plato made the most compelling case against democracy. Most of us recall Plato imagined a republic where a philosopher king ruled over an orderly utopia. For most of us it’s difficult to take seriously the idea of a philosopher king... Continue Reading →
