(AGENPARL) – mer 13 aprile 2022 You are subscribed to News from the John W. Kluge Center from the Library of Congress.
Tomorrow: “Four Threats” With Suzanne Mettler
In Four Threats, Suzanne Mettler and co-author Robert C. Lieberman explore five moments in history when democracy in the U.S. was under siege: the 1790s, the Civil War, the Gilded Age, the Depression, and Watergate. These episodes risked profound—even fatal—damage to the American democratic experiment. From this history, four distinct characteristics of disruption emerge. 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. According to the authors, what is unique, and alarming, about the present moment in American politics is that all four conditions exist.
There will be a book sale and signing at the conclusion of the talk. Register here to watch the event live via livestream, or watch live in room LJ-119 of the Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress.
Suzanne Mettler is the John L. Senior Professor of American Institutions in the Government Department at Cornell University. Her research and teaching interests include American political development, inequality, public policy, political behavior, and democracy. She is co-editor (with Lieberman and Kenneth M. Roberts) of a new edited volume, Democratic Resilience: Can the United States Withstand Rising Polarization? (Cambridge University Press), and also a recent special issue of the journal ANNALS on “Democratic Vulnerabilities,” co-edited with Lieberman and Thomas Pepinsky.