Democracy in Danger

When law professor Danielle Citron began exploring the scourge of online harassment, especially of women, what she found was disturbing. Virtually undeterred, stalkers would share intimate details about their targets, post nude photos without consent and threaten rape. This kind of behavior is enabled by the same Wild West approach to cyberspace regulation that permits so much of our personal data to be harvested and abused. What’s at stake, Citron says, is not just our privacy online, but our civil rights.

Srdja Popovic was 16 and playing guitar in a goth-rock band when Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic came to power. A decade later — after a series of brutal civil wars — Popovic and a few friends launched a resistance movement that grew to tens of thousands and helped topple Milosevic’s reign of terror. The secret of their success? Nonviolence, Popovic says. Today he leads an organization that supports pro-democracy activists all over the world. Hear him share his story, his principles and his hopes.

Like many of you, we were shocked and horrified by the killings at Atlanta-area spas last week — reminding us once again that nativist ideology in America is nothing new. Historian Erika Lee, who testified on hate crimes again Asian Americans before Congress in the wake of the massacre, walked Will and Siva through this sordid past on a show we produced in Season One. This week, we’re interrupting our regular schedule to bring you that episode.

Given a real choice, people around the world would take a shorter work week over bigger salaries, consume less to live more and seek mutual flourishing rather than plunder their natural resources. The problem is, says anthropologist Jason Hickel, the idea of a “degrowth” economy has never been on the ballot. Instead, the core tenet of capitalism — insatiable expansion — is holding humanity, and democratic ideals, hostage. The stakes can’t be higher, he argues: if we don’t fix that, we won’t save the planet.

The U.S. Constitution is clear: every person counts. But in a country with a sordid history of voter suppression, tinkering with the decennial census has become the latest trick for undermining majority rule. And the usually mundane rite of enumeration was politicized like never before when President Trump tried to exclude undocumented immigrants from the census. Dale Ho, director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, explains why that’s detrimental to the proper functioning of government. And illegal.

Over the last 25 years, college tuition has almost doubled. Meanwhile, America’s K-through-12 education system has only become more fractured — with acute disparities in standards and resources at different schools sometimes just miles away from each other. But UVA president Jim Ryan has hope that with creative solutions across the board, learning can be democratized, and democracy itself enriched in the process. Hear what he has to offer Siva and Will — and the tough questions their students have for Ryan.

American democracy is supposed to come with a warranty: equal opportunity, social mobility, the promise of success with hard work. But the fabled Dream is fraying. In fact, NYT journalist Eduardo Porter says, it was never sold as advertised. From the beginning, the myth cheated people of color and poisoned working-class solidarity. To mend this tattered republic, Porter tells Siva and Will, we need “a new idea of America” — made from policies that address wealth inequality across the social spectrum.

Brazil is cursed. Or so it would seem, says media studies scholar David Nemer. Every three decades over the last 100 years, an authoritarian government rises to power. And the results are disastrous. Under Jair Bolsonaro, the “curse of the thirty years” continues, with covid deaths mounting and Brazilian institutions buckling. Find out what’s going on and what hope remains for democracy in South America’s largest country.

In a largely unregulated social media ecosystem, a curious mom looking for info about vaccine mandates in public schools can end up feasting on the internet’s most insidious — and outlandish — conspiracy theories. Stanford researcher Renée DiResta joins Will and Siva to grapple with the tangled web of QAnon, antivaxxers and more. If the Jan. 6 riot in Washington is any indication, what starts in chatrooms doesn’t stay in chatrooms. And the real-world consequences of the virtual Wild West can be disastrous.

Remember Silvio Berlusconi? Sex scandals, shady deals and a cult-like following marked the former Italian prime minister’s lasting grip on power. It’s a playbook with a long history and a troubling appeal nowadays, says NYU historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat. On our first episode back from the winter break, she walks Will and Siva through the characteristics of political strongmen — and the lessons they offer for American democracy in the post-Trump era.