Does Star Wars have a distinct political viewpoint that we can tease out? Would the Rebel Alliance be considered a terrorist organization? How would we know if a rebellion was justified? Is the Star Wars story libertarian?

Show Notes and Further Reading

The original trilogy of Star Wars movies and the prequel trilogy of the late 90s/early 2000s will be joined by Star Wars: The Force Awakens on the day this podcast is released.

Trevor mentions Somin’s work on political ignorance; for a more in-depth study, listeners may want to read his book on the matter: Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter (2013), or read the Cato Unbound series on democracy and political ignorance.

Listeners may also enjoy the podcast we did earlier this year with Timothy Sandefur on the politics of Star Trek.

Ilya Somin was also a guest in a KosmosOnline podcast about Star Trek.

Somin frequently mentions the animated TV series Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars: Rebels.

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