Democracy Works
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Democracy Works
The Democracy Works podcast seeks to answer that question by examining a different aspect of democratic life each week — from voting to criminal justice to the free press and everything in between. We interview experts who study democracy, as well as people who are out there doing the hard work of d...
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315 episode
The new gerrymandering battles
The movement to end gerrymandering is something we've covered on the show several times over the years. Until recently, the conversation focused on in...
How misogyny fuels political violence
The last time Cynthia Miller-Idriss was on the show, we discussed how political extremism was making its way to the mainstream through a variety of ch...
Standing up for higher education
Summer is typically a quiet time for higher education but this summer has been anything but quiet amid funding cuts, lawsuits, and questions about the...
Ben Rhodes on America's changing role in a changed world
For our final episode of the season, we present a conversation with Ben Rhodes recorded at in Washington, D.C. at the end of May. Democracy Works is g...
How mental health shapes democratic engagement [rebroadcast]
In a rebroadcast from 2023, we discuss how to meet the demands that democracy places on us without sacrificing our own personal mental health in the...
Inside the MAGA black hole
Jeff Sharlet has spent the past few years embedded in the deepest corners of the growing far-right movement in the United States. He's come to think o...
How 2020 changed America
From fights over masks and vaccines to the loss of social connection, the year 2020 accelerated many of the trends that were already happening in Amer...
An update on the states
Last week's Wisconsin Supreme Court election put a spotlight on state-level politics and the way that national politics can influence what happens in...
The problem(s) with platforms
Cory Doctorow coined the term "enshittification" to describe how tech platforms have eroded over time. According to him, the process goes something li...
Lessons from Charlottesville and January 6
As the lead investigator into both the 2017 racist riot in Charlottesville and the January 6 insurrection, Tim Heaphy has a unique perspective on the...
Christianity as a democratic institution
Chris Beem, McCourtney Institute for Democracy managing director and research professor of political science at Penn State, talks with author Jonathan...
The power of practicing peace
It's easy to feel defeated in the face of political challenges, but this episode shows that everyone has the capacity to create positive change and co...
Pushing back against political violence
Instances of political violence around the 2024 election and vote certification on January 6, 2025 did not come to fruition the way some experts feare...
Democracy reform in 2025 and beyond
The results of the 2024 election — from Donald Trump's victory to the failure of democracy reform efforts like ranked-choice voting and citizen-led re...
Season finale: Reflecting on a new political era
This episode marks the first time that all five of our hosts (Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, Cyanne Loyle, Candis Watts Smith, and Jenna Spinelle) are t...
Sustaining democracy during wartime
Balazs Trencsenyi, co-director of Invisible University for Ukraine (IUFU), joins us to discuss the university's work to uphold education and democracy...
Telling America's story at the National Archives
Colleen Shogan, archivist of the United States, joins us for a conversation about democratizing access to national records and running a non-partisan...
Bad Watchdog: The Red Herring
We're excited to bring you an episode from Bad Watchdog, the podcast from the Project on Government Oversight and one of our colleagues in The Democra...
How strong is support for democracy?
We are collecting our thoughts about what's next for democracy following the 2024 election and will take up the question during our end-of-year episod...
How the Supreme Court could shape the 2024 election
Dahlia Lithwick has covered the Supreme Court since the landmark Bush v. Gore decision in 2000. In that time, she's seen a sea change in the court its...
Eddie Glaude Jr. on the peril of outsourcing democracy
With just weeks to go before the election, voting and candidates are top of mind of many of us. It's easy to think that once our preferred candidates...
Liberalism is a lifestyle
Chris Beem talks with political theorist Alexandre Lefebvre about why liberalism is more than just a political ideas and procedures, and how abiding b...
The immigration stories that aren't told
Immigration is a perennial issue in American politics, but the rhetoric we hear from candidates on the campaign trail is often very different than the...
How the National Popular Vote could change presidential elections
We're back from summer break with a deep dive on the National Popular Vote campaign, an effort to render the Electoral College obsolete when states pl...
Making Peace Visible: In search of good conflict
While Democracy Works is on summer break, we bring you an episode from our friends at Making Peace Visible, a podcast that ignites powerful conversati...
Season finale: Protests, debates, and the "meh" election
We've reached the end of another school year and another season of Democracy Works. Before we go on summer break, Michael Berkman, Chris Beem, and Can...
How elected strongmen weaken democracy
Democracies today are increasingly eroding at the hands of democratically-elected incumbents, who seize control by slowly chipping away at democratic...
30 years of democracy in South Africa
Please join us in welcoming a special guest host for this episode! Cyanne Loyle is Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs...
David Hogg on leaders we deserve
The shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida happened around the same time Democracy Works launched in 2018. In fact, one...
Democracy is the sum of us
Heather McGhee made her career in pushing for economic policy changes at the think tank Demos. But she couldn't help but feel that something was missi...
Cassidy Hutchinson on what comes after January 6
Cassidy Hutchinson, and aide to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows whose testimony captured the nation's attention in the January 6 Congre...
How discontent destabilizes demoracy
If there's one thing that people across the political spectrum can agree on, it's a sense of discontent with the current state of American politics. T...
A different take on social media and democracy
We've talked about social media a lot on this show over the years — usually focusing on algorithms, echo chambers, polarization, and the other ways it...
How to combat political extremism
Cynthia Miller-Idriss, one of America's leading experts on the far right, joins us this week to discuss what draws people to political extremism onlin...
A different kind of political divide
As a Democracy Works listener, you probably follow politics pretty closely. And we're going to go out on a limb and say that many of the people in you...
Tim Alberta on evangelicals and Republicans
Chris Beem talks with journalist Tim Alberta about the role that Evangelical Christians play in the Republican Party — and what that means for the fut...
How election officials are preparing for the year ahead
The past few years haven't been easy for election officials and their teams. They had to pivot during the pandemic and face ongoing threats that have...
Finding hope in 2024
Happy New Year! We're starting off 2024 with a conversation about finding hope in politics. We often hear from listeners that our show brings feelings...
Year in review: Media, mental health, and threats to democracy
For our final episode of 2023, we revisit some of our episodes from throughout the year and reflect on what's in store for democracy in 2024. We talk...
Making Peace Visible: The state of democracy in India
This week, we're bringing you an episode from Making Peace Visible, a podcast that helps us understand the human side of conflicts and peace efforts a...