Two of our Penn State colleagues join us this week to discuss their recent findings on the connection between state-mandated civics tests and voter turnout. Jilli Jung, a doctoral student in education policy and Maithreyi Gopalan, assistant professor of education and public policy, recently published the paper "The Stubborn Unresponsiveness of Youth Voter Turnout to Civic Education: Quasi-Experimental Evidence From State-Mandated Civics Tests" in the journal Education Evaluation and Policy Analysis.  In the paper, Jung and Gopalan study the Civic Education Initiative, a framework adopted ..read more

Democracy is sometimes described as "a system where political parties lose elections." That's true but doesn't capture the deeper feelings of grief and grievance associated with political loss. We dive into those emotions this week with Juliet Hooker, the Royce Family Professor of Teaching Excellence in Political Science at Brown University and author of Black Grief, White Grievance: The Politics of Loss. Hooker argues that whites as a group are accustomed to winning and feel a sense of grievance when they need to give up political power. Conversely, Black people are expected to be political h ..read more

Cas Mudde, one of the world's leading experts in the study of populism and far-right politics, joins us this week to discuss the tensions between populism and democracy, and why populism has increased around world in recent years. Mudde is the Stanley Wade Shelton UGAF Professor in the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Georgia and a Professor II in the Center for Research on Extremism (C-REX) at the University of Oslo. His research agenda aims to address the question: how can liberal democracies defend themselves against political challenges without undermining th ..read more

In the heyday of American labor, the influence of local unions extended far beyond the workplace. Unions were embedded in tight-knit communities, touching nearly every aspect of the lives of members—mostly men—and their families and neighbors. They conveyed fundamental worldviews, making blue-collar unionists into loyal Democrats who saw the party as on the side of the working man.  Today, unions play a much less significant role in American life. In industrial and formerly industrial Rust Belt towns, Republican-leaning groups and outlooks have burgeoned among the kinds of voters who once ..read more

Why do we disagree about the causes of and solutions to social inequality? What explains our different viewpoints on Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, income inequality, and immigration? Penn State professors John Iceland and Eric Silver join us this week to discuss how the discrepancy between social order and social justice impedes political compromise and progress. Iceland and Silver, along with Ilana Redstone of the University of Illinois, are the authors of Why We Disagree about Inequality: Social Justice vs. Social Order. In the book, they show how these competing worldviews are preventing Amer ..read more

Before we get to the show notes, we invite you to take our listener survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works coffee mug! COVID-19 brought the problems with government technology into sharp focus. The systems responsible for delivering unemployment benefits and healthcare were not prepared to mange the influx of requests they received, and the government employees who run those systems were often hobbled by a culture that focuses on regulation and oversight, not innovation and acting quickly. Beyond the day-to-day impacts of these systems not working, the long-term consequences include the ..read more

Before we get to the show notes, we invite you to take our listener survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works coffee mug! Chris Beem talks with former Republican political operative Tim Miller about the party's loyalty to Donald Trump and where it might go in 2024 and beyond. Miller is a writer-at-large for The Bulwark and the author of the best-selling book Why We Did It: A Travelogue from the Republican Road to Hell. He was previously political director for Republican Voters Against Trump and communications director for Jeb Bush 2016. He also appears on MSNBC and The Circus on S ..read more

Before we get to the show notes, we invite you to take our listener survey for a chance to win a Democracy Works coffee mug! We're back from summer break and diving into the 2024 election season, Donald Trump's indictments, the spread of election deniers, and more. We also welcome Michael Berkman back from sabbatical and discuss the significance of "Democracy '24" as the backdrop for the first Republican presidential debate on August 23. For our listeners who teach American politics, we've put together a list of episodes designed to be a companion to your courses. Check it out at democracywork ..read more

We're excited to present an episode from our sister podcast, When the People Decide, about how libraries can be sites of civic engagement and building a new social fabric in America's cities and towns. Librarians have spoken for years about “library faith,” the belief that public libraries are central to democracy because they contribute to an informed citizenry. Today, the idea is gaining even more traction, and even conservative crackdowns on what’s permitted in libraries reinforce the idea that they’re more than just “book warehouses” but centers for community engagement and representativen ..read more

Americans want electoral reforms so that they can have more choice in elections. Recent surveys show that 20 to 50 percent of Americans are open to a new electoral system, while demand for a third party has crept upward since Gallup began asking in 2003. More Americans now call themselves "independent" than identify with either of the major parties, but what happens when Americans try to reform their way out of a two-party system?  In More Parties or No Parties, Jack Santucci traces the origins and performance of proportional representation in U.S. cities, the reasons for repeal in all b ..read more