Events Calendar

Whatever one’s political views, it is hard to believe that the past election campaign and its result—most dramatically, the election of a person who received almost three million fewer votes than his rival, but nonetheless prevailed in the electoral college—put to rest widely shared concerns about the health of American democracy. And, with Brexit in the United Kingdom and the more general travails of the European Union, not to mention other parts of the world, there is probably more general anxiety about the prospects for liberal democracy than at any time at least since World War II (and the run-up to World War II in the 1930s).

The University of Texas Law School is sponsoring a symposium, “In the Winter of Our Discontent: The State of Democracy in the Age of Trump,” on Thursday, February 23, and Friday, February 24, which will address some of these widespread anxieties. In particular, it will focus on four recent books reflecting on the challenges facing democratic political systems at home and abroad:

Bruce Cain (Stanford University), DEMOCRACY MORE OR LESS: AMERICA’S POLITICAL REFORM QUANDARY

Edward Foley (Ohio State School of Law), BALLOT BATTLES: THE HISTORY OF DISPUTED ELECTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES

Samuel Issacharoff (New York University School of Law), FRAGILE DEMOCRACIES: CONTESTED DEMOCRACY IN THE ERA OF CONSTITUTIONAL COURTS

Nancy Rosenblum (Professor Emerita, Harvard Department of Government), GOOD NEIGHBORS: THE DEMOCRACY OF EVERYDAY LIFE IN AMERICA (Princeton)

The symposium will begin on Thursday at 5:30, when Sam Issacharoff, a cherished former member of the UT faculty and now a professor at the New York University School of Law, will deliver a public lecture on “Anxieties of Democracy.” That lecture, like all of the events will take place in the Eidman Courtroom.

Please RSVP here.