DEMOCRACY: April 2022 podcast playlist

Democracy is at a crossroads right now. The world’s largest autocracies are throwing their weight around and placing bets that the demise of democracy is on the horizon. How did we get here and what can we do about it?

 

This playlist is sponsored by Democracy Decoded, a podcast from Campaign Legal Center.

Podcast Playlist on DEMOCRACY

Get the full playlist on your podcast player of choice using these platforms (see the ** below for instructions):

Radiolab: “Tweak the Vote” (November 2018, 1 hr 6 min)
Can one proposed tweak to the way we vote make politics more representative, more moderate, and most shocking of all, more civil? NOTE: It may be difficult to find this episode. See the *  below for workarounds.

Overheard at National Geographic: “Documenting Democracy” (November 2020, 28 min)
Andrea Bruce, a National Geographic photographer, has covered conflict zones around the world for nearly two decades. She shares how the experience of capturing democratic ideals as a war photographer in Egypt, Afghanistan, and Iraq now shapes the way she’s chronicling democracy in America in 2020.

Democracy Decoded: “Cracks in the System” (March 2022, 18 min)
A discussion that breaks down the basics of America’s campaign finance system. The episode is an examination of how illegal coordinated campaign spending occurs, and why it has not been properly addressed.

Analysis: “Deliberative Democracy” (March 2019, 29 min)
Can panels of ordinary citizens heal political divides in a way that politicians cannot? This episode explores the idea of citizens’ assemblies, which have been used around the world to come up with solutions to polarising issues.

Scene on Radio: “S4 E10: Schooled for Democracy” (May 2020, 59 min)
In most schools, children *hear about* democracy, but don’t get to *practice* it. What would a more engaged brand of civics education look like?

Bonus podcast episodes:

• Future Hindsight: “Deliberative Democracy: Jane Suiter and David Farrell of the Irish Citizens’ Assembly” (December 2019, 30 min)
  A discussion with Jane Suiter and David Farrell, political scientists who advocated for citizens to be included in debates about the necessary political reforms to address the failures of the executive branch of government.
• The Documentary Podcast: “Understanding democracy in Hong Kong” (November 2021, 18 min)
  An explanation of the democracy protests in Hong Kong.
• Civics 101: “Gerrymandering” (November 2021, 24 min)
  The 2020 census has concluded, which means it’s time for states to redraw their congressional districts. Today we’re exploring partisan gerrymandering, the act of drawing those maps to benefit one party over the other. In this episode you’ll learn about stacking, cracking, packing, and many other ways politicians choose voters (instead of the other way round).
• Radiolab Presents: More Perfect: “Citizens United” (November 2017, 1 hr 1 min)
  Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission is one of the most polarizing Supreme Court cases of all time. So what is it actually about, and why did the Justices decide the way they did?
• This Day in Esoteric Political History: “The Confederate Constitution (1861)” (March 2021, 17 min)
  It’s March 11th. This day in 1861, the Confederate States of America ratifies its own constitution. It’s largely based on the United States constitution, but with some key changes.
• Democracy Works: “How to end democracy’s doom loop [rebroadcast]” (July 2021, 43 min)
  Lee Drutman is a senior fellow in the Political Reform program at New America. He is the author of Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America and The Business of America is Lobbying.
• Scene on Radio: “S4 E9: American Empire” (April 2020, 1 hr 1 min)
  “America” and “empire.” Do those words go together? If so, what kind of imperialism does the U.S. practice, and how has American empire changed over time?

Conversation Starter Questions:

1. What do you think about the idea of rank choice voting, as described in the Radiolab episode?
2. If you live in the United States, do you think campaign finance should be reformed? How do you think money should play into campaigning?
3. The episode from Analysis put forth the idea of using citizens assemblies to come to compromises on polarizing issues. Do you think this could work in the country where you live?
4. What role do you think schools should play in democracy?

* So, it turns out that a few days before we published this playlist, the “Tweak the Vote” episode from Radiolab fell off the bottom of their feed. BUT, it’s so good and so relevant and we really wanted to keep it on the playlist. So, here are a few workarounds:

• See ** below on the easiest way to get all of the episodes (including “Tweak the Vote”) into your player of choice. But, note that Spotify won’t work for accessing the Radiolab episode for this month.
• Listen to the episode directly in Listen Notes or Podchaser or Podyssey. Spotify won’t work for this particular episode.
• Listen on the Radiolab website.

** If you are manually finding each episode on a playlist in your podcast app, there is an easier way!!!! Every month we add the PBC playlist on four platforms: Listen Notes, Podchaser, Podyssey, and Spotify. We do this to make it easier on you so that you don’t have to hunt for each episode manually on your player of choice. You can simply grab the rss of the playlist from Listen Notes, for example, and drop it into your player and…boom!!…all of the episodes magically appear. Here’s a video that shows an example of quickly adding the episodes to Pocketcasts using the Listen Notes playlist.