Civic Engagement Opportunities
"How is your relationship with Democracy going?"
Sustaining Democracy is an informal non-partisan watchdog group that focuses on constitutional governance and threats to its flourishing. Through readings and film screenings, lectures, and discussions, we explore how liberal democracy and the rule of law are undermined by authoritarianism, tribalism, and political corruption. We investigate the interrelationships between modes of governance and law (eg human and civil rights), economy (eg wealth distribution and class conflict), and culture (eg race, religion, and ethnicity). We pay particular attention to the mechanisms of authoritarianism, such as in dictatorships, fascisms, and ethnonationalisms.
In past semesters, we have read works such as How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy At Home and Abroad by Fareed Zakariya, Twilight of Democracy by Anne Applebaum, selections from The Paranoid Style in American Politics by Richard Hofstadter, and the 1935 novel It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis. We have also held screenings with expert discussions of the PBS documentary The Dictator's Playbook and the 2020 award-winning film titled A Thousand Cuts, about Filipino human rights journalist Maria Ressa. Our lunchtime series has featured professors Alexis Carré, Jason Brownlee, and others. We produce a student-produced newsletter and meet regularly for democracy-sustaining discussions and actions such as tabling, registering voters, and contacting our elected officials on key issues.
Sustaining Democracy is sponsored by the Jefferson Center in Core Texts and Ideas, the Bech-Loughlin First Amendment Center, and the Center for Law and Democracy. Meetings are open to all UT students/community. For more information, please email susdemUT@gmail.com.
To join this group, go to https://tinyurl.com/SusDemCanvasEnroll