Is democracy failing in Australia’s number one ally?
Jason Stanley, an American expert on fascism who is leaving the US to move to Canada, and M Gessen, award-winning journalist who fled Putin’s Russia and now warns of echoes in the US, join Anna Funder, acclaimed Australian author of Stasiland and Wifedom, for this timely and chilling discussion.
How do we even begin to understand what is happening in America right now? Every day a new attack on its Constitution. People are routinely abducted by masked men and stuffed into vans. The military has been deployed against protesters in its second largest city. Universities and law firms are punished for not toeing the line. And every day there is a new assertion of unitary presidential power. And yet the daily headlines barely make a dent in our consciousness. Are we ill-equipped to understand what is playing out before our eyes?
How far has the US shifted to authoritarianism and is there any way back? And what does this mean for Australia and the rest of the world?
Presented by Sydney Opera House
