Is democracy doomed? The global fight for our future | Timothy Snyder

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4.1 • 11.9K Ratings

🗓️ 8 February 2023

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If you think democracy is some kind of inevitable, default setting for the world, then you aren't going to have it for very long, says historian and author Timothy Snyder. From World War I to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Snyder dives into the structures that uplift and tear down political systems, offering a historical perspective on the current state of democracy around the world as well as the patterns of thought that lead to tyranny. Learn more about a new approach to democracy that could help create and protect a future of freedom. (This conversation, hosted by TED current affairs curator Whitney Pennington Rodgers, was part of an exclusive TED Membership event. Visit ted.com/membership to become a TED Member.)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Ted Audio Collective
0:11.0	Hey, it's Ted Talks Daily. I'm Elise Hugh. Is democracy doomed? It's hard not to be
0:16.4	cynical about it these days, especially from where I sit, as an American in the United
0:21.4	States. Today, Professor and historian Timothy Snyder helps us better understand how to
0:26.8	think about the larger structure and spiritual responsibility we have to democracy. In this
0:33.4	2022 Ted membership event, Snyder is in conversation with Ted Current Events Curator Whitney Pennington
0:39.7	Rogers and take some questions from Ted Members after the break.
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2:01.9	I'm speaking to you from the United States and my mind is often on the United States.
2:06.2	I'm speaking to you as a historian of Eastern Europe, among other things, a historian of
2:11.5	Ukraine. So that helps a bit to define where I'm coming from. So the topic that I've been
2:18.3	asked to address is whether democracy isn't a decline, whether democracy is doomed and
2:23.6	what can we do? I think where I'd like to start is with the question itself, with the
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