The Center for Global Justice
Research/Learning for a Better World & Empowering a Solidarity Economy
The Crisis of Liberal Democracy
Feb 4th, 2020 11:00 am
Ron Aronson & Cliff DuRand
In 2016 when voters rejected the U.S. political Establishment, both Democratic and Republican, the long festering crisis of liberal democracy suddenly became visible. The loss of legitimacy by the political elite produced a President Trump. As Michael Moore pointed out, angry voters threw a human hand grenade into a political system that had failed to respond to their pain.
Philosophers Ron Aronson and Cliff DuRand will discuss the reasons for this crisis, its consequences and what we can do about it. It's the story of globalization, neoliberalism, concentration of wealth, racism, and much more. The consequences have shocked progressive minded people into action. They are searching for ways forward through electoral politics, mass protests, building local alternatives. Suddenly 'socialism' returned to the popular vocabulary. But what does that mean? And what is possible given the current social context?
These are among the issues they will discuss. Ron Aronson is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of the History of Ideas at Wayne State University in Detroit. He is author of several books, including We: Reviving Social Hope, After Marxism, and several books on Jean-Paul Sartre.
Cliff DuRand is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Morgan State University in Baltimore and a founder of the Center for Global Justice. He is editor/author of Recreating Democracy in a Globalized State and Moving Beyond Capitalism.
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Past Summer & Winter Symposiums
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Upcoming Talks & Films
Tuesday, Jan 21 - 11:00 am
Film & Discussion
For those of us who haven't experienced life on a farm, it's common to not have a full understanding or appreciation of what that life entails. It's a life filled with; hard work, good and bad luck, joys and satisfaction, sorrows and disappointments.
The Biggest Little Farm is a documentary that follows Los Angeles couple John and Molly Chester, as they impulsively purchase a...
Wednesday, Jan 22 - 11:00 am
The political leaders most able to do something continue to ignore the issue of climate change. While the cataclysmic effects of global warming become ever clearer, scientists and significant swathes of the public are trying to make a difference. That's the focus of the eye-opening documentary Ice on Fire."It focuses on many never-before-seen solutions designed to slow down our...
Thursday, Jan 23 - 11:00 am
Mexican Climate Challenges
Enrique Caldera & Diana Hoogesteger
What can Mexico contribute toward climate solutions? Two key areas are solar energy and regenerative agriculture. Diana Hoogesteder of Via Organica will discuss how intelligent farming practices can regenerate depleted soil while capturing carbon from the atmosphere and sinking it in the ground. Current common factory farming practices are adding to carbon that is warming the planet and...
Saturday, Jan 25 - 2:00 pm
Mexican Workers & AMLO's Campaign Against Neoliberalism
For decades Mexico's unions have been controlled by the government rather than independently representing workers. Now President Andres Manual Lopez Obrador is seeking to move the country away from the neoliberalism of the last 36 years. What does this mean for Mexico's workers? Author David Bacon will look at the kinds of problems workers and unions have had and what is changing.
Bacon...
Tuesday, Jan 28 - 11:00 pm
Gasland 2
"Don't frack with Mother Earth" became a popular slogan after Josh Fox's 2010 documentary on hydraulic fracking exposed the dangers to humans and environment of this controversial method of extracting fossil fuels from shale. Scenes of people living near fracking wells lighting flames from their kitchen faucets dramatically demonstrated how ground water had been made undrinkable.
Wednesday, Jan 29 - 1:00 pm
Nominated for an Oscar as Best Documentary, The Edge of Democracy is a cautionary tale for these times of democracy in crisis. We witness up close the rise and fall of Brazil's Presidents Dilma Rousseff and Lula da Silva. The legislative coup against Dilma and the judicial coup that imprisoned Lula, the most popular politician in the country, opened the way for the rise to power of...
Venezuelans Under Siege
U.S. sanctions block the Venezuelan people from obtaining food and medicine. They resulted in at least 40,000 deaths between mid-2017 and the end of 2018, according to a study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research – and that was prior to the most severe sanctions,...
Tuesday, Feb 4 - 11:00 am
Philosophers...
Wednesday, Feb 5 - 11:00 am
The Corporate Coup d'État
The Corporate Coup d'État takes a complex political/historical theme and brings it to life. In the style of '13th,' 'Manufacturing Consent,' 'The Corporation,' and 'All Governments Lie' it creates a powerful cinematic experience that explains how President Trump is the result of failed neoliberal globalist policies, and a 'corporate coup d'état' in which corporations and billionaires were able...
Friday, Feb 7 - 2:00 pm
We: Reviving Social Hope
Ron Aronson
The book We: Reviving Social Hope by philosopher Ron Aronson will be the focus of a discussion group on Friday February 7. The author will be the Unitarian Universalist Sunday speaker on February 2. His book is a message to save us from the despair, cynicism and defeatism that paralyzes too many in these troubled times.
Aronson argues that social hope is born from collective...
Tuesday, Feb 18 - 11:00 am
The Economics of Happiness
Economic globalization has led to a massive expansion in the scale and power of big business and banking. It has also worsened nearly every problem we face: fundamentalism and ethnic conflict; climate chaos and species extinction; financial instability and unemployment. There are personal costs too. For the majority of people on the planet, life is becoming increasingly stressful. We have less...
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