Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

When a government totters

Soldiers

Chadian soldiers during the ceasefire between rebels and the supporters of President Felix Malloum in N'Djamena.

Daniel Simon/Getty Images

Varga, author of “Under Chad’s Spell,” was a Foreign Service officer, serving in Dubai, Damascus, Casablanca and Toronto

In the middle of an exam, my Chadian students suddenly stood up and fled my classroom. A minute before, they had seen through the glassless window that a crowd had run from the central market in Baibokoum. No one knew why so many were running. But days before, the word on the street was that rebels had captured the main military base in Chad’s capital, N’djamena.

The exam was important for their grades and my exclamations to the 80 boys to sit down and finish the test were met with shrieks that in a choice between finishing the exam and saving their lives, it was a no-brainer. They wanted to live.


This was 1979 and the government was under attack. Rebels were marching ever closer to the heart of Chad’s government. Everyone was nervous and the future seemed to hint at further bloodshed and unrest.

I was a Peace Corps volunteer teaching at a high school in a village far from the capital. Yet, the constant whispers that a civil war was about to explode and upset everyone’s notions of what life looked like were paramount in every tribal elder’s mind, in every mother’s work in the cotton fields, in every student’s focus on mastering the present progressive tense in English. No one could escape thinking about the constant threats to stability.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

I have never forgotten those days when living with a government tottering on the brink pervaded each person with a sense of loss. Not only for Chadians. Not only for foreigners. But everyone. Those frightening images of the attack on our Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, sent me back to my village in Chad. Was the United States on the brink of civil war? It certainly looked like that for a time, as President Donald Trump reportedly watched TV in the White House. Was he going to allow this attack to succeed?

We live in a fraught time where one political party continues to attack the very institutions of our society. The many conspiracy theories denying the outcome of the 2020 election have created a corrosive tension in American society. If we can no longer agree on what the rule of law means, then we are descending into tribes that think only of war and weakening the other side, rather than finding common ground on what is best for our nation.

My time abroad in Chad taught me how fragile a society can become when the foundation of its bonds is under attack. In Chad, once the central government fell, it was each tribe for itself. The notion of a Chadian identity disappeared, and every Chadian became labeled by tribe. All Americans — including Peace Corps volunteers — were evacuated from the country. Everyone recognized the danger.

We have something noble in our country. We have a constitution that has stood the test of time. Do we want to rewrite our definition of what our country stands for? Let’s not go the route of seeing each other as representatives of a tribe with whom we’re at war. Rather, let’s continue to build an America where our American-ness means more to us than any linkage to some group who seems bent on undermining the values that have shaped our stable nation.

Our ancestors are watching as civil discourse descends into personal attacks on those performing key roles in public service. My grandfather was an immigrant from Hungary who survived as a gravedigger in Philadelphia. He spoke little English and that was the only job he could get as an uneducated worker. But in the magical way America has transformed our destinies, I was able to become a diplomat, serving abroad as a representative of the United States in some of the tensest countries of the world. We can do better than attacking those who disagree with us. Agreeing to disagree and not resorting to violence is our heritage after the lessons of our own brutal civil war. Let’s not go back to those days when some predicted the fall of our government and the sundering of the nation.

Read More

What Democracy Demands of Its Leaders When Disasters Strike

Firefighters continue battling Palisades fire as flames rage across Los Angeles, California, United States on January 09, 2025.

(Photo by Official Flickr Account of CAL FIRE / Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images)

What Democracy Demands of Its Leaders When Disasters Strike

An almost unimaginable tragedy is unfolding in Los Angeles, California. On Sunday, the Washington Post reported, "Four active fires in the Los Angeles region have burned over 40,000 acres — an area bigger than San Francisco … with flames claiming more than 12,000 structures and displacing tens of thousands.” Twelve people have lost their lives because of the fires.

Donald Trump’s response has been stunning, though not surprising. Instead of steadiness and solidarity, he has offered falsehoods, fictions, and blame. As in other things, he has departed from democratic traditions to which other Republicans have committed themselves.

Keep ReadingShow less
Senators’ credibility will be judged alongside Trump’s Cabinet picks

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump's pick to be secretary of health and human services, visited the Capitol on Dec. 19.

Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

Senators’ credibility will be judged alongside Trump’s Cabinet picks

There are roughly 1,200 positions in the federal government that require Senate confirmation, including the senior officials who make up the president’s Cabinet. The first Cabinet official was confirmed in 1789 when the Senate unanimously approved President George Washington’s nomination of Alexander Hamilton to be treasury secretary.

The confirmation or denial process is a matter of 100 senators making judgement calls to determine whether a nominee is professionally qualified, exhibits leadership skills, is ethically fit, is morally just, doesn’t carry “baggage” and has the temperament for the job.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donald Trump and Joe Biden in the Oval Office
President-elect Donald Trump and President Joe Biden meet in the Oval Office on Nov. 13.
Jabin Botsford /The Washington Post via Getty Images

Why distrust in powerful politicians is part of a functioning democracy

Surveys suggest that in many western democracies, political trust is at rock bottom. Scandals, corruption, faltering economies, conspiracy theories and swirling disinformation are all playing their part. But is it really such a bad thing for people living in a democracy to distrust their government?

In this episode of The Conversation Weekly, we talk to political scientist Grant Duncan about why he  thinks a certain level of distrust and skepticism of powerful politicians is actually healthy for democracy. And about how populists, like Donald Trump, manage to use people’s distrust in political elites to their advantage.

Keep ReadingShow less
Fulcrum Democracy Forum logo

Meet the change leaders

As the year ends, we’d like to share with you more than 40 interviews The Fulcrum produced in conjunction with CityBiz for the “Fulcrum Democracy Forum – Meet the Change Leaders” series.

The Fulcrum and CityBiz, a publisher of news and information about business, power, money, politics and people in 21 major U.S. markets, produced these insightful interviews with an array of talented democracy change leaders. The videos were shared nationally with thousands of CityBiz subscribers and across its social media channels. The podcasts have also been published in The Fulcrum and distributed through the Coffee Party/Citizen Connect social media platform with 970,000 followers.

Keep ReadingShow less