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Paul Lachelier

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    Threats to democracy

    Three threats to American democracy and their social roots

    Paul Lachelier
    September 27, 2022
    Divided American flag
    Jorge Villalba/Getty Images

    Lachelier is the founder of Learning Life, a nonprofit lab devoted to innovating education and citizen engagement.

    Democracy in America faces three existential threats: election subversion, a growing disconnect between policy and public opinion, and a longstanding gulf between democracy and Americans' everyday lives.

    On Sept. 19, Joseph Kahn, executive editor of The New York Times, announced that some of the Times’ best journalists are working to "expose the cancers eating away at democracy, as well as joining the search for solutions." Kahn fingered two threats to American democracy that Times journalists consider to be the biggest: "first, a movement within the Republican Party that refuses to accept election defeat; and, second, a growing disconnect between public opinion and government power."

    The first threat, as many journalists from the Times and other generally reliable news sources have documented, includes not just denials of election defeat, despite convincing evidence, but efforts to make it harder to vote, and to elect state and local election officials who can subvert the popular vote.

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    civic engagement

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    Big Picture

    America needs democracy learning communities

    Paul Lachelier
    Mike Morrow
    August 24, 2021
    People having a discussion over coffee

    Democracy learning communities can bring people together across political, class, race and religious divides to learn about the complexities, challenges and possibilities of democracy, the authors write.

    SolStock/Getty Images
    Lachelier is the founder of Learning Life, a nonprofit lab devoted to innovating education and citizen engagement. Morrow is a former U.S. diplomat and current senior democracy strategist with Learning Life.
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