I'm Jonathan K. Phard and welcome to K-PART.

American exceptionalism used to be a mantra that both sides of the aisle used to tout.

But after four years of Donald Trump and the January 6th insurrection, not only is that

in question, but so is our standing as a democracy.

In how civil wars start and how to stop them, Dr. Barbara F. Walter argues that we haven't

been a traditional democracy for a few years and worse, we're following a well-worn path

of anocracy and factionalism that has led many a nation to civil war.

We're talking about these other countries. I'm watching what's happening in my own country,

and all I could think about was, oh my god, these two factors are emerging here in my own country,

and they're emerging at a surprisingly rapid rate, and people don't know what these warning

signs are. In this conversation, first recorded on January 26th for Washington Post Live,

Walter discusses whether another civil war is possible here in the United States,

and she actually has good news to share.

And before I get into the factors that play here that predict a civil war,

I want you to talk about the quote that we had there on the screen, where the start of it says,

most Americans don't even think that it's possible that we could have another civil war.

Talk more about that, and then we'll get into the specifics.

Yeah, so I started writing this book in 2018 when people really still were, they were worried

about Donald Trump, but they weren't thinking about anything beyond having a president that

they didn't like, and even my colleagues at the university thought that this topic was misguided.

They didn't understand why I was writing it. They thought it was absolutely impossible and

implausible. They worried that this might be alarmist, and I didn't feel that way at all.

...