Public Intellectuals, Thought Leaders, and the Marketplace of Ideas | Daniel Drezner

Hidden Forces

Demetri Kofinas

Business, Government

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 25 September 2017

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In Episode 20 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with political scientist Daniel Drezner about public intellectuals, thought leaders, and the marketplace of ideas. Dr. Drezner is professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, and the author of "Spoiler Alerts" for the Washington Post. His latest book, The Ideas Industry, explores the balance that must be struck between public intellectuals and thought leaders in a properly functioning marketplace of ideas.

What is the state of intellectual thought in American society? Where does one go in order to find good information? How does one measure the value of an idea if he or she cannot determine its veracity? How have the foundations of Western intellectual development like empiricism and reason been turned into political footballs? Why has trust in institutions eroded? Why has the credibility of journalists, scientists, and experts been brought into question? How has the wealth gap, partisanship, and information overload created a landscape welcoming to thought leaders, but hostile to the very types of public intellectuals that would have been celebrated less than 50 years before?

Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas

Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou

Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod

Transcript

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0:00.0	What's up everybody?
0:01.0	What's up everybody?
0:02.0	What's up,
0:05.0	what's up everybody?
0:10.0	What's up everybody?
0:11.0	Welcome to another episode of Hidden Forces with me
0:13.6	Dimitri Kofinus. Today I speak with Daniel Dresner. Dr Dresner is a
0:18.4	professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.
0:25.0	He is also a non-resident senior fellow at the Project on International Order and Strategy
0:30.4	at the Brookings Institution and a contributor to the Washington Post.
0:34.0	The author of numerous books, his latest, The Ideas Industry, forms a foundation for today's conversation.
0:41.0	In this episode, we examine the state of intellectual thought in American society,
0:46.4	from the media to academia, from think tanks to TED Talks.
0:50.3	The marketplace of ideas is a bizarre bizarre full of wonders and which doctors
0:54.8	huckster selling snake oil amid the honest shopkeepers and traffickers of good
0:59.2	information. How the foundations of Western intellectual development like empiricism and reason been turned into political footballs?
1:07.3	Why has trust eroded to the bone of credibility where journalists are
1:11.1	distrusted scientists discounted, scientists discounted, and expertise despised.
1:15.4	And how is the growing trend of wealth disparity, partisanship,
1:18.8	and information overload created a landscape welcoming to the thought
1:22.2	leader, but hostile to the very type of public intellectual that would have been celebrated less than 50 years before.
1:29.0	As always, you can gain access to reading lists put together by me ahead of every episode by visiting the show's website at Hidden Forces pod.
	...

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