meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
The Lawfare Podcast

Stephen Holmes on Liberalism in the 21st Century

The Lawfare Podcast

The Lawfare Institute

History, News, National Security, Law, Terrorism, Current Events, Military, International Law, Foreign Policy, Intelligence, International Relations, Politics, Diplomacy, Rule Of Law, Government, Constitutional Law

4.76.4K Ratings

🗓️ 4 April 2020

⏱️ 60 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Stephen Holmes is the Walter E. Mayer Professor of Law at New York University. With Ivan Krastev he is the author of "The Light that Failed: a Reckoning." Jack Goldsmith sat down with Holmes to talk about his new book and much more. The pair discussed the fate of liberalism in the decades following the fall of the Berlin wall, Holmes’ experience studying Eastern European politics, the problems with trying to export liberalism across the globe and the factors that have led to the global rise of illiberal leaders.

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare.


Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

The following podcast contains advertising to access an ad-free version of the LawFair

0:07.2

podcast become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash LawFair.

0:14.7

That's patreon.com slash LawFair.

0:18.2

Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, rational security, chatter, LawFair

0:25.6

no bull and the aftermath.

0:34.2

When you listen to the rhetoric of East Central European populace like Orban in Hungary or

0:41.4

Kaczynski in Poland, one of the things you're hearing most often is the slogan. This

0:47.4

is their favorite slogan is, we don't want to be copies, we want to be ourselves.

0:53.7

When Ivan Krasdev, who's my co-author and I, we're listening to this, it occurred to

0:58.1

us that there's something there's a clue here to understanding why the process of democratization

1:04.3

and liberalization produced a politics of grievance and resentment. And that's because once you

1:11.4

see that democratization was a process of imitation and then you realize that imitation

1:17.4

often produces resentment for the simple reason that to want to imitate someone is to

1:23.1

confess that they're better than you. And over time, this hierarchical relation between

1:28.3

the superior model and the inferior imitator can be grating, can be humiliating, can make

1:34.9

you feel like you've been dispossessed of your culture.

1:39.9

I'm Jacob Schultz and this is the LawFair podcast April 4, 2020.

1:47.8

Stephen Holmes is the Walter E. Meyer Professor of Law at New York University. With Ivan Krasdev,

1:55.0

he's the author of The Light That Failed, O'Reckoning. Jack Goldsmith sat down with Holmes to

2:01.5

talk about his new book and much more. The pair discuss the fate of liberalism in the

2:07.4

decades following the fall of the Berlin Wall. Holmes is experienced studying Eastern

2:12.5

European politics, the problems with trying to export liberalism across the world, and

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Lawfare Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Lawfare Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.