The Authoritarian Playbook For 2025
Since June 16, 2015, the day that Donald Trump descended an escalator in Trump Tower and announced his run for the presidency, the American body politic has struggled to figure out how to treat him, his rhetoric, and the threat he poses to our system of government. A similar pattern plays out repeatedly: Trump makes a seemingly outlandish promise that upends conventional understandings of politics. Then, those who help Americans make sense of current events — the media, other politicians, pundits, and influencers — dismiss, distort, or deny the very promise Trump has made. And few then know quite what to make of it all or how to respond — a state of confusion that has enabled Trump to shatter democratic norms in previously inconceivable ways.
We now have more than eight years of experience with this phenomenon and a full presidential term as a track record proving that Trump’s pledges should be taken both seriously and literally. He has, for the most part, sought to do the extreme things that were dismissed as mere rhetoric when first promised, from enacting a “Muslim ban” to refusing to accept the results of an election. And yet, here we are again, with Trump making even more extreme promises to “terminate” the Constitution, seek “retribution” against political opponents, and be a “dictator” (just on day one), only to see people unsure what to make of or how to respond to these threats.
This report aims to alter these dynamics by clearly showing how Trump would follow through on his most extreme anti-democratic pledges for a second term and then offering expert recommendations for how to mitigate that danger.
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More than Red and Blue: Political Parties and American Democracy
Recognizing the serious risk of democratic backsliding in the United States, the American Political Science Association (APSA) and Protect Democracy partnered to sponsor the APSA Presidential Task Force on Political Parties.
The Task Force’s report, More than Red and Blue: Political Parties and American Democracy, presents what political science says about the functions of political parties, how we came to have the parties we have, and where sources of change exist.
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The Belonging Barometer: The State of Belonging in America
Over Zero and the Center for Inclusion and Belonging at the American Immigration Council are excited to announce the launch of “The Belonging Barometer: The State of Belonging in America.”
The Belonging Barometer report calls attention to belonging as a critical dimension of life that should matter to all stakeholders who seek to improve America’s physical, social, civic, and democratic well-being.
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What Happens When Democracies Become Perniciously Polarized?
The rise of an “us versus them” mindset and political identity in American sociopolitical life is evident in everything from the rise of highly partisan media to the decline in Americans’ willingness to marry someone from the opposing political party. Even more concerningly, these dynamics are contributing directly to a steep rise in political violence. Polarization has already brought on serious problems—what more lies ahead? Are insights on this critical question available from the experience of other polarized democracies? READ MORE>
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Root Causes Perspectives: How Did We Get Here?
Everyday Americans and political insiders alike have become increasingly concerned with the dangerous levels of division, governmental dysfunction, and public distrust in our country. These trends had been intensifying for several years, and were on display in stark terms this past year in the midst of numerous domestic crises. Our country’s responses to COVID-19, widespread civil unrest, and the January 6 storming of the Capitol each highlighted the seriousness of the situation. READ MORE>
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Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity
Lilliana Mason looks at the growing social gulf across racial, religious, and cultural lines, which have recently come to divide neatly between the two major political parties, and argues that group identifications have changed the way we think and feel about ourselves and our opponents. Bringing together theory from political science and social psychology, Uncivil Agreement clearly describes this increasingly "social" type of polarization in American politics and will add much to our understanding of contemporary politics. READ MORE>
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Palaces for the People: How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization, and the Decline of Civic Life
In Palaces for the People, Eric Klinenberg suggests that the future of democratic societies rests not simply on shared values but on shared spaces: the libraries, childcare centers, churches, and parks where crucial connections are formed. Interweaving his own research with examples from around the globe, Klinenberg shows how "social infrastructure" could help to bridge our seemingly unbridgeable divides. READ MORE>
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Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right
When Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, a bewildered nation turned to Strangers in Their Own Land to understand what Trump voters were thinking when they cast their ballots. Arlie Hochschild, one of the most influential sociologists of her generation, had spent the preceding five years immersed in the community around Lake Charles, Louisiana, a Tea Party stronghold. READ MORE>
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Philanthropists Across the Political Divide Must Work Together to Cure Extremism
Sarah Ruger of Stand Together on why the extremism threatening our democracy’s health calls for a broad-based nonpartisan philanthropic response aimed at slowing the spread of the disease and eventually reversing it, and three places where grant makers can strategically direct their dollars. READ MORE>
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The Upswing: How America Came Together a Century Ago and How We Can Do It Again
Deep and accelerating inequality; unprecedented political polarization; vitriolic public discourse; a fraying social fabric; public and private narcissism--Americans today seem to agree on only one thing: This is the worst of times.
But we've been here before. During the Gilded Age of the late 1800s, America was highly individualistic, starkly unequal, fiercely polarized, and deeply fragmented, just as it is today. However as the twentieth century opened, America became--slowly, unevenly, but steadily--more egalitarian, more cooperative, more generous; a society on the upswing, more focused on our responsibilities to one another and less focused on our narrower self-interest. Sometime during the 1960s, however, these trends reversed, leaving us in today's disarray.
In a sweeping overview of more than a century of history, drawing on his inimitable combination of statistical analysis and storytelling, Robert Putnam analyzes a remarkable confluence of trends that brought us from an "I" society to a "We" society and then back again. He draws inspiring lessons for our time from an earlier era, when a dedicated group of reformers righted the ship, putting us on a path to becoming a society once again based on community. READ MORE>
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Building the America that Never Was, Yet Still Must Be
The Ford Foundation’s Hilary Pennington explores how America can balance movements of reckoning and movements to bridge divides in order to build a truly pluralistic, multi-racial democracy. READ MORE>
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Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation
David French examines the true dimensions and dangers of America’s widening ideological gap, and what could happen if we don't take steps toward bridging it - as well as what it would take to reestablish national unity. READ MORE>
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Ways to Reconcile and Heal America
Amid a global pandemic, the United States is grappling with deep polarization after a divisive presidential election and the events that followed. Moments of polarization, radicalization and extremism have increased public distrust in government, legislative gridlock, and violence in cities around the county. At this critical moment in history, Brookings President, John R. Allen and Darrell West look at how polarized discussions on race, ethnicity, religion, immigration and gender stem from years of income inequality, geographic disparities, systemic racism and the rise of digital technology, and propose policy solutions to chart Americans on a path towards national unity and reconciliation. READ MORE>
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SSIR Guide to Overcoming Polarization
A roundup of SSIR articles exploring ways to take on the unprecedented divides in America. READ MORE>
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At Their Doorstep: What the Attack on the Capitol Might Mean for Philanthropy
Philip Rojc interviews democracy funders on what funders should have done better in the lead-up to January 6, and what they can do now. READ MORE>
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FixUS Landscape Review
In recent years, there has been a proliferation of organizations working to address our growing political divisions and hyper-partisanship. FixUS has developed this Landscape Review with the purpose of curating the many existing organizations devoted to improving the state of our democracy through political, economic, cultural, and other changes. READ MORE>
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Philanthropy Can’t Replace Our Broken Government — but It Can Help Rebuild It
Arabella Advisors’ Loren McArthur explores how philanthropy can work to bolster government over the long haul and not merely seek to make up for its deficiencies. READ MORE>
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