“It settles down into the unconscious,” he says. “I’m teaching a class on emotions this fall, and that’s one of the points—the emotions you feel have to do with how a situation is framed. It’s like the old subliminal advertising thing.”

For Karen Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at Fordham Law School, threats to democracy from disinformation are vast and real, but voters and election officials have never been more vigilant.

“Look, we know we’re being spun,” says Greenberg, co-editor of Our Nation at Risk: Election Integrity as a National Security Issue. 

“The question is, can we step back for a moment and say, ‘I know I’m being spun. How do I either ignore this and move on to something else, or how do I put this in a category where I know that this is likely disinformation or misinformation and see what I can do to verify it?’”

Here are some tips Greenberg and Davenport shared to help you stay aware of—and minimally influenced by—disinformation this election season.

Be skeptical of new messages about the election—and their messengers.

“Whenever you see new information about the election, really close to the election, you should be suspicious,” says Davenport, who directs Fordham’s Peace and Justice studies program and is a frequent political commentator for publications like Newsweek and America. “If there’s some new news source that you’re just seeing for the first time this fall, and you have questions, google them and find if there are any reports about this source.”

On social networks, he says, keep an eye out for new friend and follow requests from people and groups you don’t know, and “just be conscious that you are being manipulated by algorithms, and their goal is to addict you to hateful content because that’s what sells.”

Greenberg notes that there are laws in place against promoting disinformation related to elections, but they’re hard to enforce without buy-in from private companies. 

Don’t let disinformation lessen your belief in objective facts.

As deepfakes, doctored photos, and AI-generated images flourish, it may feel tempting to dismiss the possibility of objective truth in the media we consume. Davenport cautions against this kind of wholesale skepticism, though.

Disinformation campaigns often try to foster chaos and confusion, Greenberg says, and create the sense that “a country can’t quite hold it together through a transition period.”

“There has to be a counternarrative to ‘we’re doomed, we’re victims,’ she says. “We’re not victims.”  

Be patient at the polls.

No matter how well-trained volunteer poll workers are, it’s going to be hard to prepare them for “any kind of aberrations that come up because of misinformation,” Greenberg says. “Go early … and just be patient.”  

And don’t be deterred, Davenport adds. 

“Don’t be scared away. Even if you see something telling you that the line at your polling place is two hours long.”  

Take advantage of available election resources.

Despite all the worries that election disinformation sparks in experts, Greenberg is heartened by what she says is “an incredible amount of attention” being paid to the issue by voters, law enforcement, and election officials. And she feels confident that voters are, on the whole, savvy enough to have their antennae up. 

To stay informed, she recommends resources like Election Law Blog and Democracy Docket. And Davenport points out that contacting your county clerk’s office—or checking its website—is a good way to get any necessary information about voting.  “We still need to tell people about the threats,” he says, “but then with that, we can say, ‘And here’s how you can find reliable sources on these topics.’”

The 2024 presidential election is likely to be the first time since 1892 that an incumbent president is running against another former president. And with early primaries having such an outsized influence, the slate could be a virtual lock before Super Tuesday even rolls around—even though most Americans don’t want a Biden-Trump rematch.

John Davenport, Ph.D., professor of philosophy at Fordham and former director of Peace and Justice Studies, said there are three main problems with the uniquely American presidential primary system that have contributed to this likely matchup: the scheduling of the primaries, the way the delegates are determined, and a lack of uniformity in who can vote in each primary.

‘Glaringly Unfair Tradition’

The Constitution doesn’t say anything about how political parties or their nomination processes should work, because the authors didn’t foresee the power of parties, which now set their own primaries, Davenport said. One result is that just a few states keep holding the earliest primaries.

Davenport called it a “glaringly unfair tradition” that four states have cornered the market.

“Early primaries bring huge profits to businesses in early states and give them more influence. Iowa rescheduled its chaotic caucus to just a week after New Year’s Day in 2024, and New Hampshire’s Republican primary election was eight days later, followed soon by Nevada and South Carolina.” 

While outcomes in Iowa and New Hampshire are not always decisive, their small populations, combined with South Carolina’s, have enjoyed enormously disproportionate influence that can eliminate candidates who might have remained viable if the first primaries were held in more populous states, he said.

“Thus they can cut nine out of 10 American voters out of the process, especially when early frontrunners gain big leads,” he said, adding that “no other advanced democratic nation” allows this.

Lack of State Uniformity

Inconsistency in how delegates are awarded also affects who ultimately wins the party nominations.

Because the Republican primaries in Iowa and New Hampshire operate somewhat proportionally, Nikki Haley won 17 delegates to Trump’s 33 by garnering about 40% of the combined vote in those two states. But in South Carolina’s Republican primary this month, the majority winner in each district will take all of its delegates—meaning that Haley could get 38 to 40% of the votes but gain zero delegates out of the state’s 50-delegate total, That would make it much harder for her to raise funds for the races in Michigan and on Super Tuesday in early March. Davenport said. In still other Republican primaries, a candidate finishing first gets all or most of the state’s delegates.

By contrast, in Democratic primaries in all states, each candidate gets a number of delegates that is loosely proportional to their percentage of the popular vote. 

Who Gets to Vote?

Equally inconsistent is whether a state’s primaries are open to independent voters or just those in the party holding the primary.

New Hampshire’s Republican primary was open, and many independents voted, boosting Haley’s numbers. Nevada, which this year held both a Republican primary and caucus, closed those races to independents. 

What’s the Solution?

“Congress has the authority to change the primary election calendar, rotating the chance to hold early primaries among five or six regions of the U.S., so that every state gets a fair opportunity over five or six presidential election cycles to hold high-impact primaries,” said Davenport.

Federal law could also solve the delegate problem by mandating that political parties use one method to award convention delegates in all state primaries. And by mandating open primaries in all states, federal law could help moderate candidates continue longer in tight races, he said.

“These are just a few examples of sensible and non-partisan reforms,” said Davenport.

John Davenport has taught in undergraduate and graduate programs at Fordham since 1998. He is the author of several articles and books, including 2023’s The Democracy Amendments, which attempts to synthesize two decades of creative ideas to fix the federal system into a comprehensive program.

McGoldrick, a lecturer, author, and expert in international law, the Middle East peace process, and humanitarian aid, previously held the position of deputy special coordinator, resident coordinator, and humanitarian coordinator in UNSCO, from 2018 to 2020, when he was replaced by Lynn Hastings.

Hastings stepped down in early December, and McGoldrick was asked to oversee relief efforts in Gaza and the West Bank until a permanent replacement can be found.

McGoldrick said that previous experience gives him a good sense of who he’ll have to work with to successfully deliver aid to the region. The Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel, and the resulting war that has raged in Gaza since then, has radically changed the reality on the ground, but the major players are in many ways the same, he noted.

“It will be a challenge taking on a job like this, but I know the context, and I think I can work in that context, especially with the national and international staff in place,” he said.

“I believe that if there’s goodwill with all the people that you work with, then you can optimize what you’re trying to do. And I hope to work with all the different constituencies to try and get them to be receptive towards the humanitarian endeavor.”

A Focus on Current Needs

McGoldrick said he’s focused on getting aid to the residents of Gaza as soon as possible. A U.N. report issued on Dec. 21 laid out how dire the stakes currently are there, noting that half of residents there are on the verge of starvation.

“When you get a crisis or a disaster of this kind, you have to plan for prioritization and quick expansive response in order to try and save lives and protect people,” he said.

In April 2020, McGoldrick reflected on the challenges of working in the region, in the fifth installment of the Ireland at Fordham Humanitarian Lecture Series. At the time, he noted how excruciatingly difficult it is to separate politics from relief work in the region, but how it’s absolutely paramount. That’s still true today.

“No matter what happens at the end of this conflict, there will be community structures, groups and leaders, and authorities who will want to work with the people,” he said.

“We just have to try and find out how we can locate those and use them to try and mobilize.”

Sharing Insights with Students

As an instructor in the IIHA’s International Diploma in Humanitarian Assistance program, McGoldrick will share his insights with students at Fordham when he finishes his current assignment. He currently does so via the podcast Humanitarian Fault Lines.

“There’s a lot of theory and policy that people should understand, but I think people learn more from case studies and stories,” he said.

“If you tell somebody a story about an individual who was in a crisis or a conflict, and how their life was affected, and then changed and improved, people remember that more.”

Ultimately, he said, a humanitarian aid worker is only successful if a level of trust exists among people on all sides of a conflict.

“That is where it makes a difference because somebody might not agree with what you do immediately, but you can get them to understand why you’re doing it,” he said.

“I think that’s the approach that you have to adopt. Otherwise, it’s just sides rubbing against each other, and that doesn’t help anyone.”

John Davenport, Ph.D., a professor of philosophy, says these and many more developments are proof that NATO and the United Nations Security Council, the two bodies best equipped to promote human rights and peace, are no longer up to the job. In a book that will be published by Routledge this fall, Davenport makes the case for creating what he calls a “League of Democracies.”

Listen below

And in an extended bonus track, Davenport delves into the ways in which game theory explains how the challenges the world’s democracies face are similar to those that America’s founding fathers faced in the 18th century.

Full transcript below

John Davenport: The goal of this proposal is not to create an entity that would take over the whole world. It’s to create a new organization that could protect democracies from the rising threats posed by Russia and China, and to stop the enormous mass atrocities that keep coming at us wave after wave.

Patrick Verel: In 2011 a series of uprisings known as the Arab Spring briefly gave the impression that democracy was on an unstoppable march across the globe. Seven years later, it hasn’t exactly turned out that way. Egypt has embraced authoritarianism, Libya is in a state of near anarchy, and Syria has been mired in a catastrophic civil war for seven years. Meanwhile, the international influence of authoritarian countries such as China and Russia as grown significantly.

John Davenport, a professor of philosophy at Fordham, says these and many more developments are proof that NATO and the United Nations Security Council, the two bodies best equipped to promote human rights and peace, are no longer up to the job. In a new book that will be published by Routledge this fall, Davenport makes the case for creating what he calls a league of democracies. I’m Patrick Verel, and this is Fordham News.

What was the genesis of this book, was there one particular moment that made you think, “You know what, let’s just start all over?”

John Davenport: In a word, Syria. I think the idea for the book really came to me in the summer of 2013 when it became clear that no nations were going to do anything about the new genocide in progress. After seeing this go on for decades, in the period we thought the world was going to get better after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Instead, we had Bosnia, we had Rwanda, we had the slaughter in the Darfur region of Sudan. All of the mass movements of refugees that these crisis cause. The civil war in Libya. There just isn’t a system in place in the world today to prevent mass atrocity crimes that destabilize whole regions.

Patrick Verel: What do you think is the most pressing concern for liberal democracies today?

John Davenport: Clearly we have division among democracies across the world. Those tensions are being aggravated by China and Russia, which are trying to buy off and woo many of these democracies. That’s not something that Western democracies should take sitting down. We need some new system that can unite the will of democratic countries and assure each of those nations that others are going to do their fair share in order to have a real security arrangement that can stand up to the new threats of cyber attacks, of endless hacking of our elections. New technology, unfortunately we’re going to face armed satellites, robotic weaponry, even nanotechnology. Now we have microwave attacks on our diplomats.

Patrick Verel: President Trump’s American First posture has been described by many as a form of isolationism, which would seem to preclude any acceptance of another international body. What do you think needs to happen for that to change?

John Davenport: It’s a natural reaction for people when faced with huge challenges to retrench and say well if we just retreat within our own borders we can weather out the storm that way. Unfortunately, that’s like the illusion that the hobbits suffered from in The Lord of the Rings. If we just stick to our own affairs in the Shire we don’t have to deal with these larger problems. That’s not how the world works. Things are going to get worse and worse in the 21st century as we approach peak population, not only with climate challenges but with pandemic diseases, financial instability across the world, mass movements of people driven by mass atrocity crimes and rising dictatorships.

The United States has to give up the pretension that we can take unilateral action whenever we want to, as we did in 2003. But, I don’t think that would be a huge price for a lot of Americans now, so ironically it might turn out that the isolationist tendency could even help this argument. But then, in other parts of the world, like Europe would have to accept that in order to get the multilateral decision making that they want, they have to be willing to go outside the U.N. Security Council. It’s now proven beyond any shadow of a doubt that this system is never going to work.

If 500,000 people can be killed in Syria with no forceful response, it’s time to abandon the Security Council. By the way, I should note, I don’t propose abandoning the United Nations entirely. This proposal is simply a replacement for the security council. It provides a way for democracies to act outside the purview of the security council, so we no longer give Russia and China a veto over what we’re doing.

Patrick Verel: Now, I understand that the Federalist Papers are actually a source of inspiration for this plan. Can you explain that a little bit more?

John Davenport: Yes, it’s amazing how exactly the situation between nations in the world today fits the analogy of the relation among the 13 young states in the founding of the United States. During the revolutionary war and the period immediately after, we had enormous discoordination among the 13 states. They were being played off against one another by old European powers. They couldn’t form any common foreign policy. They couldn’t even raise revenue to pay their debts or pay their veterans.

The whole relationship among them was falling apart and easily could have devolved into civil war a lot earlier in American history, if it wasn’t for the intervention of Alexander Hamilton with his friends Madison and Jay, who were able to make very powerful and convincing arguments that these problems. The collective action problems is what is the technical term for them between the 13 states, could only be overcome by a strong central authority that could make decisions for all of them and have binding power to enforce those decisions.

That’s exactly what the United Nations Security Council, NATO, and even the European Union for the most part really lack today. All of our international bodies make decisions by consensus, which means that almost every member nation has to agree. That’s how the old American confederation worked, or rather didn’t work, and that was precisely Hamilton’s insight.

Patrick Verel: Have you thought about any unintended consequences that might happen in the event that something like this actually is put together?

John Davenport: Absolutely, there are a lot of possible objections to the plan. Of course the most likely one is you’re going to create a massive leviathan, a world government that’s going to tyrannize humanity for the remainder of our future. The goal of this proposal is not to create an entity that would take over the whole world. It’s to create a new organization that could protect democracies from the rising threats posed by Russia and China, and to stop the enormous mass atrocities that keep coming at us wave after wave. It’s got to be, in my view, a directly elected council. So that, in unlike the U.N. Security Council, it’s answerable directly to people in all of those democratic nations.

It has to have real enforcement powers. It has to have at least a small armed force of it’s own that the council together with the chief executive of the league can deploy when they see that that’s really necessary to prevent new waves of ethnic cleansing or genocide.

Patrick Verel: When I ask about unintended consequences and you mention this idea that oh, it’s not meant to be this world wide government, it allows for freedom. One of the things that dawned on me was, okay, so if you had like a Libya where they fell apart and you did have this league, and the league decided okay, we’re going to go in and we’re going to stabilize it. What happens when China and Russia they’ve formed their own little alliance and they decide, well no, they say they want us to come in and help and we’re going to send in our own troops. Then you end up with a sort of a proxy war.

John Davenport: The first thing to say about Libya, the lack of reconstruction. That’s a case where there was an assurance game between nations and no one nation wanted to be stuck with the bill and the quagmire like what we went through in Afghanistan and Iraq. So, the advantage of a league of democracies is that you could have 30 or 40 nations contributing, so the cost on any one of them is small. You could have a large presence of peace keepers there for 20 years or more and yet, the burden on any one nation is really very small.

Now, the possibility of a league of dictators, Robert Kegan has addressed this. I argue about this in the book that I think it’s very unlikely, although China and Russia are attempting to ally these days and trying to bring other smaller countries into their orbit. I think once there was serious pressure on them from a league of democracies, it would be very hard for them to continue that posture. Unless we wait too long until China’s so big that it’s got most of the worlds economy in it’s pocket. I think actually a league of democracies could simply use trade sanctions to put enough pressure on China that they would probably have to democratize.

Once either China or Russia join the league, well it’s game over. The other one would never be able to continue completely isolated. The problems that are posed by Russia and China today, the rise of their despotis model where you’ve got economic growth without political rights, that would be ended. The future of humanity would be much brighter. It would also be easy for example with a league of democracies to get China to do what it needs to, to disarm North Korea. Can you imagine what trade sanctions between 40 nations that controlled 80% or more of the worlds economy would do to China? They couldn’t withstand a month of that. The regime would collapse within weeks.

Bonus Track

Patrick Verel: Now I understand that the Federalist papers are actually a source of inspiration for this plan. Can you explain that a little bit more?

John Davenport: Yes. It’s amazing how exactly the situation between nations in the world today, fits the analogy of the relation among the 13 young states in the founding of the United States during the Revolutionary War and the period immediately after. We had enormous dis-coordination among the 13 states, they were being played off against one another by old European powers, they couldn’t form any common foreign policy, they couldn’t even raise revenue to pay their debts or pay their Veterans. The whole relationship among them was falling apart and easily could have devolved into Civil War, a lot earlier in American history, if it wasn’t for the intervention of Alexander Hamilton with his friends, Madison and Jay. Who were able to make very powerful and convincing arguments. That these problems, the collective action problems, is the technical term for them between the 13 states, could only be overcome by a strong central authority that could make decisions for all of them and have binding power to enforce those decisions.

That’s exactly what the United Nation Security Council, NATO and even the European Union for the most part, really lack today. All of our international bodies make decisions by consensus, which means that almost every member nation has to agree. That’s how the old American Confederation worked, or rather, didn’t work. And that was precisely Hamilton’s insight.

Patrick Verel: The Federalist papers though, they wrote those in like what, 1780-something? How is that relevant to today?

John Davenport: Well what’s interesting about it is that, although they didn’t use these phrases. The problems that Hamilton, Madison and Jay saw between the states were basically, games of chicken where they’d each wait for other states to do the hard work like, sending troops to Washington’s army, prisoners dilemmas where they would compete with each other to have better trade deals with other nations. And assurance games, which is less of a familiar term, but that stands for cases where the parties will only act together if they have enough trust in one another to do what’s needed for their collective good, so they don’t waste their resources. These are exactly the problems that we see among governments around the world today, SERI is basically a game of chicken. Nobody wanted to intervene. It’s a losing game of chicken, where everybody goes off the cliff.

And, like in the old car chase. In the case of preventing pandemics, like with the Ebola crisis. The U.S. did the work mainly, to prevent the last one from spreading around the world. Prisoners dilemmas, well climate change is a prisoners’ dilemma and nations are not cooperating well enough with each other because, they each gain an advantage by having cheaper energy in short. And so it’s very difficult without some power that can really enforce decisions over enough leading nations to come up with some solution to that problem.

Common Core: National Education Standards and the Threat to Democracy (Johns Hopkins, 2018) crafts a nuanced case against standardization that rests on two threads: that the Common Core is ineffective, and that it is undemocratic. Tampio illustrates that the strict requirements of Common Core pedagogy inhibit creative thinking and intellectual curiosity, traits that are essential for long-term success in the contemporary information economy. The Common Core “does not teach young people how to think; it teaches young people how to follow orders,” said Tampio in an interview.

He bases the second leg of his argument on a reading of seminal thinkers such as James Madison and Alexis de Tocqueville, who argued that instituting top-down educational policy over a pluralistic and diverse society was profoundly undemocratic. The result, they foresaw, would be a damaging collective disillusionment with the very idea of civic involvement.

In his introduction, Tampio writes that the Common Core initially sounded to him “like what the tailors told the emperor when selling him his new robe.” He notes that the book has already begun provoking reactions and conversations since its publication on March 1. Common Core received a Wall Street Journal review by Naomi Schaefer Riley, who called the book “concise and readable.”

Perhaps more important, Tampio reports having received dozens of messages from parents who have been following the rise of Common Core with alarm, and who have expressed support for his rebuttals of the initiative.

Such cross-partisan appeal stems from the book’s stimulating mixture of political perspectives to shape its polemic. On the one hand, Tampio criticizes the Common Core as rigid and intellectually demeaning, objections that one might generally expect to hear from the left. “Local education authorities,” Tampio writes, “should have the option to adopt a progressive education model that encourages self-directed learning in a supportive community.”

On the other, Tampio says that such decisions should devolve to state and local control—a typical conservative stance—going so far as to say that the issues of gender identity and sexual education should not be defined by external ideological forces. The public, Tampio said, “still tends to think of federal involvement in the education wars as if it were still 1954”—an allusion to Brown v. Board of Education and the desegregation of public schools.

Today’s policy landscape, as Tampio’s book reveals, is even more complicated.

—Michael Lindgren

Twenty years later, however, Americans have come to realize that democracy—even their own—doesn’t necessarily equate liberalism, said journalist Fareed Zakaria on April 6 at Fordham.

The CNN host made the remarks in a lecture, “Democracy and Its Discontents,” marking the centennial of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS).

A polarized America

Zakaria spoke against the backdrop of a polarized America with a populist government in power, and the deterioration of liberal democratic values in post-cold-war democracies like Russia, which voted for an authoritarian regime. He contextualized the shift within history, noting that things like the rule of law, rights for minorities, and separation of church and state do not exist in all democratically-elected governments.

“In the Western world we really think of democracy in a way that is not historically grounded,” he said. He referenced the American diplomat Richard Holbrooke, who foresaw the pitfalls facing the new democracies.

“Holbrooke recognized the real challenge and asked ‘What if they elect fascists and separatists?’” said Zakaria.

Historically, he said, the tension between liberal ideals and populist leanings has led to both liberal democratic outcomes such as the Magna Carta’s check on government power in 1215, and conservative movements such as the 19^th-century election of Viennese Mayor Karl Luger, an anti-Semite who appealed to rural voters.

“He was a precursor to Hitler; and remember—Hitler was himself elected,” he said.

He cited the Arab Spring as another example where civil societies democratically voted for “intolerance” via the Muslim Brotherhood, pitting Sunni Arab majorities against Shiite minorities, and vice versa. And in Africa, he pointed to democratic elections whose leadership is “happy to take away the rights from gay people.”

Reminding the audience that women and minorities didn’t always have a voice in our U.S. democracy, Zakaria said that today’s “happy utopian notion of democracy” is actually a post-1945 phenomenon in which liberal values have prevailed.

“This has left us unprepared to watch today’s tensions play themselves out,” he said.

Weakened political parties

While political parties used to stand for certain values, he said, today they have become “empty vessels that serve as fundraising arms for the most popular candidate.” Last year, the traditional Republican ideals of free trade and aggressive American foreign policy fell by the wayside amidst the president’s populist “America First” agenda.

“The Trump celebrity juggernaut was too powerful, and the party just collapsed,” he said.

Weakened American political parties mean the courts and a constitutionally-protected free press play a larger role in balancing power, he said; therefore, the ongoing attacks upon judges and news outlets by the president “is a worrying story.”

“The assault on the judiciary worries me the most.” Zakaria said. “If you batter its approval ratings, it is very hard to go back up—[and]there are many countries where courts are not looked at as impartial.”

He said he is optimistic that Americans will realize that our democracy is something that has to be fought for.

“It has forced the larger civil society and institutions, such as universities and grad schools, to . . . understand that they have to act.”

Among the book’s many themes are several critiques on the influence of Western liberalism in the Orthodox East. The critiques examine how some governments attempt to use that influence to divide the religions for geopolitical purposes.

In 2013, the Orthodox Christian Studies Center sponsored a conference on the subject as part of the Patterson Triennial Conference Series, which seeks to bridge the Orthodox/Catholic divide. Many of the conference’s participants contributed to the book, which was co-edited by the center’s co-directors, Aristotle Papanikolaou, Ph.D., the Archbishop Demetrios Chair in Orthodox Theology and Culture, and George E. Demacopoulos, Ph.D., the Fr. John Meyendorff & Patterson Family Chair of Orthodox Christian Studies.

Papanikolaou said that the book, like the conference, attempted to cut through much of the “identity construction” that occurred in Eastern Europe after the collapse of communism. The new order forced traditionally Eastern Orthodox countries to grapple with the relationship between Christianity and liberal democracy. The book features essays by Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox theologians reflecting on the post-communist Orthodox world and in Western political theology.

“The Christianization of the Roman Empire continues to cast its shadow over political theology,” said Demacopoulos. “It would seem that Christianity should have this easy relationship with liberalism, but it’s not that simple.”

He said that for many years ambivalence toward liberalism prevailed on the part of the Catholic and Orthodox traditions, but liberalism’s focus on the individual has its critics.

“Some of liberalism’s values are antithetical to Christian values,” he said. “The critics aren’t against democracy per se, but many believe we should keep a strong distance to certain kinds of concepts. Even though Christianity is almost seen as the source of liberalism, there seems to be a Christian backlash to something it created.”

On the Catholic front, Papanikolaou noted that Pope Francis supports democracy and isn’t looking to engage in a cultural war, but the pope also takes a critical stance toward liberalism as it relates to issues of sexual morality and neglect of the poor.

But in many Eastern countries where Orthodoxy prevails, governments that once shunned the Orthodox Church now see political opportunities to embrace the church as way to distinguish national identity. Nowhere is this more evident than in Vladimir Putin’s Russia, said Papanikolaou. So liberal values, such as same sex marriage, are seen as wedge issue opportunities.

“Putin saw this advantage to create this East/West division, and homosexuality became this global red line,” he said. “Russia is declaring that we’re not going to accept this.”

And the Russians are not alone, he said. The Orthodox Church in Romania, Bulgaria, and Greece, where the separation of the church and society is somewhat blurred, have all adopted a hard-line tone against liberalism.

“They’re following the Russian lead in calling out that Western civilization has lost its way and promotes immorality,” he said. “The governments are using traditional values as a way to carve out this difference between them and the West, and the churches are seeing it as their role too.”

He noted that there are many Catholic theologians who react strongly against what they see as an ideology of the West. And there are Orthodox theologians, like Archbishop Anastasios of Albania, who are more supportive of human rights discourse.

“The book offers conversation of all these different points of view,” said Papanikolaou. “While there are a lot of Orthodox Christians that are troubled by it, that doesn’t mean that the church should be used in the way of a political divide.”

But while the country has embraced economic freedom, democratic reforms there have not fared well, and in recent years, the ruling Communist Party has clamped down hard on dissent. Tom De Luca, PhD, professor of political science, says that the hope for democracy has been set back in other parts of the world as well, such as in post-Soviet Russia, and post-Arab Spring Egypt.

“The idea some argued when calling for China’s entry into the World Trade Organization was that with the development of capitalism, you would develop more of a middle class, which then would make demands on the system for  more openness and more political freedom. “Unfortunately, real political freedom just hasn’t happened in China,” he said.

De Luca is uniquely qualified to assess the fits and starts of the democratic process in East Asia. He first visited the country on a Fulbright fellowship in 1999 when he taught a class there on U.S. Constitutional Law, and has returned every year since, for the last nine years with Fordham students as part of his class, China and the U.S. in the Era of Globalization. The course will be offered again next spring.

In 2005, the country was open enough that De Luca was able to organize, with colleagues at China University of Political Science and Law, a conference on constitutionalism and democracy in China. In a prelude for the backlash to come, it was canceled by authorities at the last minute. Undeterred, he moved it instead to the sanctuary of the Netherlands embassy in Beijing. He attributes the growing intolerance for dissent, in part, to a deep fear of social instability that is an effect of China’s incredibly rapid change.

“A lot of people don’t know this, but China has probably 100,000 demonstrations a year. The government documents these things and its known among people who study this,” he said.

“A lot of times, it’s very local stuff. You know, they took my land to build this factory, and I was supposed to get a certain amount of compensation and it hasn’t come,” he said.

The theory and practice of democracy in the United States and abroad have formed the basis of De Luca’s scholarship. Most recently, he co-authored The Democratic Debate: American Politics in an Age of Change (Cengage Learning, 2015), now in its sixth edition.

In China, the biggest test of whether economic and political liberalization can co-exist is in Hong Kong, where leaders recently rejected a proposal by the Communist party to allow citizens to choose their leader from a slate of candidates chosen, in effect, by the party.

“Beijing has to be careful, because they can’t use the kind of extremely heavy hand that they used in Tiananmen Square in 1989. I’m not saying in the end they wouldn’t, but they have to be careful, because it would be very economically harmful to China to have that kind of confrontation now,” said De Luca, who also heads Fordham’s International Studies program at Lincoln Center.

Democracy is not unheard of in the region, of course, and De Luca notes that for every Singapore, which is economically vibrant but not democratic, there are democracies in South Korea, Japan and Taiwan. And students learn a lot just by visiting Beijing and Guangzhou (old Canton), where they live for about a week with students at Sun Yat-sen University.

“First it’s observing; how is Guangzhou different from New York or even from Beijing? But then when they’re with the Chinese kids, then it’s really a matter of talking about their lives, and that inevitably brings comparisons; you know, ‘What’s my life like, what’s your life like?’ They often make a friend or more than one friend,” he said.

Democracy isn’t fading as a model for the world, but it is in danger of losing its luster, he said, thanks to the demonization and vitriol in American politics that’s made it so difficult for our political system to look efficient.

“It’s a question for some people: Is that really a model that would work for us? So I worry about that a little. I do think still that democracy is far and away the most appealing philosophy as how to organize a society. I don’t have any doubt about that, but I do think that democracy’s not in everyone’s interest, and people will push back against it,” he said.

“We saw that in Egypt, where the president who was elected is essentially on trial for his life. It moved very quickly back to a military dictatorship. But you know, that’s how history is. History moves in its own way, so that doesn’t mean that’s the end of the story.”