Tanja Porčnik
Tanja Porčnik
President of the Visio Institute and an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute; former senior fellow at the Atlas Economic Research Foundation and a Government Teaching Fellow at Georgetown University; PhD candidate in American Studies at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Freedom Under Assail

Freedom Under Assail

For millennia, papers and books have been written about the essence and significance of human freedom. In these contributions, competing conceptions of freedom aimed to define the contest between liberty and power. Philosophers Plato and Hobbes, for example, thought that extensive or absolutist rule over society was compatible with their definition of freedom because, in their view, it would prevent society from plunging into violence or even chaos, which they perceived as more detrimental to freedom than a powerful state. Others, such as the 6th-century BCE Chinese philosopher Lao-tzu and the 16th-century Spanish scholastics, expressed and developed ideas consistent with the view of the father of modern political philosophy, John Locke, that freedom implies that an individual not “be subject to the arbitrary Will of another, but freely follow his own” More


Democracy at Play – or at Risk – in America

Democracy at Play – or at Risk – in America

In democratic societies, elections are determined by the vote of the people. The democratic process in the United States elected President Trump in 2016. Four years later, after all legal votes are counted and verified, the same process may require that he peacefully transfer that power to someone else. Clearly, from now until the inauguration on January 20, 2021 it will take many state election procedures and court battles in key battleground states to clear up all uncertainties about this election’s popular vote. The democratic process relies not only on the belief of the citizens in it, but also upon their patience with procedures that are comprehensive and time-consuming. Accordingly, President Trump might have jumped the gun when he claimed, “If you count the legal votes, I easily win”. More


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