The University of Rhode Island Honors Program is hosting their 61st annual colloquium, titled “Democracy in Peril,” from Sept. 17 through Nov. 12.
This year’s colloquium is about the United States and global trends of political polarization, declining democracy and potential solutions, according to the 2024 Honors Colloquium page on the University’s website.
The colloquium will host seven speakers, including professors and professionals in New England and throughout the U.S.
These speakers have experience in political science, reporting and history relevant to democratic decline. Ashlea Rundlett is an assistant professor of political science at URI and one of the organizers for this year’s colloquium, along with Richard McIntyre, a URI professor of economics.
“I think it’s an appropriate discussion to be having because it’s an election year,” Rundlett said.
“But part of the focus of the colloquium is we want people to know this issue is not election specific. These issues are not just happening now in 2024 because we are having one of the most contentious elections in U.S. history, it started before that.”
Rundlett said the organizers tried to find speakers who had a wide variety of perspectives and disciplines.
One of these speakers is journalist Zack Beauchamp, who recently published a book titled “The Reactionary Spirit: How America’s Most Insidious Political Tradition Swept The World.” Rundlett and McIntyre’s students read this book in the colloquium’s associated course.
“These kinds of reactionary movements that we see in the United States and Brazil and in India and in France and even in Germany now are responses to change, and responses of change that try to defend the existing socioeconomic order,” McIntyre said. “And when that order is threatened, this kind of reaction gets unleashed.”
With the controversy of the upcoming presidential election in the U.S. and political polarization across the world, McIntyre does anticipate some contention following the colloquium.
“There will be pushback because some students, to the extent they think about politics, are pro-Trump and some of this stuff we’re gonna do is gonna make them very uncomfortable,” McIntyre said. “And we have a tendency when something makes us uncomfortable to deny it exists. I expect pushback in this course for sure.”
The colloquium will also emphasize the importance of these issues outside of a U.S. context. This will be reiterated in speeches such as “Global Cases of Democratic Decline,” to be presented by Jos é Cheibub.
“We want the series to reflect that the threat to democracy is not uniquely American; this is a global phenomenon,” Rundlett said. “We’re trying to give a wide variety of perspectives on the issue from a wide variety of disciplines and backgrounds.”
The colloquium will be free and open to the public. The speeches will be hosted in Edwards Hall and online through livestream links.
“We really hope that anyone who is civically engaged or wants to be civically engaged will consider attending these lectures,” Rundlett said.
The colloquium will also encompass special events, such as an art showcase in Lippitt Hall and a theatre performance of “Machinal” by Sophie Tredwell.
To find more information on the specific dates of these events, students can visit URI’s Honors Colloquium page on the University’s website.