With Jonathan S. Gould, Susan D. Hyde, Paul Pierson, Eric Schickler, and Jake Grumbach (Moderator)
February 11, 4-5:30 p.m.
Social Science Matrix, 820 Social Science Building, UC Berkeley
We are witnessing a rapidly unfolding constitutional crisis. Please join our panel of legal and political scholars for an urgent discussion on democratic backsliding in the United States. The panelists will discuss the current expansion of executive power from a legal standpoint, the weak response of Congress and the broader erosion of separation of powers, and the emergence of direct rule by plutocrats. They’ll situate their observations in a comparative and international context. An open Q&A with the audience will follow the panelists’ opening remarks.
This event will be held in-person and live streamed via Zoom. To view the live stream, please click this invite link. You will need to sign into your Zoom account in order to join the live stream.
About the Panelists
Jonathan S. Gould is the Class of 1965 Professor of Law at UC Berkeley. His research focuses on the relationship between politics and law, with special attention to Congress and the legislative process. In exploring these topics, he draws on a variety of methods and literatures, including from public law, political theory, and political science. Gould’s scholarship has been published or is forthcoming in the flagship law reviews at Harvard, Yale, N.Y.U., Virginia, Chicago, Michigan, Georgetown, and Vanderbilt, as well as various specialty and peer-review journals.
Susan D. Hyde is the Class of 1959 Chair and Robson Professor of Political Science. She also co-directs the Institute of International Studies. She studies international influences on domestic politics and global threats to democracy. Hyde is an expert on international election observation, election fraud, democracy promotion, and international norms. She has worked with the Carter Center, the National Democratic Institute, Democracy International, the International Republican Institute, and the International Foundation for Electoral Systems on democracy promotion issues.
Paul Pierson is the John Gross Distinguished Professor of Political Science at UC Berkeley. He is the director of the Berkeley Economy and Society Initiative and serves as co-director of the Consortium on American Political Economy. His research, which focuses on the American political economy and public policy, has been awarded several major prizes from the American Political Science Association. He is the author or co-author of seven books, including the best-selling Winner Take All Politics, written with Jacob Hacker. His latest book, with Eric Schickler, is Partisan Nation: The Dangerous New Logic of American Politics in a Nationalized Era.
Eric Schickler is the Jeffrey & Ashley McDermott Professor of Political Science and co-director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at the UC Berkeley. His research focuses on U.S. Congress, American political development, political parties, and polarization. He is the author of three books which have won the Richard F. Fenno, Jr. Prize: Disjointed Pluralism: Institutional Innovation and the Development of the U.S. Congress (2001), Filibuster: Obstruction and Lawmaking in the United States Senate (2006, with Gregory Wawro), and Investigating the President: Congressional Checks on Presidential Power (2016, with Douglas Kriner).
About the Moderator
Jake Grumbach is an associate professor at the Goldman School of Public Policy at UC Berkeley, where he directs the Democracy Policy Lab within the school’s Democracy Policy Initiative. He was previously associate professor of political science at the University of Washington. Grumbach studies the political economy of the United States, with interests in democratic institutions, labor, federalism, racial and economic inequality, and statistical methods. His book Laboratories Against Democracy investigates the causes and consequences of the nationalization of state politics.