Future of Civil Rights and Democracy Series: Why Authoritarians Fear

The Future of Civil Rights and Democracy is a lecture series which brings together leading thinkers, policy makers and activists from inside and outside of the law to consider some of the key questions behind the erosion of our civil rights infrastructure and the authoritarian turn in our democracy.

The Center for Intersectionality and Social Policy Studies, together with the African American Policy Forum present ‘Why Authoritarians Fear Democracy’ featuring Professor Carol Anderson (author of “One Person, No Vote: How Voter Suppression Is Destroying Our Democracy”), Professor Nancy MacLean (author of “Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right's Stealth Plan for America”), and Janai Nelson (President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund) in conversation with Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw. This engaging conversation features two leading historians of the right and the long campaign to subvert civil rights and multiracial democracy. By connecting current attempts to weaken voting rights protections for Black communities, to the explosion of big money in the political process, this engaging conversation (followed by a book signing) will show why authoritarians are able to recruit people into a fundamentally anti-democratic vision of this country’s future.

Open house at 6pm, panel discussion at 6:30pm, book signing to follow. 

Please RSVP here at least 24 hours ahead of the event. If you are not a Columbia Law School affiliate please make sure to RSVP so your name can placed on the building's guest access list. RSVPs are limited to one per person and are non-transferrable.