THE PARADOX OF DEMOCRACY

If democracy seems imperiled, don’t blame only cable news and social media. Two media experts argue that it has always lurched from crisis to crisis.

Gershberg, a journalism and media studies professor, and Illing, a Vox reporter and podcaster, challenge the idea that the linchpin of democracy is a set of rules or institutions, such as safeguards for free elections or laws that protect civil rights. In this dense history of the intersection of politics, democracy, and free expression, the authors argue that “the essential democratic freedom” is freedom of expression. That freedom leads to “the paradox of democracy”—“a free and open communication environment…because of its openness, invites exploitation and subversion from within.” Fascists like Mussolini and injustices like Jim Crow laws arise because open communication allows people to persuade others to support their aims, and it’s been that way for millennia. In ancient Athens, Socrates’ death sentence was “democracy’s original sin”: A city known for free speech condemned a philosopher for speaking freely. Moving chronologically through the centuries, Gershberg and Illing show how their “paradox” has played out in movements that include the Reformation, the Enlightenment, the American Revolution, the rise and fall of local newspapers, the ascent of cable news and social media, and the eruption of the “cancel culture.” Viewing democracy as inherently messy, the authors offer no global blueprint for fixing the chaos, and their few suggestions are overfamiliar, including their call for “the restoration of local journalism, especially print newspapers.” A flat narrative also works against their worthwhile material: The authors don’t develop or expand their thesis so much as elaborate on the same paradox, again and again, and how it informed successive eras. The result is a book that provides valuable context for the latest assaults on democracy but one that, with a more effective structure, could have reached a general readership.

A clear and informative history with limited appeal for nonspecialists.