https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPEzaQP0SyU&t=1s

Podcast audio:

In this episode of New Ideal Live, Elan Journo and Nikos Sotirakopoulos discuss historian Niall Ferguson’s “We’re All Soviets Now,” a viral essay about American economic and cultural decline.

Among the topics covered:

Ferguson’s argument that America is following the path of the late USSR;

The disanalogies between America and the Soviet Union;

Ferguson’s blindness to the role of ideas in his comparative analysis;

How Ferguson’s doomsaying prepares the grounds for authoritarianism;

How some of Ferguson’s valid criticisms misidentify root causes of American decline.

The podcast premiered on July 11, 2024. Listen and subscribe from your mobile device on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. Watch archived podcasts here.