This is Democracy – Episode 221: Bridge-Building in American Democracy

[00:00:00] Intro: This is Democracy, a podcast about the people of

[00:00:09] Intro: the United States, a podcast about

[00:00:11] Intro: citizenship, about engaging with politics and the world around you. A podcast about educating yourself on today’s important issues and how to have a voice in what

[00:00:22] Intro: happens next.

[00:00:28] Jeremi: Welcome to our new episode of This Is Democracy. This is a very special episode. I mean, I guess every one of our episodes is special, but this one is particularly special because it’s our last episode of 2022 and in honor of this year that has been filled with so much news, uh, so much excitement. So many Apocalypses. Uh, we wanted to make sure we closed in a sense, coming back to our core issues.

[00:00:50] And one of the issues that’s motivated our podcast for over four years now is the question that Franklin Roosevelt put out, um, more than a half century ago. [00:01:00] How can we, as a people learn to write a new chapter of cooperation and bridge building, bringing different groups together to share idea. And to share experiments in the improvement of our democracy.

[00:01:13] We’re joined today by someone who I think is on the forefront, if I might say so, of this Rooseveltian mission in our society today. Uh, this is Manu Mill. He is the c e O of Bridge, u s a. Which is a national organization, organization that is investing in the future of democracy. Uh, through his work, Manu has contributed to several news outlets, uh, in addition to founding his organization, bridge usa.

[00:01:37] And what Manu does in all of these settings, whether it’s, uh, through the creation of his organization that he’ll talk about through his, uh, writings, uh, through his work at the Department of State and in various other areas, uh, is to try to bring especially young people, Uh, for open conversation about controversial issues, uh, but controversial issues where there actually is more space for [00:02:00] possible agreement than we often recognize in our society.

[00:02:03] And our conversation today will be about exactly that kind of work, which is so central to the spirit of our podcast, and I think so crucial for our democracy, especially as we look. On this, uh, difficult yet also promising year. Uh, Manu, thank you for joining us

[00:02:18] Manu: today, Jeremy and Zachary. Thank you so much for having me, and I’m excited as this is the last episode.

[00:02:24] So hopefully we’ll leave listeners at some hope.

[00:02:27] Jeremi: That, that’s the plan that we leave them with hope, and then they, they come back for more in the next year. Manu. Right? We’ll keep ’em coming. , Zachary, uh, you of course have a poem to start us off with today, as always. Uh, and congratulations on your acceptance to college, by the way.

[00:02:43] Thank you. Uh, for our listeners, for anyone who doesn’t know, uh, Zachary has been accepted to Yale University and he’s very excited to be getting ready, uh, for that. Um, so what is the, uh, title of your poem? Listening. Listening. Well, I’m gonna try to listen. Go ahead. [00:03:00]

[00:03:01] Zachary: When grandfather got off his boat, the harbor looked, he wrote The way A castle or a fortress must have seemed to a shepherd by the moat, nothing but a man and his goats.

[00:03:12] See how the time floats and we are standing in front of skyscrapers, eating donuts, asking why down the decrees fly, not ours to question. Wait for your first election. I’d like it if you could imagine yourself on the threshold of some great dream, and I pray in the prairie skies. You could hear all the size of all the ones who never had a say.

[00:03:39] In the town where the streets are empty on cold nights, they count dust mites at the store and wonder how much more at the carwash in the city never sleeping. They are making suds and weeping. What for? The door was shut? Well before they ever had a chance to knock. Take a good [00:04:00] look at the clock. Does it run slow?

[00:04:02] Have we been carrying the same sticks since 1776? Have we been waiting in this bread line since 1989 or have we just been counting wrong and more than once, simply forgot the song we were supposed to sing. Each dawn, I am listening. I am listening. I am listening.

[00:04:26] Jeremi: I, I’m hesitant to say anything after Zach that Zachary, cause I’m supposed to be listening.

[00:04:30] Uh, what, what is your poem about?

[00:04:31] Zachary: My poem was about, uh, the power of, of listening to each other, um, and of respecting, uh, each other’s humanity, of, of being able to set aside ideology and, and really ask ourselves, are we where we want to be as a society? And I think the answer is no. . Uh, and, and how can we, how can we make that answer yes in the new year?

[00:04:52] Um, I think that’s, that’s really what this poem is about. That’s

[00:04:55] Jeremi: great. That’s great. Ma Manu, your reactions?

[00:04:57] Manu: Well, Zachary and Jeremy, I have to say one thing, which [00:05:00] is that you’ve managed to do something my English teachers never did, which was, uh, Uh, have me sit still and listen to a poem, um, and, and closely analyze it.

[00:05:09] You know, I, I loved that Zachary. And there’s actually a specific line I wrote down, which was carrying the same sticks in 1776. I mean, I think the way that you speak about the human condition and marry it with the story of America is awesome. So I’m very much looking forward to this conversation. Last thing I’ll say, by the way, is congratulations on going to a school way more superior than mine.

[00:05:31] I went to a, uh, a shabby public school, the size of a small country, and, uh, you’re going to an elite, smart, intelligent school where they care about you. So congrat.

[00:05:41] Jeremi: Mao you went to a great university as well. Our public university’s, uh, university of, uh, Texas, where I am, a University of Wisconsin Madison, and particularly University of California, Berkeley, where you went.

[00:05:52] These, these are actually some of the greatest institutions created by human beings. In the last century. I say that as a historian who’s written a lot about this. I will say, I [00:06:00] will say Berkeley’s not quite as good as Stanford where I went, but that’s our story. .

[00:06:05] Manu: I’m glad we’ve started off with great

[00:06:07] Jeremi: divisions.

[00:06:08] There we go, right when we’re supposed to be talking about bridge building. Uh, and, and, and I guess that’s where I wanted, uh, us to, to go. Um, Mannu, I think it naturally flows. Zachary’s, beautiful poem. Um, what are the ways in which you’ve been motivated to address these issues? I know so much of your story, your journey since, since you went to, uh, Berkeley, has been about about many of these issues.

[00:06:30] Can you sort of share some of your journey with us? Well,

[00:06:32] Manu: I think this is something that many listeners will relate to, but my story about getting involved in democracy and politics is a very unlikely one. If you had asked someone at the senior of my high school what I would be doing five years from now, there’s no way they would’ve predicted this.

[00:06:47] I was a pre-med student at Berkeley in 2017. I was a freshman. Um, I had no interest in politics then. I sometimes have less of an interest in politics now. Um, for me, this [00:07:00] began. Uh, in February of 2017 when we had what seemed to me at the time, very ordinary protests over a right wing speaker named Milo Yiannopoulos coming to campus, but then they turned out to be the largest protests in Berkeley’s history since the sixties.

[00:07:16] Free speech and anti-war protests and. , my journey began like so many that have engaged in politics in the past, especially in America, which was that I was deeply stricken by events. I was deeply saddened by the amount of pain, the anger, the resentment. I mean, it takes a lot to have young people leave class for six hours in a day to go violently protest.

[00:07:38] And that’s what set off my journey and the journey of some of my best friends that have been with me and stuck with me at this work. And since then, we’ve been wrestling with one question, Jeremy and Zachary, that question. How do you help people see the common humanity amongst each other when they think that they live through one of the most divided times?

[00:07:56] And I think answering that question is essential.

[00:07:58] Jeremi: A and how do you [00:08:00] go about getting people engaged in, in trying to answer that question?

[00:08:04] Manu: I think it starts with two things. One is I think. , the aperture through which we view our politics these days is very narrow. Um, there’s two stats that I was thinking about to help describe this condition that I call, um, the, the, the hogging of the microphone by the minority of voices.

[00:08:24] The first is that on social media about, uh, 90% of all content is generated by 10% of users, and secondarily, The participant rate in our primary elections is approximately 11%. The problem that we’re living through right now is I think, one of having the loudest voices not only control and determine the narrative in our politics, but seeding the battleground, the battle space, and the political landscape to those that seek power.

[00:08:54] And I think the second thing is helping people overestimate. [00:09:00] The power of dialogue and underestimate the power of their deficients. And when you can have people broaden their apertures and listen to actual humans like you and I, uh, combined with helping them get some perspective in the current political moment, I think you can achieve a lot.

[00:09:15] Jeremi: And it’s, it’s a beautiful vision, but what I really love about what you’ve done and your journey is it’s not just talk. You’ve actually put the, uh, elbow grease and shoe leather into this. Can you share some of that with us?

[00:09:27] Manu: Not only is it not just, just talk, but I think we live in this moment where we forget the value of dialogue in society.

[00:09:34] I think we forget the value of actual human communication. I think we forget. Without human communication, democracy collapses. Democracy does not exist if we can’t talk to each other, it is that simple. But in addition to that, uh, since we graduated college, which was in 2020, we’ve built, um, from three chapters to 50 college chapters, from zero high school chapters to 20 high school chapters.

[00:09:56] We’ve engaged young people and students across the country, um, [00:10:00] left, right, middle. African Americans, Indian Americans, white Americans, uh, Latinx students, indigenous folks, um, small schools, large public state schools, elite Ivy League schools, um, liberal arts seminaries, and I mean, , the amount of optimism, hope that I’ve been filled with over the last year, last two years is something that I would not have foreseen before.

[00:10:24] Uh, the only other thing I would say is that the elbow grease of this work really comes down to helping people again, see the power of conversation. I think right now, if you’re a person listening to this and you hear me talk about. You know, having discussions and dialogues with people that are different than you, you probably have two reactions.

[00:10:41] Uh, one is you think this is kumbaya, , and two is, it sounds like a life sucking experience. Even I don’t get up every day wanting an ideological brawl with someone and, and my job is to help people see the power of this work. And,

[00:10:55] Jeremi: and what does that look like in practice? Uh, Manu let you know what do your chapters [00:11:00] actually do?

[00:11:00] How, how can we help our listeners to really have a feel for what it is? The, the really extraordinary work that bridge u s a, your group is doing.

[00:11:09] Manu: You know, if you’re listening to this, I’m sure you’ve, you can relate to one of these three experiences. Uh, one is we often meet folks that just are super dissatisfied with politics.

[00:11:21] They want to engage, but they see it as too crazy. They see it as too loud, they see it as too divisive, and they just disengage. Uh, second bucket of folks that we meet are, are folks that. , um, believe that the only way to get engaged is to hyper engage. That nuance is not something that is necessary in politics, but in fact, what you need is fiery sound bites.

[00:11:40] And, and the third experience that oftentimes we’ve seen a lot of young people give is, is just an experience of apathy, of, of not really caring. Um, again, not because they don’t have this deep desire to care, but because it all seems kind of pointless. It seems like a blood sport, rather than a way to help realize our moral ambitions.

[00:11:58] And so what our chapters. [00:12:00] Are three things. Uh, the first thing is that our chapters hold these small group discussions anywhere from five students to 30 to sometimes 70, depending on which campus and size of student body you’re in. And these discussions are led by young people. For young people, they’re student moderators and.

[00:12:15] They’ll get together and they’ll bring in, you know, all of the different identity groups. If there’s a recent protest on campus, they’ll bring the folks that are protesting, that are not protesting, and they’ll just have really interesting fastening conversations. And importantly, they’re trying to bring in people that normally wouldn’t be attracted to this work.

[00:12:31] One of the odd. Things about this work is while we decry ideological echo chambers, we’ve actually built sometimes echo chambers of people that wanna talk to each other. Um, the second thing that our chapters do is what I call the air game. Um, the first pillar was the ground game. The second is the air game, creating social campaigns, narratives, giving people the social permission to bridge build.

[00:12:52] Right now, if you’re in society, and let’s say you’re either an elected official or you’re someone that’s engaging on social media, or you’re trying to create the most noise, [00:13:00] You’re incentivized to D divide. You’re not incentivized to. , we have to flip that equation. And I think the third thing that our chapter’s doing this is something that I’m sure, uh, folks in my generation like Zachary can relate to, is have fun around this work.

[00:13:12] We’re trying to build an identity around bridge building, um, whether it’s social events, whether it’s constructive conversations, whether it’s potluck, um, we want people to build connection to forge new relationships around the table that we call bridge building because that’s what our parties are currently doing.

[00:13:28] They’ve replaced our identity for their labels and we have to take that back. I guess

[00:13:33] Zachary: my question for you, um, and I, I, I admire a lot of the work you’re describing, but my question is, uh, I think you’ve identified a key problem in our democracy, and that is that we don’t listen to each other. But I think there’s another key problem, and that is that we don’t have competent leaders.

[00:13:49] And to some degree, uh, competence is not universal. Right. And how do you, how do you bring people together and, and focus. Bridge building [00:14:00] when maybe there isn’t, uh, competent leadership or competent policy on both sides of that

[00:14:04] Manu: bridge. Zachary, it’s such a good question, and interestingly, I think it gets to a, a story that I often tell.

[00:14:13] You know, oftentimes when we’re working with, uh, young people on campuses, and, uh, again, I’m, I’m 23, so I, I think that I’m still a young person, but some people can contest that, um, . But when I’m working with young people on campuses, they’ll again say it’s, it’s not necessarily our fault. It’s those leaders that are dividing, that are not competent, that are not engaging.

[00:14:32] And then we’ll go into the halls of Congress or local state legislators or city council meetings and they’ll say, Look, we wanna solve problems, but the people that are putting us in power are just extraordinarily divided and they’re very extreme. So we gotta respond to them. And I think there’s two things that help me think through that question.

[00:14:47] The first is, I think we live in a moment where everybody is bucking accountability. Leadership’s are buck, the leadership is bucking. Accountability, people are bucking accountability. The electorate is not holding itself. [00:15:00] And I think that it’s not a question of either or, but it’s a question of both. And the second thing is when we think about leadership, and I know Jeremy can speak to this much better than I can or, or you can.

[00:15:12] Um, but oddly enough, I think especially in this moment, we don’t have leaders. We have people that reflect. a mirror upon society. Um, I think there’s this myth, especially in American politics, that uh, everybody that’s in elected office is leading, but I think oftentimes they’re just reflecting our worst tendencies and we have to flip that.

[00:15:34] And this is actually where I think some of the electoral reform work comes in, because obviously you need dialogue and engagement, but you also need some of the institutional fixes. But I think our organization focuses on people because I think that people are at the core of our democracy. So

[00:15:50] Jeremi: what do you say though?

[00:15:52] Following on Zachary’s question. Manu. Uh, when there’s concern among young people, I don’t think Zachary’s cynical, but there’s a concern [00:16:00] about cynicism or, or a motivation to cynicism to say, well, this is all fine and good, but, um, unfortunately our world is gonna be driven by powerful people with money who are gonna do what they want to.

[00:16:13] Um, and we have to respond to that, and we have to sort of play that game. How do you convince people not to play the game that that is dividing us today, rather than the, the bridge building that you see as an alternative, aspirational way of pursuing politics?

[00:16:28] Manu: I think the best thing to do with the negative feeling oftentimes is to help people understand that it’s all right, that you’re feeling that way.

[00:16:35] Um, and here’s what I mean by that. , I sometimes am cynical, you know, I think, uh, this notion. Hopeful. People that express hope are just enliven with hope and optimism all the time is just not true. I think it’s also historically not true. I think it’s all right to be cynical. Um, but the question is what do you do with that cynicism?

[00:16:55] When we meet students and we’re meeting also older folks, and oftentimes older folks will [00:17:00] ask us like, why is it that, you know, around 50% of young people engage in federal elections and it’s much less than that in local and state elections? Or why is it that apathy is such a big problem with gen. You know, I think about my life.

[00:17:12] Um, I’m 23. I was, uh, I was born around nine 11. I went to middle school around the Great Recession, . I went to high school around the 2016 election, and I’m, I graduated college in the year that was 2020. The pandemic, the capital riots, the Black Lives Matter, protests, not a great sample size of democracy and boundless progress and.

[00:17:34] The reason why I tell that story is, is not to justify cynicism, but it’s to help people understand that it’s okay to be cynical, but again, the question is do we choose to wallow in our cynicism or do we recognize that we’ve just been handed a, a difficult hand that generations before as have also been handed in different ways?

[00:17:53] And the questions whether or not we’re willing to create new narratives to actually forge a future. Lifts off from [00:18:00] what many people see as rock bottom.

[00:18:02] Zachary: What comes after that though? What happens when, not when the conversations are over? Because obviously the conversations need to continue, um, but the conversations have to go somewhere.

[00:18:12] Yes. So, so how, how do you make policy or, or find leaders, um, from convers.

[00:18:20] Manu: Zachary, you’ve asked the question that probably every listener’s begging to ask right now, and also something that almost every young person asks us when we’re actually pitching, uh, building a chapter. Um, the first is I would actually push back a little bit on the notion that dialogue and talk is not enough.

[00:18:35] In fact, I actually think that it’s the cornerstone of humanities progress. A lot of evolutionary biologists often make the argument that humanity’s core competency is our ability to communicate. It’s our ability to create language and importantly, One of the fundamental reasons why we evolved into societies, into complex organizations and have gone from groups of eight to 8 billion is our ability to communicate.

[00:18:56] So I would argue that actually communication is essential, that [00:19:00] it is a prerequisite to any action. I think right now we’re so quick to rush to action without recognizing not only the implications of our policy actions, but also trying to understand how these policies affect different stakeholders. , but beyond that, you have a point, which is great.

[00:19:15] Well, we all get to talk to each other then. What I think what dialogues do are two things I think first is our students are. Their apertures again about democracy are widened. Um, oftentimes the most cynical people I’ve met only get their information through Twitter. These pundits only get their information through social media.

[00:19:34] Um, they haven’t talked to real Americans. And when you actually have those dialogues with conservative students or liberal students, or socialist students or folks on, uh, different sides of political and ideological spectrums, your aperture of what’s possible, widens and. Secondarily, what our students will often do is they’ll take those dialogues, they’ll take those consensus building projects and, and actually employ them in, in their future life, in their [00:20:00] future aspects of work.

[00:20:01] Uh, a great corollary to this actually is from the conservative movement. There’s a man by the name of Morton Blackwell that built this thing called the Leadership Institute in the eighties and nineties, and the Leadership Institute was a conservative training organization, college campuses. Now almost every p.

[00:20:17] Republican politician from Paul Ryan to John Bayner came from the Leadership Institute. Our job is to lay the seeds of hope, optimism, dialogue, open-mindedness, curiosity early so that people can go and do their own thing afterwards. Um, people are gonna be Republicans, people are gonna be Democrats. My job is not the paper over disagreements.

[00:20:36] My job is to help people be disagreeable, and I think that in and of itself is a value added, a moment where no one is able to communicate with each.

[00:20:44] Jeremi: It, it’s so interesting, Manu and so insightful, what you’re saying. Uh, and, uh, in, in a way you stole my thunder because, uh, one of the interesting insights from a philosopher like Friedrich Nietzche is that, that actually what separates human beings from others is not just our ability to [00:21:00] communicate, but our ability to tell stories.

[00:21:01] And then our ability to remember stories, it’s memory and storytelling. And it seems to me, and you and I have talked about this offline before, it seems to me that really at the core of what you’re doing is building bridges through narratives, building bridges through stories. Uh, tell us a little bit more about how you see that working.

[00:21:20] Manu: I think that is such a, a powerful point, Jeremy. The power of narratives. You know, I wanna give you a quick story in, uh, I think this was 2019, we held a discussion at Berkeley on homelessness. It was actually with our partner organization, braver Angels, and we held a braver angels debate. And the idea behind this debate was, , uh, that uc, Berkeley has a big student homeless population actually, unfortunately, and there’s this famous park called People’s Park next to Berkeley that many folks might have heard of.

[00:21:49] Um, it’s existed since the sixties and it’s kind of a homeless sanctuary and, um, the university needs to build new housing. So the proposition was that the university was going to raise the park and create new student [00:22:00] housing. There are were many people in support of that and many people opposed to them.

[00:22:04] So what we did was we said, Hey, let’s bring in some of the, the homeless folks that are deeply affected by this measure. Let’s bring in some of the students that are homeless and need do housing. Let’s bring in some administrators and folks showed up and. . You know, the fascinating thing about that experience was that initially some of the homeless folks were ready to protest and, and some might argue rightfully so, they weren’t wanting to engage in this dialogue.

[00:22:26] 30 minutes in Jeremy, the most engaged people were the homeless folks. We had a hard time ending the discussion cuz they weren’t willing to disengage. And the reason for that was, That entire debate was not actually focused on logic and facts, but it was people sharing their heartfelt stories about whether it was being homeless or students that were talking about the violence and crime and the safety issues that they faced, or young women talking about the fact that they did not leave their, their, their encampments without carrying pepper spray.

[00:22:56] Um, the power of story is so [00:23:00] powerful and, and not only is it powerful, but I think as our society becomes increasingly isolated and alienated and we retreat to our bubbles, whether they’re digital or physical, We forget that human beings are human beings. They’re sometimes imperfect. They’ve got similar stories, sometimes they’ve got different stories, but those stories inform each other and, and our job is through these dialogues to help people see the validity in each other’s lived experiences.

[00:23:24] Not to compromise, but again to be disagreeable. Do

[00:23:28] Zachary: you think, uh, you, you, you’ve been doing this work for a few years. Do you think you’ve, you’ve made, uh, do you think that the, the campus environment, because I think we hear a lot about, uh, the, uh, poor state of political dialogue on college campuses. Do you think it’s changed for the better, uh, since you’ve been doing this work, uh, because of your work, but also because of the work of many.

[00:23:50] Manu: I, I play an incredibly small role in in, in a large puzzle of people doing this work. Um, if I said that I, I changed the state of dialogue, [00:24:00] um, you brought the wrong guest on , uh, uh, first because my measure of that would be incredibly wrong because I think in some ways it’s gotten worse. Um, but in other ways because so many folks are contributing to this problem.

[00:24:11] Zachary, I think the state of dialogue on campus. Both mirrors our politics, but is also actually ahead of our politics in some way. And, and let me just explain what I mean by that. In 2017 at Berkeley, some of the biggest issues that we were discussing revolved around critical race theory, immigration policies, uh, DACA students on campus.

[00:24:33] A lot of the culture issues that now dominate our politics in that way. Our campus environment was actually five years ahead and we actually were prepped for a lot of these issues that now are main. In other ways, young people are also a product of, as you said, leadership, that if all we see is crazy nonsense, then we’re either gonna feel very apathetic about the process or engage in, in that way and emulate those leaders.

[00:24:58] Um, what I’ve seen [00:25:00] is not necessarily the state of discourse change, but the demand for this. Go through the roof. I mean, we went from three chapters to 25 to 50. Our goal by June of 24 is to get to 250 chapters. Um, the amount of young people I’ve met, that’ll just say that I’m just gonna keep quiet. Uh, not because I agree with everything that’s being said, but because this seems like a blood sport is through the roof.

[00:25:24] The amount of times I’ve met people that just say, Not only is this such a divisive moment, but I actually wanna do something about it. And that Zachary, I think is, is the bellwether. Historically, when we go through these inflection points, people will feel dissatisfaction, but once they feel enough dissatisfaction that they’re ready to act, that’s when the change switches.

[00:25:46] And my job is not to create demand, but it’s to meet that demand because that demand exists and it’s all over the place. It,

[00:25:54] Jeremi: it seems to me some of the work you’re doing is the bread and butter work of, uh, social mobilization, [00:26:00] which, which often involves not simply raising the consciousness of people, but actually providing them with the infrastructure to connect to one another.

[00:26:08] Right. It’s not that people are, um, non desirous. Of these kinds of activities, but he said they don’t know where to start and they don’t know how to connect to someone else. And they don’t know how to name the problem and they don’t know where to go and what to do. Um, and it seems to me you are providing them the space, uh, to operate in and providing them the connections.

[00:26:25] Do, do you see it that

[00:26:26] Manu: way? Yep. And I think it’s something that your podcast does very well, Jeremy and Zachary, which is that you’re trying to help illuminate for people the problem that is our democracy and the hope that is our democracy. That people have a way to get started. And I think all of us, I love the phrase that you identified there, that all of us are doing something around creating the infrastructure for people to start.

[00:26:48] The other way I think about this is, and this is one of my fears, I was just doing an interview with Nicki, which is the Japanese news media agency just 30 minutes ago. And one of the questions that they’d asked us, what is your biggest fear? Um, [00:27:00] and I have many, but one of them is, The amount of places that exist in society where people of different ideas, different beliefs are working towards a common goal are sh shrinking rapidly.

[00:27:11] I think the two places that are really left that are institutionalized for people of different backgrounds and ideas and and from different geographic areas to actually come together are the higher education space, colleges and universities and the work. , and I think there’s a lot of misfortune to that, but I think there’s a lot of opportunity there as well because I think that the workplace and universities now will play a unique role in that they’re going to help people actually manage differences.

[00:27:39] The role that civil society organizations used to play in the past, I think needs to now be filled by these institutions. And our job is to, to help those institutions navigate that, that role and respons.

[00:27:50] Jeremi: I, I’d, I’d add to that, that I think one of the real dangers we face, and we’ve seen already the results of some of this, uh, negative activism, [00:28:00] is that people who don’t have a place to go will find alternative, uh, connections and connections that offer encourage bad, encourage bad behavior.

[00:28:07] So this is in fact what the proud boys are and what, what many of these, uh, organizations that encourage hate are about, they’re, they’re building glue. Angry people and providing them a space to share their anger and then act on that anger there. There is a kind of civic activism in that too. It’s just a civic activism with unci consequences, and it does seem to me people turn to that manu when there aren’t more positive alternatives for them.

[00:28:33] Manu: Yeah. And, and, and I think you’ve, you’ve done a lot of work on this and, and Zachary’s poem actually speaks a lot to this notion that people want connection. You know, people are social. I mean, just look at, for Jonathan Hite, uh, from NYU has done a lot of good work on this. On sort of the mental health crisis over the last 10 to 15 years, the rise in anxiety, depression, um, suicide rates, um, [00:29:00] unfortunately have gone up.

[00:29:01] Um, people are people that, that has never changed from the start of time to today. We might have aided the human experience with technological innovations. We might have affected the human experience through crazy algorithms that only show the worst in each other. But at the end of the day, whether you go to my village in India, or you go to New York, or you go to Austin, Texas, or you go to New Jersey, uh, people want connection.

[00:29:26] And if we don’t fill the void, to your point with with positive glue, then somebody else is gonna fill it with negative.

[00:29:32] Jeremi: Do, do you see, uh, new narratives that provide this positive glue? That’s a very scientific term you, you’re using here. Do you see new narratives, uh, in your work arising? Can you share some of them with us or some of the outlines of them?

[00:29:46] Things that we’re not seeing because we’re so caught up, uh, in our traditional narratives of left versus right, et cetera. Uh, what are some other narratives you see emerging from a

[00:29:56] Manu: new generat? I think narratives is actually [00:30:00] something that we need to be much better at doing. I think people are, to your point, are motivated by stories, they’re motivated by experiencing, they’re motivated by visions.

[00:30:07] Um, I have a couple of ideas, uh, and this is again, from. my experience working with, with many students across the country, doing a lot of road trips, talking to folks. Um, and, and I think there’s, there’s, there’s sort of two contours I have that, that we found resonates a lot with people. I think the first is that we have to contextualize the American moment in with, with the broader story of empires and nation states.

[00:30:35] Uh, there’s this assumption. The United States is going to be 250 years old in 2026 that we must be a very old and aging democracy. In fact, we’re on the precipice of collapse. But as you very well know, um, the Chinese Empire lasted for 1800 years. The Roman Empire lasted for approximately 1100 years.

[00:30:54] Athenian democracy lasted for 400 years. We’re not at the end of the American story. [00:31:00] We’re at the. We’re in maybe chapter one or chapter two depends on how long are the books are that you read. Um, we have to help people realize that they’re not inheriting some old age democracy, but that they’re still the pioneers of a new experiment.

[00:31:15] And I think when people realize that the foundation still needs to be built, Suddenly it opens the aperture of possibility tremendously. And as you know, it’s what F D R was very good at articulating. It’s what Lincoln was very good at articulating. It was what Reagan was very good at articulating. So what Obama was very good at articulating.

[00:31:33] The second contour of this narrative is what I mentioned earlier about feelings of cynicism. I think that the problems the United States currently faces of racial division of tension of deep economic unres. Are completely expected and normal in the course of a country’s history. The United States by 2045 is going to be a majority minority country.

[00:31:57] That is an immensely. [00:32:00] Important milestone. No society has ever been as diverse as the United States is going to be by 2045. Um, we will have gone through tremendous technological change by 2050, the likes of which societies have never experienced by 2070. The global order will look like something that has never looked like before.

[00:32:19] Um, when you think about. our moment as one that is expected rather than uncertain. I think it gives people the hope to act. I think right now people lack agency. People feel powerless. To your point, cynicism comes from this feeling that I’m this random person living in this house. Listen to this podcast.

[00:32:39] What can I do about it? . But I think when people realize the agency of their action, which I think every important narrative has to deliver, then I think it can be incredibly powerful. So those are the two things I’m working with. And I’m curious about your thoughts on this. I know this has been a one way conversation, but I, I, I, I know y’all are also thinking about narrative change, and I’m curious what [00:33:00] you think.

[00:33:01] Jeremi: Well, in many ways, Manu, you beautifully articulated the spirit of our podcast and the historical, uh, motivation. It’s exactly in those two, uh, vectors that you described, those two narrative, uh, scaffoldings, I mean the, the first being, as you say, um, the sense of our country being at the beginning of its story, not the end, uh, that.

[00:33:21] Franklin Roosevelt again, that every generation writes a new chapter in the storybook of democracy. And our story is very, very young and very early. And that, that provides and bleeds into the second point you made, which is, um, about hope That because we’re young, and, uh, still in a sense a juvenile democracy.

[00:33:41] We’re gonna make a lot of mistakes, but that’s okay. We can learn from those mistakes. We have the ability to, to see them and study them and, and, and that’s the whole point of historical analysis, right? Not to go back to the past and find perfection and try to remake it. Uh, that’s that, that’s mythmaking.

[00:33:57] It’s to go back to the past and learn from the mistakes of those who [00:34:00] came before us so we can make our own mistakes, but make different mistakes. I love.

[00:34:04] Zachary: I, I would say I, I would disagree slightly because I, I think, I think part of our problem is that we’re thinking too broadly in the sense that, that we think in terms, or at least I think I, I notice among a lot of young people that, that there’s this idea that, that when we, when we have such a visceral politics, the solution is a sort of sweeping ideology.

[00:34:24] Or some sort of historical understanding as we described, which is obviously critical to any politics in any policy making. But I also think that, as you described very powerfully in your example from Berkeley, this politics is very local. And I think that people can, people when it’s in their community, when it’s across the street from them, uh, when it’s their house, their life, their livelihood, uh, that can make a, that can make a huge difference in opening up conversation and changing it from partisanship to actually, like, how can we help?

[00:34:53] Our neighbors and how can we help

[00:34:55] Manu: ourselves. Zachary, I think that is a brilliant, brilliant point because what it does [00:35:00] is it, Helps the listeners and people that are often engaged and they think that they’re participants but not actors, realize where to start. Um, again, if you’re sitting here and you’re listening to this conversation, you’re like, Manos talking about some weird historical narrative stuff and great, and we gotta go elect a president.

[00:35:17] But what does that change locally? I think it, that entire question misses the boat that you can act right now. I. In fact, local action is some of the best place to start. I, I would just give you a quick story on this, Zachary. Um, in the summer of 21 I went to on a road trip, sometimes I’m a little crazy and what I’ll do is I’ll, I’ll like get in the car and like drive around and, and this time we went from Austin to Boston and I went to Austin Tech.

[00:35:44] I started in your hometown and then I. Uh, went to New Orleans in Lake Charles, Louisiana. We went to Meridian, Mississippi, Selma, Alabama, Georgia, Fayetteville, North Carolina, uh, dc New York, Boston. And, and to your point, to [00:36:00] your exact point, almost everybody I met, whether there were conservative pastors in Georgia or you know, black activists in Selma, Alabama, or oil rig workers in Louisiana, everybody said something.

[00:36:14] Along three things. One is I’m just trying to live a life where my family is safe and secure. Second is I want my kids to do better than me. And third is I wanna live in a country that cares about me. To your very smart point, this stuff is not complicated, and I think the more we can localize the power for action, but at the same time recognize the national narratives that need to be told, I think the farther we get with our project,

[00:36:41] Jeremi: So that brings us perfectly manu, uh, to, um, where we always like to, to close our episodes, uh, which is first of all, on an optimistic note, a well-informed note, uh, but also a call to action.

[00:36:54] And is that your call to action for our listeners to, to find a local [00:37:00] cause that supports the, the development and flowering of our democracy and get involved with it? Or, or, or what would you say is your call

[00:37:07] Manu: to. Jeremy, I would say that my comms people would be incredibly angry at me if I did not plug Bridge, u s a here , which you should,

[00:37:14] Jeremi: you should please plug

[00:37:17] Manu: Um, and Zachary, we gotta get something started where you are, sir. Um, I, I would just say, uh, uh, two, two actually calls to action. One is, If, if you are a college student, you’re a high school student, and uh, you want to change the way that politics operates, rather than just be a participant in the tribal bloodsport, that is our politics.

[00:37:36] Then you should think about starting a Bridge USA chapter, which is@bridgeusa.org. . But secondarily, if you’re someone that’s not in college or you could care less about building bridges, uh, to Jeremy’s point, think about how you can act in your local community. Create a simple plan of action. Most folks don’t even know where their town hall is.

[00:37:55] Start with that. Uh, the last thing I would just say. Is [00:38:00] about people, and this sounds squishy and I get pushback for it a lot, but it is incredibly powerful and it’s what keeps me sustained. Make a list of three people that you often experience in your life that you’ve never had a conversation with. It could be your local grocery store owner, it could be the doorman, it could be your neighbor.

[00:38:15] And just have a five to 10 minute conversation about who they are as a person. Uh, again, we as people like kind. We wanna be acknowledge, we wanna be heard. And if you can do that in your life, it’s simple, easy, accessible, and anybody can do it.

[00:38:30] Jeremi: That’s terrific. Zachary, uh, Manu has laid out a, a pretty clear, uh, articulate, uh, compelling agenda.

[00:38:37] As, as is true for every one of his answers, uh, he has for us, um, joining usa he has for us, uh, getting involved in local activism. And then he has, uh, also a very, I think, very powerful point. Kindness and, and finding new avenues for kindness in ordinary lives. Is that compelling to you? Is that sufficient?

[00:38:59] What do you think? [00:39:00]

[00:39:00] Zachary: I think it is, um, I would add to that list, uh, support our teachers, uh, because I think what you are describing, uh, at, at college campuses is a real lack of, of civic understanding. And, and where does, uh, citizen. Begin, it’s in the classroom. Uh, and I think, uh, at their best, um, our educators and our education systems, our schools are, are, are doing that work.

[00:39:23] Um, and, and we need to encourage that work and

[00:39:26] Jeremi: praise that work. That makes a lot of sense. That makes, do you have some outlet for teachers in Bridge usa? Manu,

[00:39:33] Manu: uh, you know, something that, Our chapters often do is they make the lives of teachers very, uh, uh, very much, um, uh, more easy because it’s tough to have those difficult dialogues when you’re teaching a lesson.

[00:39:46] Yes. Or when something controversial comes up, use the chapters and outlet for some of those difficult disagreements and arguments. Let those students lead on that. Um, and oftentimes we found that when the member of a community leads a discussion with a community, so student to student, it can be very.[00:40:00]

[00:40:00] Jeremi: You, you read my mind, Manu, because I was just thinking about how valuable it could be for me to pa uh, to partner in my own teaching, uh, in many different areas, many different subject areas, uh, with exactly the kind of infrastructure that you’re building and that, that you described. Uh, I, I’ve been inspired by this conversation and I wanna make a connection as we.

[00:40:18] Close to another event that’s occurring. Uh, we happen to be recording this conversation on the day that the, uh, Ukrainian President Zelensky is, uh, visiting Washington DC and I was so struck as he arrived at the White House today in his, um, battle, uh, camouflage close, not in the suit and tie. Uh, and he warmly embraced, uh, president Biden.

[00:40:43] And I’m not making a political statement here. I’m making a statement about bridge building. I, I was, I was so struck by the importance of bridge building between not just these two men, the president of the United States and the president of Ukraine, a country, uh, at war and under attack, but also, uh, of the ability of two individuals who [00:41:00] are so diff different from one another, such different backgrounds.

[00:41:03] Two, we hope. Find a way to connect and the ways that we have many of us as citizens have connected to the people of Ukraine in one way or another. I, I think, Manu, what you bring to the table better than almost anyone else I’ve talked to is the ability to articulate and actually put elbow grease and shoe leather as well as, Um, thoughtful historical analysis behind the actual art of bridge building, of bringing people together.

[00:41:29] And it’s, I think, central to our history, central to our politics, and it is something that needs more attention. And just by virtue of giving it the attention you’re giving it, I think you’re helping our democracy and our di democratic discourse, uh, move forward. So, um, really, really proud and happy, uh, to know you Manu, and to have you on our podcast.

[00:41:49] Manu: Jeremy and Zachary, it’s been a privilege. I’ll make sure that my mom hears that last part, Jeremy, cuz I, I still get pressure to go to law school. , ? Uh, I can I, can I just say one quick, I know we’re ending. I just wanna say one quick thing about [00:42:00] Zel coming to the United States. You know, I, I grew up, after I was born in the US I grew up in a village for the first five years of my life with my grandparents while my parents lived in the us and when I came back I was immediately, By what we have in this country, and I don’t mean this in some myopic way, of course, depending on your social location.

[00:42:21] We each experience the United States in different ways. But something that the Ukrainian story has shown me is that is a story of what happens when we lose what we take for granted. And that is, I think, how we inspire action and that action as we’ve laid out in those calls to. Are very simple. They don’t require much.

[00:42:43] But if we don’t act, then democracy loses the fuel to keep moving forward. So I just, I love the way that you close that, and I think it’s important for our listeners to know that that’s happening today.

[00:42:52] Jeremi: Well, and, and I think this perfectly connects us back to Zachary’s poem because as you said, Manu, uh, and as Zelensky, uh, I [00:43:00] identifies for us embodies, um, the simple.

[00:43:03] Acts are the most important ones. Uh, they’re essentially what, what are, what become the building blocks of, of democratic development. And, and Zachary, you identified the most important one listening. Bridge building starts with, with listening. Um, thank you to all of our listeners for joining us. We wish everyone a happy holidays and a happy new year, and we will be back in the new year with many more discussions.

[00:43:26] I don’t know if we’ll be able to find a guest as inspiring as Manu, but we will week in and week out continue to to search for these guests of knowledge, insight, and inspiration for the new chapters of our democracy. Thank you again, Manu, for joining us. Thank you, Zachary. And thank you, most of all, to our listeners.

[00:43:44] Happy holidays

[00:43:45] Manu: everyone. Thank you everybody.

[00:43:54] Outro: This podcast is produced by the Liberal Arts Its Development Studio and the College of a Liberal Arts at the University of [00:44:00] Texas at Austin. The music in this episode was written and recorded by Harris Kini. Stay tuned for a new episode every week You can find. This is Democracy on Apple Podcast.

[00:44:11] Spotify and Stitcher. See you next time.