Hahrie Han

And so we have to understand all aspects of that equation, the rights and responsibilities, the uncertainty, what are the conditions under which humans will accept that or not accept that? You know, these are all, I think, really important questions that sometimes get lost if we just think about democracy as

And so we have to understand all aspects of that equation, the rights and responsibilities, the uncertainty, what are the conditions under which humans will accept that or not accept that? You know, these are all, I think, really important questions that sometimes get lost if we just think about democracy as

Yeah. Yeah. Which I think has a couple different implications that are really important. So, so first it's just kind of going back to this idea of uncertainty is that like, what are the conditions under which people are going to accept uncertainty over outcome, right? They have to be willing to say, look, I don't know if the policy that I want is going to win.

Yeah. Yeah. Which I think has a couple different implications that are really important. So, so first it's just kind of going back to this idea of uncertainty is that like, what are the conditions under which people are going to accept uncertainty over outcome, right? They have to be willing to say, look, I don't know if the policy that I want is going to win.

I don't know if the candidate that I want is going to win the party, whatever. Right. And If people feel like the range of outcomes that they may possibly have to accept becomes too broad, then it's not irrational for them to withdraw consent from the system, right? I mean, that's a totally rational kind of act.

I don't know if the candidate that I want is going to win the party, whatever. Right. And If people feel like the range of outcomes that they may possibly have to accept becomes too broad, then it's not irrational for them to withdraw consent from the system, right? I mean, that's a totally rational kind of act.

And so the question is, how do people come to understand what that range of outcomes is? And so I think there's a lot of interesting questions that come up if you think about that question of uncertainty. But then...

And so the question is, how do people come to understand what that range of outcomes is? And so I think there's a lot of interesting questions that come up if you think about that question of uncertainty. But then...

The second piece to the point about abstraction is also like, how do people come to have an experience of democracy, of all parts of that equation, of both the rights and responsibilities and the possible outcomes that can emerge?

The second piece to the point about abstraction is also like, how do people come to have an experience of democracy, of all parts of that equation, of both the rights and responsibilities and the possible outcomes that can emerge?

And I think that's one thing that is part of the reason why I spend so much of my time thinking about what are the spaces in which people come to learn the capacities of democracy

And I think that's one thing that is part of the reason why I spend so much of my time thinking about what are the spaces in which people come to learn the capacities of democracy

citizenship and democracy and so on and so forth, because I think that experiential understanding of what it means to be a member of a small d democratic community is foundational to actually making the system work, you know, because of all the things that we just talked about.

citizenship and democracy and so on and so forth, because I think that experiential understanding of what it means to be a member of a small d democratic community is foundational to actually making the system work, you know, because of all the things that we just talked about.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, there's this hilarious, I mean, hilarious in a certain kind of way, statistic that I remember learning in grad school, which is that, you know, when CNN came online and people began to be able to see like 24-hour news, sorry, not CNN, C-SPAN, when C-SPAN came online and people began to be able to see the way in which Congress works, that support for democracy and politics and people's trust in politics actually went down.

I mean, there's this hilarious, I mean, hilarious in a certain kind of way, statistic that I remember learning in grad school, which is that, you know, when CNN came online and people began to be able to see like 24-hour news, sorry, not CNN, C-SPAN, when C-SPAN came online and people began to be able to see the way in which Congress works, that support for democracy and politics and people's trust in politics actually went down.

Because the original idea was that we want to have sunshine in government. We want transparency. We want people to see how the sausage is made. But it turns out when people see how the sausage is made and they realize how much compromise and negotiation goes into it, they actually – you know, dislike the process itself.

Because the original idea was that we want to have sunshine in government. We want transparency. We want people to see how the sausage is made. But it turns out when people see how the sausage is made and they realize how much compromise and negotiation goes into it, they actually – you know, dislike the process itself.