Fixing our Democracy with Lawrence Lessig

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Today, I’m very honored to speak with Lawrence Lessig. For those that don’t know this impressive human.

Lawrence Lessig is the Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School, prior to which he founded the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School, and taught at the University of Chicago. Founder of Equal Citizens and a founding board member of Creative Commons, Lessig serves on the Scientific Board of AXA Research Fund and has received numerous awards including a Webby, Free Software Foundation's Freedom Award, Scientific American 50 and Fastcase 50 Awards.

Cited by The New Yorker as “the most important thinker on intellectual property in the Internet era,” Lessig's current work addresses “institutional corruption”—relationships which, while legal, weaken public trust in an institution—especially as that affects democracy. His books include:
They Don't Represent Us (November 2019), Fidelity & Constraint: How the Supreme Court Has Read the American Constitution (May 2019), America, Compromised (2018), Republic, Lost v2 (2015), Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress—and a Plan to Stop It (2011) among many others. Lessig holds undergraduate degrees from the University of Pennsylvania, an MA in philosophy from Cambridge University, and a JD from Yale.

We get in a little bit of Lawrence's personal background, why he didn't become a corporate lobbyist.

We discuss why we need to get fundraising type money out of politics.

What public campaign financing looks like and how citizens could take part in this.

We discuss civic juries, what they are and how they can be useful for our democracy.

How everyday citizens can meaningfully impact our democracy right now.

We also discuss electoral college reform and his non-profit that is working on this named Fix the College.

And some media recommendations. Namely, the The Swamp on HBO and his podcast Another Way.

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Note: the background music is by my good friend Taavi of https://bestproducer.substack.com/