117 - Jacob Mchangama

General

Jacob’s website:
http://jacobmchangama.com/

Order Jacob’s forthcoming book, ‘Free Speech: A History from Socrates to Social Media’:
https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/jacob-mchangama/free-speech/9781541620339/

Jacob’s podcast series on free speech, ‘Clear and Present Danger’:
http://www.freespeechhistory.com/

Follow Jacob on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/JMchangama

Discover more about Jacob’s think tank, Justitia:
http://justitia-int.org/

Timestamps

00:56 Iona introduces Jacob and his forthcoming book ‘Free Speech: A History from Socrates to Social Media’.

2:28 Iona reads some passages from Jacob’s book on the Nazis vs. free speech, including how Hitler hoisted the Weimar Republic by its own petard (or, why intolerance of intolerance doesn’t work).

17:21 Does censorship of bigoted and authoritarian ideas work to prevent such ideas from taking hold? The “Weimar fallacy.”

23:18 Free speech as the guarantor of freedom: Trump’s America compared to Putin’s Russia and Modi’s India.

31:44 The counterintuitive idea of free speech and its fragility in practice. “Milton’s Curse”—selectivity about free speech, even among its greatest historical champions, from Milton to Voltaire. The need for a strong culture of free speech (without which legal protections are almost meaningless).

36:30 Iona’s “footnote” on Milton, whose ‘Areopagitica’, of course, is the namesake of ‘Areo’. Why, despite Milton being an imperfect champion of free speech, ‘Areo’ is appropriately named! Plus: the history of free speech in Britain, the two ancient and competing conceptions of free speech (elitist and egalitarian), and Milton’s more radical-on-free-speech (and oft-neglected) Leveller contemporaries. The tragic irony of Milton becoming a censor. How Milton’s authorial intentions have been undercut by the radical implications of his arguments and the power of his language.

47:21 The historically influential antiquity-rooted elitist vs. egalitarian concepts of free speech (or, the Roman vs. Athenian concepts of free speech) and “elite panic” whenever a new form of disruptive and democratising communications technology, from the printing press and the radio to the internet and social media, arises.

54:50 On elite distrust of the lower classes—we can’t trust them with new communications technologies or free speech!

1:00:18 Is the contemporary “golden age of free speech” in a process of decline? Are we seeing a “global free speech recession” alongside a “democracy recession”? Rising authoritarianism and the worrying loss of faith in free speech (and internet freedom) in liberal democracies. Many on both right and left now seem to prefer purging ideas to debating them.

1:03:52 What can be done about the free speech recession? Taiwan’s tech-based g0v initiative—combatting disinformation and promoting new forms of democracy for the digital age without censorship. The tensions between the “Analogue City” and the “Digital City” and how we must find solutions for these without sacrificing free speech. Plus: how the lack of free speech in China made the Covid pandemic worse.

1:10:01 The worrying power of private social media and other internet companies over what we can say and hear. John Stuart Mill, George Grote, and the tyranny of the majority: the need for a culture of tolerance and openness to dissenting views. The problems with centralised platforms that are pretty much monopolies and the need for technological rather than legal solutions to these. The need for a “more decentralised social media ecosystem.”

1:16:30 Last words.