Liberal democracy, free speech and freedom of the press are under attack in many parts of the world. Two of the most insidious threats are from conspiracy theories and the growing global reach of China's dictatorship.

In this episode we discuss two interviews from "Democracy Works", a podcast series from The McCourtney Institute at Penn State University about what it means to live in a democracy.

Larry Diamond, author of the 2019 book, "Ill Winds: Saving Democracy from Russian Rage, Chinese Ambition and American Complacency" discusses the threat China's model of authoritarian capitalism poses to democracy in the United States and around the world. The Chinese government is using its growing military, technological, and economic to change the direction of the world.

Conspiracies are becoming increasingly prominent in the public discourse. Democracy Scholars Democracy scholars Russell Muirhead and Nancy Rosenblum call the current version “conspiracy without the theory” and unpack the concept in their book "A Lot of People Are Saying: The New Conspiracism and the Assault on Democracy."In this episode Jim and Richard discuss the ideas raised in both sets of interviews.