Professor Max Auffhammer will discuss the global ramifications of the Trump Administration on climate change. This lecture is one of a series of guest lectures as part of ISF 198.5 "The 2016 US Election in Global Context: A semester-long teach-in".
The unexpected victory in November 2016 of Donald Trump, a celebrity businessman with a twitter account, no political experience, and ties to a foreign power, is a shocking and dangerous American story that takes place in the midst of the rise of strange right-wing movements from Estonia to Spain, and from India to Australia, each informed by local conditions and politics, but enabled by new media technologies, and related globally.
What does the Trump victory signify? A political movement favored by the remnants of the working class in opposition to the establishment, to globalization, to multiculturalism, and to identity politics? A new and dysfunctional democratic politics driven by “false news” across social media platforms, and unreliable reporting from the old media? The intervention of a foreign power in a US election? An old wine of nativism, populism, white nationalism, or even fascism deployed in a new global bottle?
This interdisciplinary teach-in will consist of campus specialists from a range of disciplines who seek to engage students in a critical discussion of these and other questions raised by this "unpresidented" historical event.