CUSP LECTURE - It Can Happen Here 2.0: Democratic Backsliding and the Rising Threat of Violence in the U.S.

Distinguished Professor of Anthropology, Director of the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights, and UNESCO Chair on Genocide Prevention, Rutgers University

Hybrid event.
Zoom Webinar: https://uu-se.zoom.us/j/65802739142 External link, opens in new window.

ABSTRACT:
Drawing on years of research on U.S. political culture and Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement, this paper examines the logics of the MAGA movement, how its future-oriented messaging is rhetorically packaged and driven, and how the movement poses challenges to democracy and stability in the U.S., including the risk of political violence. In doing so, the paper reconsiders the author’s book, It Can Happen Here: White Power and the Rising Threat of Genocide in the US External link, opens in new window. (NYU Press, 2021), which was centered on Trump’s first term. There are important continuities between Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0, but the threat is now greater and following a very clear plan to erode traditional checks and balances, expand executive power, and undertake related initiatives detailed in documents like “Project 2025.”

ABOUT:
Alexander Hinton is Distinguished Professor of Anthropology, Director of the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights, and UNESCO Chair on Genocide Prevention at Rutgers University.

Recent titles by Hinton include It Can Happen Here. White Power and the Rising Threat of Genocide in the US (NYU Press, 2021), Anthropological Witness. Lessons from the Khmer Rouge Tribunal (Cornell UP, 2022), and Perpetrators. Encountering Humanity's Dark Side, with Antonius C. G. M. Robben (Stanford UP, 2023).

Alexander Hinton is the recipient of the American Anthropological Association’s Anthropology in the Media Award in 2022, a 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Network of Genocide Scholars, and a H. F. Guggenheim Distinguished Scholar Award in 2024. He is the 2025 Hugo Valentin Lecturer at Uppsala University.

CUSP is an arena for addressing big societal challenges of our time: social, political, cultural, economic, environmental, and/or medical. In an effort to give voice to urgent societal problems, Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study (SCAS) invites academics, policy-makers, artists, and other actors to publicly address such global concerns.