Lawrence Lessig has narrated 3 audiobooks on Listento.it by 1 author, with an average listener rating of 5★ across 3 ratings. The most-rated is Republic, Lost.
Republic, Lost
Summary
In an era of ballooning corporate campaign expenditures, unleashed by the Supreme Court in Citizens United, trust in our government is at an all time low. More than ever before, Americans believe that money buys results in Congress - and that our Republic has been lost. Using examples that resonate as powerfully on the Right as on the Left, Republic, Lost not only makes clear how the economy of influence defeats the will of the people, but offers cogent strategies to correct our course - from a constitutional convention to a Regent Presidency. A onetime friend of Barack Obama, Lessig, a professor of law at Harvard, is as critical of the president and the Democratic Party as he is of Republicans. Both have allowed the core institution of our democracy to become little more than a shill for the most powerful moneyed interests in our Republic. America may be divided, argues Lessig, but we must recognize that corruption is our common enemy, and we must find a way to fight against it.
©2011 Lawrence Lessig (P)2011 Hachette Audio
They Don't Represent Us
Summary
“This urgent book offers not only a clear-eyed explanation of the forces that broke our politics, but a thoughtful and, yes, patriotic vision of how we create a government that’s truly by and for the people.” (DAVID DALEY, best-selling author of Ratf**ked and Unrigged) In the vein of On Tyranny and How Democracies Die, the best-selling author of Republic, Lost argues with insight and urgency that our democracy no longer represents us and shows that reform is both necessary and possible. America’s democracy is in crisis. Along many dimensions, a single flaw - unrepresentativeness - has detached our government from the people. And as a people, our fractured partisanship and ignorance on critical issues drive our leaders to stake out ever more extreme positions. In They Don’t Represent Us, Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig charts the way in which the fundamental institutions of our democracy, including our media, respond to narrow interests rather than to the needs and wishes of the nation’s citizenry. But the blame does not only lie with “them” - Washington’s politicians and power brokers, Lessig argues. The problem is also “us.” “We the people” are increasingly uninformed about the issues, while ubiquitous political polling exacerbates the problem, reflecting and normalizing our ignorance and feeding it back into the system as representative of our will. What we need, Lessig contends, is a series of reforms, from governmental institutions to the public itself, including: A move immediately to public campaign funding, leading to more representative candidates A reformed Electoral College, that gives the President a reason to represent America as a whole A federal standard to end partisan gerrymandering in the states A radically reformed Senate A federal penalty on states that don’t secure to their people an equal freedom to vote Institutions that empower the people to speak in an informed and deliberative way A soul-searching and incisive examination of our failing political culture, this nonpartisan call to arms speaks to every citizen, offering a far-reaching platform for reform that could save our democracy and make it work for all of us. Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2019 Lawrence Lessig (P)2019 HarperAudio
Republic, Lost: Version 2.0 - Part 1: The Flaw
Summary
New material for the 2016 election! In an era when special interests funnel huge amounts of money into our government - driven by shifts in campaign-finance rules and brought to new levels by the Supreme Court in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission - trust in our government has reached an all-time low. More than ever before, Americans believe that money buys results in Congress and that business interests wield control over our legislature. With heartfelt urgency and a keen desire for righting wrongs, Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig takes a clear-eyed look at how we arrived at this crisis: how fundamentally good people, with good intentions, have allowed our democracy to be co-opted by outside interests and how this exploitation has become entrenched in the system. Rejecting simple labels and reductive logic - and instead using examples that resonate as powerfully on the Right as on the Left - Lessig seeks out the root causes of our situation. He plumbs the issues of campaign financing and corporate lobbying, revealing the human faces and follies that have allowed corruption to take such a foothold in our system. He puts the issues in terms that nonwonks can understand, using real-world analogies and real human stories. And ultimately he calls for widespread mobilization and a new Constitutional Convention, presenting achievable solutions for regaining control of our corrupted - but redeemable - representational system. In this way Lessig plots a road map for returning our republic to its intended greatness. While America may be divided, Lessig vividly champions the idea that we can succeed if we accept that corruption is our common enemy and that we must find a way to fight against it. In Republic, Lost, he not only makes this need palpable and clear - he gives us the practical and intellectual tools to do something about it.
©2016 Lawrence Lessig (P)2016 Hachette Audio