Irit Dekel is guest editor of an ongoing symposium on Jeffrey Goldfarb’s latest book on the retreat of democracy.

András Bozóki (Central European University) and Andrea Szabó and Zoltán Gábor Szűcs-Zágoni (Eötvös Loránd University) argue that while TISZA’s performance in the April 12th election may not be a new model for fighting autocracy by electoral revolutions, it is a paradigm case for perfectly using the instruments originally designed to maintain an electoral autocratic regime against the regime, without resorting to violence.

Hussein Banai (Indiana University) argues that what is underway in Washington is a revolution from within. Previous American wars, however disastrous, were waged by a state with recognizable continuity; this one is being waged by an extractive regime that is turning the state into a pariah.

Patrick Gilger (Loyola University Chicago), drawing on his particular commitments as a Catholic priest and a sociologist, describes how Democracy Seminar seeks to understand and help build communities that are united not by pre-existing commonalities but by a commitment to a common search for the common good.

Michael Weinman (Indiana University Bloomington) and Siobhan Kattago (University of Tartu) discuss the relaunch of Democracy Seminar 3.0 and the founding of the European Democracy Institute as a space for critical reflection, debate, and transatlantic collaboration. Drawing on the intellectual legacies of Hannah Arendt and Fritz Stern, they examine contemporary authoritarianism, democratic backsliding, and the enduring relevance of thinking critically in times of crisis. Against the backdrop of shifting global power, it frames the renewed Democracy Seminar as a “third escape toward freedom”—an effort to sustain democratic imagination, accountability, and shared political responsibility.