LAWRENCE LESSIG / Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress - and a Plan to Stop It

Tuesday, October 25, 2011 - 7:30pm
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Harvard Law School professor Lawrence Lessig investigates the most vexing problem in American democracy: how money corrupts our nation’s politics, and the critical campaign to stop it.

 

In an era of ballooning corporate campaign expenditures, unleashed by the Supreme Curt in Citizens United, trust in our government is at an all new 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 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.

 

Lawrence Lessig is the Director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard University, and a Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Prior to returning to Harvard, Lessig was a Professor of Law at Stanford Law School (where he was founder of Stanford's Center for Internet and Society), Harvard Law School (1997-2000), and the University of Chicago Law School. Lessig clerked for Judge Richard Posner on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals and Justice Antonin Scalia on the United States Supreme Court.

He is the author of five books on the law and technology, including
Remix, Code v2, Free Culture, The Future of Ideas and Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, and is a founding board member of Creative Commons, a board member of the Software Freedom Law Center, an advisory board member of the Sunlight Foundation and a former board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

 

If you’re unable to attend Lessig’s talk this evening, please note that we’ll be hosting him, along with Berkeley Arts & Letters, the following evening in Berkeley. Details; tickets.