The American Council on Germany will host the Dr. Richard M. Hunt Memorial Lecture and Luncheon with Dr. Daniel Ziblatt, Director of the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies and Eaton Professor of Government at Harvard University, on “Responding to Democratic Threats in an Age of Crisis: A Transatlantic Perspective”
Responding to Democratic Threats in an Age of Crisis: A Transatlantic Perspective
May 8 @ 12:00 pm - 2:00 pm EDT
Dr. Daniel Ziblatt is the Director of the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard University, where he is also Eaton Professor of Government. He leads a research group based in Germany at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. His current research focuses on the comparative study of democracy and authoritarianism with a focus on Europe and the United States.
He is the author of four books, including How Democracies Die (2018), co-authored with Steven Levitsky, a New York Times bestseller and described by The Economist magazine as “the most important book of the Trump era.” In 2023, he published Tyranny of the Minority, an analysis of American democracy in comparative perspective, also with Steve Levitsky and a New York Times bestseller. Prior to this, he authored the prize-winning book Conservative Parties and the Birth of Democracy, a history of democracy in Europe, in addition to a book on European state-building titled Structuring the State.
In 2023, Dr. Ziblatt was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In recent years he has been a Fellow or Visiting Professor at the European University Institute (Florence, Italy), Center for Advanced Study (Stanford), Max Planck Institute (Cologne), University of Munich, and the École Normale Supérieure (Paris).
About This Event:
The Dr. Richard M. Hunt Memorial Lecture Series honors late ACG Vice Chairman Dr. Richard M. Hunt, who was deeply committed to strengthening ties between Germany and the United States and gave exceptional support to the ACG for 50 years. He was the first and longest-serving President in the organization’s history, from 1972 to 1988, and subsequently served as Vice Chairman until his passing on April 10, 2020. During his tenure, Rick Hunt worked tirelessly behind the scenes to help create the American-German Young Leaders Conference, which was launched in 1973, and the McCloy Fellowship program, which was launched in 1976 – both of which remain central to our work today. He also helped shape the German-American Conference. These programs are just a fraction of his many lasting legacies to the Council. His wise counsel, his keen knowledge of German-American relations, his faith in younger generations, and his warm, unassuming manner are sorely missed.