#05 - David Stasavage - The History of Democracy and Innovation : Islamic World, China, and Europe

The Innovation Civilization Podcast

We're joined by the Dean of Social Sciences at New York University and Professor of Political Science David Stasavage (@stasavage) who wrote the recent book (The Decline and Rise of Democracy). We talk about:

- the first principles and definitions of what we exactly mean by 'democracy'
- a compressed summary of the origins, and pre-17th century non-European early forms of democracy in the Islamic world, China, Africa.
- democracy, institution-building, and state development in early Rashidun Caliphates, Umayyads and Chinese empires.
- Does adopting democracy automatically lead to more economic development and innovation?
- The reasons for the development of late democracy in Europe.
- The reasons for development of the democratic model in the United States.
- Technology and the future of democracy in the world.

Follow our host Waheed Rahman (@iwaheedo) for more updates on tech and civilization.

Here are the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players, you should be able to click the timestamp for the episode.

(00:00) - Episode intro and key moments

(04:55) - Why David wrote a book on the history of Democracy across different regions?

(05:52) - Definitions and first principles of Democracy.

(07:10) - Is democracy a consensus-based system?

(07:45) - First principles of early vs modern democracy

(08:58) - Examples of early democracy across the world

(09:32) - Compressed summary of the origins of democracy till today

(11:20) - The role of democracy between 7th and 13th CE Islamic world

(14:08) - How decentralised system of governance made democracy possible?

(15:15) - Democratic process of the early Rashidun caliphates

(16:30) - Standardization and unification of democratic policies

(17:11) - How is China's political development different from the rest of Europe and the Islamic world

(21:41) - How is democracy tied to the idea of economic development?

(24:30) - The role of democracy when it comes to technological innovations

(25:48) - Emergence of democracy in Europe

(28:09) - Why were Aristotle's democratic discussions more popular in Europe than in the rest of the world

(29:31) - Impact of Aristotle's democratic theory on early Europe

(30:23) - Does democracy help reduce inequality?

(35:50) - What is bureaucracy?

(37:49) - Mixtures model of democracy

(39:25) - Are there hierarchies in a modern democracy?

(41:54) - Does democracy change forms?

(45:04) - Is autocracy deeply rooted in the culture of political and state development?

(47:14) - Development of the democratic model in the US and the future of democracy

(49:48) - Outro