What exactly is democracy?

"If you think democracy is some kind of inevitable, default setting for the world, then you aren't going to have it for very long." Yale University historian Timothy Snyder, in the first ten minutes of this TED talk, describes what a dynamic thing democracy is and how hard it is to hold on to.

He urges that we consider democracy as a verb, not a noun. He describes how it exists inside us. And he mentions the dangers of “procedures.”

From World War I to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Snyder also dives into the structures that uplift and tear down political systems, offering historical perspective on the current state of democracy throughout the world as well as discussing patterns of thought that lead to tyranny. Not least, he introduces a new approach to democracy that could help create and protect a future of freedom.