Democracy on Earth

RS Deese

Democracy on Earth by RS Deese makes three arguments about the past, present, and probable future of government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” on planet Earth.

Concerning the past, this book argues that democracy has deeper roots than we are taught to believe, because consensual cooperation has played a key role in the survival of humanity since long before the founding of the first kingdoms or empires.

Concerning the present, this book argues that democracy is the most effective form of government for meeting the ecological challenges of our time because the free exchange of ideas and information is essential to the accurate understanding of our shared terrestrial habitat, and the ability of citizens to fire unfit leaders and change outdated or destructive laws is indispensable for any ecologically sustainable society.

Concerning the possible future of democracy, this book identifies nationalism as the greatest threat to democracy in our time and argues that the preservation of democracy requires that government by the consent of the governed must now grow beyond the borders of the nation state.

RS Deese is a writer and historian whose most recent book, co-edited with Michael Holm, is How Democracy Survives: Global Challenges in the Anthropocene (Routledge, 2023). Other books: The Mirror & the Monkey (Pelekinesis, 2022), Climate Change and the Future of Democracy (Springer, 2019), We Are Amphibians: Julian and Aldous Huxley on the Future of Our Species (University of California Press, 2015), and a book of poems, Surf Music (Pelekinesis, 2017). His essays, poems, and book reviews have been published in AGNI, Berkeley Poetry Review, Democracy Without Borders, Endeavour, Impact, MungBeing, New Times Los Angeles, The Quarterly, The Journal of Religion, and the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature & Culture.

Deese grew up in Claremont, California. After earning a bachelor’s degree in history at UC Berkeley, he traveled to East Asia, where he taught English Composition at Nanjing University in China. Deese first came to Boston University to study poetry and then returned to earn kis PhD in history in 2007.