JACKSONVILLE -- October 25, 2002 -- Former Congressman Glen Browder, a Jacksonville State University eminent scholar, will carry his provocative public lecture series on the future of American democracy into the national capital after America’s Fall elections.

For the past few months, Dr. Browder has been conducting American Democracy Forums throughout Alabama, and his unconventional analysis is being featured on public television and public radio programs.

Now, Browder has been invited to speak at several civic and educational events in Washington, DC, Maryland, and Virginia. He currently is scheduling appearances at Georgetown University, American University, James Madison University, the Center for Democracy and Citizenship, and other similar institutions.

The purpose of the series is to encourage public debate, especially among young people, about dramatic developments that challenge traditional notions of American public life. Drawing from his new book The Future of American Democracy: A Former Congressman’s Unconventional Analysis (2002), Browder says that America is changing in important and unsettling ways that demand national dialogue.

“America’s Great Experiment has indeed been a grand and glorious endeavor for over two hundred years,” he says, “but our national democratic experiment also embodies principles and tendencies that inherently and continuously jeopardize American democracy.”

Particularly at the beginning of the Twenty-First Century, he believes that we are undergoing a democratic metamorphosis that, for better or worse, is transforming our nation and the world. “The critical question for contemporary America is how our nation--a people of growing cultural diversity, with increasingly divergent ideals, values, and principles of governance--can continue the collective pursuit of freedom, equality, and justice through the historic framework of representative democracy.” Perhaps, Browder speculates, we may have reached the limits of our democratic destiny. As he asks rhetorically at the beginning of his new book: “Is America dying?”

Browder, who has served as an Alabama State Legislator (1982-86), Secretary of State (1987-89), and U.S. Congressman (1989-96), taught thousands of students the essentials of American democracy as a JSU professor before launching his political career. He brings to this series a unique combination of experience and perspectives as a public official, political scientist, and self-proclaimed “American dreamer.”

Browder’s unconventional analysis has received strong, positive reviews from public officials, academicians, and journalists. Former White House Chief of Staff Leon Panetta calls Browder’s message “a wake-up call for our democracy”; Dr. Larry Sabato, Director of the University of Virginia’s Governmental Studies Center, says that Browder “challenges every citizen, especially the young, to think anew about America’s democracy”; and Governing Magazine’s Alan Ehrenhalt asserts that “all of his recommendations are worth reading and paying attention to.”

For additional information regarding this series and specific events, contact the JSU News Office at 256-782-5826 or the JSU Political Science Department at 256-782-5650.