#1 Degrees of Freedom
Series launch “Futuring the Liberal Script”

Christoph Möllers in conversation with Jan-Werner Müller,
moderated by Mariam Lau

In the wake of new populisms, erosions of liberal values and political polarizations, the idea of freedom is one in need of theoretical and practical remapping. Christoph Möllers and political theorist Jan-Werner Müller discuss Möllers’ latest book “Degrees of Freedom” (Freiheitsgrade, Suhrkamp Verlag 2020) live from the silent green. What if freedom is permanent political negotiation rather than applied political mechanics of core liberal ideas? What kind of future and resilient political scenarios for democratic societies emerge, if freedom is conceived not as an unshakable core but as a practice and open ended process of a liberalism in the making?

Christoph Möllers, SCRIPTS, Professor of Public Law and Jurisprudence, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Jan-Werner Müller, Visiting Fellow SCRIPTS, Roger Williams Straus Professor of Social Sciences, Princeton University
Mariam Lau, Journalist, Die Zeit (Moderation)

Free Online Event: Livestream on YouTube
In cooperation with Suhrkamp Verlag and silent green.
Language: German

About the Series - Futuring the Liberal Script

“Futuring the Liberal Script” is a conversation series live from the silent green. Researchers of the Cluster of Excellence “Contestations of the Liberal Script – SCRIPTS” discuss and analyze current crisis of liberal societies and democracies and reflect on future political imaginaries from diverse perspectives. As a script “in trouble” the liberal script needs manifold analytical and discursive registers for keeping track of open antagonisms but also of its inherent contradictions and tensions. 

As such, “futuring” is not necessarily a variant of optimizing, but rather relates to developing a critical and creative stance in response to current erosions and contestations of liberal values. The liberal script has to compete increasingly with alternative scripts and agendas for organizing societies, be they run by authoritarian, populist, Islamic fundamentalist, terrorist or technocratic autocracies. Whether liberal democracies are confident, flexible and agile enough to respond to the challenges posed by contrary political systems and alternative ideas is a central matter of acute political and social concern. The SCRIPTS conversations assemble a variety of views, concerns and actors by putting research topics and timely diagnosis up to public and ongoing debate.