​​The Future of Democracy

With a US election looming and four billion people heading to the polls in 2024, Yun Jiang and John Lyons discuss the threats and challenges to democracy around the world with host Emma Shortis.

John Lyons is the Walkley Award-winning Global Affairs Editor of the ABC, and has been a foreign correspondent in Washington, New York, the Philippines and the Middle East. Yun Jiang is a public policy specialist with expertise assessing Australia’s relationship with China. With host Emma Shortis, these experts will explore imperialism, corruption, autocracy and other global challenges to modern democracy. With more than half of the world’s population able to vote in elections this year – including the pivotal upcoming US election – there has never been a more urgent time to confront the future of democracy.

Due to lengthy delays in granting an Australian visa to speaker Masha Gessen, they will no longer be able to participate in The Future of Democracy. The event will proceed with John Lyons and Yun Jiang in conversation with Emma Shortis.

For more information visit: https://www.wheelercentre.com/events/the-future-of-democracy

Presented in partnership with The Wheeler Centre.

Masha Gessen’s visit to Australia is made possible by the support of Bill Manos and the Manos Foundation. Masha Gessen is presented in Melbourne by The Wheeler Centre and in Sydney by Festival of Dangerous Ideas.

Speaker Bios

Masha Gessen

Masha Gessen is an opinion columnist for The New York Times and a Distinguished Professor at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. They have written extensively on The Russian-Ukrainian war, Israel/Palestine, Vladimir Putin, and Donald Trump. They have won numerous awards, including the George Polk Award, the Hannah Arendt Prize for Political Thinking, and the National Book Award. Their books include Surviving Autocracy and The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia.

John Lyons

John Lyons is one of Australia’s most experienced journalists and the Global Affairs Editor of the ABC. Previously he was Head of Investigative Journalism at the ABC, responsible for Four Corners, 7.30, Foreign Correspondent, Insiders, Australian Story, Q&A and the Investigative Reporting Team. For six years, John was The Australian’s Middle East correspondent, based in Jerusalem, an experience that led him to write the bestselling Balcony Over Jerusalem. He has interviewed everyone from former Israeli prime ministers Shimon Peres and Ehud Olmert to key figures from Hezbollah and Hamas. John has won many awards, including the Graham Perkin Australian Journalist of the Year Award, three Walkleys and UN awards. He now lives in Sydney.

Louisa Lim

Louisa Lim is the author of Indelible City: Dispossession and Defiance in Hong Kong, which has just been published in the US. It’s been described by the New York Times as a “vivid, loving book”. It’s due to be released here in Australia next month.
Her first book The People’s Republic of Amnesia: Tiananmen Revisited (2014), was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize and the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism. She covered China and Hong Kong for a decade as a correspondent for the BBC and NPR and has written for the New York Times and the Guardian. Raised in Hong Kong, she lives in Australia with her two children and is now a Senior Lecturer at the University of Melbourne.