Samuel Ely Bagg is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of South Carolina, where he teaches political theory. He has also taught at the University of Oxford, McGill University, and Duke University, where he received his PhD in 2017. His research in democratic theory has appeared in the American Political Science Review; the American Journal of Political Science; the Journal of Politics; the Journal of Political Philosophy; and Dissent Magazine; among many other venues.
Democrats have failed to confront the realities of power, Samuel Bagg compellingly argues, frustrating their own hopes by thinking about democracy itself the wrong way. In doing so, they have helped reproduce hierarchy rather than prioritize mechanisms to counteract the risk of state capture. Few books are both important and original in their provocation, and even fewer explore an arresting insight with the generality and specifics to make it potent. The Dispersion of Power does all of this-and more. * Samuel Moyn, Yale University *