The Beautiful Game and the Fragile Democracy - with Political Scientist Cas Mudde

The Beautiful Game and the Fragile Democracy - with Political Scientist Cas Mudde

From The Assistant Professor of Football: Soccer, Culture, History. by Philipp Gollner

April 13, 2026 · 1h 10m · Season 4 · Episode 75

About this episode

The episode features political scientist Cas Mudde discussing the intersection of soccer and fragile democracies.

Today's assistant professor has spent his career studying the forces that threaten liberal democracy — the far right, populism, nationalist movements that have reshaped politics from Hungary to the United States. He's one of the most cited political scientists working on those questions, based at the University of Georgia, originally from the Netherlands, and the kind of scholar who combines rigorous theory with an unusually grounded sense of how politics actually lives in people's lives. But...

People in this episode

Host: Philipp Gollner

Guest: Cas Mudde

Topics covered

  • democracy
  • politics
  • populism
  • nationalism
  • soccer
  • culture

Keywords

  • liberal democracy
  • far right
  • populism
  • nationalist movements
  • soccer
  • politics

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: University of Georgia

Places: Hungary, United States, Netherlands

More episodes of The Assistant Professor of Football: Soccer, Culture, History.

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the The Assistant Professor of Football: Soccer, Culture, History. podcast page.