About this episode

Yascha Mounk and Ivan Krastev discuss America's crisis of self-confidence and its founding ideals on the country's 250th anniversary.

Yascha Mounk and Ivan Krastev examine what the country’s founding ideals mean on its 250th anniversary. Ivan Krastev is Chairman of the Centre for Liberal Strategies and the Albert Hirschman Permanent Fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM) in Vienna. He is a founding board member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and serves on the advisory and governing boards of several international organizations, including the European Investment Bank, the International Crisis Group, and GLOBSEC. In this week’s conversation, Yascha Mounk and Ivan Krastev discuss what the 250th anniversary of the United States reveals about America’s crisis of self-confidence, whether America and Europe are converging rather than diverging, and how competition with China will reshape American identity in the decades ahead. We’re delighted to feature this conversation as part of our series on Liberal Virtues and Values. That liberalism is under threat is now a cliché—yet this has done nothing to stem the global resurgence of illiberalism. Part of the problem is that liberalism is often considered too “thin” to win over the allegiance of citizens, and that liberals are too afraid of speaking…

People in this episode

Host: Yascha Mounk

Guest: Ivan Krastev

Topics covered

• American identity
• liberalism
• self-confidence
• competition with China
• Europe and America
• founding ideals
• illiberalism

Keywords

• America
• liberalism
• self-confidence
• China
• Europe
• founding ideals
• illiberalism
• Ivan Krastev
• Yascha Mounk
• John Templeton Foundation

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Centre for Liberal Strategies, Institute for Human Sciences (IWM), European Council on Foreign Relations, European Investment Bank, International Crisis Group, GLOBSEC

More episodes of The Good Fight

• Claude Steele on the Hidden Stress of Diverse Spaces · July 21, 2026 · 52 min
• The Good Fight Club: Refounding Liberalism, Gen Z’s Political Instincts, and a Watergate Ghost Story · July 18, 2026 · 51 min
• John Harpham on the Intellectual Origins of American Slavery · July 14, 2026 · 1h 2m
• Deirdre McCloskey on What Really Caused the Industrial Revolution · July 11, 2026 · 1h 6m
• Arvind Narayanan on Why AI Isn’t All That Revolutionary · July 7, 2026 · 1h 1m
• Charles Fain Lehman on Why Cities Got Safer · June 30, 2026 · 1h 4m

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the The Good Fight podcast page.