Are We the Soviets? A Reply to Niall Ferguson

In this episode of New Ideal Live, Elan Journo and Nikos Sotirakopoulos discuss historian Niall Ferguson’s “We’re All Soviets Now,” a viral essay about American economic and cultural decline.

Among the topics covered:


● Ferguson’s argument that America is following the path of the late USSR;
● The disanalogies between America and the Soviet Union;
● Ferguson’s blindness to the role of ideas in his comparative analysis;
● How Ferguson’s doomsaying prepares the grounds for authoritarianism;
● How some of Ferguson’s valid criticisms misidentify root causes of American decline.

The podcast premiered on July 11, 2024.

0:00:00 Introduction
0:04:04 Ferguson’s argument
0:11:50 Disanalogies between the US and USSR
0:20:35 Ferguson’s blindness to the role of ideas
0:29:17 Doomsaying and grounds for authoritarianism
0:33:52 Root causes of American declines