In this episode of Unpopular Front’s author series, I spoke to political theorist, writer, and researcher Laura K. Field. Laura has written for The Bulwark, The New Republic, Politico, and is a scholar in residence at American University, a senior advisor at the Illiberalism Studies Program at Georgetown, and a fellow at the Brookings Institution.
She is also the author of Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right, out now from Princeton University Press. I had the honor to blurb this book:
“A pathbreaking intellectual history from the world’s preeminent researcher of the contemporary American right. Furious Minds scrupulously chronicles the coalescence of a modern movement that took place as much online as in the seminar room or the corridors of power. Essential reading to understand today’s political situation.”
Laura’s book charts the rise of a group of malcontent intellectuals as they go from a scrappy group of bloggers fantasizing about an authoritarian America to joining a seditious conspiracy against the Republic and providing legal architecture for a coup. It also gives a very helpful taxonomy of the different schools of MAGA thought. We talked about all that, the strange influence of Leo Strauss and his students, and how JD Vance has embraced the New Right thinkers.
