More than 60 SWA members and other interested students, faculty, and community leaders filled a conference room at LaGuardia Community College in New York City to hear the internationally-renowned political philosopher, Dr. Benjamin R. Barber, speak about a world-in-crisis and what can be done to promote global democracy and root out effectively and multilaterally the cancer of global terrorism. Fifty SWA members had been provided a free copy of Dr. Barber’s latest book, “Fear's Empire: War, Terrorism, and Democracy in an Age of Interdependence,” to read and ask questions about its core ideas and suggestions. The members capably fulfilled this purpose and not only engaged Dr. Barber in thoughtful and probing questions during the session, but gathered around him for about an hour after the event to continue their conversations with him. Dr. Barber graciously interacted with them, autographed their copies of his book, and posed for pictures with them. Dr. Barber clearly was enjoying his time with these highly interested students.

The whole event was filmed and CDs of it will be available free-of-charge to interested faculty and students. The lecture will be placed on the SWA website as well. A CD was express-made to the International Pacific College in New Zealand so that the students and faculty there could hold a videoconference discussion of Dr. Barber’s speech with LaGuardia students on Sept. 30 as part of their joint Internationalism course.

Dr. Barber was introduced by Dr. M. Reza Fakhari, Academic Advisor of the SWA and director of Honors & International Programs at LaGuardia. “No other author has written as originally and effectively as Dr. Barber on our post-9/11 world and what we can do to create a just, humane, and democratic world order for everyone on earth,” commented Dr. Fakhari in his introduction. Besides being a leading public intellectual in the U.S., Dr. Barber is also the principal of the Democracy Collaborative and the CivWorld Citizens Campaign for Democracy, an organization with which SWA collaborates. Dr. Barber is also the Gershon and Carol Kekst Professor of Civil Society and Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland and the writer of 17 other books, including the classic, “Jihad vs. McWorld,” translated into 20 languages.

Dr. Barber expounded on his key ideas in “Fear’s Empire” and how a better world is possible and a moral imperative of our time. In response to questions, he commented on the quagmire in Iraq and the choice faced in the coming presidential election by Americans.

He praised students’ role in building global democracy and underlined that “this is democracy’s moment” and all of us need to be engaged to prevent further future catastrophes. The SWA members were truly inspired by the intellectual caliber of Dr. Barber’s arguments and by the realism of his recommendations for a better global future.