Highlights

1. Destabilization could be the biggest setback for great power conflict, AI, bio-risk, and climate disruption.
2. Polarization plays a role in nearly every causal pathway leading to destabilization of the United States, and there is no indication polarization will decrease.
3. The United States fits the pattern of past democracies that have descended into authoritarian regimes in many key aspects.
4. The most recent empirical research on civil conflicts suggests the United States is in a category that has a 4% annual risk of falling into a civil conflict.
5. In 2022 (when this was originally written), Mike Berkowitz, ED of Democracy Funders Network and 80,000 Hours guest, believes there is 50% chance American democracy fails in the next 6 years.
6. For every dollar spent on depolarization efforts, there are probably at least a hundred dollars spent aggravating the culture war.
7. Destabilization of the United States could wipe out billions of dollars of pledged EA funds.

Note following the assassination attempt of former President Trump

This is the extended version^[1] of my 2022 draft submission^[2] to the Open Philanthropy (OP) Cause Area Competition. I am releasing it today because the section on accelerationist events and protecting politicians from assassination seems very salient given the last 24 hours. (Thanks to Woody Campbell for relevant and possibly prescient thoughts on the latter).

The overall topic of this piece is also salient for this 2024 election year. I have been pleasantly surprised how many EAs have mobilized this year around the issue of protecting American democracy… I wish this had been the situation back in 2020 or after January 6th or after I pushed this on the Forum and EAGs in 2022. Democracy is jeopardized not because of a single candidate but because of the forces that made the viability of such a candidate possible. Thus this issue cannot be addressed only in election years.

The worry I’ve had this year is that EAs will prioritize this area only until election day and then forget about it after January 20th, 2025. The degradation of American democracy and stability is not stopped only at the ballot box, and the forces/dynamics that are driving that degradation have continued unabated despite every red line^[3] that has been crossed to date. And I’m not optimistic that the red line crossed yesterday will be any different.

Preface

Epistemic status:

I have thought a lot about this over the years and was warning about risks to American democracy before the topic entered mainstream and often sensationalized discourse.. I could be more well read on academic literature, however I think it likely wouldn’t change my views much on diagnosis and prognosis of the situation^[4] but could greatly influence my views of the prescription. This is a topic that lends itself to getting lost in the rabbit hole and alarmism. My greatest hesitation about the gravity of the situation is the fact that many very intelligent people come to very different conclusions than me; however, I have yet to see an argument I found compelling. I think the probability of a destabilizing event rests a lot on people’s subjective judgements. Below is an overview of my confidence on a few items in this piece:    

• Very confident that destabilization is more likely than EAs appreciate.
• Confident the consequences of destabilization make it an X-factor.
• Moderately confident it’s neglected financially relative to severity as an X-factor and relative to money injected annually into polarization efforts (read: culture war).
• Very confident the problem is quite difficult to solve.
• Very low confidence in most proposed interventions; modest confidence on a couple.

My top reading/listening recommendations are:

1. Robert Evans’ podcast series It Could Happen Here (March – May 2019)
   1. Not to be confused with a book of the same name by Jonathan Greenblatt, the head of the Anti-Defamation League.
   2. In August 2021, Evans released a daily podcast under the It Could Happen Here name. This is not the content I am referencing. If you are searching on a service like Spotify, you will need to sort the podcast episodes from oldest to newest to find the original series released in 2019.^[5]
2. Ezra Klein’s book Why We’re Polarized
3. Robert Evans’s podcast miniseries “Behind the Insurrection” (a set of episodes from his Behind the Bastards podcast he released in the wake of January 6^th)
4. Daniel Ziblatt and Steve Levitsky’s How Democracies Die and Tyranny of the Minority 
   1. (if you don’t want to read a whole book, watch their presentation at Politics and Prose)

This is an extended version of my submission to the Open Philanthropy (OP) Cause Area Competition. The word limit and scoring structure affected the final product (I would prefer to have focused more on the possibility and importance of a destabilization event). I have been working independently on an informal effort to make the case that EA should prioritize protecting American democracy and ambitious structural change in the U.S. political system. (The latter is not just because of its role in the former but also because it has immense upside benefits even if American democracy were secure). Reach out if you are interested in collaborating or just want to give words of encouragement.

Apologies in advance for switching back and forth between nationality-neutral and American-centric language (e.g. the American government vs. our government). I know EA is majority non-Americans; although throughout this piece I feel like I am appealing especially to American EAs.

Acknowledgements

Rawan, Woody Campbell, Mike Berkowitz, Professor Spivey, Steve Thompson, Kyle Lucchese, Tom Latkowski, František Drahota, and public libraries.

Summary

The trajectory of polarization, increasing minoritarian rule, and the erosion of democratic norms and the rule of law in the United States is unsustainable. The forces that are driving this trajectory (the revenue models of social media and news media, and structural political incentives) are deeply entrenched and are known to us. Yet, if there was going to be an intervening force sufficient to alter our trajectory, it should have appeared by now (especially in the wake of the January 6th, 2021 insurrection). Continuing on this path–in addition to high levels of government dysfunction (also worthy of EA’s attention)–will eventually yield destabilization. Destabilization which would likely manifest as an authoritarian regime or civil conflict (likely sparked by a failed authoritarian power grab).^[6]

The consequences of destabilization of the world’s most powerful superpower are immense, (including for suffering, x-risks, and the long-term future) and could be the catastrophic event that cascades into an existential event. Destabilization of the nation that is home to the largest efforts addressing artificial intelligence, bio-risk, and climate disruption would also be devasting for the EA movement because of the amount of EA talent in the United States and the degree to which the handful of fortunes (of Americans) that represent the vast majority of pledged EA funds are tied to the health of the America system. For example, a right-wing authoritarian could shutdown Facebook or take other actions that would wipe out most of its stock value; Forbes states that the majority of the net worth of Dustin Moskovitz—the principal source of OP’s funding—is from his estimated 2% stake in Facebook; billions of dollars of EA/OP funding would evaporate if this scenario were to happen.

OP and the Effective Altruism community can take a multitude of actions, many of which not only decrease the chance of destabilization but also have the upside of making our government function better, thus having a force-multiplier effect on the outcomes our trillion-dollar government. Action is urgently needed, but unfortunately most interventions have either a very unclear cost-effectiveness or appear to not meet OP’s typical 1000x standard in short-term measurements. However, a medium-level investigation could change the perspective on return on investment. Effective Altruism at large needs to explore the risk of destabilization of the United States, given the possibility it could become one of EA’s top X-factors.

If anyone reading this would like to discuss or collaborate on this topic, please reach out! Also, let me know if this changed your opinions/priors at all AND/OR what arguments you think need to be improved. 

Possibility

Here is a distillation of my argument: the experts that I have read understand the situation as the elements and dynamics depicted in this flow chart. The reasons they cite for why they are not pessimistic about the worst-case scenario do not address the mechanisms of the situation and are more so hunches, each of which has a strong counter argument. They openly give the impression that they are optimistic because it is practical rather than intellectually merited. I am merely looking at the trajectory (where the flow chart is taking us) and the inertia (the fact that nothing has intervened to change the trajectory after an unprecedented presidency, pandemic, and insurrection), and making the logical jump that the end point is eventually destabilization.

Big picture

Authoritarianism

Democracies have fallen into authoritarian regimes throughout the past 100 years, and scholars have studied those instances to create a playbook of how tyrants successfully come to power in democracies. ^[7]  Trump has partially or completely checked off every box except for crippling the opposition and wresting control of the security forces^[8] (the latter being the most important).

Trump was unsuccessful in seizing power, however many people have interpreted the wrong lesson—our institutions work, we can be optimistic about democracy. The process of resisting Trump’s power grab and January 6^th made them weaker, and they continue to be eroded—not rebuilt—to this day.^[9] The pathway to power has been illuminated for other would-be authoritarians. The Trump-wing of the Republican party is finding decent success in replacing non-radical Republicans in critical positions to enable a future “constitutional coup.” The next authoritarian in the White House, be it Trump or someone more competent, will have much more success. These are the concerns of a number of serious scholars and pundits.^[10]

The demise of democracies into presidential autocracies, fascist regimes, and one-party states is an arc, not a linear line. The rise of fascism in the 30s occurred on a sharp arc relative to the gentler curve of illiberal authoritarianism of Viktor Orban’s Hungary. Daniel Ziblatt and Steve Levitsky, the authors of How Democracies Die, emphasize how modern democracies deteriorate over longer time scales that enable a boiling-frog syndrome.

I contend that both a sharp and gentle curve are possible. The important point is that we could be near or past the inflection point of the curve. In Behind the Bastards’ miniseries “Behind the Insurrection,” journalist Robert Evans focuses on how insurrections, paramilitary groups, political violence, enablement of authoritarians by establishment politicians, and a voter base of around 30% of the population were at the inflection point of fascist regimes that came to power or attempted to come to power. In more recent regimes birthed from democracies, How Democracies Die emphasizes the erosion of the democratic norms forbearance and mutual toleration, establishment politicians enabling the aspiring authoritarian, and the aspiring authoritarian being elected to power in more recent.^[11] The United States has roughly analogous features in the present situation.

A notable difference Evans highlights between now and then is that WWI supplied an enormous number of veterans that experienced brutal trench warfare that went on to become fascist foot soldiers, whereas the number of combat veterans from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq is much smaller and the combat is relatively sanitized compared to trench warfare in the 30s (this is not to make light of 21^st century combat or say that most soldiers have a bent towards fascism).

Civil conflict

Civil conflict would most foreseeably manifest from a failed authoritarian power grab. We saw these dynamics play out on January 6^th of 2021. The base of an aspiring tyrant faithfully believes their leader’s declarations that the opposition is illegitimately grabbing power. They respond to this perceived existential threat to democracy with violence.

This danger is underpinned by the proliferation of armed groups for over a decade,^[12] alarming number of extremists in law enforcement,^[13] easy accessibility of weapons—unique to America,^[14] and historically-high population sentiments tolerating or advocating for political violence, believing their fellow Americans are the enemy, perceiving the stakes as existential, and not seeing democracy as essential.^[15]

Some people find this hard to visualize so let me set out a few important points.

1. It would not look like the first American civil war—a conventional war divided neatly between belligerents. It would be somewhere on the range of messy low- to high-intensity civil conflicts like those in Congo^[16] and Syria, respectively.
2. Also, people get hung up on the fact that the majority is against a civil conflict. Conflicts are always a minoritarian endeavor; there is a strong asymmetry between the number of organized combatants and the civilian population they can suppress.^[17] This same dynamic plays out with authoritarianism. The European fascist regimes in the 30s came to power with around 30% support from the population^[18] (which is roughly the support for Trump)^[19].
3. Likewise, people have trouble reconciling what they see in the country right now with the prospect of destabilization in several or even a few years’ time. Humans naturally think linearly and are regularly mistaken when they encounter exponential trends. Many conditions of present-day United States are analogous to the conditions of ill-fated democracies around their inflection point—e.g. militias normalizing political violence, establishment politicians supporting an authoritarian outsider for political gain and/or miscalculation. 

Barbara Walter, author of How Civil Wars Start, makes an empirical case that the United States is vulnerable to a civil war.^[20] The CIA’s Political Instability Task Force analyzes a dataset of incidents, and their most recent model has identified two predictive variables: anocracy and ethnic mobilization. Countries with both of these variables had an annual 4% chance of starting a civil conflict.

Walter cites the Center for Systemic Peace’s polity scale^[21] which downgraded the United States to an anocracy on the bubble of being a democracy.^[22] Daniel Ziblatt makes a similar point that the United States has a long constitutional tradition but only became a full democracy after the civil rights movement.^[23]

I am uncertain how valid the empirical argument from Walter’s is.^[24] Ethnic mobilization is definitely occurring, but the 4% annual risk of civil conflict is also dependent on the United States being an anocracy. Walter cites one measure of the United States dipping into the anocracy zone, but there are other ratings that have the United States as a democracy.^[25] Walter also concedes, on a podcast with Michael Shermer, that the experts are unsure why anocracy is a predictor and that they think that it’s a proxy for a weak government—which the United States is not; however, I can imagine the dysfunction/deterioration of the government to a point that it creates the space for rebel groups, which is the mechanism she describes as driving civil conflicts. I am also skeptical of a forecasting tool by the CIA given the critiques of their abilities by Legacy of Ashes, Cass Sunstein’s 80,000 Hours interview, and the work of Philip Tetlock (Good Judgment Project).

Polarization

“The most fundamental challenge that we face today is extreme polarization”

- Steven Levitsky

Nearly every causal pathway (ultimate to proximate causation) of authoritarianism and civil conflict converge on polarization^[26] at some point.

Polarization is driven by polarized content/rhetoric from politicians,^[27] media personalities,^[28] and political entrepreneurs^[29] which reaches the population through news media and social media.^[30]

Social media and news companies, especially cable news, earn the majority of their revenue through ads. The product they are selling is the attention of the audience.^[31] Their revenue increases by maximizing the aggregate amount of time viewers spend watching their content. Directing/providing the audience towards polarized content that triggers their ape brain is one of the most effective ways to increase time spent consuming media.

Politicians are incentivized to engage in polarization to increase their visibility in the media and because of structural incentives—most decisively: the combination of party primaries, single-member districts, first-past-the-post voting—to appeal to an unrepresentative and highly politicized “base”.^[32] This combination is one of the worst configurations of election methodology possible.^[33]

We have reached a toxic level of polarization because of alternate information ecosystems. Robert Evans describes this as when people can watch and hear the same thing and come to wildly different conclusions (e.g. Kyle Rittenhouse Shooting). Carnegie Endowment researchers Thomas Carothers and Andrew O’Donohue found that American polarization is exceptional on multiple dimensions.^[34] Ezra Klein finished his book, Why We’re Polarized, stating he suspects “we can't reverse polarization.” He wrote the book before the COVID-19 pandemic and the January 6^th insurrection. 

The prognosis is even more damning following the double-down on polarization and neofascism that ensued the soft coup attempt. With the exception of the initial weeks after the insurrection, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy has trivialized the attack and helped purge non-Trump loyalists.^[35] Tucker Carlson, received two new shows from Fox News (in addition to his primetime show) after he began spreading flagrant disinformation about the insurrection one month after the attack. The list is long, but those are two of the most concerning.

So what is the end point of continual toxic polarization? I think that it is destabilization. I believe this because of how it drives the inputs into authoritarianism and civil conflict. I also contend that a society can’t be sustained if the two dominant factions can’t have a shared set of facts/truths about which they base their disagreements on. Despite the latter being purely my intuition, it is a view voiced by some experts^[36] and I would speculate that it is most of our views if confronted with that question.^[37]

Even if a toxically polarized United States can resist destabilization for a long time, it would be highly dysfunctional (keep that in mind as you read the “Importance” section). Ezra concludes his book that the United States must reform its political system to function amidst polarization. For reasons discussed in the “Tractability” section, this is very unlikely. This resigns us to a perpetual state of government dysfunction (which gradually decays the nation) and vulnerability to destabilizing events. The authors of The Paradox of Democracy, Sean Illing and Zac Gershberg, believe this eventually has to course correct back to liberal democracy or to the end of liberalism and democracy, with the predisposition being for the latter.^[38]

How close we already came (January 6^th)

Reporting and investigations into January 6th, including the House select committee on January 6^th, have continually revealed we were closer to disaster than we expected. However, even in the initial aftermath, there was enough reason to believe that if we played this event out a hundred times that several of the times would have resulted in a destabilizing event (most likely a civil conflict following a failed coup—one that went a lot further than this coup attempt did). Below I list three variables that could have easily gone very differently and if they had, I think we’d be living in a very different situation today:

1. Had the extremists^[39] held possession of the building for 24 hours.
   1. The extremists were in a position to hold the building for substantially longer than they did. They had an overwhelming numbers advantage and the security forces were unwilling to use lethal force.
   2. If the extremists held the building into January 7^th, this would have dramatically inspired and emboldened extremists across the country including those withing a few hours drive of Washington D.C. Statehouses across the country could have come under spontaneous siege from extremists and tens of thousands more could have descended onto the nation’s capital. The longer the Capitol building was held the more likely extremists would sincerely believe this was a “1776 moment.” 
   3. The extremists however did not make a serious attempt to hold the Capitol. There are many plausible explanations: the extremists were all bark and not bite, they didn’t expect to make it into the building and thus were unprepared to capitalize on their success, they headed Trump’s eventual tweets, etc.
   4. The situation might have played out very differently if Trump continued to double-down on the attack via Twitter instead of being talked down by aides and family members to tweet that the mob should go home.
   5. This event likely wouldn’t have resolved in an overthrow of the federal government but it could have unleashed a wave of insurgencies or proto-insurgencies and domestic terrorism.
2. Had the insurrectionists intercepted a number of elected representatives and executed multiple of them.^[40]
   1. This would have the same emboldening and inspirational effect described in the point above. It could also function as an accelerationist event wherein future reprisal killings for the executions kicks off a vicious cycle political violence and assassination.
   2. The insurrectionists were alarmingly close to intercepting elected legislators
      1. A mob of insurrectionists were 60 feet^[41] from evacuating legislators and had them in their line of sight at one point. Those insurrectionists were breaching the barrier between them and the fleeing legislators and only stopped after the first insurrectionist through the barrier was fatally shot.^[42]
         1. This could have played out very differently if the Capitol police office did not discharge his weapon, which is what happened in all other instances of confrontation that day between security forces and insurrectionists.
         2. Some insurrectionists carried firearms with them. I do not know if any members of the mob in that corridor had a firearm. Play out this scenario enough times and you probably have situations where an armed insurrectionist near the front of the mob and is zealous enough to fire back. Now, play that situation out enough times and the mob overruns the few police officers in front of them and is on the heels of vulnerable legislators.
      2. Insurrectionists had an unimpeded straight shot at the Senate chamber which had not been fully evacuated. The only reason they didn’t is because they followed Officer Eugene Goodman.^[43]
         1. I’m surprised Goodman’s ruse worked. I content that if played out multiple times, the mob enters the Senate chamber.
   3. Insurrectionists where at their closest point 40 feet from Vice President Mike Pence.^[44] Although the insurrectionists didn’t realize how close they were to Pence. Reporting has come out that Pence’s security detail perceived the situation as grave enough that it necessitated goodbye calls to loved ones.^[45]
   4. I don’t doubt that the insurrectionists would have executed elected representatives they got their hands on. It was a mob in full-on mob mentality. Multiple insurrectionists entered with firearms, zip ties, and other tactical gear. The rhetoric leading up to the event and at the event was clear that the extremists wanted to so see their opponents die.
3. Had Vice President Pence left the premise and the Senate Pro Tempe declined to certify the results or certified ballots of fake electors.
   1. When Pence was evacuated to a subterranean secure location in the Capitol building, his Secret Service detail wanted evacuate him from the premise in his motorcade. The only reason they didn’t s because Pence refused.
   2. It has been reported that some Secret Service officials were unprofessionally close or loyal to Trump.^[46]
   3. It has been reported that Pence’s National Security Advisor General Kellog perceived the evacuation of the Pence from the Capitol building as part of the desires of Trump/secret service officials loyal to Trump.^[47] General Kellog is reported to have said “You can’t do that, Tony. Leave him where he’s at. He’s got a job to do. I know you guys too well. You’ll fly him to Alaska if you have a chance. Don’t do it.” to senior Secret Service official Tony Ornato.
   4. Reporting has now revealed that some legislators, including Senator Ron Johnson, had explored plans to have a false set of electors stashed in legislators’ offices the night before and present them to the Senate as the valid representatives of their state’s electoral college.

When examining January 6^th, we should also keep in mind that this was the last-ditch attempt to illegitimately overturn an election of an ongoing effort that was disorganized, poorly disciplined, lacking talent, and took action too far downstream. A more competent authoritarian could have taken action further upstream (i.e. before the election) to lay the groundwork for a less blatant constitutional coup.

A note on the military counter argument

Arguably the strongest guardrail against authoritarianism and civil conflict is the professionalism and strength of the United States Military (USM). Here are three things to consider:

1. USM is well positioned to stop an authoritarian power grab^[48] but it is less well positioned to neutralize an insurgency. Even if insurgents have no hope of winning, the will to fight is sufficient to disrupt society (see Iraq War). 
2. An authoritarian could 1) install civilian loyalists at the top of the military (e.g. Sec of DoD) and 2) promote officers loyal to the authoritarian. There are strong rebuttals to those two points being consequential for destabilization, however a potential authoritarian could still do serious damage with these actions regardless.
3. We have no confidence the military would act to stop a constitutional coup.^[49] The military is not calibrated to decisively intervene in a gray area that is nominally legal/constitutional but is fiercely antidemocratic. Imagine if on January 6^th there were no insurrectionists, but GOP senators presented false slates of electors and Vice President Mike Pence certified these electors. Imagine if we had a similar situation to the 2000 presidential election or worse. Now imagine if either of these actions were upheld by the Supreme Court (plausible with its current composition). What is your confidence level that General Mark Milley would use the military to override that Supreme Court decision?

Top reasons why the United States wouldn’t destabilize

If you told me that in 30 years I’d be proven wrong, I’d offer these two reasons as to why:

My top reason is that American rhetoric supporting political violence, especially on the Right, is all bark but no bite. The biggest indicator is that millions of Americans claim they believe Biden illiterately seized power, yet only thousands showed up on January 6^th to do something about it.^[50] However, this is also one of the strongest reasons a constitutional coup would prevail—the same lack of action by the Right to stop what they perceived as an illegitimate power grab probably extends to the Left and moderates.

I do believe it’s possible that the red line for GOP and media elites, which wasn’t triggered by January 6^th, exists at some point before the point of no return. However, I believe the probability is small (perhaps 10% if I had to put a number on it).

What I would have included in a longer version

My original plan was to describe different components of the destabilization threat, detail different scenarios under which destabilization could have unfolded, as well as, cover a list of counterarguments and provide my rebuttals to them. An email exchange with OP clarified that it would likely have been beyond the scope of the competition and word limit. Here is a document with the topics I would have liked to discussed. I might expand on upon these in a future piece if EAs want to have a discourse around destabilization of the United States as an X-factor.

Conclusion

1. Democracies do die and we check most of the boxes of democracies that have descended into authoritarianism and civil conflict.
2. Polarization is a convergent instrument in most of the causation pathways.
3. The forces of polarization are entrenched. If there was going to be change, we likely would have seen it by now.
4. Without an intervening force, we head towards an end point of destabilization. Even if we stop just short, the concomitant governmental dysfunction would still have highly undesirable consequences on the issues laid out in the “Importance” section.

My current personal prediction is that if we play out our present scenario ten times, six of those times would result in destabilization (at least eclipsing the point of no return) in the next ten years—civil conflict or authoritarianism, including minoritarian rule an order of magnitude greater than what we already have. Mike Berkowitz, executive director of Democracy Funders Network, believes there is a 50% chance that “democracy fails,” particularly an illegitimate election, in the next 4 to 6 years.^[51]

To me, the lowest reasonable probability of destabilization over the next ten years is 15%. I expect that most EAs won’t rise to the degree of my risk assessment, however, I do think the case I presented should significantly increase people’s priors absent a concrete refutation of my macro arguments. To put this section in a sentence: unless you can point to why we are going to reverse polarization, our trajectory and inertia should make the default position that destabilization is probable enough to be considered a major x-factor.

Importance

Authoritarianism^[52] and civil conflict have reliable negative consequences, such as economic decline^[53] and increased violence. However, the consequences of destabilization of the United States would constitute an X-factor and a historic setback to alleviating suffering and stewarding the long-term future.

Global ramifications and great power conflict

Destabilization of history’s most powerful superpower would hijack global attention from other issues (e.g. eradicating abject poverty, developing better PPE). It could also disrupt the current liberal-led world order. Multiple international democracy experts think failure of American democracy would result in a global decline in democracy.^[54]

The decline of the world’s superpower and/or the disruption of the Western hegemony would reduce the power disparity between China and other members of the Western alliance and incentivize competition in artificial intelligence and bio-capabilities for military purposes. 

Superpower decline, disruption of the dominant alliance, a superpower led by an authoritarian with little checks on power, and a civil conflict of the 2^nd largest nuclear arsenal (think rogue nukes) all increase the likelihood of a great power conflict. The risk of nuclear war, engineered pandemics, weaponized AI, and development of new WMDs all go up.^[55] Cooperation on climate disruption, AI safety, and biosecurity all evaporate. The latest research suggests that the stakes from nuclear warfare can reach five billion human deaths.^[56]

Artificial Intelligence and bio-risk 

Applicable to both

The United States is the home of the top hubs (both policy and technical) for artificial intelligence safety and biosecurity, thus magnifying destabilization’s impact.

San Francisco, the world’s capital of AI and Bio-technology, is also a prime target of an authoritarian regime or belligerents in a civil conflict. San Francisco is a liberal bastion that is a national symbol of Leftism and cultural openness—perceived opposition to the Right-wing. It could be the target of punitive policies by a tyrant,^[57] domestic terrorism, or combat operations attacking the metropolitan areas supply lines. This point is highly speculative but illustrates plausible scenarios on the darker side. In It Could Happen Here: The Revenge of Rural America, Robert Evans concretely describes how just a few hundred organized combatants from the outlying rural conservative areas of Northern California could cripple the supply lines to the San Francisco Bay area and disrupt supply lines across the United States.

Artificial Intelligence

An authoritarian will have the incentive to develop AI recklessly to enhance their suppression of the American population.^[58] An authoritarian could foreseeably be less likely to listen to technocrats warning about AI safety and engage in a great power competition over development of AI.

Accelerating climate disruption

Authoritarianism

A regime^[59] would most likely stop taking serious proactive action, rollback efforts to combat climate disruption, and not push other nation’s to do better. The regime might also be derelict in fighting wildfires, especially in coastal states perceived as bases of opposition support (namely California). California wildfires in 2020 contributed to 1.7% of the nation’s GHG emissions^[60] and it gets worse each year.^[61]

Civil conflict

Not only will conflict-affected populations neglect environmentalist behaviors, conflicts themselves release ridiculous amounts GHGs. The first five years of the Iraq war released the GHG equivalent to putting 25 million more cars on American roads.^[62] From 2001 to 2018, USM has emitted 280 million metric tons overseas to directly support combat operations^[63] representing 22% of the entire DoD’s GHG emissions for that period.^[64][65]

Combat operations in wildfire-vulnerable areas will almost certainly cause wildfires.

Significance

I believe destabilization’s effect on climate change is the most significant part of the X-factor. I believe that mainstream EA underrates climate disruption because 1) the reasons laid out in this post, 2) we can’t accurately model how systemic species loss at mass extinction levels in nearly every ecosystem cascades across ecosystems and over a prolonged chain reaction, and 3) climate-induced mass migration will imperil the very liberal democracies we expect to lead safeguarding against other X-risks because of migration’s demonstrated effect on authoritarian/fascistic/nationalistic sentiments in voters and the leaders they elect.

My opinion on point 2 would be most likely to change if I were to be walked through one of the most comprehensive models to date and someone could demonstrate how the model is sufficiently capturing far-off run-on effects.

Effects on the Effective Altruism movement

Talent

According to the 2019 EA survey,^[66] the plurality of EAs (39%) are Americans.^[67] The destabilization of the United States would realistically disrupt the work of a substantial portion. This would also apply to EA organizations based in the United States.

Funds

The majority of the tens of billions of dollars pledged to EA is tied up in the fortunes of Americans Cari Tuna, Dustin Moskovitz, and Sam Bankman-Fried.

There is not a clear answer for how much authoritarianism and civil conflict would hurt the value of the equity behind the majority of pledged EA funds. It depends on how instrumental American consumers, American workers, American intermediaries, and the value of the dollar are to the net worth of the people behind OP and FTX. It also depends on the speed destabilization and the speed of mitigation efforts. However, it reasonable to believe that such a catastrophic event would reduce them by a substantial amount, even most of the value under some scenarios.

Plausible scenario

The principal source of OP’s funding is Dustin Moskovitz’s estimated 2% stake in Meta (formerly Facebook) worth between 13 and 29 billion USD depending on the month.^[68] OP is very vulnerable to any changes in Meta’s stock value. An authoritarian’s attempt to control the information ecosystem could lead to a shutdown or crippling of Facebook and other Meta platforms. The likelihood is probably related to the degree the authoritarian views the organization, its users, or its discourse as adversarial to the regime. There is an extra risk if the authoritarian is Trump because his ownership of the social media platform Truth Social is more incentive to target Facebook.

Neglectedness

Preventing destabilization of the United States is dangerously neglected when taking into account its probability and importance which make it a major X-factor. Additionally, it will have substantial reverberations in suffering and likely the long-term future. It is also very neglected when considering the investment in forces that are actively making the problem worse.

Given the gravitas and tractability (covered in the next section) of the problem, there is a deficit in funding, scaling, and longitudinal efficacy in depolarization interventions, and, possibly, innovation to produce new effective strategies and tactics to advert destabilization. I suggest interventions in the “Prescription” section.

The rest of this section examines neglectedness through a financial lens.

[2024 edit: if I had the time, I would like to update this section with findings from the Democracy Fund’s report on “The State of Pro-Democracy Institutional Philanthropy” which projects that pro-democracy institutional philanthropy in the ‘21-’22 cycle was 6 billion USD. I think that number should be taken in context to the numbers from section below on polarization, as well as the funding that goes into organizations undermining democracy in ways other than polarization–e.g. project 2025 or the organizations^[69] involved in placing judicial nominees that go on to carry water for increased corruption^[70] and decreased accountability of the executive. ^{[71] [72] [73]}]

Through the lens of polarization

I did a “back-of-the-envelope calculation” (see my BOTEC here) to estimate the amount of money going into American depolarization and polarization efforts.^[74] Depolarization efforts are at best outspent ten to one by polarizing efforts. My best guess returned a ratio of 278 dollars spent on the culture war for every dollar spent on depolarization efforts.

Unfortunately, it’s likely that each dollar spent on polarizing efforts is substantially more effective than an equivalent dollar spent on depolarization.^[75] Our ape brains are wired for identity, fear, and disgust.^[76] These triggers will often supersede the more taxing cognitive activities of deciphering complexity and nuance.

To conduct this BOTEC, I made several assumptions and decisions that have strong implications. For example, choosing to focus on money that goes into polarization and depolarization instead of the amount of hours or content. Broadly, I chose to focus on polarization at the macro level instead of individual elements farther downstream (i.e. more proximal causation) of destabilization risk. A more downstream assumption was that substantial amount of messaging by federal-level candidate campaigns was messaging that fed into the culture war.

A future investigation of this issue would use different approaches and improve on the one I used in the BOTEC.

Tractability

Reducing the risk of destabilization is, at the least, difficult. The solution generally breaks down as a combination of structural reform, halting the forces driving polarization, and actively depolarizing the population. Ballot initiatives are arguably the best available vehicle for accomplishing structural reform and getting polarized Americans to work together in a constructive way that humanizes each other.

Here is my depiction in a flow chart.

Polarization breaks down into stopping the drivers of polarization and depolarization itself. These two approaches are analogous to addressing climate disruption through reducing GHG emissions and the creation of carbon sinks. One attacks the source of the problem, the other tries to undo the damage. 

For the former, our problem is not a lack of solutions but a lack of political will. We know what the problem is at both the macro and micro levels, and we have solutions ranging from rough ideas to proposed policies. However, decision-makers are unwilling to act forcing us to circumvent them—the same is true of structural reform. The latter is an issue of funding and a lack of practical solutions. If we can’t overcome the former’s issues of political will, then we are stuck trying to scale one of the largest social projects in American history amidst competing polarizing forces.

I’d give preference to shutting off the sources over reversing damage already done.Ezra doesn’t believe we can sufficiently scale depolarization efforts^[77] and is skeptical that we can reverse the incentives of polarization, thus he opts for reforming government to function amidst high polarization.^[78] My sense was that Berkowitz has more optimism in the potential of depolarization efforts than I did.

I believe the best strategy is to invest in all approaches but particularly in methods that cross over multiple approaches—e.g. grassroots organizing around structural reforms (supported by the populist Left and Right) that creates a depolarizing space for activists on both sides.

What is needed

The broad needs

• Change the incentives so the GOP pursues diversifying their voter base instead of minority rule.
• Stop would-be tyrants from being elected.
• Stop Americans from viewing each other as the enemy and the stakes as existential (especially on the Right).^[79]
• Increase the quality of life of regular Americans to reduce the potential for radicalization.

Structural-reform needs^[80]

• Address weaknesses of the primary system through: ^[81]
  • Voting reforms that don’t reward extremist candidates or polarizing political behavior (e.g. approval voting, ranked-choice voting).
  • Multi-member districts (or other form of proportional system) to break the two-party duopoly.
  • Creating a universal/non-partisan primary.^[82]
• Reform minoritarian institutions 
  • Abolish the filibuster
  • (These are not imperative at the moment, but it’s an eventual necessity to avoid a legitimacy crisis and other bad outcomes of minoritarian rule. By 2040, 70% of the population will live in just 30% of the states—15.)^[83] 
    • Make the Senate proportional or abolish it.
    • Abolish the electoral college
• Curb money in politics^[84]🡪 better policies 🡪 more prosperous Americans 🡪 less economic populism that is co-opted by demo gauges
  • Campaign finance reform
  • Lobbying reform
  • Cracking down on the revolving door

Needs for stopping polarizing forces

• Decrease incentives for politicians to play to the culture war. 
  • Alter the revenue model or decrease optimization of the revenue model of:
    • New media companies, particularly cable news
    • Social media companies
      • Social media companies are more tractable because of bipartisan anger at them for their effects on mental health and to a lesser extent their polarizing algorithms and disinformation.

Needs for Depolarizing the population

• Massive efforts that:
  • Humanize Americans to each other (i.e. empathize).
  • Get Americans to not see the opposition as an existential threat and believe that we can move forward without getting everything we want (i.e constructively disagree)

Why it’s difficult

Structural reform

Enacting structural reforms are a herculean task for two reasons. The American government is built for gridlock^[85] and has minoritarian institutions. Therefore, a polarized reform, such as abolishing the electoral college, will not pass under current conditions. A popular non-polarized reform, such as multi-member districts that would lead to a multi-party system,^[86] doesn’t have traction with politicians because they are incentivized to not change the rules that they came to power under.

Stopping polarizing forces

The forces that are driving polarization are heavily entrenched. We know this because the majority of elected Republicans and media executives have doubled-down on those forces despite Trump’s election in 2016—the first undeniable sign of how far polarization had come—the politicized pandemic that killed 1+ million Americans, and the January 6^th insurrection. If these people’s red line wasn’t crossed by the attempted coup, it’s hard to believe that it exists somewhere where it won’t be too late.

If GOP and media elites won’t voluntarily reverse course, then there are three paths forward: 1) pass structural reforms that eventually lead to politicians that have the political will to regulate social media and news media, 2) mass mobilization of citizens to create a pressure to reform that is untenable for these elites to resist, 3) effectively personally lobbying decision-makers to take these actions. The first is an undesirably long feedback loop. The latter two need innovation to be more effective than they have been in the past.

Epistemic notice:

I am confident that politicians and news media have doubled down on it. I am uncertain if social media execs have taken low-visibility actions to reign in their algorithms. I am aware that they enhanced their operations to purge extremists and extremist groups on their platforms.

Depolarize the population

Depolarizing the population is a problem of immense scale—Mike Berkowitz questions if we have historical precedent for it. Tens, if not a hundreds, of millions of Americans are unhealthy polarized. One-time interventions rarely change attitudes; longitudinal interventions are required. Additionally, we lack the scientific literature to know what interventions have longitudinal efficacy.^[87] If the problem is as urgent as I describe it, then we don’t have the time to wait for that research either.

Interventions can also make the problem worse if not thoughtfully constructed. A common oversimplification is that Americans need to watch more news of opposing viewpoints or interact with more compatriots that are different from them. Research finds that more informed citizens, especially when they consume news of the opposition, are more likely to engage in motivated reasoning.^[88] There are also studies that find that exposure to opposing media can moderate beliefs under specific conditions.^[89] Constructive direct interactions with a person of contrasting beliefs is dependent on the circumstances (e.g. do they feel pressure to preform for an audience, does the opposition concede points to be intellectually honest).^[90]

“Once a society becomes deeply divided, it is very difficult to heal.” ^[91]

Polarization is expected to worsen as the development of artificial intelligence exacerbates social media algorithms and propagates deepfakes.^[92]

Where there is traction

Ballot initiatives

Given the incentives for political actors to not pass popular structural reforms, multiple organizations and leading advocates^[93] in the structural reform space opt for ballot initiatives to circumvent legislatures. Ballot initiatives are not a perfect tool,^[94] but they are arguably the best direct intervention available.

Ballot initiatives can also contribute to depolarization by bringing heterogeneous ideologies and identities into the same team working for a unified cause. This is applicable for structural reforms that are popular across the Left-Right axis (e.g. ranked-choice voting).^[95] This is congruent with Ziblatt and Levitsky’s position that saving democracy necessitates coalitions of dissimilar views.^[96]

Robust federalism

An advantage of the federal system is that it enables compromise through fractionalizing geography instead of nation-wide policy concessions. Ezra notes that there are Progressive and Conservative advocates that support using federalism to get through this highly polarized period.

Prescription (what OP/EA could do)

I spent 90 minutes listening to a semi-public meeting of 75+ civil-society leaders in the protecting-American-democracy space and 30 minutes speaking 1-1 with a leader in this space. The field has developed dramatically since 2018 and organizations are now developing robust coordination capabilities. Arguably the most significant value-add that OP and EA could have is funding and helping the field scale.^[97] Not only is the field not adequately prepared to scale, but the scale likely needed to avert serious threats to democracy is immense.^[98]

I offer a curated menu of interventions. Given the level of uncertainty in these interventions, a cost-effective approach would likely invest broadly in the upstream interventions and carry out narrow experimentation with downstream interventions. Lessons learned from these actions will enable more effective and aggressive downstream interventions. However, a cost-effective approach may be in tension with an approach calibrated to the urgency and exigence of the issue—the more probable a destabilization event is over a short-time frame, the smaller the window to operate in and the more impetus to prioritize action over cost-effectiveness.

Funding and scaling existing efforts

Create an operation focused on recruiting more funders and key non-funder partners to this effort

Part of scaling up depolarization and structural reform efforts is increasing the capital (and maybe talent) going into them. OP could spin-up an operation that focuses on recruiting big-dollar funders to the effort. The operation would specialize in researching potential targets, identifying the network to reach them, developing a pitch that persuasive in their own worldview, and maintaining relationships with them. My understanding is that this is somewhat neglected in the space.

Presumably, as depolarization and structural reform efforts scale, there will also be talent gaps that can’t be filled by existing people/organizations in the movement. I don’t know what these will be but I think it is reasonable to be in a position to readily fill them.

Fund ballot initiative efforts and organizations

Ballot initiatives at this moment are the most tractable means of accomplishing structural reform. They also can be used to depolarize politically active Americans.

Historically, the cost per signature (to get a measure on the ballot) has ranged from 1.30 USD to 32.49 USD.^[99] Smaller states can act as experiments, only costing six-figures to get a measure on the ballot. California could also be targeted for the “California effect.” The most and least costly measures to get on the 2020 California ballot were 6 and 2 million dollars respectively.^[100]

Those figures do not include costs to campaign for the measure after it’s accepted onto the ballot. The most expensive ballot measure in the state’s history was Proposition 22 in 2020.^[101] Uber and Lyft spent over 200 million USD of the 224 million USD spent on that measure (both for and against the measure).^[102] The recent typical cost of a California ballot measure has been in the eight figures.^[103] For example, the Farm Animal Confinement Initiative (Proposition 12) was passed in favor (63% to 37% on 12 million votes) with over 13 million USD spent in support and less than 700,000 USD spent in opposition.^[104]

There are multiple options for investing in the ballot-initiative approach

1. Fund relevant ballot measures that make it onto ballots independent of EA activity.
2. Fund existing organizations that leverage the ballot-initiative process.
   1. E.g. FairVote which is most known for enacting ranked-choice voting via the ballot initiative process.
   2. [find name of that center that does research]
3. Fund new ballot initiatives tailored to EA’s agenda and strategy
4. Fund new organization(s) that will be EA-aligned and optimize leveraging the ballot-initiative using EA’s comparative advantage (i.e. intellectual rigor and culture).

My guess is that there is a strong case to diversify across all of these options.

Fund existing depolarization efforts and organizations

Organizations like Braver Angels already exist. A study^[105] (n=1,800) of their red-blue workshops found that roughly 75% felt less angry about the other side. ^[106]

Organizations like More in Common^[107] already do research to understand why societies are polarizing.

Here is a fairly comprehensive list of organizations and projects that engage in depolarization: https://icccr.tc.columbia.edu/media/media-library-2018/centers-amp-labs/icccr/Organizations-Bridging-Divides-Nov-2020.pdf

Fund new organizations to fill gaps through an approach similar to the arrangement between CE and FTX for biosecurity

Most of the interventions listed could be carried out by new organizations that have the competitive advantage of being EA-aligned. Open Philanthropy could make an arrangement with an incubation and research organization, like Charity Entrepreneurship (CE)^[108], to build a more confident view on what the best interventions are and then spin off organizations to carry out these interventions. An example would be standing up an operation specializing in message testing prospective content for depolarization efforts to prevent inadvertent consequences.

A minimum viable prototype of this would be an EA-aligned hackathon on the topic of protecting American democracy/preventing destabilization.

FTX and CE recently announced a deal for FTX to fund 470,000 USD for CE to spin off charities that will fill gaps in the biosecurity space.^[109]

Fund experiments/projects that will give us actionable information

OP could fund select projects or experiments in downstream interventions that are promising but untested or are missing crucial information. These projects/experiments would be similar to a minimum viable prototype and offer information that could lead EA to go deeper on a particular intervention or pivot away. An example would be funding a ballot initiative slate (e.g. voting, money in politics, and structural reforms) to contrast it with existing piecemeal ballot initiatives (e.g. just ranked-choice voting).

Miscellaneous interventions

Preempting accelerationist events

Now this one bloody protest would not lead inevitably to a civil war. It just starts a process. Crossing the bridge from civil unrest to civil warfare doesn't require a magical and improbable shift in the firmament of reality, it just takes a bunch of the same fucked up shit that’s always happening in America happening all at once and in quick succession.        

- Robert Evans, It Could Happen Here

The United States is vulnerable to attacks by accelerationist^[110] groups/individuals that seek to destabilize the nation through strategic acts of violence that create cascades of upheaval.^[111]

The accelerationist events I am most worried about are well thought out false-flag attacks that would elicit a major wave of reprisal attacks in response to it.^[112]

Assassinations are another accelerationist event that is more tractable to stop.

Imagine how things would spiral out of control if a lone wolf assassinated Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and then two weeks later there was a retaliatory assassination of Lauren Boebert. This is very unlikely but completely possible.

One intervention could be to provide security details to visible elected-office holders (credit goes to fellow EA Woody Campbell for this idea).^[113] Of the interventions I propose, this intervention might be one of the easiest to calculate cost-effectiveness for. Open Philanthropy or other EA funders could fund a lobbying operation (layered on top of existing EA lobbying efforts) for this measure. I’ll take a guess that the cost would be in the seven figures. This would be the cost for a substantial reduction in an accelerationist assassination.

Invest in local journalism

According to Mike Berkowitz, revitalizing local journalism is imperative for:

• Combating disinformation
• Keeping federal, state, and local political actors accountable

Philanthropy has been taking a more active role in supporting journalism during the digital age and that need will exist for the foreseeable future. This intervention is favored by Zac Gershberg and Sean Illing (authors of The Paradox of Democracy) and Mike Berkowitz.

Promote sincere populist leadership in the Republican apparatus to replace culture warriors

Note: Populism and anti-establishment might mean different things to you than they do to me. This suggestion is not premised in populism/anti-establishments being great, but the suggestion assumes that populism—the top vs bottom, class-oriented, anti-establishment populism—is better than continued culture war polarization of Liberals and Conservatives.

Most populists/anti-establishment people on the Right and Left support voting, money-in-politics, and structural reforms and often agree on interventions or goals (e.g. disclosing dark money^[114], multi-party system^[115]). However, their attention and effort are often diverted from working on these issues (the solution) and towards culture war issues (the problem) because of politicians and media personalities. The Right is substantially worse at this. I attribute the disparity between sincere leadership of Left- and Right-wing populism to talent pipelines (or the lack thereof).

Occupy Wall Street kicked off a wave of organization of the populist Left and it grew year after year. Thus, as the Left began to gain national recognition and institutional power,^[116] they had people ready to become public figures and fill institutional roles. Whereas this pipeline was never developed in Right-wing populism before Right-wing populism assumed the mantle of the Republican Party and the White House.^[117] Hence, establishment figures and political opportunists latched on to nominal populism to maintain influence with the Trump base whilst cynically peddling the culture war.

Right-wing elites nominally presenting themselves as anti-establishment/populist and then working to make the culture war salient is, in my view, the chief obstacle to depolarization through building anti-establishment Left-Right coalitions of average citizens that work towards structural reforms (which would at the same time have a strong depolarizing effect).^[118]

Open Philanthropy can explore and carry out efforts to displace culture warriors from the populist Right with anti-establishment people seriously committed to structural reforms over the culture war. These people would be willing to cooperate with the Left on structural reform and use rhetoric with the base that pushes the base to focus on the top-bottom axis instead of the Left-Right axis.

Specific interventions could include hosting a right-wing populism conference, hosting a populist conference open to everyone across the ideological spectrum, providing fellowships, training, and media/branding assistance for promising sincere Right-wing populists, funding constructive right-wing populist and general populists organizations, and supporting select sincere populists candidates that would displace nominal populists pushing the culture war.

This objective carries serious risks and should be evaluated carefully before taking action.

Invest in mutual aid networks

Mutual aid networks are the “voluntary reciprocal exchange of resources and services.”^[119] They often arise to address material inadequacies when the government fails to do so. Robert Evans advocates for mutual aid networks to bring together people across the ideological spectrum in a depolarizing situation (i.e. helping each other).^[120]

Strengthening unions and preparing for a general strike

Unions often organize Americans across the political spectrum that inhabit the same workplace. There is some evidence that they are effective in depolarizing people. This study suggested that unions decrease racial animus (one of the driver’s of Trumpism). ^[121] My friends involved in the labor movement say there is other evidence, however I did not dive deep into it.

One of my friends in the labor movement advocates for a general strike as a last-ditch attempt to stop an authoritarian from seizing power. I have yet to hear back from them about historical precedent for this.

I think it’s plausible but has serious tractability issues which compounds with opportunity cost i.e. the scale of that organizing could be invested in more upstream preventive efforts. Notably, this option becomes attractive if the time-scale of destabilization was seen as imminent and withing the course of a couple years. Such a timescale would preclude structural reform and stopping the forces of polarization. I would guess that depolarization at that time scale is more intractable than a general strike. In this case, a general strike is truly an “in case of emergency break glass” tool.

My personal favorite

Left-Right coalitions to run a slate of ballot-initiatives for structural reform

Features:

• Ballot-initiative process
  • Most viable option for enacting structural reform currently.
• A slate of ballot initiatives
  • Current efforts are afflicted by piecemeal implementation (ranked-choice voting in one county, public campaign finance in another county). A slate of initiatives branded as one bundle to the public is a means for enacting comprehensive structural reform through the ballot-initiative process.
• Coalitions of the anti-establishment Left and Right
  • There are structural reforms that are popular with both sides (which can be bundled together in a slate). E.g. unmasking dark money, multi-member districts, and ranked-choice voting.

Outputs

• Structural reform (long-term feedback loop)
• Depolarization (short-term feedback loop)

Innovation:

• Focusing on slates instead of single ballot measures
• The combination of the above features in one intervention

Uncertainties (why OP/EA should do a medium-level investigation)

These are my chief uncertainties/concerns/action items that would be worth exploring further in a medium-level investigation:

• How long can a society function with the population being divided into two incompatible meta realities?
• Why haven’t millions of Americans that believe Biden illegitimately grabbed power resorted to force yet? Is there an identifiable point where they would likely resort to force?
• How much would authoritarianism and civil conflict hurt the net worths behind EA?
• Is there a viable window for eliciting action from GOP and media elites through innovative and effective lobbying?
• A better quantification of the ROI and cost effectiveness.
  • Quantify the consequences I mapped out in “Importance.”
  • What amount of money spent do we think leads to an X% decrease in the likelihood of destabilization. Could be broken down into specific causal pathways:
    • How much money into depolarization efforts results in X units of depolarization in X number of citizens?
    • How much money would an aggressive lobbying and public opinion campaign cost to increase the chance of social media regulations being enacted by 50%?
• What is the best value add of EA to the saturating field of democracy protection efforts?

Conclusion/call to action

Destabilization of the United States is immensely important and quite possible—to the point it is a major X-factor. Work to prevent destabilization is drastically neglected relative to the gravitas of destabilization and the asymmetry between polarization and depolarization funding. There are clear pathways to decrease the risk, but all have great difficulties. Funding opportunities are immediately available for both pre-existing efforts and to explore new novel contributions. Non-fungible funding from OP (i.e. no one else would have provided the funding) for interventions with a force-multiplier effect (e.g. targeting obstacles to scaling depolarization efforts) are conceivably the most likely actions to meet OP’s 1000x impact standard.

OP should conduct a medium-level investigation into the possibility/probability of destabilization of the United States and the adverse impact that it would have i.e. how much of an X-factor is it. The more severe those considerations are, the more willingly OP should be to take big bets even if they appear less tractable or cost-effective. A worthwhile question is how much of pledged EA funds are jeopardized by destabilization. The investigation additionally should look at the return on investment of existing interventions and potential of new innovations in the field. 

OP and the Effective Altruism movement at large should explore with earnest the possibility that destabilization of the United States is the most pressing X-factor. The movement should be wary that how it pursues impact, by focusing on marginal impact that can be measurably demonstrated, creates a blindspot for preventing speculative events of historic proportions–which might be less neglected and less tractable than typical EA focuses but whose impact would drastically change the world we live in and could easily erase the progress of the movement to date–and that this blindspot could result in a world where the event has come to pass and EA will have done nothing about it.

[1] It is 2X what could be submitted. The original submission was released on the Forum the final day of the red team competition which I think is partly why it got little visibility.

[2] This has not been significantly updated for the last two years and in some parts you will clearly notice it (e.g. references to SBF).

[3] e.g. heavy politicization and polarization of a pandemic that killed more Americans than WWII, an insurrection

[4] The works of people much more well-read than me (e.g. Ezra Klein) don’t indicate there is a compelling completely alternative explanation lurking in the scholarly literature.

[5] When listening, remember this was recorded in 2019 before the George Flloyd protests. I personally found the podcast eerily prescient.

[6] Another potential form of destabilization is entrenched one-party minoritarian rule.

[7] Daniel Ziblatt, Steve Levitsky, Jason Stanley

[8] This includes armed forces, intelligence services, and law enforcement. In the case of the United States, the most important element is its nearly two-million-person military.

[9] Daniel Ziblatt and Steve Levitsky emphasize forbearance and mutual toleration and the most important democratic norms. Forbearance: constitutions are not exhaustive, there is a lot of room to play no-mercy politics that hurt democracy; without legal restraints, norms are what restrain political actors from playing constitutional hard ball (e.g. obstructing Supreme Court nominations, court packing). Mutual toleration: the opposition is a legitimate rival and not the enemy.

[10] Daniel Ziblatt, Steve Levitsky, Fareed Zakaria, Jason Stanley, Timothy Snyder, Brian Klass, David Kilcullen

[11] Daniel Ziblatt and Steve Levitsky state the best way to prevent an authoritarian regime is to not elect an authoritarian in the first place.

[12] https://www.csis.org/blogs/examining-extremism/examining-extremism-militia-movement

[13] https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/white-supremacist-links-law-enforcement-are-urgent-concern

https://www.adl.org/resources/reports/extremism-in-american-law-enforcement-far-greater-transparency-accountability

https://www.propublica.org/article/secret-border-patrol-facebook-group-agents-joke-about-migrant-deaths-post-sexist-memes

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-police-extremism

https://www.csis.org/analysis/military-police-and-rise-terrorism-united-states

[14] https://www.vox.com/2018/6/21/17488024/gun-ownership-violence-shootings-us

[15] [long list of polling citations]

[16] 2024 edit: The conflict currently being waged by M23 makes North Kivu in Congo a less accurate example. However, South Kivu and Ituru provinces are still apt. The Central African Republic would be another appropriate example.

[17] The height of American troop presence in Iraq and Afghanistan was one solider for every 164 and 300 inhabitants, respectively.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_troop_surge_of_2007

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-afghanistan-military/u-s-troops-in-afghanistan-now-down-to-2500-lowest-since-2001-pentagon-idUSKBN29K229

[18] Robert Evans, Behind the Bastards (mini-series called “Behind the Insurrection”)

[19] [ polling numbers on different frames of the question]

[20] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqTeqc4DqgU&t=1271s

[21] It runs from -10 to +10. Positive six through positive ten are democracies, negative six through negative ten are autocracies, negative five to positive five are anocracies.

[22] The United States was declining throughout the 21^st century and in _ it slipped to a positive five. It rebounded in _ to a six.

[23] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5v4NTtS2f5k&t=2334s

[24] I base my concern in civil conflict mostly in a mechanistic understanding of the situation rather than a comparative empirical lens.

[25] I also think these ratings are calibrated to capture the flaws in repressive nominal democracies in the global south, but are not calibrated to capture the decay of Western democracies via plutocracy.

[26] This is not be confused with “political sorting.” The polarization I am referring to includes the identify-based animus and intensity that layers onto political sorting. See Why We’re Polarized for an in-depth description of the distinction.

[27] E.g. Ted Cruz, Ron DeSantis

[28] E.g. Tucker Carlson, Ben Shapiro

[29] E.g. Charlie Kirk, Dennis Prager, Candace Owens

[30] Social media includes YouTube.

[31] Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media

[32] Ezra Klein, Why We’re Polarized

[33] https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/aaron-hamlin-voting-reform/

[34] https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2019-09-25/how-americans-were-driven-extremes

https://carnegieendowment.org/2019/10/01/how-to-understand-global-spread-of-political-polarization-pub-79893

[35] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mccarthy-cheney-trump-stefanik-republican-conference-chair/2021/05/09/f9b9f476-b0ed-11eb-a980-a60af976ed44_story.html

[36] Mike Berkowitz, Jason Stanley

https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/mike-berkowitz-preserving-us-democracy/

Jason Stanley, How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them

[37] Ezra, in his talk with Lawrence Lessig, notably argues that other political systems have functioned amidst high polarization, but the American system is designed to stagnate amidst political sorting and polarization. I am unsure if the high polarization he describes here is interchangeable with the toxic polarization he characterized in the book. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11NOuikZHD8

[38] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih4i5Qwneo8&t=1871s

[39] This included insurrectionists within the building and extremists on the Capitol grounds premises that could have been emboldened.

[40] We don’t know the exact number of deaths needed to trigger crazy spin-off effects. It could be just one, it could be a dozen. My guess is that the inflection point is around three legislators. It’s subjective how many elected federal officials would need to be killed to trigger an existential crisis

[41] My best guess. I couldn’t find the exact number looking through the internet.

[42] WARNING: GRAPHIC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQaeg1d82Lo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWMpTHLJXbw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgnh5jvmuZw

[43] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Goodman#Responding_to_the_2021_Capitol_attack

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/12/us/capitol-police-eugene-goodman-riots-senate-chambers-trnd/index.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFzx1FJia94

[44] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/proud-boys-jan-6-pence-vp-b2102995.html

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2022-07-22/mob-got-feet-away-from-pence-during-riot

[45] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNbpvtaqxpg

[46] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/dec/31/joe-biden-secret-service-team-trump-loyalty

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-tony-ornato-jan-6-b2113434.html

[47] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/07/18/jan-6-probe-renews-questions-about-secret-service-independence/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/30/anthony-ornato-dispute-conversations/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lU2wL0vIfGg&t=335s

[48] I am agnostic on the risk of mutin(ies) in USM. Three former generals wrote a Washington Post piece arguing the possibility of it. This is a worthwhile research question.

[49] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitutional_coup

“[I]t is important to note that the ‘constitutional’ element of constitutional coups refers more to the exploitation of ambiguity within democratic rule of law, not a truly legal process. This ambiguity, combined with enough political power, allows anti-democratic seizures of power to occur under the guise of constitutionality.”

[50] Epistemic notice about my prediction track record:

In August 2020, I correctly predicted there would be an unprecedented violent skirmish in D.C. sometime between the election and the inauguration (my premise was that Biden would win). However, I greatly overestimated the size of pro-Trump belligerents anticipating tens of thousands even eclipsing six figures. I also overestimated the scope of the violence.

[51] Author’s conversation with Mike Berkowitz

[52] This is not universal. Counterexamples are China, Singapore, Rwanda. Also, some argue that authoritarian government is better calibrated to certain X-risks than other forms of government.

[53] https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ahranYvH9uum5dhtH/open-philanthropy-shallow-investigation-civil-conflict

[54] I learned this second-hand from an American practitioner that interviewed them.

[55] Toby Ord, The Precipice, pg. 175-176

[56] https://www.nature.com/articles/s43016-022-00573-0

[57] Think of Desantis and Disney

[58] A right-wing authoritarian is also less likely to care about discrimination and biases being baked into algorithms/training data sets.

[59] I presume this to be a right-wing regime because an authoritarian regime is most likely to emerge from the far-Right.

[60] 91 million metric tonnes of the national 5,222 million metric tonnes

[61] https://climate.nasa.gov/ask-nasa-climate/3066/the-climate-connections-of-a-record-fire-year-in-the-us-west/#:~:text=To%20put%20the%20carbon%20dioxide,metric%20tons%20of%20carbon%20dioxide

AND

https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/inventory-us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-sinks

[62] 141 million metric tons. Oil Change International said these were “very conservative” estimates.

http://priceofoil.org/content/uploads/2008/03/A%20Climate%20of%20War%20FINAL%20(March%2017%202008).pdf

[63]https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/imce/papers/Pentagon%20Fuel%20Use%2C%20Climate%20Change%20and%20the%20Costs%20of%20War%20Revised%20November%202019%20Crawford.pdf

[64] When accounting for the DoD’s domestic GHGs to support Central Command (the command overseeing Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria) the authors estimate war operations as 35% of DoD’s emissions those 18 years.

[65] The plurality of emissions from the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars was from jet fuel, thus there is could be a significant difference between the emissions of a high-intensity war overseas and a low-intensity civil conflict in the homeland.

[66] https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/wtQ3XCL35uxjXpwjE/ea-survey-2019-series-community-demographics-and

[67] The number of EAs living in the United States is likely higher than this. Many EAs from abroad come to the United States to study or work on policy, bio-risk, and AI.

[68] https://www.forbes.com/profile/dustin-moskovitz/?sh=1fdb6fd21dd3

https://www.bloomberg.com/billionaires/profiles/dustin-a-moskovitz/

[69] https://www.propublica.org/article/dark-money-leonard-leo-barre-seid

[70] https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/06/supreme-court-limits-scope-of-anti-bribery-law/

[71] https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/11/21/23964561/supreme-court-sec-jarkesy-donald-trump-authoritarian-unitary-executive

[72] https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/supreme-courts-radical-immunity-ruling-shields-lawbreaking-presidents-and

[73] https://www.acslaw.org/expertforum/the-specter-of-dictatorship-and-the-supreme-courts-embrace-of-the-unitary-executive-theory/

[74] Many people conducting polarization efforts probably don’t explicitly think of their work as a polarization effort. However, that is precisely the effect of political actors and media personalities that engage in the culture war.

[75] At some point there will be an diminishing marginal returns for polarization efforts because of saturation or a natural asymptote.

[76] Ezra Klein, Why We’re Polarized

[77] Julia Galef’s interview of Ezra Klein:

http://rationallyspeakingpodcast.org/260-why-were-polarized-ezra-klein/

[78] Ezra Klein, Why We’re Polarized

[79] This is a thoughtful actionable list of 7 ideas

https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/07/23/7-ideas-to-reduce-political-polarization.-and-save-america-from-itself-pub-82365

[80] This list is not comprehensive; I am highlighting what experts, at least the ones I’ve been exposed to, referenced most

[81] Ezra Klein and Aaron Hamlin say we have one the worst combinations of voting/representation methods.

[82] See California and Alaska for examples.

[83] Ezra Klein, Why We’re Polarized

[84] Represent.Us’s Anti-Corruption Act is the most comprehensive approach I’ve seen yet.

https://represent.us/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/AACA-Revised-Full-Provisions-List-%E2%80%93-12_9_19.pdf

https://represent.us/anticorruption-act/

https://anticorruptionact.org/

[85] Ezra Klein, Why We’re Polarized

[86] I don’t actually know if multi-member districts as a policy are popular, but I do know that a multi-party system is very popular.

[87] I surveyed the scientific literature for about two hours. This is also similar to the opinion of Mike Berkowitz.

[88] Ezra Klein, Why We’re Polarized

[89] https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2112552118

[90] An example of some conditions that lead to constructive interactions are presented in Better Arguments’ five principles:

https://betterarguments.org/our-approach/

[91] https://carnegieendowment.org/2019/10/01/how-to-understand-global-spread-of-political-polarization-pub-79893

[92] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih4i5Qwneo8&t=1871s

[93] E.g. Lawrence Lessig, FairVote

[94] https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/11/6/21549654/california-ballot-initiative-proposition-direct-democracy

https://aceproject.org/ace-en/topics/es/ese/ese08/ese08b/ese08b03/mobile_browsing/onePag

[95] https://publicconsultation.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/RCV_Report_0422.pdf

[96] https://80000hours.org/podcast/episodes/mike-berkowitz-preserving-us-democracy/

[97] This is very dependent on limited exposure to practitioners in this space.

[98] Author’s conversation with Mike Berkowitz

[99] https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_measures_cost_per_required_signatures_analysis

[100] https://ballotpedia.org/How_much_does_an_initiative_petition_drive_cost

[101] https://www.theverge.com/2020/11/4/21549760/uber-lyft-prop-22-win-vote-app-message-notifications

[102] https://ballotpedia.org/What_were_the_most_expensive_ballot_measures_in_California

[103] https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_measure_campaign_finance,_2018

[104] https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_12,_Farm_Animal_Confinement_Initiative_(2018)

[105] https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kkpwt59p7Ci6jhtOaAIYFr0cqy4QOAy9/view

[106] Again, there are uncertainties about strength of longitudinal effect. Self-selection bias also distorts the effects.

[107] https://www.moreincommon.com/our-work/what-we-do/

[108] See CE’s model:

https://www.charityentrepreneurship.com/research-process-2021

[109] https://ftxfuturefund.org/our-grants/?_organization_name=charity-entrepreneurship

[110] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism#Far-right_accelerationist_terrorism

[111] https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/11/11/20882005/accelerationism-white-supremacy-christchurch

[112] I think we should approach this topic as having serious info hazards.

[113] Judges and Justices are also good candidates for this program. Reasonably, the most vulnerable is the legislative branch because the nature of their office means regular interactions with the public.

[114] From my personal experience, eliciting a positive reception to these issues is largely about how you frame them. When I talk to a Progressive, I ask them if they like Charles Koch funding astroturfing with dark money. When I’ve spoken with Trump supporters they get excited when I say we should know were George Soros is injecting money into politics. 

[115] Both Bernie and Trump supporters generally don’t identify with the two parties and are hostile to the establishment of the parties.

[116] Starting around the rise of Senator Bernie Sanders in 2016

[117] Interestingly, multiple people at Occupy Wallstreet where disillusioned by the lack of results and spiraled into neofascist organizers, including Jason Kessler, organizers of the Charlottesville Unite the Right rally.

[118] I talk about this prospective intervention later on.

[119] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_aid_(organization_theory)

[120] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/87567555.2021.1915237

[121] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/ajps.12537