2026 Annual Lecture of the Yan P. Lin Centre
The Lin Centre’s 2026 Annual Lecture, ‘Counter-constitutions: On being the object of a coup,’ was delivered on March 19th, by Professor Kim Lane Scheppele, the Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor of Sociology and International Affairs in the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, and the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University.
Professor Scheppele’s lecture addressed growing concerns that democracies have deteriorated in many parts of the world, including in the United States. Buried within the general phenomenon of democratic decline is a set of cases in which charismatic new leaders are elected by democratic publics and then use their electoral mandates to dismantle by law the constitutional systems they inherited. These leaders aim to consolidate power and to remain in office indefinitely, eventually eliminating the ability of citizens to exercise their basic democratic rights, to hold leaders accountable, and to change their leaders peacefully. Professor Scheppele’s lecture revealed how constitutional rights in America - from basic liberty to free speech to equality before the law – have been turned upside down. In one year, Donald Trump has mounted a counter-constitutional coup, transforming the US Constitution into its opposite. American foreign policy also breaks international law. By explaining in rigorous detail how America has experienced a coup, brought about by an election, aided and abetted by a packed Supreme Court and now held in place by open violence, Professor Scheppele captured the “counter-constitution” under which Americans now live – and discussed what avenues of hope there may be for democratic recovery.
Professor Scheppele’s primary field is the sociology of law and she has published widely in both social science and law journals. Specializing in ethnographic and archival research on courts and public institutions, her scholarship contributes to sociological theory, comparative/historical sociology, political sociology, sociology of knowledge and human rights. In 2014, she received the Kalven Prize from the Law and Society Association for scholarship that has had an important influence on the development of socio-legal studies, and in 2016, she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.