How much inequality can a democracy withstand before citizens push back? That was the central question explored in BigTentUSA’s conversation on June 17 with New Yorker staff writer and author Evan Osnos, moderated by Ed Luce, Financial Times US National Editor.
Drawing from his latest reporting and book The Haves and the Have-Yachts, Osnos examined the growing concentration of wealth and power in America, arguing that today’s oligarchs wield influence not only through money, but through control of information, technology, and political institutions. The discussion explored the unprecedented alliance between political power and extreme wealth, the rise of tech billionaires, and the ways social media and artificial intelligence could accelerate economic inequality in the years ahead.
The conversation also looked abroad for lessons, highlighting how corruption and democratic backsliding have unfolded in countries such as Hungary—and what Americans can learn from those experiences.
The takeaway was clear: democratic change rarely begins with majorities. It starts when engaged citizens decide enough is enough—and take action to make democracy work for everyone.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:
Evan Osnos has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2008. In addition, he is co-host of The New Yorker’s Political Scene podcast, and a nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. His coverage ranges from politics and foreign affairs to white-collar crime and espionage. His first book, “Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China,” won the National Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. His latest book “The Haves and Have-Yachts: Dispatches on the Ultrarich,” was an instant New York Times bestseller. Prior to The New Yorker, he worked as the Beijing bureau chief for the Chicago Tribune, where he was on teams that won the Pulitzer Prize in 2001 and 2008. Before his assignment to China, he worked in the Middle East, reporting mostly from Iraq. He lives with his family near Washington, D.C.
Edward Luce is the US national editor and columnist at the Financial Times. Before that he was the FT’s Washington Bureau chief. Other roles have included South Asia bureau chief, Capital Markets editor, and Philippines Correspondent. Luce was previously the speechwriter for US Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers, in the Clinton administration.
He is the author of four highly acclaimed books: Zbig, The Life of Zbig Brzezinski: America’s Great Power Prophet (2025); The Retreat of Western Liberalism (2017); Time to Start Thinking: America in the Age of Descent (2012); and In Spite of the Gods: The Strange Rise of Modern India (2007).
