- Spring 2028 College Park Maryland. Just before “The Winter”

“Sabine. Sabine!” Marcus Ellery called after Sabine, chasing her down the hallway.

Marcus is an associate professor, and a senior colleague of Sabines in the department of government and politics. He is in his mid-40s, tall and slightly rumpled, with a perpetually distracted air and a habit of scribbling notes on napkins. His hair is salt-and-pepper, usually uncombed, and his glasses are always smudged. His office is a chaotic haven of books, several of which lie opened to various pages of interest. Newspapers are scattered about the clutter, as well as a few half-drunk cups of tea. He is brilliant but absent-minded, known for quoting obscure philosophers’ mid-conversation, but frequently searching for his missing keys. Despite his eccentricities, he’s deeply respected in the department and has a warm, mentoring relationship with Sabine. They often debate over coffee, trading ideas about the erosion of democratic norms, the rise of populism, and how artificial intelligence is changing the world, and people’s relationships with one another. Marcus is one of the few people Sabine confides in as she feels the world shifting beneath her feet.

“Yes Marcus? What do you need?”

“Ah, I am glad I caught you. I wanted to pass on advice about the interview with that podcaster. After thinking about it, and researching the man more deeply, I think you should do it. I mean interviews on podcasts is the hot new thing.”

“Marcus, interviews on podcasts is not new.” Sabine said laughingly.

“Well, you know what I mean.”

“Yes, I do. I am not sure if I agree with you though. I mean what am I going to do, just go on here and argue with this guy about the presidency? He seems to be a fan.”

“But isn’t that the point? I mean some interviews are just going to be adversarial, this is the kind of thing that we need to improve the discourse in society.”

“You have too much faith in society Marcus. I mean look around; social media has pushed society into tribes that only care about what the tribe says. In group ‘good’, out of group ‘bad’, seems to be the general feeling. And AI doesn’t seem to be helping.”

“You are quite the optimist!” Marcus retorted with a smile.

“But seriously, this is how we break those bubbles. We must cross those lines, we have to get into arguments. Let there be a battle of ideas and may the best one’s win.”

“I don’t believe that is how it works Marcus. I don’t believe the best ideas will win. That is how we got into this mess to begin with.”

“We can have this debate again later Sabine. You know how I feel on the subject. But I really think you should accept. This is a good opportunity to discuss your studies with the public. And it is something you can point to in your tenure packet when the time comes for you to submit that.”

The tenure packet, something that Sabine hadn’t been thinking about. Marcus was right, some day she would have to submit that and make her strongest case for why she deserved to be tenured. It was good to have a colleague who had taken such a deep interest in her career. She found out after the stressful hiring process, somehow making it through the hundreds of applicants, that Marcus had been a warrior for her on the hiring committee. In their numerous discussions since that time, he was the one who was often pointing out to her the things that would be helpful to further advancing her career. Reading her papers to critique them prior to submission, suggesting journals that she might not have had the confidence to submit to, pushing her to think more deeply on subjects and convincing her not to give up on solid research paths. He really was an ideal person to have on her side.

“I guess that is true Marcus.”

“Good. It is settled then. Call his team back and schedule the interview before you change your mind again.”

Marcus knew all to well Sabine’s process. Often vacillating several times before landing on a decision. She often made the right decision in his opinion, but she seemed to lack the confidence at times to simply pull the trigger.

“Alright Marcus, I will do it right now.”

Sabine turned back and continued walking down the hall. At 5’6’’ she was taller than the average woman and took long strides. It didn’t take long for her warm hazel eyes to find her office door. She was 8 offices away from Marcus, which sometimes felt like a good thing, and others felt like a bad one.

She opened the door and quickly maneuvered her way to her desk. Her office was the polar opposite of Marcus’. Everything was neatly placed, nothing ever seemed to be out of order. The moment she was done reading a book, or a physical copy of a paper, it was placed neatly back in its proper place. She didn’t have it in her personality to allow things to get messy the way many of her colleagues did. Everything was done deliberately, and with a purpose. If anything was out of order it served as an unwanted distraction.

Sabine looked over at her bookshelf and located the book “On Tyranny” by Timothy Snyder and considered grabbing it off the shelf, but when she looked at the clock she thought better of it. Office hours began in 5 minutes, there simply wasn’t time to get too deeply involved in anything.

Office hours had become an annoyance for her. Not because she disliked the students coming to see her, in fact she very much liked that. Rather because it was rare that any students showed up at all. She wasn’t sure how much of that was simply a generational shift away from getting help from your professors or simply the reality that generative AI could help people study effectively. The speed of advance in chat bots had been breathtaking. Since it was rare that anyone took advantage of her office hours, she would have an awkward hour of time where there was a risk that if she got too involved in something that might cause her concentration to be broken, yet if she didn’t start working on anything it might become simply wasted time.

Sabine decided that she would just shoot off an email to Chase Kettering’s team at The American Pulse podcast accepting the invitation.

Chase was a youthful and charismatic former journalist turned political commentator. He had learned, like many others of his ilk, that taking provocative and controversial stances was a way to garner attention. Chase was clearly a believer that there is no such thing as bad attention. Recently Chase had been making the argument for strong executive power and the curtailing of congress to achieve his desired policy goals, something the current president, Malcolm Trenholm, seemed all too willing to push for himself.

Sabine knew quite well why Chase had invited her on. Simply he wanted to “dunk” on her recent paper that had garnered a substantial amount of attention. Sabine had made a number of arguments in the paper pointing out both historical and modern reasons for limiting the power of the executive, and the challenges that AI introduced in keeping limited government. She felt she had made a strong case for returning more power to the congressional branch of government, which in her view was closer to the people. She did not believe that the congressional branch was effectively balancing its power with the executive. Sabine felt very compelled by classical liberal ideals and would have likely been a member of the Republican party in the era before Malcolm had seized its reins.

Suddenly a knock came at Sabines door, startling her nearly to the point of jumping out of her chair. Sabine looked up and saw a familiar face, one of her students Leila Nadir. Leila was a junior majoring in Government and Politics with a minor in Philosophy. She was thoughtful, inquisitive, and slightly reserved, but passionate about civic engagement and democratic theory. In class Leila often brought questions that went beyond those outlined in the syllabus, including the ethical implications of AI in governance or the philosophical roots of populism.

Leila was working on a research paper for the class titled “Digital Sovereignty and the Fragmentation of Democratic Norms” and was seeking Sabine’s guidance on framing the paper and rounding its rough edges. Sabine viewed Leila as her best student, in fact Leila may have been the best student Sabine ever had. She was happy to see her in office hours.

“Please come in, I will be just a moment.” Sabine said invitingly, while finishing up her acceptance email.

“Thank you, professor.” Leila said as she sat down.

Sabine typed furiously to get that email off her back, and off her mind. Once completed she looked up at the clearly nervous Leila.

“So, what did you want to talk about today?”

“Well, I was hoping maybe you could help me with finishing up my research paper—”

“You mean the one about digital sovereignty as I recall?”

“Yes, that is the one.”

“Are you focusing mostly on domestic policy, international relations or both?” Sabine asked.

“Mostly domestic, but I think there’s a global dimension—like how authoritarian regimes justify surveillance as digital sovereignty.”

“Let me make a suggestion, I think it will make your writing easier if you start with a comparative case study, for instance you could compare how the U.K. and Hungary are handling digital sovereignty.”

“Thank you, professor, I like the idea of a comparative case study.” Leila replied, as the copy of On Tyranny caught her eye.

“The choice of Hungary seems to be a good one and reminds me of the quote: ‘post-truth is pre-fascism.’” Leila stated.

“I see you have been reading your Timothy Snyder. Well done, Leila.”

“But sometimes this makes me feel hopeless. I guess, like if you look at Hungary as an example, people are all too willing to trade freedom for convenience.”

“There is often a counterbalance to these forces though. We have seen strands of intellectual resistance in Hungary, protests at universities for example. Intellectual resistance is where full on resistance begins. Though I do think your worries are valid, we have become extremely fragmented in our opinions. And we can’t discount the ability of a few tech giants to change public opinion. Might I suggest you look at “The Age of Surveillance Capitalism” by Shoshana Zuboff?” Sabine suggested as she scanned her bookshelf and grabbed a copy to hand to Leila.

“Thank you, professor.” Leila said as she accepted the book.

“No problem. I know you were probably looking for a bit more from me, but I think that you are asking the right questions. Just make sure your paper goes beyond simply diagnosing the problem, try and offer a vision even if it is imperfect.”