Has Money Taken Over American Politics?

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Part 2 of the TED Radio Hour episode Solving It.

About Lawrence Lessig's TED Talk

Legal scholar Lawrence Lessig says corruption is at the heart of American politics. He says the campaign funding process weakens democracy and he issues a bipartisan call for change.

About Lawrence Lessig

People talk about the division in American poltics between the right side and the left side. But the important division in American politics is between the inside and the outside.

Lawyer and activist Lawrence Lessig has spent years arguing for sensible intellectual property law for the digital age. He was a founding board member of Creative Commons, an organization that builds better copyright practices through open source principles.

In 2007, Lessig turned his attention to what he calls a fundamental problem that blocks all types of sensible policy — the corrupting influence of money in American politics. In 2011, Lessig founded Rootstrikers, an organization dedicated to changing the influence of money in Congress.