Nobel economist Daron Acemoglu, promoting his book "What Happened to Liberal Democracy?", argues the system has failed to deliver shared prosperity and that trust in establishment politics has eroded. He pushes back on the idea that social liberalism caused the problem, and on the claim that liberalism only works when anchored in religion.

• Acemoglu says the bottom half of the US population has gained nothing from economic growth and has lost ground in real terms, which undercuts liberalism's core promise of shared prosperity.
• He sees a second, less tangible crisis: a broad public feeling that establishment politics and democracy itself no longer work, which he argues is driven partly by internal weaknesses rather than just social media or provocateurs.
• He rejects blaming social liberalism or secularism for the decline, arguing social liberalism drove real gains in emancipation and anti-discrimination, while liberalism's real mistake was sidelining community, including religious community, through top-down intervention.