ZadekpediaDuke University is identified in The Bob Zadek Show as the academic affiliation of Michael Munger, a professor of political science, economics, and public policy who appeared as a guest across multiple episodes. The episodes treat the university almost exclusively as a credential attached to Munger’s name rather than as a subject in its own right; no excerpt describes Duke’s history, governance, curriculum, or campus. The institution enters the program’s record through the host’s introductions and through one guest’s passing biographical remark.
Munger’s affiliation as introduced by the host
Bob Zadek introduced Mike Munger as a professor at Duke University in the 2015 episode on campaign finance, noting that Munger had a PhD in economics from Washington University, had been at Duke for many years, had run for Governor of North Carolina in 2008 as a Libertarian, and had worked as a staff economist at the Federal Trade Commission Who Wants to Buy a Politician? With Mike Munger (2015). In the 2019 episode on capitalism and cronyism, Zadek described Munger as a professor of political science, economics, and public policy at Duke, active in the American Institute for Economic Research and a scholar with the Independent Institute in Oakland, California, and as the author of Is Capitalism Sustainable? Mike Munger is Taking Public Choice Seriously (2019).
The 2022 episode on the Constitution and COVID-19 repeated and extended the introduction: Zadek called Munger professor of political science, economics, and public policy at Duke, said he had chaired that department, noted his work as a staff economist for the Federal Trade Commission in the Reagan administration, his 2008 Libertarian candidacy for governor of North Carolina, his book Tomorrow 3.0: Transaction Costs and the Sharing Economy, his senior fellowship at the Independent Institute, his writing for the American Institute of Economic Research, and his former presidency and chairmanship of the Public Choice Society Troubleshooting the Constitution (2022). The 2023 episode on the Broken Window Fallacy again identified him as professor of political science, economics, and public policy at Duke The ‘Broken Window Fallacy’ is Back (2023).
Duke as a vantage point in Munger’s arguments
In the 2022 episode, Munger referred to his colleagues at Duke while making an argument about political power. He said that colleagues on the left at Duke had once told him they could not imagine his warnings about a bad president, because they believed a more powerful government was desirable and that the president would always be good; after 2016, he said, that was no longer hypothetical because they thought Trump was actually dangerous Troubleshooting the Constitution (2022). He added that he had assumed they would conclude a less powerful presidency was needed once Trump left office, but that they did not, and instead wanted a powerful president in the person of Biden. The excerpt ends as Munger says they are trying to pass a voting rights act that will ensure—and the passage breaks off there.
This is the only excerpt in which Duke appears as something other than a title in an introduction: it is the setting Munger invokes for a disagreement among colleagues about executive power.
Klayman’s reference
In the 2012 episode on the Trayvon Martin case, Larry Klayman, described by Zadek as the founder of Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch, said that when he was at Duke University he read Albert Camus’s The Stranger, that he was a French literature major as well as a political science major, and that the book influenced him greatly and he had lived it in his legal career Who’s Looking Out for Us? (2012).
Across episodes
Duke University is touched on in the 2012, 2015, 2019, 2022, and 2023 episodes, but the episodes show no development in the treatment: in every case the university appears as a biographical fact about a speaker—Klayman’s alma mater in one instance, Munger’s employer in the others—and no episode revisits, revises, or expands on what an earlier one said about the institution.
Guests and episodes
4 appearances by 1 guests, 2015–2023. Guests A–Z by first name.
- Mike Munger ×4 (Duke University economist) — Who Wants to Buy a Politician? With Mike Munger (2015) — Campaign finance and money in politics.; Leviathan in Chains: Michael Munger on Public Choice Economics (2017) — Public Choice Economics and Political Authority.; Mike Munger is Taking Public Choice Seriously (2019) — Sustainability of capitalism and the threat of cronyism.; The ‘Broken Window Fallacy’ is Back (2023) — Green energy and the broken window fallacy.