In Part 2 of the podcast, Shadi questioned Fukuyama on whether ostensibly liberal states in fact promote a particular conception of the good life for their citizens. For example, can state-enforced secularism, like France's, truly be part of a liberal state? Damir raises the point that the universalist assumptions behind liberalism may simply not be workable in a large, diverse, societies.

Finally, we talk about the specific ways in which rising illiberalism could be beaten back. Fukuyama believes that the only way to defeat right-wing illiberalism is to defeat it decisively at the polls, through the Democratic party moving towards the American center and ditching its "woke" wing. In the long term, however, he is optimistic about liberalism's prospects, and the chances for "partisans of human freedom" to succeed.