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The Last Best Hope?

The Last Best Hope?

By: Adam Smith
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Abraham Lincoln called the United States “the last best hope of Earth.” In this podcast, we ask whether that claim still holds — and whether it ever did.

Each episode takes a figure, idea, or moment in American political history and asks what it tells us about the country’s understanding of itself, always with an eye to how America looks from the outside in. The Last Best Hope? takes ideas seriously: America as a creed, the arguments of the people who built and remade it, and what America has meant to the rest of the world. We take our subjects from history, not the news — though the present is rarely far away.


Hosted by Adam Smith, Orsborn Professor of American Political History and Director of the Rothermere American Institute at Oxford, The Last Best Hope? brings him into conversation with leading scholars and public figures, including Hillary Clinton, Annette Gordon-Reed, Eric Foner, David Frum, Heather Cox Richardson, Stacy Schiff, Jonathan Freedland, James Morone, Michael Kazin, Kevin Kruse, Julian Zelizer, Bruce Schulman, Ty Seidule, Liz Varon, Eric Rauchway, Phil Tinline, Emily Bazelon, Richard Carwardine, Rachel Shelden, Richard Blackett, Devin Fergus, and Dan Jackson.


“Adam Smith is one of the UK’s foremost historians of America, and communicates his expertise with zest, wit and unforced passion. The Last Best Hope? brings him together with fellow scholars to provide a unique insight we can’t do without.” — Phil Tinline, BBC radio documentary-maker and author


“The Last Best Hope is an absolutely brilliant podcast. Thoughtful, clever, engaging and accessible, Adam Smith always gets the best out of his guests, and I’ve learned an enormous amount from every episode. I love it.” — Dominic Sandbrook, historian and co-host of The Rest is History


“The must-listen US podcast.” — Nick Bryant, former BBC Correspondent in New York


Produced by the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford. https://www.rai.ox.ac.uk/home

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

© 2022 The Last Best Hope?: Understanding America from the Outside In Art World
Episodes
  • 1776 and the break up of the United States

    1776 and the break up of the United States
    May 27 2026

    The rebels who tried to break up the United States in the 1860s thought of themselves as the rightful heirs to the spirit of 1776. The South Carolina Declaration of the Causes of Secession took the Declaration of Independence as its template. Washington’s face appeared on Confederate banknotes and the Confederacy’s Great Seal. Many of the leaders of the Revolution of the 1860s were the literal grandsons of the men who had made the Revolution of the 1770s.


    In this episode, Adam explores an alternative legacy of 1776. Jefferson's Declaration of Independence launched the United States. It also licensed the greatest-ever effort to break it up. In conversation with Caroline E. Janney of the University of Virginia and Robert Hancock, Senior Curator at the American Civil War Museum in Richmond, Adam discusses how the Confederacy built a national identity in four short years out of the material the Founding had left lying around: the flags, the seals, the songs, the textbooks, the sermons, the fast days and the inaugurations.


    A century and a half later, as the United States marks the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the Confederates remain among that document’s most committed readers.


    The Last Best Hope? is a podcast of the Rothermere American Institute at the University of Oxford and is kindly supported by Tom Amraoui. For details of our programming, go to rai.ox.ac.uk


    If you would like to support us by making a donation go to https://www.rai.ox.ac.uk/giving


    Producer: Emily Williams. Presenter: Adam Smith

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    Show More Show Less
    39 mins
  • The idea of America in British politics

    The idea of America in British politics
    May 13 2026

    For 250 years, the idea of America and the fact of American power have unsettled British politics. Is America of us, or apart from us? Rival or special friend? In the British political imagination, America has provoked envy, resentment, condescension, and neediness. It has also divided us, because America has so often illuminated or distorted our understanding of ourselves. Since the radical Whigs of the 1770s, one strand of the British left has looked to the United States for democratic inspiration. Another has seen America as a plutocratic, imperialist hegemon. Conservatives, meanwhile, have alternately recoiled from America in horror and embraced its go-getting freedom.


    In this episode of The Last Best Hope?, Adam discusses the place of the US in the British political imagination with the Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland. He reported from Washington early in his career and now presents the Guardian’s Politics Weekly America podcast.

    The Last Best Hope? is a podcast of the Rothermere American Institute at the University of Oxford and is kindly supported by Tom Amraoui.


    For details of our programming, go to rai.ox.ac.uk


    If you would like to support us by making a donation go to https://www.rai.ox.ac.uk/giving

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    Show More Show Less
    50 mins
  • New Series Trailer

    New Series Trailer
    May 12 2026

    As the US gears up for the 250th anniversary celebrations of the Declaration of Independence on 4 July, the RAI’s podcast, The Last Best Hope?, returns for our 16th series on 13 May. As always, each episode uses history to explore what makes America different


    “The must-listen US podcast” Nick Bryant, former BBC Correspondent in New York


    The Last Best Hope? is a podcast of the Rothermere American Institute at the University of Oxford and is kindly supported by Tom Amraoui. For details of our programming, go to rai.ox.ac.uk


    If you would like to support us by making a donation go to https://www.rai.ox.ac.uk/giving


    Producer: Emily Williams. Presenter: Adam Smith

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
    Show More Show Less
    2 mins
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All stars
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Essential listening for anyone trying to understand why America is like it is today.

The best history podcast I have found.

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I am really enjoying this podcast. "divided by a common language" comes to mind. This podcast helps to explain this difference.

excellent

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