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PUP Author Geoffrey Robinson in Documentary about East Timor

April 22, 2013 by

This weekend the acclaimed documentary Alias Ruby Blade will premiere at the Tribeca film festival. The documentary unravels the history behind the new nation in East Timor after its struggle for independence. The documentary features PUP author Geoffrey Robinson who has written a book about East Timor. Robinson authored “If you Leave Us Here, We Will Die”: How Genocide Was Stopped in East Timor. For showtime information click here.

Read a review for the documentary from This Week in New York below.

Alias Ruby Blade: A Story of Love and Revolution is an intimate, involving documentary that goes behind the scenes of East Timor’s battle for independence, structured like a gripping thriller with a decidedly personal edge. In 1991, Australian Kirsty Sword went to East Timor as part of a team posing as tourists while actually making a secret film about the embattled Indonesian island. Almost immediately, the Australian teacher and activist found herself right in the middle of the violent struggle as bullets flew all around her and her team, but they kept the cameras rolling, compiling amazing footage that helped alert the world as to what was happening there. Sword soon became a courier for the revolution, adopting the spy name Ruby Blade and smuggling in notes and, eventually, electronic equipment to jailed resistance leader Kay Rala “Xanana” Gusmão, who was serving a life sentence in Jakarta’s Cipinang Prison. Armed with a camera, Sword took remarkable footage during those years, most of which has never before been shown to the public; she opened up her archives for husband-and-wife documentarians Tanya Ager Meillier and Alex Meillier and speaks extensively with them in the film, relating her involvement with the independence movement — which included falling in love with the charismatic Xanana. The Meilliers also talk with such key resistance fighters as Nobel Peace Prize winner José Ramos-Horta and diplomat Constancio Pinto as well as historian and human rights activist Geoffrey Robinson and Inside Indonesia editor Pat Walsh, who share their stories about the Indonesian occupation that lasted from 1975 to 1999, followed by a UN-sponsored referendum for independence that led to yet more horrors. But Sword, who narrates much of the film, and Xanana, who appears primarily in archival footage and photographs, never gave up their dream of a free, democratic East Timor while also considering a life together. As much as Alias Ruby Blade delves into the political situation in East Timor, it’s really about how a young, strong woman followed her heart and made a difference in a faraway part of the globe. Alias Ruby Blade will have its North American premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival, where it’s part of the Documentary Competition. (By the way, the less you know about how things turned out in East Timor, the more exciting the film is, so don’t read up on it before going to one of the four screenings.)

Learn more about the film here.

Filed Under: Asian and Asian American studies, Events, International Relations, Sociology, Twitter, World History

Presidential Leadership and the Rise of American Power Forum in Cambridge

April 17, 2013 by

Today at Harvard, four of the university’s best experts on leadership will discuss presidential leadership and the rise of American power during the JFK Jr. Forum at 6 pm. The event is open to the public. Among them is Joseph Nye, author of the forthcoming book Presidential Leadership and the Creation of the American Era. Don’t miss out on this exciting event!

The lineup for the forum:

Joseph S. Nye, Jr.: University Distinguished Service Professor; Nye, who coined the term “soft power,” is one of the nation’s most influential analysts of the nature and applications of power. A former HKS dean, Nye also has held senior roles in the Pentagon, and was chairman of the National Intelligence Council.

Graham Allison: director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; founding dean of the modern Kennedy School; assistant secretary of defense in the Clinton Administration, and a Pentagon advisor in the Reagan Administration.  Allison has studied presidential decision-making from Kennedy’s handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis to Obama’s decision to launch the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

Nancy F. Koehn: The James E. Robison Professor of Business Administrationat Harvard Business School; Koehn  studies effective leadership, with a special focus on entrepreneurial leadership, and how leaders craft lives of purpose, worth and impact. She has written several books on leadership; her next book explores the lessons from six leaders’ journeys, including that of Abraham Lincoln.

Moderator David Gergen: Co-Director of the Kennedy School’s Center for Public Leadership and HKS Professor of Public Service, has served at the right hand of four presidents from both parties; he knows how presidents exercise power. He is also a leading journalist and senior political analyst for CNN. He is the author of Eyewitness to Power: the Essence of Leadership, Nixon to Clinton.

For more information on the event: http://forum.iop.harvard.edu/content/presidential-leadership-and-rise-american-power

Filed Under: Events, International Relations, Political Science and International Relations, Twitter

Affluence and Influence Create Supercitizens

March 4, 2013 by

According to Martin Gilens in his book Affluence and Influence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America, with great wealth comes great influence on the policies that are enacted in this country. While many believe that though there is economic difference in society there is still political equality, Gilens shows that an individual’s amount of affluence mirrors their level influence on policies. In a recent article by Chrystia Freeland for New York Times, the affluent are described as “supercitizens” because of their more extensive influence when it comes to policy changes. Freeland explains why this is the case in the article.

When Supercitizens Pull Up the Opportunity Ladder

MIAMI — Louis D. Brandeis, the American jurist, famously warned: “We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both.”

randeis’s cri de coeur was inspired by an indignant observation of the shenanigans of America’s robber barons during the Gilded Age. Today, we live in a data-driven age, and some careful students of the connection between money and politics have now amassed a powerful body of evidence to support Brandeis’s moral claim. A lot of it is assembled in a report by the progressive research organization Demos, published this week.

One of the most striking findings is the extent to which economic power translates into political power.

Institutionally, this is an era of unprecedented democracy — one of the triumphs of the 20th century has been the extension of voting rights to all adults in a lot of the world.

But even in the United States, the country that thinks of itself as being the world’s leading democracy, it turns out that those rights do not translate into much actual political power. David Callahan, co-author of “Stacked Deck,” the Demos report, describes the superrich as “supercitizens, with an outsized footprint in the public square.”

“I think most Americans believe in the idea of political equality,” Dr. Callahan told me. “That idea is obviously corrupted when in 2012, one guy, Sheldon Adelson, can make more political donations than the residents of 12 states put together.”

The Demos study draws in part on the quantitative research of Martin Gilens, a professor of politics at Princeton University, in New Jersey, and author of “Affluence and Influence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America.” Dr. Gilens, who focused on the divide between the top 10 percent and everyone else, found a high degree of what he calls political inequality.

Read the FULL article here.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Economics, International Relations, Political Science, Twitter

Admati on CBSNews.com’s Moneywatch

February 25, 2013 by

Anat Admati appeared on CBSNews.com’s Moneywatch to discuss the problems with the banking system and possible solutions to remedy the problems. Admati is co-author of The Bankers’ New Clothes, a forthcoming book that not only critiques big banks but also gives them advice to fix their mistakes before it is too late.

Also, read the accompanying article on CBSNews.com.

Filed Under: Economics, Finance, International Relations, Political Science

Admati on Fox Business Network

February 21, 2013 by

Anat Admati appeared on Fox Business Network’s Money with Melissa Francis on Tuesday to discuss the government’s regulations for the financial sector. Admati is co-author of The Bankers’ New Clothes: What’s Wrong with Banking and What to Do About It which examines the current banking system problems and how to fix them in clearly defined terms.

Watch the full interview here.

Additionally The New Yorker, Bloomberg Business Week, and Business Insider all discuss the financial situation and possible solutions as laid out by Admati and Hellwig in The Banker’s New Clothes. Admati and Hellwig say that “higher equity requirements would therefore alleviate the problem of banks being too big, too interconnected, or too political to fail. Not only would banks be less likely to fail, they would bear more of their own losses should they incur losses.” James Pethokoukis for Business Insider agrees and sums up that “capping bank size, limiting bank activities, higher equity capital requirements — all tools in the toolbox for eliminating the crony capitalist subsidy of the US financial system by government.”

Read the articles about The Banker’s New Clothes:

Filed Under: Economics, Finance, International Relations, Political Science, Twitter

Anat Admati interview on Nightly Business Report

February 13, 2013 by

Anat Admati was interviewed on PBS’s Nightly Business Report on Tuesday, February 11th to talk about the size and safety of banks, and her new book The Bankers’ New Clothes. Watch the interview below.

If this video is not working, please visit the Nightly Business Report site.

Also, tune into Fox Business’s Money with Melissa Francis TONIGHT at 5:00 pm for another interview with Admati.

Filed Under: Economics, Finance, International Relations, Political Science, Twitter

Margaret J Radin talks Boilerplates in op-ed in the Los Angeles Times

February 13, 2013 by

Boilerplate coverWhether it is a one time practice or a weekly scheduled session, gymnastic facilities have participants sign a boilerplate that relieves the gym and all their personnel of all responsibility if you get hurt while there. At a gym near my hometown, a friend of mine dislocated her elbow after an instructor did not properly spot her while she tried a new gymnastics trick. Needless to say, the gym manager at the time handed her a phone to call her mother, then wiped his hands of the situation and it was on to the next class.

In a recent op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, Margaret Jane Radin discusses how a boilerplate to attend a birthday party at a gymnastics facility forced her niece to sign that the gym was not responsible if her three year old were to sustain any injuries. Radin discusses what boilerplates mean for our legal rights in her book Boilerplate. Boilerplates are the paperwork or its electronic equivalent that must be signed in order to use the service or product. What exactly are you signing away when you sign or click “I accept”?

Read part of the op-ed below.

Blackmailed by the fine print

Boilerplate is more than just an annoyance. It threatens democracy and the rule of law.

My niece, the mother of a 3-year-old, told me she felt blackmailed: In order for her child to attend a birthday party at a gymnastics facility for young children, she had to sign a form that included this:

“The undersigned agrees to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless [this facility], its officers, managers, members, employees, servants, agents and coaches/instructors and their successors and assigns from and against all legal liability, claims, suits, damages, losses, and expenses, including attorneys’ fees, threatened or incurred, and arising from the child’s participation, or from any cause whatsoever.”

Forms like this are called boilerplate because they are delivered to us on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. If my niece signed this one, she would relieve the gym of legal liability if her child were harmed at the party. And should she try to challenge the “hold harmless” form, she would be responsible for the facility’s legal expenses if she lost.

Lawyers know (but non-lawyers probably don’t) that such forms may be found to be legally overreaching if the matter ever reaches a court; no business or individual can “contract out” of reckless or grossly negligent or intentionally harmful behavior. When such questions do reach a judge, however, courts in many states will excuse mere negligence, such as a failure to screen employees or maintain equipment or premises properly.

Read the FULL op-ed here.

 

Filed Under: International Relations, Law, Political Science, Twitter

John McGinnis op-ed for Investor’s Business Daily

February 13, 2013 by

2-7 AcceleratingJohn McGinnis, author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Governance through Technology, proposes in his book that the government does not take full advantage of the benefits that technology gives. He explains that recent technology can be used to better analyze past, present, and future public policy. In a recent op-ed for Investor’s Business Daily, he explains how prediction markets can serve as a way to discover if policies will be beneficial before they are fully enacted. McGinnis argues that prediction markets are not the same as internet gambling and that they should be legalized as a way to assess policies that fits the technology of today.

Read the full op-ed below.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: International Relations, Law, Political Science, Twitter

Why Americans Hate the Media and How It Matters- Winner of Goldsmith Book Prize

February 13, 2013 by

2-13 whyAmericanshateCongratulations to Jonathan M. Ladd whose book, Why Americans Hate the Media and How it Matters, was recently selected as the winner of the 2013 Goldsmith Book Prize in the Academic Category!

“The Goldsmith Book Prize is awarded to the trade and academic book published in the United States in the last 24 months that best fulfills the objective of improving democratic governance through an examination of the intersection between the media, politics and public policy.

The Goldsmith Book Prizes honor the best academic and trade books of the year in the field of media, politics and public policy. The Prizes are underwritten by an annual gift from the Goldsmith Fund of the Greenfield Foundation. The authors will be honored at the Goldsmith Awards Ceremony at Harvard’s Kennedy School on March 5, 2013.”

For more information about the award, and the full list of finalists and winners, click here.

Filed Under: American History, International Relations, Political Science, Twitter

Padgett & Powell Guest Bloggers for Orgtheory.net: Second Post

February 13, 2013 by

2-7 theemergenceJohn Padgett and Walter Powell, authors of The Emergence of Organizations and Markets, are guest bloggers for February for Orgtheory.net. In their latest blog, Padgett and Powell discuss some of the mechanisms that allow multiple networks to become synced for better productivity for an organization. They also give examples of each mechanism including some successes and failures that have resulted from their application.

John F. Padgett is professor of political science and (by courtesy) professor of sociology and history at the University of Chicago. Walter W. Powell is professor of education and (by courtesy) professor of sociology, organizational behavior, management science, communication, and public policy at Stanford University.

Check out part of their second blog below.

the emergence of organizations and markets, part 2: a guest post by john padgett and woody powell

Single autocatalytic networks generate life, but they do not generate novel forms of life. There is nothing outside of a single decontextualized network to bring in to recombine with what is already there. Self-organizing out of randomness into an equilibrium of reproducing transformations, the origin of life, was a nontrivial accomplishment, to be sure. But this is not quite speciation, which is emergence of one form of life out of another.

Transpositions and feedbacks among multiple networks are the sources of organizational novelty. In a multiple-network architecture, networks are the contexts of each other. Studying organizational novelty places a premium on measuring multiple social networks in interaction because that is the raw material for innovation. Subsequent cascades of death and reconstruction may or may not turn initial transpositions (innovations) across networks into system-wide invention.

Read the rest of the post here.

 

 

Filed Under: Economics, International Relations, Political Science, Sociology, Twitter

John McGinnis on Technology and the Government

February 9, 2013 by

In such a fast paced world, it only makes sense that everything in our lives moves as quickly as we do. Whether the speed is through our internet connection or news updates, our society feeds off technological advances that have made our lives quicker and more efficient. In the government, however, technology has not been fully embraced thus giving the government a slow image. Recently, Todd Park became the White House chief technology officer and aims to change the government’s image. In Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Governance Through Technology by John McGinnis, he explains how fast-evolving information technologies can be used to better analyze past, present, and future public policy but says that this can only happen if the government keeps up with technology’s pace. In a recent interview with The Takeaway, McGinnis discusses his book and why the government should use technology to test social policy and more.

 

Filed Under: International Relations, Law, Political Science, Twitter

John Padgett & Walter Powell: February Guest Bloggers for Orgtheory.net

February 7, 2013 by

John F. Padge2-7 theemergencett and Walter W. Powell, co-authors of The Emergence of Organizations and Markets, will be contributing to the orgtheory.net blog for the month. They will be discussing their book and other thoughts throughout the month. Fabio Rojas, an associate professor of sociology at Indiana University, says that their blog postings will be “*required* reading for sociologists, management scholars, political scientists, and economists.”

John F. Padgett is professor of political science and (by courtesy) professor of sociology and history at the University of Chicago. Walter W. Powell is professor of education and (by courtesy) professor of sociology, organizational behavior, management science, communication, and public policy at Stanford University.

Check out part of their first blog below.

emergence of organizations and markets, part I by padgett & powell

A guest post by John Padgett and Woody Powell about their new book The Emergence of Organizations and Markets:

Innovation in the sense of product design is a popular research topic today, because there is a lot of money in that. Innovation, however, in the deeper sense of new actors—new types of people, new organizational forms—is not even much on the research radar screen of contemporary social scientists, even though “speciation” (to use the biologists’ term for this) lies at the heart of historical change over the longue durée, both in biological evolution and in human history. Social science—meaning mostly economics, political science and sociology—is very good at understanding selection, both at the micro level of individual choice and at the macro level of institutional regulation and lock-in. But novelty, especially of actors but also of alternatives, has first to enter from off the stage of our collective imaginary for our existing theories to be able to go to work. Our analytical shears for trimming are sharp, but the life forces that push up novelty to be trimmed tend to escape our attention, much less our understanding. If this book accomplishes anything, we at least hope to put the research topic of speciation—the emergence of new organizational forms and people—on our collective agenda.

Read the full post here.

Filed Under: Economics, International Relations, Political Science, Sociology, Twitter
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