We end our series by touching on why we started the project and with one final interview: a conversation with Noah Feldman, professor of law at Harvard Law School, on the history of the American social contract and why it’s a powerful tool to organize around.

Noah Feldman, The Three Lives of James Madison: Genius, Partisan, President (Random House 2017).

Mark Hulliung, The Social Contract in America: From the Revolution to the Present Age (Univ. Press of Kan. 2007).

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

Sound effects downloaded from freesound: https://freesound.org/

The final episode in our series discusses how citizens can rewrite the social contract through participation in the democratic process. We hear from Larry Lessig, professor of law at Harvard Law School and 2016 presidential candidate; Eric Liu, founder and CEO of Citizen University; Charlotte Alter, national correspondent at TIME Magazine; and Amanda Nguyen, founder and CEO of Rise.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

E.J. Dionne & Kayla Meltzer Drogosz, The Promise of National Service: A (Very) Brief History of an Idea, Brookings (June 2, 2003), https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-promise-of-national-service-a-very-brief-history-of-an-idea/.

Lawrence Lessig, Republic, Lost: Version 2.0 (Twelve 2015).

Lawrence Lessig, I'm Trying to Run for President, but the Democrats Won't Let Me, POLITICO Mag. (Oct. 1, 2015), https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/10/lessig-lawrence-democrats-debate-2016-213215.

Eric Liu, You're More Powerful than You Think: A Citizen’s Guide to Making Change Happen (PublicAffairs 2017).

Eric Liu & Nick Hanauer, The Gardens of Democracy: A New American Story of Citizenship, the Economy, and the Role of Government (Sasquatch Books 2011).

Eric Liu, How Donald Trump Is Reviving American Democracy, Atlantic (Mar. 8, 2017), https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/03/how-donald-trump-is-reviving-our-democracy/518928/.

Charlotte Alter, The School Shooting Generation Has Had Enough, TIME (Mar. 22, 2018), http://time.com/longform/never-again-movement/.

Charlotte Alter, A Year Ago, They Marched. Now a Record Number of Women Are Running for Office, TIME (Jan. 18, 2018), http://time.com/5107499/record-number-of-women-are-running-for-office/.

Amanda Nguyen, TED: Re-Writing Laws to Help Sexual Assault Survivors, YouTube (Dec. 20, 2016), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBJBi8oyG18.

Diana Pearl, How a 24-Year-Old Rape Survivor Is Pushing Congress to Change the Way the U.S. Handles Sexual Assault, People (Aug. 30, 2016), https://people.com/celebrity/amanda-nguyen-and-rise-profile-passing-sexual-assault-bill-of-rights/.

Patrick D'Arcy, How to Turn a Cause into a Law, TED (Nov. 17, 2017), https://ideas.ted.com/how-to-turn-a-cause-into-a-law/.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

Our series continues with a discussion about the service that is required to uphold a social contract. We hear from Ray Mabus, former Secretary of the Navy and Governor of Mississippi; Alan Khazei, co-founder of City Year and longtime leader in the movement for national civilian service; and Stanley McChrystal, retired four-star general, former U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and chairman of Service Year Alliance.

Stanley A. McChrystal, You Don't Have to Wear a Military Uniform to Serve Your Country, The Atlantic (Jul. 20, 2016), https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/07/you-dont-have-to-wear-a-military-uniform-to-serve-your-country/491765/.

Alan Khazei, Big Citizenship: How Pragmatic Idealism Can Bring Out the Best in America (Pub. Affairs 2010).

David B. Larter, Out-going SECNAV Mabus defends progressive personnel reforms, Navy Times (Jan. 12, 2017), https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2017/01/12/out-going-secnav-mabus-defends-progressive-personnel-reforms/.

Grayson Kirk, Shall We Have Universal Military Training? (1944 Censored), American Historical Association, https://www.historians.org/about-aha-and-membership/aha-history-and-archives/gi-roundtable-series/pamphlets/em-21-shall-we-have-universal-military-training-(1944-censored).

Matthew Spalding, Principles and Reforms for Citizen Service, Heritage Foundation (Apr. 1, 2003), https://www.heritage.org/jobs-and-labor/report/principles-and-reforms-citizen-service.

Janna Malamud Smith, 'Giving Back' Used To Be A Principle Of Our Democracy. Can It Be Again?, WBUR (Feb. 27, 2018), http://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2018/02/27/giving-back-janna-malamud-smith.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

The series continues by considering how to pay for the social contract, in particular through taxation. We hear from Mark Meckler, co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots and current President of Citizens for Self-Governance; Raúl Carrillo and Danny Sufranski, leaders of the Modern Money Network; and Michele Oberholtzer, a housing advocate in Detroit and candidate for State Representative of Michigan’s 4th District.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Shamus Khan, The Rich Haven’t Always Hated Taxes, TIME (Sept. 18, 2012), http://ideas.time.com/2012/09/18/the-rich-havent-always-hated-taxes/.

Mark Meckler, The Health Care Fiasco Should Make Americans Sober to This Reality, Breitbart (Mar. 28, 2017), http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/03/28/meckler-health-care-fiasco-make-americans-sober-reality/.

Convention of States, https://conventionofstates.com/ (last visited May 22, 2018).

Raúl Carrillo & Jesse Myerson, The Dangerous Myth of Taxpayer Money, Splinter (Oct. 19, 2017), https://splinternews.com/the-dangerous-myth-of-taxpayer-money-1819658902.

Michele Oberholtzer, Myth-busting the Detroit foreclosure crisis, Detroit Metro Times (Sept. 13, 2017), https://www.metrotimes.com/detroit/myth-busting-the-detroit-tax-foreclosure-crisis/Content?oid=5552983.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

We continue our series with a discussion about the consequences of a social contract that intentionally excluded, separated, and segregated. We hear from Michele Oberholtzer, a housing advocate in Detroit and candidate for State Representative of Michigan’s 4th District; Sarah Schindler, professor of law at University of Maine School of Law; and Rebecca Elliott, assistant professor of sociology at London School of Economics.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Richard Rothstein, The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America (Liveright 2017).

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, State of the Union Message to Congress (Jan. 11, 1944).

Michele Oberholtzer, Myth-busting the Detroit foreclosure crisis, Detroit Metro Times (Sept. 13, 2017), https://www.metrotimes.com/detroit/myth-busting-the-detroit-tax-foreclosure-crisis/Content?oid=5552983.

Sarah Schindler, Architectural Exclusion: Discrimination and Segregation Through Physical Design of the Built Environment, 124 Yale L. J. 1934 (2015).

Rebecca Elliott, Opinion, In Hurricane Harvey’s Wake, We Need a Green ‘New Deal’, N.Y. Times (Aug. 31, 2017), https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/31/opinion/in-hurricane-harveys-wake-we-need-a-green-new-deal.html.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

This episode explores what a social contract of employment looks like, given the changing nature of work in the 21st century economy. We hear from Tom Kochan, a professor at MIT Sloan School of Management; Oren Cass, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute; Steven Pedigo, an assistant professor at the NYU School of Professional Studies; and Sharon Block, Executive Director of the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School.

You can learn more about enrolling in Tom Kochan’s edX course, Shaping the Future of Work, here.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Thomas A. Kochan, Shaping the Future of Work: A Handbook for Action and a New Social Contract (MIT Press 2017).

Oren Cass, American Workers Need a New Kind of Labor Union, Wall St. J. (Aug. 31, 2017), https://www.wsj.com/articles/american-workers-need-a-new-kind-of-labor-union-1504220896.

Richard Florida, What the New Urban Anchors Owe Their Cities, CityLab (Sep. 21 2017), https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/09/what-the-new-urban-anchors-owe-their-cities/540588/.

James B. Atleson, Values and Assumptions in American Labor Law (U. Mass. Press 1983).

Mark Barenberg, The Political Economy of the Wagner Act: Power, Symbol, and Workplace Cooperation, 106 Harv. L. Rev. 1381 (1993).

Jake Rosenfeld, What Unions No Longer Do (Harv. U. Press 2014) 

Benjamin Sachs, Agency Fees and the First Amendment, 131 Harv. L. Rev. 1046 (2018).

Benjamin Sachs, Despite Preemption: Making Labor Law in Cities and States, 124 Harv. L. Rev. 1153 (2011).

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

Our country’s education system challenges a national sense of community. This episode explores what happens when we limit our obligations to those in our immediate neighborhood and shrink our social contract to a local level. We hear from Marta Tienda, a professor of sociology at Princeton University; James Blacksher, a civil rights attorney from Birmingham, Alabama; Jon East, a Vice President at Step Up for Students, a non-profit that administers Florida's school voucher programs; Tressie McMillan Cottom, an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University and author of Lower Ed; and Wick Sloane, an adjunct professor at Bunker Hill Community College and columnist for Inside Higher Ed.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Marta Tienda, Thirteenth Annual Brown Lecture in Education Research: Public Education and the Social Contract: Restoring the Promise in an Age of Diversity and Division, 46 Educ. Res. 271 (2017).

I.L v. Alabama, 739 F.3d 1273 (11th Cir. 2014).

Beth Kassab, Step Up for Students takes lead on school vouchers, Orlando Sentinel (Dec. 22, 2017) http://www.orlandosentinel.com/features/education/school-zone/os-florida-vouchers-step-up-for-students-20171203-story.html.

Tressie McMillan Cottom, Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy (The New Press 2017).

Wick Sloane, Veterans at Selective Colleges, 2017, Inside Higher Ed (Nov. 10, 2017) https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2017/11/10/wick-sloanes-slightly-depressing-annual-survey-veterans-elite-colleges-opinion.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

We continue our series with a discussion about health as a component of the social contract. We take a step back from the hyper-partisan political debate around health care and instead explore whether there are ways to reimagine and reframe a social contract of health that challenges the status quo, adopts new tools for substantive change, and invites new voices and perspectives to the table. We hear from Lisa Costello, a pediatrician, internist, and assistant professor of medicine; Rebecca Onie, Co-Founder and CEO Emerita of Health Leads; and Anthony Iton, Senior Vice President for Healthy Communities at The California Endowment.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Atul Gawande, Is Health Care a Right?, New Yorker (Oct. 2, 2017), https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/02/is-health-care-a-right.

Editorial Board, Renew Federal Funding for Children’s Health Insurance Program, Newsday (Dec. 19, 2017), https://www.newsday.com/opinion/editorial/chip-future-1.15524256.

Al-Rasheed Benton, et al., Inaction on CHIP Puts WV Children at Risk, Herald-Dispatch (Jan. 2, 2018), http://www.herald-dispatch.com/news/inaction-on-chip-puts-wv-children-at-risk/article_b3293341-7807-5ed7-92b7-304b8c1edbbd.html.

Sandhya Somashekhar, et al., Americans Watch a Health-Care Bill That Could Upend Many Lives Again, Wash. Post (June 29, 2017), https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/americans-watch-a-health-care-bill-that-could-upend-many-lives-again/2017/06/29/29ba6542-5b4e-11e7-a9f6-7c3296387341_story.html?utm_term=.ed239cbe9977.

Rebecca Onie, What If Our Healthcare System Kept Us Healthy?, TED (April 2012), https://www.ted.com/talks/rebecca_onie_what_if_our_healthcare_system_kept_us_healthy. 

Anthony Iton, Opioid Crisis is Only a Symptom of Deadly Epidemic, Sacramento Bee (Dec. 14, 2017), http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/op-ed/soapbox/article189630399.html.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

The third episode in our series explores the role of safety in an American social contract. We ask how our country’s debate around guns defines who can keep themselves safe—through both access to and protection from guns in their communities. We hear from Arwen Mohun, a professor and historian of technology; Dean Winslow, a professor of medicine, former Trump nominee, and retired Air Force colonel; Maj Toure, a musician and founder of Black Guns Matter; and Landon Shroder, a security and intelligence specialist.  

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Arwen P. Mohun, Risk: Negotiating Safety in American Society (Johns Hopkins Univ. Press 2012).

Dean L. Winslow, I spoke my mind on guns. Then my Senate confirmation was put on hold., Wash. Post (Dec. 20, 2017), https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/i-spoke-my-mind-on-guns-it-torpedoed-my-appointment-in-the-trump-administration/2017/12/20/8f708f6c-e50d-11e7-833f-155031558ff4_story.html.

Maj Toure: Living the Solutionary Lifestyle, NRA Blog (Oct. 3, 2016), https://www.nrablog.com/articles/2016/10/maj-toure-living-the-solutionary-lifestyle/.

Landon Shroder, Gun Control Isn’t the Answer, Disarmament Is, RVA Mag (Oct. 2, 2017), https://rvamag.com/politics/opinion/opinion-gun-control-isnt-the-answer-disarmament-is.html.

Adam Winkler, The Secret History of Guns, The Atlantic (Sept. 2011), https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/09/the-secret-history-of-guns/308608/.

Heather Sher, What I Saw Treating the Victims From Parkland Should Change the Debate on Guns, The Atlantic (Feb. 22, 2018), https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/02/what-i-saw-treating-the-victims-from-parkland-should-change-the-debate-on-guns/553937/.

David E. Vandercoy, The History of the Second Amendment, 28 Val. U. L. Rev. 1007 (1994).

Joyce Lee Malcolm, The Supreme Court and the Uses of History: District of Columbia v. Heller, 56 UCLA L. Rev. 1377 (2009).

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)

Our second episode explores dissent—as both a shaper and a component of the social contract. We hear from Tim McCarthy, an educator, historian, and citizen-activist; Charlene Carruthers, founding national director of Black Youth Project 100; Nate Boyer, former Seattle Seahawks long snapper and United States Army Green Beret; David McCraw, vice president and deputy general counsel of The New York Times; and Stas Walker, a blogger, essayist, and scholar.

This episode is marked explicit due to brief strong language describing an incident of hate speech.

For additional information on the issues we briefly examine, we recommend the following resources:

Protest Nation: Words That Inspired A Century of American Radicalism (Timothy Patrick McCarthy & John McMillian eds., The New Press 2010).

Charlene A. Carruthers, Remnants of Survival: Black Women and Legacies of Defiance, in The Burden: African Americans and the Enduring Impact of Slavery (Rochelle Riley ed., Wayne St. Uni. Press 2018).

Nate Boyer, An Open Letter to Colin Kaepernick, from a Green Beret-Turned-Long Snapper, Army Times (Aug. 30, 2016), https://www.armytimes.com/opinion/2016/08/30/an-open-letter-to-colin-kaepernick-from-a-green-beret-turned-long-snapper/.

Nate Boyer, Ex-Green Beret Nate Boyer Writes Open Letter to Trump, Kaepernick, NFL and America, ESPN (Oct. 13, 2017), http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/21003968/nfl-2017-ex-green-beret-nate-boyer-writes-open-letter-president-donald-trump-colin-kaepernick-nfl-united-states-america.

David McCraw, I Hardly Expected My Letter to Donald Trump’s Lawyer to Go Viral, N.Y. Times (Oct. 17, 2016), https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/18/insider/i-hardly-expected-my-letter-to-donald-trump-to-go-viral.html.

David McCraw & Stephen Gikow, The End to an Unspoken Bargain? National Security and Leaks in a Post–Pentagon Papers World, 48 Harv. C.R.C.L. L. Rev. 473 (2013). 

Anastasia Walker, Cleveland State and the Degradation of “Free” Speech in the Trump Era, Huffington Post (Nov. 29 2017, 9:33 PM), https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/cleveland-state-and-the-degradation-of-free-speech_us_5a11dd0ee4b0e30a9585082a.

This episode was produced by Mareva Lindo.

Thanks to Doctor Turtle for the music:
"Lullaby for Democracy" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/The_Double-Down_Two-Step/lullaby_for_democracy)
"Go Tell It On the Molehill" (http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Doctor_Turtle/Flush_Your_Rolex_1416/go_tell_it_on_the_molehill_2)