This week’s episode is from our friends at the Feet in 2 Worlds podcast (originally released April 22, 2025):

Over the past couple of years, around 40,000 Venezuelans arrived in Denver fleeing political and economic instability, eager to work while their immigration statuses played out. Initially, with help from the city and non-profit organizations, many were able to find stable housing and jobs. However, with all the recent changes in immigration policy, they now face an uncertain future and finding work has become more difficult.

Producers Ann Marie Awad and Andrés Pacheco-Girón explore how the rules of the hustle have changed for one Venezuelan couple in Denver.

Read more at fi2w.org.

Editor’s Note: As of May 19, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that the Trump administration can terminate temporary protective status. The administration has announced that TPS status for some people is already terminated, and for others, it terminates in 2026.

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Disrupting Peace is a production of The World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung. 

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, my colleagues, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan.

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram at @worldpeacefdtn.

This week we’re bringing back our very first episode, We Thought We Solved World Peace, from September 2024.

When host Bridget Conley was a college student in the 90s, there was this air of optimism. It might sound crazy to say now, but she and her colleagues honestly believed they had solved world peace. 

In this first episode of Disrupting Peace, Bridget speaks with Yale law professor Sam Moyn and South African activist Mamello about what went wrong in the 90s, and what it would take to turn things around by 2050. 

Sam Moyn is Professor of Law and History at Yale Law School, and co-host of “Digging a Hole: the legal theory podcast.” He’s written several books that complicate key tenets of peacebuilding, including human rights, liberalism, economic equality, and the laws of war. Follow Sam Moyn on X at @samuelmoyn.

Mamello is head of campaigns at the South Africa-based organization, Open Secrets. Open Secrets holds the profiteers of economic crime, human rights abuses, and war to account. She was one year old when Nelson Mandela was elected president in 1994, and grew up amidst massive political change in South Africa. Find out more about Mamello and Open Secrets at opensecrets.org.za. 

Disrupting Peace is a production of the World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung. 

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, my colleagues, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan.

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram at @worldpeacefdtn.

This week’s episode is from our friends at the Making Peace Visible Podcast.

When the Trump administration slashed the budget and suspended most of the staff of the United States Agency for International Development last month, their representatives said the agency was using taxpayer dollars to fund a radical, “woke” agenda around the world. Criticism coming from the Left since the founding of USAID in 1961 has characterized USAID as an arm of American imperialism. 

The reality, of course, is much more complicated. It’s heartbreaking to hear stories of children suddenly unable to attend school and receive essential vaccinations. But beyond the shockwaves of a sudden halt in the flow of assistance, there's a lot about US foreign aid that's up for debate. Questions like what does it accomplish? Does it really help? How does it help? Should it continue? Or, should foreign aid be scaled down over time? 

Host Jamil Simon has seen USAID projects succeed, and fall short – having worked for more than three decades as a USAID contractor, developing communication strategies to promote reform in more than 20 countries.

Our guest, Gregory Warner is a Peabody Award - winning journalist who has reported on USAID on the ground in places including Sub-Saharan Africa, Ukraine and Afghanistan. He was the creator and host of NPR's international podcast Rough Translation. Before that, he was an international correspondent for NPR, based in East Africa. Warner has reported on USAID on the ground in Africa, as well as in Ukraine and Afghanistan. He writes the Substack blog Rough Transition.

MORE FROM GREGORY WARNER

Subscribe to get Rough Transition in your inbox. 

Read Warner’s recent reporting about the gutting of USAID and what it says about the perception of America in the world. 

Listen to the Rough Translation episode about a woman who lied so she could receive aid designated for sexual violence survivors in the Democractic Republic of the Congo. 

Explore the Rough Translation podcast archive. 

To close out Season 2, we’re talking about the long-term impacts of electing a right-wing populist to office. Silvio Berlusconi transformed Italian government and society, beginning when he was first elected Prime Minister in 1994. In this episode, we’ll explore how Berlusconi legitimized the far-right (even though he himself was a center right politician), why people repeatedly vote for leaders that don’t make their lives better, and how Italian activists have still achieved some progressive victories. 

Fabi Fugazza is the Co-Executive Director and Legal Expert at the Italian Coalition for Civil Liberties and Rights. She is (also) a lawyer with extensive experience in human rights law. Follow her on Instagram @fabi.fugazza.

 Luisa Chiodi holds a PhD in Social and Political Science, and has been the director of think tank and online newspaper OBC Transeuropa since 2006. Follow her on Instagram @luisachiodi.

 Disrupting Peace is a production of The World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung.

 Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, my colleagues, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan. 

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram at @worldpeacefdtn.

Today we’re talking about academic freedom in higher education. What it is, why it’s at risk, and what’s at stake for democracy when this particular freedom is eroded. We explore why academic freedom is so threatening to existing hierarchies, why it’s so hard to explain academics to a broad audience, and what everyday people are doing to fight for the integrity of higher education.

Amy Reid is a senior manager for PEN America’s Freedom to Learn program. PEN America is an organization that has been promoting free expression globally for over a hundred years. The Freedom to Learn team focuses on supporting higher education and academic freedom. She is currently on leave from New College of Florida. Find out more about Amy’s work at pen.org.

Isaac Kamola is an associate professor at Trinity College in Connecticut. He focuses on the political economy of higher education, African anticolonial theory, and critical globalization studies. He is also director of the American Association of University Professor’s Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom and founder of Faculty First Responders, a program that monitors right-wing attacks on academics and provides resources to help faculty members and administrators respond to manufactured outrage. Follow Isaac on x @isaac_kamola. 

Disrupting Peace is a production of the World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung.

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, my colleagues, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan.

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram at @worldpeacefdtn.

What's it like to lead without a military? In this episode, we focus on Costa Rica, and explore what happens when a country abolishes its military, Costa Rica’s approach to domestic security, and the ways that having a military can increase violence and instability in a country…Plus we’ll have our first former president on the show! 

Carlos Alvarado Quesada served as President of Costa Rica from 2018 to 2022. While president, he focused on combating climate change, defending human rights, democracy, and multilateralism, which is when countries cooperate to solve problems. Carlos currently teaches graduate courses on leadership at the Fletcher School at Tufts University, where the World Peace Foundation is based. Follow Carlos on Instagram @carlosalvq.

Jorge Vargas is Director of the State of the Nation Program in Costa Rica. As an academic researcher, he focuses on state reform and democracy in Central America. Find out more about Jorge’s work at estadonacion.or.cr.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) study we referenced can be found at www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2024-04/2404_fs_milex_2023.pdf

Check out “The Arms Trade - Let’s Talk About Big Weapons” and “AI & Autonomous Weapons Today” from Season 1 for more about militarization.

Disrupting Peace is a production of the World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung. 

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan.

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram @worldpeacefdtn.

How does a country rebuild after overthrowing a dictator?

On December 8, 2024, armed forces led by Islamist rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham overthrew the Assad regime, which had ruled as a corrupt and brutal dictatorship in Syria for over 50 years.

For now, the country is in an in-between phase – what was is gone, but it’s not yet clear what’s coming next. In this episode, we explore what it was like on the ground in the weeks after the Assad regime fell, why it was necessary to have some continuity with the former government, and key areas where Syria remains vulnerable.

Mohammad Kanfash is a PhD candidate at the Center for Conflict Studies at Utrecht University, where he focuses on State-Society relations in post-conflict areas in Syria. He also works on sanctions. Follow Mohammad on Linkedin, and learn more about his work at www.uu.nl/medewerkers/MKanfash

Ali Aljasem is a researcher at the Centre for Conflict Studies at Utrecht University focusing on paramilitary groups in Syria and on humanitarian aid. Ali visited Syria one week after Assad was defeated. Follow Ali on Linkedin, and learn more about his work at www.uu.nl/medewerkers/AAljasem

Note: we recorded this interview in late January. Since then the former leader of the victorious rebel group, Ahmed al-Sharaa, was officially appointed interim President, an interim Constitution has been crafted, and there has been large-scale violence led by Assad loyalists.

Disrupting Peace is a production of The World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung.

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan.

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram @worldpeacefdtn.

Sustaining a democracy often looks mundane. It includes managing different stakeholders, crafting policy, debating nuances and compromising. Ending a democracy can be dramatic: and it almost happened on December 3, 2024 when the president of South Korea, Yoon Suk Yeol, attempted to declare martial law during a televised address. 

In this episode, we’ll hear a first-hand account of what happened on the ground that night, and discuss how a political opposition can successfully overturn a president’s power grab.   

Jiho Cha is a member of the South Korean Parliament, in the opposition, Democratic Party. By training he is a physician, and has worked in global health and humanitarian affairs. Follow Jiho on Instagram @chajiho_oh and on Linkedin. 

 Myunghee Lee is an expert on authoritarian politics, democratization, protest and foreign policy in East Asia. She is an Assistant Professor of political science at Michigan State University. Find out more about her work at https://jmc.msu.edu/faculty-staff/directory/Lee.html 

Disrupting Peace is a production of The World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung.   

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan. 

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram @worldpeacefdtn. 

What can we learn about building and sustaining a women’s movement from arguably the world’s leaders: Icelandic feminists?

To kick off the season, we’re focusing on Iceland, the country ranked number one for gender equality for 15 years in a row. Together, we explore what makes Iceland unique, how younger generations are pushing the feminist agenda forward, and why limiting freedom around parental leave has increased equality in this volcanic, Nordic country.

 Silja Bára Ómarsdóttir is a Professor of International Affairs at the University of Iceland. Her research includes Icelandic and feminist foreign policy, national security, and reproductive rights. Find out more about Silja’s work at: https://english.hi.is/staff/sbo

Tatjana Latinović has lived in Iceland since 1994, when she relocated there from Croatia. She is a Vice President of Intellectual Property at Ossur, a medical device company. But most relevant to this conversation, she’s a human rights activist, focusing on feminist and immigrant issues in Iceland, and is the current President of the Icelandic Women's Rights Association. Find out more about Tatiana’s work at: https://kvenrettindafelag.is

Disrupting Peace is a production of The World Peace Foundation. The show is produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson. Marketing and Social media by Emily Ruhm. Show artwork by Simon Fung.

Special thanks to Jeremy Helton, my colleagues, Lisa Avery, B. Arneson, and Alex de Waal, and the team from the Tufts Digital Design Studio, including Kimberly Lynn Forero-Arnias, and Miles Donovan.

Find out more about the World Peace Foundation at worldpeacefoundation.org. Follow us on Bluesky at worldpeacefdtn.bsky.social, and on Instagram at @worldpeacefdtn. 

In Season 2 of Disrupting Peace, we are looking around the world – and here in the US – to learn about how people resist efforts to concentrate political power. In each episode, host Bridget Conley, research director at the World Peace Foundation, speaks with local experts on the history and practicalities of resistance. Together they explore what works, what doesn’t, and why we shouldn’t give up.

Season 2 launches on March 11th.

Disrupting Peace is a production of the World Peace Foundation. Find out more at worldpeacefoundation.org.

Full Transcript

Bridget: Imagine you are president of the United States. It's a little bigger than Costa Rica. What would happen if the US abolished, you know, got rid of its military? How would that be possible and what would that change in the world?

Jorge: Frankly speaking, I could not envisage any scenario in which the US can disarm itself. At least not on my senses. Maybe if I am high… [laughter]

I could think about it because it's not a problem of a specific institution, but it's a problem of changing the global order.

[Music comes up] 

I’m Bridget Conley, research director at the World Peace Foundation, and host of “Disrupting Peace”, a podcast about why peace hasn’t worked, and how it still could.

Today, it’s clear the US is backsliding when it comes to democracy and human rights. And it’s not just us. There’s a global shift towards concentrating power in the hands of an ever-smaller group of men – and it's nearly always men – at the top.

So this season, we’re looking at examples of resistance from six countries to see what we can learn. Scholars, activists, and politicians will help us understand how leaders attempt to concentrate power and how people fight back.

We’ll ask what we can learn from Iceland about sustaining a gender equality movement.

Silja: Prepare, resist oppression, lift the marginalized voices. And that's where there's opportunity for progress.

 We’ll hear from the former president of Costa Rica about governing without a military. From a member of South Korea’s parliament about overturning martial law. And from Syrians, about how people rebuild their lives in the wake of dictatorship and war.  

Ali: I arrived in Damascus one week after the Assad was toppled. I remember passing by a checkpoint and we had a driver. And then he said, you know, I want to kiss your forehead. I want to hug you because you don't know what we were going through just 10 days ago.

And while the topics are serious - think attempted state takeovers and preserving women’s rights - we’re not.

Tatjana: I welcome, you know, all these, you know, new revolutions being made, like free the nipple girls, you know, and -

 Bridget: Wait, sorry. You're gonna have to say, Tatjana. What was that?

Tatjana: Sorry [laughter], free the nipple. It was 10 years ago that girls from various colleges here just freed their nipples and took off their bras and marched to protest sexist behavior of boys in schools.

Season 2 of Disrupting Peace launches March 11th.

You can find us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. Subscribe now, so you don’t miss a single episode. We’ll see you then!