We continue our Best of 2023 episodes with an  episode from the Future Hindsight podcast, hosted by Mila Atmos.

Jocelyn Simonson is Professor of Law at Brooklyn Law School, a former public defender, and the author of Radical Acts of Justice: How Ordinary People Are Dismantling Mass Incarceration. We discuss how certain radical acts of justice challenge the legitimacy of the criminal system and form the underpinning of a new collective legal thought.

The four pillars of this work comprise of court watching, community bail funds, participatory defense, and people’s budgets. Bail funds are pulling the rug out from the system's justification for what it's doing. Defunding the system in this way shows that the combination of carceral and economic forces that we currently use to “do justice” is not inevitable. A big part of the power of these acts of justice is that they’re done collectively. Abolition has two sides: breaking down and building up. Jocelyn shared that “we need to simultaneously decarcerate, stop spending our resources, and start building it out.”

Follow Jocelyn on Twitter: 

https://twitter.com/j_simonson

Follow Mila on Twitter: 

https://twitter.com/milaatmos

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We continue our Best of 2023 episodes with an  episode from the Village SquareCast podcast, hosted by the Village Square.

This is when you meet a living legend and get the benefit of his thinking on the topic he’s been brilliantly, prophetically right about for more than three decades: the deterioration of our connectedness with each other across almost every demographic and every aspect of our lives—our loss of social capital.  And yet here we are, painfully and tragically paying the price for our failure to put our shoulders to this wheel when it was (almost eerily) knowable when Dr. Robert Putnam first articulated the societal trend in his iconic book “Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of America Community” (we’ve just re-read it, and we’re still not sure he’s not secretly a time-traveler).  Joined by Shaylyn Romney Garrett, his co-author on “The Upswing: How America Came Together A Century Ago and How We Can Do It Again,” they’re beseeching us to do it now (and we’re doing just that, until the end of 2024). Bonus: they’re showing us that what we need to do is actually fun, fills our souls—and might just save our country.

Learn more about Dr. Putnam and Shaylyn Romney Garrett in the full program description online here. Pick up a copy of The Upswing and Bowling Alone (you'll thank us) at our partner bookseller Midtown (wherever you live).

Please also take a moment to watch the trailer of "Join or Die: A film about why you should join a club - and why the fate of America depends on it," produced and directed by Rebecca Davis and Pete Davis. 

Note that in the discussion Dr. Putnam references a chart in the discussion - you can find the two-slide chart here (the first is the imaginary picture we have in our minds about how race in America changed and is not correct; the second is correct).

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We continue our Best of 2023 episodes with an  episode from the Let's Find Common Ground podcast, hosted by Richard Davies & Ashley Milne-Tyte.

We speak with two women from opposing sides of the bitter and often toxic debate over abortion. Frances Hogan and The Rev. Anne Fowler were involved in a series of years-long intensive, secret talks. Their candid conversations began after a gunman opened fire at two Massachusetts abortion clinics nearly thirty years ago. The attack left two women dead and five people injured.  

In this episode, we learn the extraordinary story of how Anne and Frances gained a much deeper understanding and respect for one another. They didn’t change their views about the abortion issue, but they did become friends. 

We share moments of compassion, kindness, and humor.

Both Frances and Anne were among those profiled in the new documentary, "Abortion Talks", about what happened after the deadly attacks. On "Let's Find Common Ground", both of them explain how incredibly difficult it was to be part of many hours of exhausting conversations. We hear how they learned to overcome fear, stereotyping, misunderstandings, and anger. 

Please tell us what you think! Share your feedback in this short survey. For every survey completed, we’ll plant 5 trees.

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We continue our Best of 2023 episodes with an  episode from the The Bully Pulpit podcast, hosted by Bob Shrum and Mike Murphy

CPF Director Bob Shrum joins former U.S. Representatives Val Demings and Adam Kinzinger for a conversation on the politics of climate with the goal of finding common ground. They discuss political barriers to enacting climate action, climate legislation passed by Congress, and how environmental legislation can help achieve climate justice.   Featuring:

• Val Demings: Former U.S. Representative (D-FL)
• Adam Kinzinger: Former U.S. Representative (R-IL)
• Bob Shrum: Director, Center for the Political Future; Warschaw Chair in Practical Politics, USC Dornsife
• Bruce Bond: Co-Founder, CEO, & Board Chair of Common Ground Committee

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We continue our Best of 2023 episodes with an  episode from the Democracy in Danger podcast, hosted by Will Hitchcock & Siva Vaidhyanathan.

Law enforcement is among the most undemocratic institutions in America, says New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie. And the effect this has on communities of color is especially stark. Bouie visits Will and Siva’s class for another live recording with their students, to discuss police brutality, the country’s culture of violence, and the shifting ground of racial oppression in U.S. history. How citizens experience government, he says, depends a lot on what they look like and what levers of power they hold.

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On this episode of Our Body Politic, guest host Karen Grigsby Bates talks with Virginia Kase Solomón, CEO of the League of Women Voters, about the threats and issues poll workers face protecting democracy. Karen then speaks with Melissa Murray, NYU law professor and host of the podcast Strict Scrutiny about some of the cases SCOTUS will hear this term. We round out the show with Karen discussing how to navigate medical bias with artist, author and doctor, Shirlene Obuobi.

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Coming at you live from Light House Studio’s Vinegar Hill Theatre in Charlottesville, our fair city: Emily and Siva welcome Jennifer Weiss-Wolf and Samhita Sunya to the stage, as part of the Karsh Institute’s Democracy360 forum. Sunya, a cinema expert, and Weiss-Wolf, a pioneering advocate for women’s rights, discuss the power of film and print media to shape global feminism. From Bollywood to Ms. magazine, we look at why the women’s movement and its representation matter for the health of a society.

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The Democracy Group's Jessie Nguyen interviews Jahnavi Rao & Nivea Krishnan about New Voters, an organization that is helping the next generation of our country have their voice heard and a seat at the decision table. 

Jahnavi Rao is President & Founder of New Voters,  Government at Harvard University, Formerly White House, DNC, Harvard Kennedy, and UPenn. 

Nivea Krishnan is Executive Director of New Voters, Public Policy and Econ at USC, Student Government VP, Formerly State of Hawaii and Crooked Media.

Find this interview and more in our bi-weekly newsletter, a collection of the hottest podcast episodes from the network, upcoming special events, expert features, and news from you favorite shows.

Jahnavi Rao joins The Great Battlefield podcast to talk about her start in political activism, founding New Voters, which registers high school students to vote and now running New Voters Research Network where they use behavioral science tools to solve challenging problems.

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At the core of the deep societal divisions we navigate every day is an assumption that we share little with “those people” with whom we share a country—a belief that leaves us on dangerous ground as a nation. But author and entrepreneur Dr. Todd Rose says we’ve got that all wrong. According to Dr. Rose, not only do we agree more often than we think but we’re making terrible assumptions about what the people on our own side of the aisle think—then acting on those incorrect assumptions in a way that accelerates the divisions. Born of our highly social nature and hardwiring in our DNA, we so desperately want to protect our status and reputation inside our groups so we conform with what we think our group thinks—finding ourselves inside a “collective illusion” that is not only destabilizing society, it’s making us personally miserable.

Dr. Rose offers his compelling and revelatory insights about human forces that are far too easily ignored in his most recent book: “Collective Illusions: Conformity, Complicity and the Science of Why We Make Bad Decisions.” We think his work is just so important that we’re delighted to bring him to Tallahassee to meet you (and we’ll be hosting book clubs to dive into “Collective Illusions” through the year). We don’t think you’ll ever see the world quite the same way again (trust us, that’ll be a good thing). 

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