The Fletcher Forum Podcast

Matt Livesay (MGA '26) sat down with Professor Michael Glennon to discuss his recent article titled, "Where Have All the (War) Powers Gone?" which is his latest in a series of publications analyzing the rapidly changing international and domestic legal environments.

On this "Fletcher Focus" episode, Shabnam Waheed (MALD '26) was joined by the student organizers of the 2025 Conference on Gender and International Affairs (Emily Ruhm PhD, Maeve Murphy MALD '26). Through a discussion of this year's conference, Emily and Maeve address misconceptions of how gender is viewed in international affairs, the wide range of applications for the lens, and why it is so salient today.

The conference will take place on campus November 13 and 14th. Please see the links below for more details.

Conference Website: https://sites.tufts.edu/genderconference/

Article Referenced: https://worldpeacefoundation.org/blog/interrogating-the-authoritarian-frame-boundaries-of-belonging/

-The views shared on the Fletcher Forum Podcast are not representative of the Fletcher School or the Fletcher Forum of World Affairs-

Matt Livesay (MGA '26) sat down with Professor Mikhail Troitskiy to discuss the current state of diplomatic negotiations in the Russia-Ukraine War, the challenges of negotiating with authoritarians, nuclear risks arising from this conflict, and events at the Russia-Eurasia Center at Fletcher.

The Decolonizing International Relations Conference is back at Fletcher October 16 and 17!

DIR 2025 intends to highlight transformative practices that unsettle imperial legacies and challenge the rearticulation of colonial modes of control in policy, scholarship, and everyday life.

Katherine and Lorenzo sat down with Professor Juan Carlos Portilla Jaimes on September 12th to discuss Arms Smuggling, International Law, and the future of education in Colombia. Professor Juan Carlos is an internationally recognized speaker specializing in anti-money laundering and the global fight against transnational financial crime. He received an L.L.M. from Fletcher and currently teaches International Financial Law at Sabana University School of Law in Chia, Colombia.

(Image courtesy of Professor Juan Carlos)​

The civil war in Sierra Leone ended more than two decades ago, but that's no reason for Theresa Betancourt and Moses Zombo to turn their eyes away. In this episode, we speak about their decades of work in Sierra Leone and their most recent book, Shadows into Light: A Generation of Former Child Soldiers Comes of Age, where they present findings from tracking more than 500 former child soldiers over the course of twenty years.

Their insights are surprising but hopeful: despite immense suffering, this is not a lost generation. Theresa and Moses take us on a journey to Sierra Leone to explore the long road of recovery, resilience, and what it means to come of age after war.

KP and Katherine sit down with Climate Policy Lab scholars - Bethany Tietjen, Hengrui Liu and Nora Hampl to discuss the upcoming Symposium themed "Mind The Gaps: Climate Policy Integration and Implementation" happening September 18 and 19 on campus!

REGISTER HERE: https://www.climatepolicylab.org/symposium

Michael Caster, Head of Global China Programme at ARTICLE 19, joins the podcast to discuss the growth of Chinese norms in digital governance and cybersecurity.

Check out Article 19! : ARTICLE 19 - Defending freedom of expression and information.

Report on Cybersecurity with Chinese Characteristics: cybersecurity-with-chinese-characteristics.pdf

Report on the Digital Silk Road: China: The rise of digital repression in the Indo-Pacific - ARTICLE 19

Bhaskar Chakravorti is the Dean of Global Business at Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. He is the founding executive director of Fletcher's Institute for Business in the Global Context, where he established and chairs the Digital Planet research program. His recent book Defeating Disinformation (co-edited with Joel Trachtman) was published by Cambridge University Press in January 2025.

Dean Chakravorti is joined by Veeradittya Podder and Alexander Wolfe for a frank discussion on the theoretical limits of AI and the politics which lurk behind it.

Today, Marlene is joined by Emily Prey (F20), a Senior Non-Resident Fellow at the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy. Her research focuses on women and children in crisis and conflict situations. She most recently co-authored a report on Children Born of War (CBOW).

In this episode, we explore what CBOW entails, how countries can handle the trauma of victims, and why this phenomenon has always been present in wars. We touch on a variety of case studies which show that children are in the midst of every war — no matter if we continue to ignore them.

Trigger warning: We speak about sexual violence in this episode.

Children Born of War: Considerations for Policymakers by Ingvill Constanze Ødegaard and Emily Prey, co-published with the Children Born of War Project

Conflict-Related Sexual Violence in Ukraine: Lessons from Bosnia by Emily Prey, Tanya Domi, and Dr. Kinsey Spears

Emily Prey offers her special recognition and thanks to Inger Skjelsbæk, leader of the EuroWARCHILD project, and Torunn L Tryggestad, Deputy Director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), who co-hosted a workshop on children born of war in Oslo. Thank you to all of the participants for sharing their research and deep expertise on this topic, which have led to such a rich conversation on this podcast.