The Global Cable

Welcome to another year of The Global Cable. In this special episode, we mark the launch of the Great Powers and Urbanization Project (GPUP for short).

GPUP is a new international initiative, in which Perry World House, the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, the University of Melbourne's Connected Cities Lab, and the Argentine Council for International Relations are looking at the evolving role of cities on the world stage.

Perry World House’s John Gans and Jocelyn Perry sit down with leaders from three major cities, and an expert on urbanization:

• Ian Klaus, Senior Fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs
• Penny Abeywardena, Commissioner for International Affairs, New York City
• Henri-Paul Normandin, Director for International Relations, City of Montréal, Canada
• Mauricio Rodas, Mayor of Quito, Ecuador (2014-2019)

Due to a range of factors, cities and city leaders are increasingly active in international diplomacy, something that was traditionally the preserve of the nation state. This special episode explores what cities can do, what they can't do, and what this means for a changing world.  

Music and produced by Tre Hester.

While it is often presented as an issue of the future, climate change is already having an immense impact on our environment. On this episode of The Global Cable, our Director William Burke-White talks to Aromar Revi and Irina Marinov about how the international community can mitigate the impact, and adapt in the face of climate change.

Aromar Revi is the Director of the Indian Institute for Human Settlements, and was a contributing author to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s recent report on the devastating potential effects of just 1.5°C change in temperature. Irina Marinov is an Associate Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, researching the impact of climate change on the world’s oceans.

Together with Burke-White, Revi and Marinov discuss the problems climate change is already causing, from migration of species to ocean acidification. They look at how the international community, local governments, and businesses will need to come together to transform the way we live, and find innovative solutions to address climate change.

This is the final episode of Season 2 of The Global Cable, and we’ll be taking a break over the summer. Thank you for listening!

Is the threat at the Southern Border really as severe as President Trump claims it to be? On this episode of ‘The Global Cable’, our Director Bill Burke-White sits down with national security expert Richard Clarke to find out.

A University of Pennsylvania graduate, Clarke served in the federal government for 30 years, rising to become National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection and Counter-Terrorism and a member of the National Security Council. He is currently the Chairman and CEO of Good Harbor Security Management, working with governments across the world to advise them on risk.

While in recent months the migration crisis at the United States’ Southern border has dominated the news agenda, Burke-White and Clarke discuss the new developments that Clarke feels actually put the United States at risk. In a world where data can cross borders more easily than people – with espionage in the tech sector, and the threat of cyber-attack – the two talk about ways the United States can ensure its security.

On this episode of The Global Cable, Perry World House’s Director William Burke-White sits down with Bruce Jentleson, Professor of Public Policy and Political Science at Duke University, to discuss his book ‘The Peacemakers: Leadership Lessons from Twentieth-Century Statesmanship.’   

As a seasoned scholar with extensive real-world policy experience –on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s policy planning staff, he looked for ways to prevent atrocities around the world – Jentleson brings a unique perspective to the stories of 14 people who worked for peace at different moments in the 20th Century.  

Each of the book’s chapters profiles a peacemaker – exploring what they set out to accomplish, what influenced them, and where they succeeded and failed. 'The Peacemakers' draws important lessons from the lives and work of yesterday’s leaders that can help today’s leaders.  

Burke-White and Jentleson also explore some of the challenges for those trying to make peace in the twenty-first century. Any would-be peacemakers must contend with major challenges, including climate change and the United States’ complex relationship with China. As a result, Burke-White and Jentleson consider whether there can ever be such a thing as a perfect peacemaker in today’s dynamic world.

On this episode of The Global Cable, Perry World House Deputy Director LaShawn Jefferson is joined by Edith Kahbang (‘Kah’) Walla, our 2018-2019 Global Shifts Visiting Fellow.

Kah is a Cameroonian political leader, activist, feminist, and entrepreneur with 20 years' experience working on political, economic, and social issues in Africa.

Cameroon is facing serious conflict, with tensions high between the English-speaking and French-speaking parts of the country. In this episode, Kah and LaShawn discuss how Cameroon can start to bridge this divide – a legacy of its colonial past – and begin the transition from autocracy to a democratic, inclusive state.

Music & Produced by Tre Hester.

On this episode of The Global Cable, Perry World House Inaugural Director and University of Pennsylvania Law Professor William Burke-White and Global Shifts Program Manager Jocelyn Perry are joined by Dr. Victoria Herrmann, President & Managing Director of the Arctic Institute, a center for circumpolar security studies. They'll discuss Victoria's research on climate change, community adaptation, human development, and resource economies, the role of the United States & Canada in protecting communities in the far north and the impact climate change is having on the Arctic region as a whole.

Music & Produced by Tre Hester

On this episode of The Global Cable, Perry World House Inaugural Director and University of Pennsylvania Law Professor William Burke-White is joined by Penn Alumnus & Mayor of Quito, Ecuador, Mauricio Rodas to discuss the role of cities in climate change adaptation and mitigation, the importance of city and government collaboration to act on climate change and the significance of the U20!

Music & Produced by Tre Hester

On this episode of The Global Cable, Perry World House Associate Director and University of Pennsylvania Professor of Political Science Michael Horowitz is joined by Former Environmental Protection Agency Administrator and Director of Harvard's new climate science center, C-CHANGE, Center for Climate, Health and the Global Environment, Gina McCarthy to discuss the role of federal agencies in climate change adaptation and mitigation, the importance of individual actions to act on climate change and which Boston sports team will be the next champion.

Music & Produced by Tre Hester

On this episode of The Global Cable, Perry World House Inaugural Director William Burke-White is joined by Penn Presidential Professor of the Practice and Former Governor of Florida, Jeb Bush to discuss the role of states in climate change adaptation and mitigation, the state of American politics today and the importance of being active in local politics. 

Music & Produced by Tre Hester

On Today’s Global Cable, Perry World House Deputy Director LaShawn Jefferson will be talking with Veronica Gago, a professor at the National University of San Martin in Argentina, Joanne Smith, the founding president and CEO of Girls for Gender Equity, an advocacy group committed to the physical, psychological, social, and economic development of girls and women, and Veronica Avila, the national campaign co-manager with Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, a restaurant workers’ center committed to improving wages and working conditions for the nation’s restaurant workforce about important issues facing women and girls in the world today and the importance of grassroots organizations in the #MeToo movement across the world!

LaShawn Jefferson is Perry World House’s Deputy Director. She brings to Perry World House over two decades of legal and policy advocacy, strategic planning and communications, and research and writing on women’s international human rights through civil-society organizations and philanthropy. She joined Perry World House after almost seven years at the Ford Foundation, where she worked to advance women’s human rights globally and in the U.S. through field building and investments in the areas of rights advocacy; strategic communications and engagement; intersectional leadership and analysis; research; and capacity building. For fourteen years, she also held several leadership positions at Human Rights Watch, a global human rights organization, where she led their women’s rights research and advocacy work, providing strategic and intellectual guidance to the work on women’s international human rights, crafting and executing long-term advocacy strategies, and representing HRW at the highest level of national and international fora. She is the author of many reports on a variety of issues confronting women around the world, and has written op-eds and articles that have appeared in the Wall Street Journal and The International Herald Tribune. She received a BA from Connecticut College and an  MA in International Relations and Latin American Studies from Johns Hopkins SAIS.

Veronica Avila is currently the National Campaign co-manager with the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC-United), a restaurant workers’ center committed to improving wages and working conditions for the nation’s restaurant workforce. Previously she served as a researcher with ROC-United and as the Director of ROC Chicago. In addition to supporting ROC-United's campaign work, she is currently a fellow with Data and Society, looking at the cross section of tech and restaurants. Prior to her work with ROC-United, Avila worked a labor rights organizer with service worker unions, Unite Here Local 1 and SEIU 32BJ. Avila holds an MSc in Inequalities and Social Science from the London School of Economics.

Verónica Gago is a professor at the Instituto de Altos Estudios at the National University of San Martín, in Argentina, and a visiting scholar at the University of Buenos Aires, in its International Consortium of Critical Theory Programs. Gago teaches Political Science at the University of Buenos Aires and is a professor of Sociology at the Instituto de Altos Estudios, National University of San Martín. She is also an Assistant Researcher at the National Council of Research (CONICET). Gago is the author of Neoliberalism from Below: Popular Pragmatics and Baroque and of numerous articles published in journals and books throughout Latin America, Europe, and the U.S. She is a member of the independent radical collective press Tinta Limón. She was part of the militant research experience Colectivo Situaciones, and she is now a member of Ni Una Menos, which is a Latin America grassroots, feminist movement that works to eradicate gender-based violence.

Joanne N. Smith is the Founding President and CEO moves Girls for Gender Equity (GGE), an intergenerational advocacy organization committed to the physical, psychological, social, and economic development of girls and women. Smith advances GGE’s mission through strategic advocacy, development, and leadership cultivation. A staunch human rights advocate, Smith co-chaired the nation’s first Young Women’s Initiative, a cross-sector Initiative coordinating government, philanthropic, and community efforts to create the conditions for cis, trans girls of color and GNC youth to thrive. Smith’s leadership helped to facilitate a $30M commitment from government and philanthropy to invest in community-driven recommendations. Smith is a steering committee member of Black Girl Movement and member of Move to End Violence -a 10-year initiative designed to strengthen the collective capacity to end gender-based violence in the United States. Smith is an alumna of Hunter Graduate School of Social Work and Columbia Institute for Nonprofit Management. GGE challenges structural forces - racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia, economic inequality - that work to constrict the freedom, full expression, and rights of girls and young women of color (trans and cis) and gender non-conforming/non-binary youth.

Music & Produced by Tre Hester.