The current narrative of US-China relations is one of confrontational, geopolitical jockeying – but is this consistent with reality?

Dr. Michel Hockx, Director of the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies within Notre Dame’s Keough School of Global Affairs, joins Ray Offenheiser to help us look beyond this existing rhetoric of US-China relations and imagine an alternative narrative.

For the past 30 years, Dr. Hockx has lived, worked, and conducted research in China and has published widely on topics related to modern Chines literature and culture. His ongoing research focuses on the effects of moral censorship on the preservation and digitization of modern Chinese cultural products.

In the first of a two-part series on China, Dr. Hockx breaks down the current state of US-China relations and brings a new perspective to this complicated conversation.

Dr. Gary Gereffi, Emeritus Professor of Sociology and Director of the Center on Globalization, Governance & Competitiveness at Duke University, joins Ray Offenheiser to discuss the effect of COVID-19 on global supply chains. Recognized as one of the founders of the Global Value Chains framework, Dr. Gereffi speaks about what we can expect post-crisis and how COVID-19 could affect globalization as we know it.

Listeners will get an insight into the Global Fragility Act (GFA) in this discussion with Maura Policelli, Executive Director of Notre Dame’s Keough School of Global Affairs Washington Office, and Paul Perrin, Director of Evidence & Learning with the Pulte Institute for Global Development.

Both Policelli and Perrin are part of the Keough School team that produced a policy paper in support of the US government’s efforts to implement the GFA and address global fragility. You can read the paper online at go.nd.edu/globalfragility.

Peter Bryant – Chair and Co-Founder of the Development Partner Institute – talks with Ray Offenheiser and discusses how the Extractive Industries are rethinking their role in society.

Ian Gary – Director of Power and Money at Oxfam America – talks with Ray Offenheiser and discusses the ethics and activism in the extractive industries. This episode is a recording of Offenheiser’s conversation with Gary as part of a live webinar hosted in partnership with the Catholic Peacebuilding Network, part of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. Learn more about Gary and his work at oxfamamerica.org, or on Twitter at @IanPGary.

Ben Phillips—co-founder of the Fight Inequality Alliance—sits down with Ray Offenheiser and discusses a variety of topics related to domestic and global inequality, including the concentration of wealth among a handful of individuals; the relationship between taxes on the wealthy and economic growth; and the links between inequality and poverty.

Admiral Tim Ziemer—the Acting Assistant Administrator for the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Assistance (DCHA) at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID)—sits down with Ray Offenheiser and discusses how the U.S. is working to address critical health and humanitarian issues across the globe. 

Scott Paul, the Humanitarian Policy Lead at Oxfam America, sits down with Ray Offenheiser and discusses the Saudi Arabian–led intervention in Yemen, which has led to a humanitarian crisis that has been called "the worst in the world" by the United Nations. Paul was at the University of Notre Dame for a panel event titled "Hope for Yemen: Ending the World’s Worst Humanitarian Crisis." Other panelists included Awssan Kamal, the Rights in Crisis Acting Head at Oxfam International, and Nawal al-Maghafi a Special Correspondent with the BBC. Learn more and see a recording of the panel at ndigd.nd.edu/HopeforYemenPanel.