Podcast

This episode focuses on challenges facing K-12 education, particularly at the intersection of racism and sexism in the US education system today.  Dr. Watson—Associate Professor of Education Leadership, Provost Fellow, and inaugural Director of the Office for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging—discusses Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s idea of the “beloved community” and a framework for education based on care, courage, critical reflection, and community. She engages the disproportionate suspension of Black girls, adultification, and the imposition of oppressive norms and expectations. Prof. Watson finds that the voices of Black girls are essential to realizing just and inclusive education. She also discusses her research on Black women leaders in education, the limitations often imposed on their leadership, and their rich contributions in all spheres of society, and the positive impact of Black teachers on education outcomes. She focuses on improving the educational experiences of all children, especially the most marginalized, emphasizing the importance of seeing the strengths, cultural wealth, talents, and assets of children. 

This episode grapples with the limitations of the legal definition of genocide in international law and its implications for international responses to mass civilian destruction. Prof. Dirk Moses—Anne and Bernard Spitzer Professor of Political Science at The City College of New York—historically situates the development of the concept of genocide, examines the challenges posed by the narrow definition codified in the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948), and what killings of innocent civilians are obscured and “normalized” by its status as the “crime of crimes.” He discusses his latest major publication—The Problems of Genocide: Permanent Security and the Language of Transgression, published by Cambridge University Press in 2021. Prof. Moses illuminates gaps in international law regarding civilian protection and presents the concept of “permanent security,” which he argues captures genocide and other recognized mass atrocity crimes as well as the continuous “collateral damage” that we see in today’s low-intensity warfare. Prof. Moses concludes the episode with an analysis of the Ukraine conflict, what the UN can do to resolve it, and the war’s broader implications for the international system. 

This episode is devoted to examining the right to health and health care systems in comparative perspective with Dr. Lorraine Frisina Doetter, Political Scientist and Senior Lecturer in Public Health at the University of Bremen, Senior Consultant at the World Health Organization, and editor of the Global Dynamics in Social Policy book series published by Palgrave Macmillan.  It engages the challenges and benefits of comparing Global North and Global South systems as well as the impacts of neoliberalism, aging populations, and migration, including of health care workers, on such systems. It considers the US health care system, its weaknesses, and impediments to reform as well as key global challenges regarding effective emergency response resulting from pandemics and climate change impacts. 

This episode engages the theme of reproductive rights in the United States and beyond. Prof. Cynthia Soohoo—Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Human Rights and Gender Justice Clinic at the CUNY School of Law—illuminates the history of reproductive oppression in the United States. She examines the rights gains made with past US Supreme Court decisions—particularly Roe v Wade (1973) and subsequently Planned Parenthood v Casey (1992)—as well as the obstacles that have been erected over the past decades at the state level that have disproportionately impeded access to abortion for women of color, the poor, and those in rural areas. She discusses trends in regulation, criminalization, and heath care spending as well as foreign aid restrictions. Prof. Soohoo also examines the implications of the 2022 Dobbs decision that overturned a 50-year-long right to abortion in the United States. She argues that the post-Roe era is distinct owing to an expansion of state-level criminal law. She explains the impact of diminished rights resulting from forced pregnancy and childbirth, including the right to privacy, right to autonomy, right to health, and right to be free of torture, cruel and inhuman treatment. Prof. Soohoo also notes how the US Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision counters the global trend of reproductive rights liberalization worldwide. 

This episode engages with a range of themes at the intersection of human rights and medicine with Christian De Vos, Director of Research and Investigations, and Payal Shah, Director of the Program on Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones, at Physicians for Human Rights (PHR). They discuss PHR’s work gathering evidence of grave human rights abuses to advance justice processes, supporting clinicians to provide survivor-centered, trauma-informed care, and advancing advocacy to change law and policy. They cover such issues as sexual violence in armed conflict contexts, support for asylum seekers, attacks on health workers and facilities, and instances of medical professionals’ complicity in torture and cruel and inhumane treatment. De Vos and Shah draw on a range of country examples, including Bangladesh, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Syria, Ukraine, and the United States.