Trending Globally: Politics and Policy

The Watson School
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An award-winning show exploring today's biggest global challenges with the world's leading experts, from the Watson School of International and Public Affairs at Brown University. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.

  1. 2D AGO

    Border politics at our doorstep with Ieva Jusionyte

    How do borders — both the physical barriers and the political realities — shape our society? These questions have long driven the work of Ieva Jusionyte, an anthropologist at the Watson School and director of Watson’s Center for Human Rights and Humanitarian Studies. In the last nine months, Ieva won both a MacArthur Genius grant and a Guggenheim fellowship for her path-breaking work exploring how political borders shape individuals and communities. On this episode, Dan Richards talks with Ieva about her research, how it feels to have her work receive so much recognition, and what we can all learn from border communities as immigration enforcement comes to our collective doorstep. Watch the conversation on our YouTube channel Transcript coming soon to our website

    35 min

  2. APR 30

    The extraction industry powering the green transition (from the Rhodes Center Podcast)

    Lithium is an essential ingredient of most modern electronics. It helps to power our phones, our laptops, and increasingly EVs and other key parts of the green transition. As Thea Riofrancos, a political scientist and author of the new book “Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism,” explains, the story of lithium — how it's mined, how it’s refined, and how it makes its way around the world — isn’t just a business story. It's a story of geopolitics and power. On this episode (originally published on the Rhodes Center Podcast, another podcast from the Watson School), Watson political economist and Rhodes Center director Mark Blyth talks with Thea about the politics and economics of lithium extraction, how the race to electrify our energy supply is reshaping the global economy, and what it means for the future of our planet. Learn more about and purchase Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism Watch Mark and Thea’s discussion at the Watson School

    40 min

  3. APR 16

    From pandemics to misinformation: rethinking security today

    From a once-in-a-century global pandemic, to wars in Europe and the Middle East, to the unchecked rise of AI and social media technologies, we are living in an age of threats against humanity that are profound, fast-moving, and interconnected. On this episode, produced in collaboration with the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Dan Richards talks with two experts from very different fields about the interdisciplinary nature of “security studies”, how the COVID-19 pandemic has pushed experts to think about international security in new ways, and where they see some of the biggest threats to humanity today. Guests on this episode: Rose McDermott is a political scientist and professor of international relations at the Watson School.Jennifer Nuzzo is a professor of epidemiology and director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University’s School of Public Health. Learn more about the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Learn more about Brown University School of Public Health’s Pandemic Center

    40 min

  4. APR 2

    Biden’s industrial policy: what worked, what didn’t, and why it still matters

    On this episode, Dan Richards talks with Andrew Schrank, a professor of sociology and international and public affairs at the Watson School, about the legacy of President Biden’s industrial policy — what it achieved, what it failed to achieve, and its continued effect on America’s economy and society. They also explore how President Trump's efforts to shape American industry compare to President Biden’s, and how both administrations have challenged long-standing notions about the role that government should play in our economy. Watch the video of this conversation on YouTube. Read Andrew Schrank’s article “Can Industrial Policy Still Do Big Things?” in Issues in Science and Technology

    39 min

  5. MAR 19

    A brief history of US interventionism in Iran and beyond

    On this episode, Dan Richards spoke with Watson School Senior Fellow Stephen Kinzer about the history of U.S. foreign intervention and how it can help us to understand today’s conflict in Iran. Stephen is an award-winning foreign correspondent who spent more than 20 years reporting around the world with the New York Times, and has written multiple books on the history of U.S. intervention abroad, including “All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror,” which explored the history and unintended consequences of the CIA-backed 1953 coup in Iran.

    39 min

  6. MAR 5

    How US economic policy is interacting with the global economy today

    On this episode, Watson School Dean and economist John Friedman talks with economist Sebnem Kalemli Ozcan about how U.S. economic policy in the last year has changed the American economy, how those changes have rippled throughout the global economic and financial system, and what it means for America’s place in a rapidly evolving international order. Sebnem Kalemli Ozcan is a professor of economics at Brown and the director of the Global Linkages Lab, a collaborative research hub dedicated to deepening our understanding of globalization. Starting in July, she'll also be serving as the director of the Watson School’s Rhodes Center for International Economics and Finance. John Friedman is Vascellaro Family Dean of the Watson School, and Briger Family Distinguished Professor of Economics and International and Public Affairs Watch this episode of Trending Globally on YouTube.

    42 min

  7. FEB 12

    How federal courts shape US public policy — and how that’s changed under President Trump

    President Trump has issued more executive orders in the first year of his second term than he did in all four years of his first. These orders — which have directed government action on issues ranging from immigration to tariffs to the funding of federal agencies — have been met with hundreds of lawsuits filed in federal court. As a result, our federal court system is shaping U.S. public policy more than at any time in recent history, and federal judges are making decisions on many of the most pressing policy issues facing society today. So, what does this new legal landscape mean for American politics, and what does it mean for America’s judicial branch? To help make sense of this change (and to put it in historical context), Dan Richards spoke with Judge William Smith, former Chief Judge for the U.S. District Court of Rhode Island. Judge Smith was appointed by George W. Bush in 2002 and retired in 2025; he is also a Senior Fellow in International and Public Affairs at the Watson School, where he currently leads a study group on the role of the courts in U.S. public policy.

    44 min

  8. JAN 29

    Are human brains wired for war?

    Violent, organized conflict is a near constant in human history. But why? Often, large-scale conflicts and wars are explained in material or political terms: humans engaging in conflict over land, resources, or ideologies. But as Rose McDermott, the David and Marianna Fisher University Professor of International Relations, sees it, these explanations fail to fully account for war’s existence and persistence throughout the long history of our species. To do that, McDermott argues that we need to take more seriously the ways that human psychology — shaped by our evolution as a species — predisposes some of us to violence. On this episode, Dan Richards spoke with Rose McDermott about how millennia of human evolution have wired our brains — particularly male brains — for war; what this means for modern society; and how we might think about building structures and institutions to help chart a new, more peaceful path for humanity.

    39 min
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An award-winning show exploring today's biggest global challenges with the world's leading experts, from the Watson School of International and Public Affairs at Brown University. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.

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