Tag Archives: Governance / Law

Scholars’ Circle – Aftermath of The US Election 2020 exposes A Crisis of Legitimacy – November 22, 2020

November 21, 2020 host

Was the election conducted properly? Will mail in ballots be counted and will that count be allowed to stand? Will the US Supreme Court decide the final outcome? And what, in any case, will become of American democracy? In this urgent and timely event, University of Auckland lecturers will use the lenses of law, political science, and psychology to explain this contested election and discuss the implications of the final outcome. This is a recording of the panel gathered at University of Auckland Law School on November 18th, 2020.

Associate Professor Timothy Kuhner from the Faculty of Law at University of Auckland. Professor Kuhner is known for his critical approaches to the law of democracy. His teaching and research focus on comparative constitutional law, corruption, political finance, and law & society. He is the author of Capitalism v. Democracy: Money in Politics and the Free Market Constitution (Stanford University Press, 2014)
Dr Maria Armoudian from the Faculty of Arts at University of Auckland. Dr. Maria Armoudian is a lecturer at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, the host and producer of the radio program, The Scholars’ Circle, and the author of two books, Kill the Messenger: The Media’s Role in the Fate of the World, and Reporting from the Danger Zone: Frontline Journalists, Their Jobs and an Increasingly Perilous Future.
Associate Professor Danny Osborne from the Faculty of Science at University of Auckland. Danny Osborne is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Psychology at the University of Auckland. Danny received his PhD from UCLA in 2011, where he studied social psychology with an emphasis in political psychology and quantitative methods. Danny’s research seeks to understand the causes and consequences of inequality, with a particular emphasis on ideology and collective action. His publications include Ideology and Post-Colonial Society and Opposing Paths to Ideology: Group-Based Relative Deprivation Predicts Conservatism Through Warmth Toward Ingroup and Outgroup Members.
Associate Professor Scott Optican from the Faculty of Law at University of Auckland.He specializes in evidence, criminal procedure, and comparative criminal procedure, and has written widely on criminal justice and policing issues arising under the New Zealand Bill of Rights. Scott is also a co-author of The New Zealand Bill of Rights (Oxford University Press: 2003), the first comprehensive treatise on the protection of rights and freedoms under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – US 2020 Elections, views from outside the US – November 8, 2020

November 7, 2020 host

How does the US election look to people outside the US. Will its ability to navigate the process show observers abroad the strength of US democracy or will it show its weaknesses.

We explore the American election as viewed from Greece, Britain, Brazil and Canada. [ dur: 58mins. ]

Aristotle Tziampiris is Professor of International Relations and Director of the MSc Program in Energy: Strategy, Law & Economics at the Department of International and European Studies of the University of Piraeus. He is also the President of the Council for International Relations-Greece. He is the author of Greece, European Political Cooperation and the Macedonian Question and co-editor of The New Eastern Mediterranean: Theory, Politics and States in Volatile Era and The Emergence of the Israeli-Greek Cooperation.
Erica Resende is Assistant Professor of International Relations and Security Studies at the Brazilian War College in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She is the co-editor of Memory and Trauma in International Relations: Theories, Cases and Debates; and Crisis and Change in Post Cold-War Global Politics.
Simon Radford is an independent scholar based in the UK. He is the author of Can donations buy you a British peerage: a study in the link between party, political funding and peerage nominations, 2005 – 2014.
Lisa Burke is a Ph.D. Candidate at the University of Denver. She is the author of Natural Disasters in the book Rethinking 21st Century Security.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Supreme Court and 2020 US Elections -/- Role of Class and Identity in US Elections – November 1, 2020

November 1, 2020 host

We speak about the Supreme Court and the Presidency. Also, how has Donald Trump reshaped the Federal Judiciary and the Supreme Court and how does that shape the election? [ dur: 29mins. ]

Michele Bratcher Goodwin is a Chancellor’s Professor at the University of California, Irvine and founding director of the Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy. She is the author of Policing The Womb: Invisible Women and the Criminalization of Motherhood, Baby Markets: Money and the Politics of Creating Families and Black Markets: The Supply and Demand of Body Parts.
Tim Fadgan is Politics and Policy Lecturer at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. He is the author of Do the best interests of the child end at the Nation’s shores: Immigration, state courts, and children in the United States.
Jennifer Frost is an Associate Professor for History at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She is the author of An Interracial Movement of the Poor: Community Organizing and the New Left in the 1960s and Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood: Celebrity Gossip and American Conservatism

We discuss how the role of class and identity politics in the midst of American politics are shaping elections. [ dur: 28mins. ]

Nancy Isenberg is Professor of American History at Louisiana State University. She is the co-author of The Problem of Democracy: The Presidents Adams Confront the Cult of Personality and author of the New York Times Bestseller White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America.
Tim Fadgan is Politics and Policy Lecturer at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. He is the author of Do the best interests of the child end at the Nation’s shores: Immigration, state courts, and children in the United States.
Jennifer Frost is an Associate Professor for History at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She is the author of An Interracial Movement of the Poor: Community Organizing and the New Left in the 1960s and Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood: Celebrity Gossip and American Conservatism

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – US Presidential Elections 2020 and Voter Suppression -/- How much does foreign and economic policy change with change of presidency? – October 11 , 2020

October 10, 2020 host

Who gets to vote? What are the laws that help or hinder the vote? How are those changing and how might that effect the results of the 2020 election? And how are the misinformation and disinformation campaigns through the use of social media misleading the voters? [ dur: 27mins. ]

Bertrall Ross is Chancellor’s Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of Passive Voter Suppression: Campaign Mobilization and the Effective Disfranchisement of the Poor and Fair Elections During a Crisis: Urgent Recommendations in Law, Media, Politics and Tech to Advance the Legitimacy of, and the Public’s Confidence in, the November 2020 U.S. Elections.
Tim Fadgan is Politics and Policy Lecturer at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. He is the author of Do the best interests of the child end at the Nation’s shores: Immigration, state courts, and children in the United States.
Jennifer Frost is an Associate Professor for History at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She is the author of An Interracial Movement of the Poor: Community Organizing and the New Left in the 1960s and Hedda Hopper’s Hollywood: Celebrity Gossip and American Conservatism

How much does the president truly matter for the direction of the United States and for the rest of the world. [ dur: 30mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

William F. Grover is Professor of Political Science at Saint Michael’s College in Vermont. He is the author of The President as Prisoner: A Structural Critique of the Carter and Reagan Years, co-editor of Voices of Dissent: Critical Readings in American Politics, and The Unsustainable Presidency: Clinton, Bush, Obama and Beyond.
Joseph G. Peschek is Professor of Political Science at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is the author of Policy-Planning Organizations: Elite Agendas and America’s Rightward Turn, co-editor of Voices of Dissent: Critical Readings in American Politics, and The Unsustainable Presidency: Clinton, Bush, Obama and Beyond.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Politics and policy implication after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg – Sept 27, 2020

September 26, 2020 host

The death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg and the Republican promise to replace her has profound implications for American politics and policy. In our first segment we examine the potential legal impacts on the Court’s decisions themselves. In our second segment, we explore the impact of this decision on public policy, on the checks and balances of the branches of American government, and the 2020 election. [ dur: 58mins. ]

First Panel: [ dur: 28mins. ]

Sanford Levinson is W. St. John Garwood and W. St. John Garwood, Jr. Centennial Chair in Law at the University of Texas Law School. He is the author of many publications including Our Undemocratic Constitution: Where the Constitution Goes Wrong (and How We the People Can Correct It) and Framed: America’s 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance and, with Cynthia Levinson, Fault Lines in the Constitution: The Framers, Their Fights, and the Flaws that Affect Us Today.

Erwin Chemerinsky is Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law and Dean at University of California Berkeley School of Law. His many publications include Closing the Courthouse Doors: How Your Constitutional Rights Became Unenforceable and We the People: A Progressive Reading of the Constitution for the Twenty-First Century.

Second Panel: [ dur: 28mins. ]

John Vile is Dean and Professor of Political Science at Middle Tennessee University. He is the author of Essential Supreme Court Decisions: Summaries of Leading Cases in U.S. Constitutional Law, 17th Edition, The United States Constitution: One Document, Many Choices and The Bible in American Law and Politics: A Reference Guide.

Mark Peterson is Professor of Public Policy, Political Science, and Law at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the author of Legislating Together: The White House and Capital Hill from Eisenhower to Reagan and the editor of Healthy Markets? The New Competition in Medical Care and co-editor of the volume Institutions of American Democracy: The Executive Branch.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Root causes of political and economic crisis in Lebanon – Aug 9, 2020

August 8, 2020 host

The devastating explosion in Lebanon last week is just one of many crisis causing profound suffering for the people there. The economic and political crises have been exacerbated by the Covid 19 pandemic bringing the country to the brink of collapse. What is behind these crises? What can be done? Doug Becker explores. [ dur: 58 mins. ]

Bassel F. Salloukh is Associate Professor of Political Science in the Department of Social Sciences at the Lebanese American University. He is the co-author of The Politics of Sectarianism in Postwar Lebanon and Beyond the Arab Spring: Authoritarianism and Democratization in the Arab World.
Hannes Baumann is Senior Lecturer at the University of Liverpool and Visiting Fellow at the London School of Economics, Middle East Center. He is the author of Citizen Hariri: Lebanon’s Neoliberal Reconstruction.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – Implications of Homeland Agency troops against Protestors in Portland – July 26, 2020

July 26, 2020 host

Federal troops occupy Portland despite local government’s demand that they leave. These troops often do not wear uniforms and have seized protesters off the streets in unmarked vans. We discuss the legal and political implications. We also examine the implications on democracy, civil liberties, and the protest movements that mark America’s cities. Doug Becker hosts. [ dur: 58mins. ]

Jennifer L. Selin is a Kinder Institute Assistant Professor of Constitutional Democracy at the University of Missouri. She is the co-editor of Sourcebook of United States Executive Agencies and co-author of Political Control and the Forms of Agency Independence.
Nadine Strossen is John Marshall Harlan II Professor of Law Emerita at New York Law School. She is the Immediate Past President of the American Civil Liberties Union (1991-2008). She is the author of HATE: Why We Should Resist it With Free Speech, Not Censorship.
David S. Meyer is Professor of Sociology, Political Science, and Planning, Policy, and Design. He is the author of The Politics of Protest: Social Movements in America and co-editor of The Resistance: The Dawn of the Anti-Trump Opposition Movement.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – US Supreme court decisions and its effects on future of American Politics – July 19, 2020

July 18, 2020 host

What does the decisions made by the Supreme Court in 2020 mean for the future of American politics? What is the future of the Court? And how does this influence the relationship between the Supreme Court and the other branches of government? Doug Becker hosts. [ dur: 58mins. ]

Sanford Levinson is W. St. John Garwood and W. St. John Garwood, Jr. Centennial Chair in Law at the University of Texas Law School. He is the author of many publications including Our Undemocratic Constitution: Where the Constitution Goes Wrong (and How We the People Can Correct It) and Framed: America’s 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance.
Erwin Chemerinsky is Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law and Dean at University of California Berkeley School of Law. His many publications include Closing the Courthouse Doors: How Your Constitutional Rights Became Unenforceable and We the People: A Progressive Reading of the Constitution for the Twenty-First Century.
Alison Dundes Renteln is Professor of Political Science, Anthropology, Public Policy and Law at the University of Southern California. She is the co-author of Global Bioethics and Human Rights and Cultural Law: International, Comparative, and Indigenous.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – President Trump’s immigration policies – July 5, 2020

July 4, 2020 host

One of the most fundamental features of the Trump Administration is a policy of limiting immigration and reversing previous US policy on work visas, asylum, and deportation policy. Today we examine the status of this policy in light of recent US Supreme Court decisions and the Covid-19 Pandemic. Hosted by Douglas Becker, Assistant Professor (Teaching) of International Relations and Environmental Studies at USC, Los Angeles, CA. [ dur: 58 mins. ]

Peter J. Spiro is a Professor of Law at Temple University, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. He holds the Charles Weiner Chair in international law. He is the author of Beyond Citizenship: American Identity After Globalization (Oxford University Press 2008) and Citizenship: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press).
Hiroshi Motomura is a Susan Westerberg Prager Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA, Los Angels, CA. He is a scholar of immigration and citizenship, with influence across a range of academic disciplines and in federal, state, and local policymaking. He has authored many books including Americans in Waiting: The Lost Story of Immigration and Citizenship in the United States (Oxford 2006) and Immigration Outside the Law.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Scholars' Circle Interviews

Scholars’ Circle – India-China border conflicts examined -/- Issues with privatization of governmental services – June 21, 2020

June 20, 2020 host

Tensions along the India/China border have left soldiers killed, emotions high, and the risk of war increasing. We examine the cause of these tensions and the importance of de-escalation on today’s show. Doug Becker hosts. [ dur: 34mins. ]

Ritu Mathur is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and Geography at the University of Texas at San Antonio. She is the author of the upcoming book Civilization-al Discourses in Weapons Control.

Then, how does privatization amount to what our guest calls a Constitutional Coup. [ dur: 24mins. ]

Jon Michaels is a Professor of Law at UCLA School of Law. He is the author of Constitutional Coup: Privatization’s Threat to the American Republic.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

The Scholars' Circle Interviews

Tag Archives: Governance / Law

Scholars’ Circle – Aftermath of The US Election 2020 exposes A Crisis of Legitimacy – November 22, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – US 2020 Elections, views from outside the US – November 8, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – Supreme Court and 2020 US Elections -/- Role of Class and Identity in US Elections – November 1, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – US Presidential Elections 2020 and Voter Suppression -/- How much does foreign and economic policy change with change of presidency? – October 11 , 2020

Scholars’ Circle – Politics and policy implication after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg – Sept 27, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – Root causes of political and economic crisis in Lebanon – Aug 9, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – Implications of Homeland Agency troops against Protestors in Portland – July 26, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – US Supreme court decisions and its effects on future of American Politics – July 19, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – President Trump’s immigration policies – July 5, 2020

Scholars’ Circle – India-China border conflicts examined -/- Issues with privatization of governmental services – June 21, 2020

By Maria Armoudian