Backlash is hardly a new political force — since America’s founding, change has often been driven by citizens mobilizing in opposition to policies, programs, or social movements.
But recently, as our guest on this episode explains, backlash movements have come to dominate our politics in unprecedented ways. He argues that to build a more stable and healthy politics, we need to better understand how these forces work.
Why do certain policies, movements, or individual politicians incite powerful backlash movements while others don't? And why — whether we’re talking about immigration, healthcare, reproductive rights, or countless other issues — has backlash come to dominate so many different policy realms?
On this episode, Dan Richards explores these questions with Eric Patashnik, a political scientist at the Watson Institute, and author of the book “Countermobilization: Policy Feedback and Backlash in a Polarized Age.” In the book, Patashnik provides a theory of political backlash — what causes it, why it’s diffused through our politics over the last few decades, and how policymakers and politicians can learn to remain effective in a political moment dominated by backlash and countermobilization.
,Watson Institute,Watson International Institute,Brown University,Brown u,Brown,Public Affairs,3-Gxnb2NLI4,UCok8bs3XNbyU93LMwQ4A55w, Society, channel_UCok8bs3XNbyU93LMwQ4A55w, video_3-Gxnb2NLI4,In January of 2019, journalist Elizabeth Rush joined 56 scientists and crew people aboard an ice-breaking research vessel to study the Thwaites glacier in Antarctica. The glacier, which is about the size of the state of Florida, has been nicknamed the “Doomsday Glacier” for the effect its disintegration would likely play in the rise of global sea levels.
“If we lose Thwaites, there's great concern that we will lose the entirety or big portions of the West Antarctic ice sheet and that those glaciers combined contain enough ice to raise global sea levels 10 feet or more,” Rush told Dan Richards on this episode of Trending Globally.
Rush recounts her voyage aboard the Palmer and how it reshaped her understanding of our changing climate and planet in her 2023 book, “The Quickening: Antarctica, Motherhood and Cultivating Hope in a Warming World.” However, as the title suggests, the book is also about another, more personal journey: Rush’s decision to have a child.
The resulting book is part adventure travelogue, part mediation on the meaning of motherhood, and part climate change manifesto. It also offers some much-needed wisdom on how to envision a future when it feels like the world is falling apart.
Learn more about and purchase “The Quickening” (https://milkweed.org/book/the-quickening)
Learn more about “The Conceivable Future” (https://www.conceivablefuture.org/)
Transcript coming soon to our website (https://trending-globally.captivate.fm/)
,Watson Institute,Watson International Institute,Brown University,Brown u,Brown,Public Affairs,Diplomacy,Foreign Affairs,International Relations,American Governance,Career Diplomat,u1uD8IYSww8,UCok8bs3XNbyU93LMwQ4A55w, Politics,Society, channel_UCok8bs3XNbyU93LMwQ4A55w, video_u1uD8IYSww8,Ambassador Victoria Nuland is Shelby Cullom Davis Professor in the Practice of International Diplomacy and Director of the International Fellows Program at the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs. A U.S. diplomat for 35 years, she served six U.S. Presidents and 10 Secretaries of State of both political parties and holds the rank of Career Ambassador. She was Acting Deputy Secretary of State from July 2023 until March 2024, and served concurrently as Under Secretary for Political Affairs. Her tenure as U/S for Political Affairs began in April 2021.
,Watson Institute,Watson International Institute,Brown University,Brown u,Brown,Public Affairs,SMugglers,North Africa,Africa,Maritime Law,Middle East,International Relations,hayN4yS138Y,UCok8bs3XNbyU93LMwQ4A55w, Society, channel_UCok8bs3XNbyU93LMwQ4A55w, video_hayN4yS138Y,Smuggling is typically thought of as furtive and hidden, taking place under the radar and beyond the reach of the state. But in many cases, governments tacitly permit illicit cross-border commerce, or even devise informal arrangements to regulate it. Drawing on extensive fieldwork in the borderlands of Tunisia and Morocco, Max Gallien explains why states have long tolerated illegal trade across their borders and develops new ways to understand the political economy of smuggling. His book, “Smugglers and States – Negotiating the Maghreb at its Margins” examines the rules and agreements that govern smuggling in North Africa, tracing the involvement of states in these practices and their consequences for borderland communities. It demonstrates that, contrary to common assumptions about the effects of informal economies, smuggling can promote both state and social stability. States not only turn a blind eye to smuggling, they rely on it to secure political acquiescence and maintain order, because it provides income for otherwise neglected border communities. More recently, however, the securitization of borders, wars, political change, and the pandemic have put these arrangements under pressure. Gallien explores the renegotiation of the role of smuggling, showing how stability turns into vulnerability and why some groups have been able to thrive while others have been pushed further to the margins.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Max Gallien is a political scientist specialising in the politics of informal and illegal economies, the political economy of taxation and the modern politics of the Middle East and North Africa. He is a research fellow at the Institute of Development Studies and a Research Lead and the International Centre for Tax and Development. He is the author of “Smugglers and States – Negotiating the Maghreb at its Margins” (Columbia University Press, 2024).
,1,Jeff Colgan, Director of Climate Solutions Lab (CSL) and Richard Holbrooke Professor of Political Science and International and Public Affairs, explains the Climate Syllabus Bank project at Climate Solutions Lab, located at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University.
The Climate Solutions Lab syllabus bank fosters and improves university-level courses on climate change in the social sciences. At many universities, such courses are scarce — despite student demand on the world's most important global problem. For potential instructors, developing a new syllabus from scratch can be a barrier to teaching the course. So, we offer existing syllabi, for free, to anyone in the world. Different courses have different features, such as documentary films or class simulations.
We are extremely grateful to the instructors who have volunteered their syllabi for this purpose. More syllabi are welcome.
To submit a syllabus, please use this form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdTDGnl7u1_evbPhJ_MMSTqyUXEQMyJX6xrbGQo6C0ZemlIcQ/viewform
,1,On June 4, results came in from the largest democratic election in history. Over 640 million people voted in India’s election, which took place at over one million polling places across the country over the course of six weeks.
Many predicted that India’s prime minister Nerandra Modi and his party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would dominate the election, grow their ranks in Parliament, and further impose their Hindu-nationalist ideology on the country.
However, that wasn’t what happened. Modi was reelected, but his party lost over 60 seats in the lower house of Parliament. The BJP will have to govern as part of a multi-party coalition, and most likely moderate their Hindu-nationalist aspirations.
On this episode, you’ll hear from Ashutosh Varshney, a political scientist at Brown University and director of the Watson Institute’s Saxena Center for Contemporary South Asia (https://watson.brown.edu/southasia/) , about this historic election: what led to its surprising outcome, what it means for the Hindu-nationalist movement embodied by Prime Minister Nerandra Modi, and what it might tell us about the struggle for democracy occurring in countries around the world.
*Trending Globally will be taking a brief summer hiatus, but we’ll be back in July with all-new episodes*
Learn more about the Saxena Center for Contemporary South Asia (https://watson.brown.edu/southasia/) at the Watson Institute
Learn more about the Watson Institute’s other podcasts (https://home.watson.brown.edu/news/podcasts)
Transcript coming soon to our website (https://trending-globally.captivate.fm/)
,1,Backlash is hardly a new political force — since America’s founding, change has often been driven by citizens mobilizing in opposition to policies, programs, or social movements.
But recently, as our guest on this episode explains, backlash movements have come to dominate our politics in unprecedented ways. He argues that to build a more stable and healthy politics, we need to better understand how these forces work.
Why do certain policies, movements, or individual politicians incite powerful backlash movements while others don't? And why — whether we’re talking about immigration, healthcare, reproductive rights, or countless other issues — has backlash come to dominate so many different policy realms?
On this episode, Dan Richards explores these questions with Eric Patashnik, a political scientist at the Watson Institute, and author of the book “Countermobilization: Policy Feedback and Backlash in a Polarized Age.” In the book, Patashnik provides a theory of political backlash — what causes it, why it’s diffused through our politics over the last few decades, and how policymakers and politicians can learn to remain effective in a political moment dominated by backlash and countermobilization.
