2015

  • 2015 Mar 26

    Harvard Seminar on History & Policy: Accounting, Accountability, and the Struggle for Nation-Building

    4:10pm to 6:00pm

    Location: 

    Carr Conference Room, Rubenstein 219, Harvard Kennedy School

    Join us for the next meeting of the Harvard Seminar on History and Policy when we will host Professor Jacob Soll (History and Accounting, USC) who will present his new work on “Accounting, Accountability, and the Struggle for Nation-Building.” Professor Alex Keyssar of the Harvard Kennedy School will comment. 

    Speakers:
    Jacob Soll, Professor of History and Accounting, University of Southern California
    Alex Keyssar, Professor of History and Social Policy, Harvard Kennedy School... Read more about Harvard Seminar on History & Policy: Accounting, Accountability, and the Struggle for Nation-Building

  • 2015 Mar 21

    #Hack4Congress San Francisco

    (All day)

    Location: 

    Code for America, 155 9th Street, San Francisco CA, 94103

    Hack4Congress adOrganized with the OpenGov Foundation and POPVOX

    #Hack4Congress is a multi-city event that brings together political scientists, technologists, designers, lawyers, organizational psychologists, and lawmakers to foster new digital tools, policy proposals and other innovations to address the growing dysfunction in Congress.... Read more about #Hack4Congress San Francisco

  • 2015 Mar 20

    ’Fixing Congress’ Panel Discussion and Reception

    5:30pm to 7:00pm

    Location: 

    SPUR Urban Center, 654 Mission St, San Francisco CA, 94105

    Hack4Congress adCurrent and former members of Congress and Bay Area technologists address the prospects for solving congressional dysfunction

    Co-organized with the HKS Alumni Network of San Francisco, the OpenGov Foundation and POPVOX

    The Ash Center and the HKS Alumni Network of San Francisco invite you to a kickoff panel for the San Francisco #Hack4Congress “Not Just for Technologists” hackathon. The panel will address key structural problems that undermine the efficacy of Congress and explore solutions for improving the lawmaking process in addition to better to facilitating cross-partisan dialogue, and modernizing congressional participation. Panelists will also discuss the prospects and strategies for integrating technology into the operations of Congress today.... Read more about ’Fixing Congress’ Panel Discussion and Reception

  • 2015 Mar 06

    Do ’We The People’ Know Best? Direct Democracy in Action from National Independence to Workers’ Benefits

    12:00pm to 1:00pm

    Location: 

    Ash Center Foyer, 124 Mount Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA

    Ash Center Student Speaker Series

    Joanna Penn, MPP ’15, Georgia Hollister Isman, MC ’15, and Quinton Mayne, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Public Policy (moderator)

    Lunch will be provided.

    About the Event
    The recent referendum on Scottish independence was seen by some as a high point for democracy in the country with record turn out of over 80%. Yet referenda may be better tools for forming policies than others. In Massachusetts, recent policy victories through the referendum process, notably on paid sick leave, have sparked excitement, but most policy issues are dealt with through candidate campaigns. This discussion will use the different experiences across the Atlantic to discuss different ways that voters tackle and reason about issues in electoral politics. Does direct democracy offer a solution to the dissatisfaction the public feels about politicians? How do campaigns differ when they’re asking people to make a policy decision rather than elect someone to represent them? Are certain kinds of issues better served by referendum process then candidate elections, and vice versa?... Read more about Do ’We The People’ Know Best? Direct Democracy in Action from National Independence to Workers’ Benefits

  • 2015 Mar 03

    Workshop on Immigration, Race and Ethnicity (WIRE)

    4:30pm to 6:00pm

    Location: 

    124 Mount Auburn Street, Ash Center Foyer, Suite 200-North, Room 226, Cambridge, MA

    Statue of LibertyAbout the Series
    The Workshop on Immigration, Race and Ethnicity (WIRE) at the Ash Center is a bi-monthly seminar style forum for Harvard and Boston area researchers and students working on the topics of immigration, race and ethnicity from a diverse variety of perspectives. Workshop sessions are thematically organized and themes are different each semester. For the fall semester of 2014, the themes are: (1) Experiments on Race, Immigration, and Public Policy and (2) Economic Impacts of Immigration and Immigration Policy.

    Upcoming Seminars

    “Is there a “Disconnect” between Public Opinion and U.S. Immigrant Admissions Policy?”

    Morris Levy (University of Southern California)
    Matthew Wright (American University)
    Jack Citrin (University of California, Berkeley)

    A large body of research suggests that immigration policy-making in liberal democracies overlooks most citizens’ preferences most of the time. To support this view, scholars often point to an apparent “disconnect” between the expansionary immigration policies prevailing in most of the West and the heavily exclusionary bent of public opinion. This paper argues that the “disconnect” thesis oversimplifies ordinary citizens’ preferences over immigrant admissions policies in ways that inflate the divergence of public policy from public opinion.... Read more about Workshop on Immigration, Race and Ethnicity (WIRE)

  • 2015 Feb 24

    February 24, 2015: The Rails Race: Japan and China in Global Infrastructure Politics

    12:30pm to 2:00pm

    Location: 

    Bowie-Vernon Room (K262), CGIS Knafel Building, 1737 Cambridge Street

    A. Maria Toyoda, Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Interdisciplinary Studies and Global Initiatives, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Villanova University; Moderator: Mary Brinton, Reischauer Institute Professor of Sociology and Chair of Sociology, Harvard University

  • 2015 Feb 23

    Innovation for the Public Good: Reflections on Changing Models of Innovation in Business, Government and Civil Society

    4:10pm to 5:30pm

    Location: 

    Ash Center Foyer, 124 Mount Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA

    Geoff Mulgan, CEO National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, U.K., and Former Director of Strategy, Tony Blair Government

    The results of social innovation – new ideas that meet unmet needs – are all around us. They include fair trade and restorative justice, hospices and kindergartens, distance learning and traffic calming. Over the last two centuries, innumerable social innovations have moved from the margins to the mainstream. Geoff Mulgan, Senior Fellow at the Ash Center, and a leading expert on innovation around the world, will reflect on the models that help generate, develop, implement and scale these new ideas. This second edition of the Ash Center’s Innovation Round Table will be moderated by Mark Moore (HKS). Discussants will be Julie Wilson (HKS) and Jorrit de Jong (HKS).... Read more about Innovation for the Public Good: Reflections on Changing Models of Innovation in Business, Government and Civil Society

  • 2015 Feb 21

    Global Urban Datafest: Smart Cities Challenge – Boston

    8:30am to 7:00pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Business School, Batten Hall, 2nd Floor, 125 Western Avenue, Boston, MA

    CityscapeThe Challenge: Join us and work with Massachusetts cities to solve real challenges they face. Help Holyoke develop solutions to improve its pedestrian experience & support Somerville measure the impact of its city services.

    Who Should Participate: Everyone! You don’t need to be a technology expert to participate... We’re looking for business thinkers, policy analysts, journalists, designers, community organizers, urban planners, or anyone else who is interested in solving real urban challenges.... Read more about Global Urban Datafest: Smart Cities Challenge – Boston

  • 2015 Feb 18

    50 Years after the Voting Rights Act: Strategies for Moving Forward

    6:00pm

    Location: 

    JFK Jr. Forum, Harvard Kennedy School, 79 JFK St., Cambridge, MA

    Signing Voting Rights ActCongressman Robert C. "Bobby" Scott (D-VA), Penda D. Hair, Co-founder and Co-Director, Advancement Project, and Alex Keyssar, Matthew W. Stirling Jr. Professor of History and Social Policy, Harvard Kennedy School

    We will explore the current and future prospects for voting rights on the 50th anniversary of the landmark Voting Rights Act. Voting has been the cornerstone of American democracy since the earliest days of the republic, and throughout our history the right has been progressively expanded, though in fits and starts, to our current universal suffrage. Yet a wave of legislation at the state level seeking to impose additional burdens on voting spells the end of our longstanding efforts to expand the right to vote. Given the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in Shelby v. Holder, which struck down a key section of the Voting Rights Act, and the unlikelihood of a federal reauthorization of the VRA, what actions and strategies hold the greatest promise in protecting and promoting the right to vote in America?... Read more about 50 Years after the Voting Rights Act: Strategies for Moving Forward

  • 2015 Feb 17

    Urban Resilience and Natural Hazards in Asia: Film Screening and Panel Discussion

    6:30pm to 8:00pm

    Location: 

    Land Hall, Fourth Floor, Belfer Building, Harvard Kennedy School

    Next City logoAs the effects of climate change intensify and rapid urbanization continues across many parts of Asia, the region faces increased vulnerability to a range of natural hazards. This event features four short films that highlight innovative strategies for building disaster resilience in several major Asian cities (Bangkok, Da Nang, Phnom Penh, and Surat), followed by a panel discussion featuring academics and practitioners with expertise in disaster risk reduction and urban planning and policy. The films were produced by the online magazine Next City as part of the series “Asia H20: How Water Issues are Changing an Urbanized Continent,” which was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation.... Read more about Urban Resilience and Natural Hazards in Asia: Film Screening and Panel Discussion

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