124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
David Lazer, Harvard Kennedy School
About the Seminar What is the potential use of the Internet by members of Congress to better connect with their constituents? This talk will summarize the results of a multi-year NSF-funded study on the potential and actual use of Internet by Members of Congress for communication purposes.... Read more about Diffusion of Information Technology Use in Congressional Offices
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
The Dynamics of Policy Failure
Ariane Chebel d’Appollonia, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
About the Seminar In this seminar, Ariane Chebel d’Appollonia examines three interlocking processes that fuel ’the dynamics of security/integration policy failure.’ The first relates to the spiral effect of border escalation. Designed to prevent illegal immigration and terrorist threats, she argues that border controls in fact generate new immigration flows and increase insecurity. Second, the increasing volume of counter-terrorism activity has led to the proliferation of similarly flawed policy institutions in the United States and Europe: Hampered by a vague definition of terrorism, they have expanded and tackle security issues unrelated to terrorism. Third, the impact of the securitization of immigration may actually increase alienation and therefore facilitate terrorist recruitment. The net effect is the creation of a self-fulfilling prophesy of a permissive environment of violence.... Read more about Immigration, Security, and Democracy
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Bryan Long, Volpe Center, United States Department of Transportation
About the Seminar The Global Maritime Domain Awareness Program is an initiative of the U.S. Department of Transportation's Volpe Center, which developed the technology to track vessel movement on the seas much more effectively.
The Volpe Center staff built the Maritime Security and Safety Information System (MSSIS), a freely-shared, unclassified, near real-time data collection and distribution network. Its member countries share data from Automatic Identification Systems (AIS), coastal radar, and other maritime-related systems.... Read more about Securing the Seas: A Conversation with the Global Maritime Domain Awareness Program
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Why It Is OK That No One Elected Oxfam
Jennifer Rubenstein, University of Virginia
About the Seminar Advocacy campaigns by international anti-poverty non-governmental organizations are an increasingly prominent feature of global politics. Professor Rubenstein focuses on two possibilities for how these campaigns be conceptualized and normatively evaluated: 1) INGOs should be viewed as non-elected “representatives” and evaluated based on how representative they are; 2) INGOs should be viewed as “agents of justice” and evaluated based on how well they promote some conception of global justice.... Read more about The Ethics of INGO Advocacy
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Jorrit de Jong, Senior Lecturer in Public Management, VU University, Amsterdam and Visiting Research Fellow, Ash Center
About the Seminar One of the challenges in the public sector is to benefit from other people’s innovations. Why reinvent the wheel? Unfortunately, replicating public sector innovations is not easy: sometimes differences seem to outnumber similarities between organizations and contexts.
Please join us as Jorrit de Jong discusses how using a management simulation can help to develop analytical and practical innovation transfer skills. Based on experiences with groups of managers from around the world, he will discuss mechanisms that impede successful transfers as well as strategies that help create success.... Read more about Tricky Transfer: On the (Im)possibility of Replicating Government Innovations
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Rosemarie Day, Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority
About the Seminar As the United States explores ways to expand access and reduce costs to health care, Massachusetts is a key focus of the national debate. The Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority is the independent state authority that is charged with increasing the pool of citizens with health insurance in Massachusetts, a central mandate of the state’s health reform law of 2006 requiring that all Massachusetts adults must purchase health insurance if they can afford it. The Connector is a public-private hybrid entity that combines funding from both government and private insurance agencies to operate.... Read more about Health Care for All: A Discussion with the Massachusetts Commonwealth Health Connector
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
The Political Economy of Expatriate Dual Citizenship
David Leblang, University of Virginia
About the Seminar Professor David Leblang will discuss the causes and consequences of dual citizenship rights as they apply to expatriates. Arguing that migrant networks provide sending/home countries with access to global capital pools, he will demonstrate that the provision of dual citizenship helps home countries harness the financial and human capital of their diasporas. His seminar will assess the implications by examining the linkage between migration, dual citizenship and flows of foreign economic aid, portfolio investment, and remittances. He will also provide some evidence that dual citizenship increases the likelihood that migrants will express an intention to return to their home country and will discuss the rise in national policies providing for dual citizenship rights.... Read more about Harnessing the Diaspora
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Larry Diamond, Hoover Institution & Freeman Spogli Institute
About the Seminar Why is there not a single democracy in the Arab world today, when every other region has a significant number of democracies? This seminar examines possible cultural, historical, economic, political, institutional, and geostrategic explanations for the democracy deficit in the Arab world. Rejecting some of these possible explanations and affirming others, it also considers what factors might foster transitions to constitutional democracy in the Arab world.... Read more about Why Is There No Arab Democracy?
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Sandford Borins, University of Toronto
About the Seminar Please join us as Sandford Borins shows how concepts from the study of narrative can be used to analyze public management innovations, based on the 2008 and 2009 finalists of the Innovations in American Government Awards. He will also discuss how narratives can facilitate the diffusion and replication of innovations, and provide a brief introduction to approaches to the diffusion of innovation to be discussed in upcoming seminars.... Read more about Spreading Innovation: Innovation as Narrative
124 Mt. Auburn Street, Suite 200-North, Cambridge, MA
Poverty and the Culture of Deliberation in Indian Village Democracies
Vijayendra Rao, Lead Economist, Development Research Group, World Bank
About the Seminar In this seminar, Vijayendra (Biju) Rao will examine transcripts of village meetings (gram sabhas) in South India, to demonstrate how boundaries of caste and status are breached within them, and definitions of poverty and beneficiary selection understood and interrogated. The session will outline how discursive skills and civic agency are acquired and deployed by the poor in a quest for dignity.... Read more about Dignity Through Discourse