• Carolyn Whitzman, "Home Truths: Fixing Canada's Housing Crisis" (On Point Press, 2024)
    Mar 15 2025
    Hundreds of thousands of Canadians exist on the edge. Renters fear eviction, homeowners feel trapped, and both are vulnerable to becoming homeless with a single stroke of misfortune. Unaffordable housing in Canada is tearing communities apart as long-time residents seek affordable housing elsewhere and businesses shutter because they cannot find staff who can afford to live nearby. For two generations, Canadians have watched affordable housing vanish while other nations have been tackling the problem. In Home Truths: Fixing Canada's Housing Crisis (On Point Press, 2024), housing expert Carolyn Whitzman reviews the decades of policy that have gotten us into this mess and shows how all levels of government can work together to provide affordable housing where it is needed. Her compelling arguments for policy solutions are backed by ideas from researchers, planners, politicians, developers, and housing advocates at home and abroad. Home Truths addresses Canada’s crisis from all sides, including exploring what adequate housing looks like, providing ideas on how to resolve homelessness, explaining why nonmarket housing is crucial for Canada, and showing how and why to tackle ever-growing wealth disparities between renters and those who own. From policymakers, planners, developers, and observers needing to understand Canada’s housing struggles through to Canadians seeking ideas for a new way forward, Home Truths is a critical read for a nation on edge. Carolyn Whitzman is a leading housing and senior policy researcher. She has authored, coauthored, or lead-edited six previous books, the most recent being Clara at the Door with a Revolver. She has undertaken research for the Office of the Federal Housing Advocate, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, the Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa, and many other organizations. Alex Hallbom is a Registered Professional Planner in British Columbia, Canada. He sits on the editorial board of Plan Canada, the professional publication for planners in Canada, and publishes periodically in Plan Canada and Planning West. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    28 mins
  • Lydia Pelot-Hobbs, "Prison Capital: Mass Incarceration and Struggles for Abolition Democracy in Louisiana" (UNC Press, 2023)
    Mar 14 2025
    Every year between 1998 to 2020 except one, Louisiana had the highest per capita rate of incarceration in the nation and thus the world. Prison Capital: Mass Incarceration and Struggles for Abolition Democracy in Louisiana (University of North Carolina Press, 2023) is the first detailed account of Louisiana's unprecedented turn to mass incarceration from 1970 to 2020. Through extensive research, Dr. Lydia Pelot-Hobbs illuminates how policy makers enlarged Louisiana's carceral infrastructures with new prisons and jail expansions alongside the bulking up of police and prosecutorial power. At the same time, these infrastructures were the products of multiscalar crises: the swings of global oil capitalism, liberal federal court and policy interventions, the rise of neoliberal governance and law-and-order austerity, and racist and patriarchal moral panics surrounding "crime." However, these crises have also created fertile space for anticarceral social movements. From incarcerated people filing conditions of confinement lawsuits and Angola activists challenging life without parole to grassroots organizers struggling to shrink the New Orleans jail following Hurricane Katrina and LGBTQ youth of color organizing against police sexual violence, grassroots movements stretch us toward new geographies of freedom in the lineage of abolition democracy. Understanding Louisiana's carceral crisis extends our understanding of the interplay between the crises of mass criminalization and racial capitalism while highlighting the conditions of possibility for dismantling carceral power in all its forms. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 6 mins
  • In Covid’s Wake: How our Politics Failed Us: A Conversation with Frances Lee
    Mar 12 2025
    In the first part of our two-part conversation on Madison’s Notes, we speak with Frances Lee, Professor of Politics and Public Affairs at Princeton University, about her co-authored book In COVID’s Wake (Princeton UP, 2025). The book offers a comprehensive and candid political assessment of how institutions performed during the pandemic. It explores how governments, influenced by Wuhan’s lockdown, deviated from existing pandemic plans, leading to policies that often favored the “laptop class” while leaving essential workers vulnerable. Extended school closures disproportionately affected less-privileged families, and the politicization of science marginalized dissent. Lee and her co-author, Stephen Macedo, argue that future crises must uphold the values of liberal democracy: tolerance, respect for evidence, and a commitment to truth. This discussion dives into key questions raised in the book, including the importance of conducting a post-mortem of the pandemic response. Lee highlighted how polarization in the two-party system complicates evaluations of what worked and what didn’t. We also explored the role of states as “laboratories” for different responses and whether meaningful comparisons can be drawn between them. Lee reflected on why pre-existing pandemic plans were abandoned and how the pandemic strained the public’s trust in media, policy advisors, and academic institutions. The ambiguity of desired policy outcomes, she noted, often hindered rational cost-benefit analysis, further complicating the response. Lee emphasized the value of embracing complexity and ambiguity in conversations about societal and political issues. By examining the pandemic’s lessons, “In COVID’s Wake” challenges readers to consider how we can better prepare for future crises while staying true to democratic principles. Madison’s Notes is the podcast of Princeton University’s James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions. Contributions to and/or sponsorship of any speaker does not constitute departmental or institutional endorsement of the specific program, speakers or views presented. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    46 mins
  • Kimberly Clausing, "Open: The Progressive Case for Free Trade, Immigration, and Global Capital" (Harvard UP, 2019)
    Mar 8 2025
    Critics on the Left have long attacked open markets and free trade agreements for exploiting the poor and undermining labor, while those on the Right complain that they unjustly penalize workers back home. In Open: The Progressive Case for Free Trade, Immigration, and Global Capital (Harvard University Press, 2019), Kimberly Clausing takes on old and new skeptics in her compelling case that open economies are actually a force for good. Turning to the data to separate substance from spin, she shows how international trade makes countries richer, raises living standards, benefits consumers, and brings nations together. At a time when borders are closing and the safety of global supply chains is being thrown into question, she outlines a clear agenda to manage globalization more effectively, presenting strategies to equip workers for a modern economy and establish a better partnership between labor and the business community. Kimberly Clausing holds the Eric M. Zolt Chair in Tax Law and Policy at the UCLA School of Law. During the first part of the Biden Administration, Clausing was the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Tax Analysis in the US Department of the Treasury, serving as the lead economist in the Office of Tax Policy. Prior to coming to UCLA, Clausing was the Thormund A. Miller and Walter Mintz Professor of Economics at Reed College. Professor Clausing is also a nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. She has worked on economic policy research with the International Monetary Fund, the Hamilton Project, the Brookings Institution, the Tax Policy Center, and the Center for American Progress. She has testified before the House Ways and Means Committee, the Senate Committee on Finance, the Senate Committee on the Budget, and the Joint Economic Committee. Professor Clausing received her B.A. from Carleton College in 1991 and her Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1996, both in economics. Other New Books Networks interviews on related themes include Yale economist Penny Goldberg, former Chief Economist of the World Bank, on The Unequal Effects of Globalization, Princeton economist Leah Boustan on how immigrants have contributed to and rapidly assimilated into US society, and University of Massachusetts economist Isabella Weber on China's process of integration into the world economy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 3 mins
  • Gary Griggs, "California Catastrophes: The Natural Disaster History of the Golden State" (U California Press, 2024)
    Mar 7 2025
    California has more natural hazards per square mile than any other state, but this hasn’t deterred people from moving here. Entire California towns and regions frequently contend with destruction caused by earthquakes, floods, landslides and debris flows, and sea-level rise and coastal erosion. As Dr. Gary Griggs demonstrates in California Catastrophes: The Natural Disaster History of the Golden State (University of California Press, 2024), few years go by without a disaster of some kind, and residents often rebuild in the same locations that were just destroyed. Considering the current climate crisis and increasing environmental inequalities, the stakes are growing ever higher. This book dives into the history of the state’s vulnerability to natural hazards, why and where these events occur, and how Californians can better prepare going forward. A mix of photographs and maps both historical and contemporary orients readers within the state’s sprawling landscapes and provides glimpses of some of the geologic risks in each region. With the final chapter, Dr. Griggs issues a call to action and challenges readers to envision a safer, more equitable, and sustainable future. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 9 mins
  • Daniel J. Solove, "On Privacy and Technology" (Oxford UP, 2025)
    Mar 7 2025
    Succinct and eloquent, On Privacy and Technology (Oxford UP, 2025) is an essential primer on how to face the threats to privacy in today's age of digital technologies and AI. With the rapid rise of new digital technologies and artificial intelligence, is privacy dead? Can anything be done to save us from a dystopian world without privacy? In this short and accessible book, internationally renowned privacy expert Daniel J. Solove draws from a range of fields, from law to philosophy to the humanities, to illustrate the profound changes technology is wreaking upon our privacy, why they matter, and what can be done about them. Solove provides incisive examinations of key concepts in the digital sphere, including control, manipulation, harm, automation, reputation, consent, prediction, inference, and many others. Compelling and passionate, On Privacy and Technology teems with powerful insights that will transform the way you think about privacy and technology. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    40 mins
  • Chris Higgins, "Undeclared: A Philosophy of Formative Higher Education" (MIT Press, 2024)
    Mar 4 2025
    Undeclared: A Philosophy of Formative Higher Education (MIT Press, 2024) is an imaginative tour of the contemporary university as it could be: a place to discover self-knowledge, meaning, and purpose. What if college were not just a means of acquiring credentials, but a place to pursue our formation as whole persons striving to lead lives of meaning and purpose? In Undeclared, Chris Higgins confronts the contemporary university in a bid to reclaim a formative mission for higher education. In a series of searching essays and pointed interludes, Higgins challenges us to acknowledge how far our practices have drifted from our ideals, asking: What would it look like to build a college from the ground up to support self-discovery and personal integration? What does it mean to be a public university, and are there any left? How can the humanities help the job-ified university begin to take vocation seriously? Cutting through the underbrush of received ideas, Higgins follows the insight where it leads, clearing a path from the corporate multiversity to the renaissance in higher education that was Black Mountain College and back again. Along the way, we tour a campus bent on becoming a shopping mall, accompany John Dewey through a midlife crisis, and witness the first "happening.” Through diverse and grounded philosophical engagements, Undeclared assembles the resources to expand the contemporary educational imagination. Chris Higgins is Associate Professor and Chair in the Department of Formative Education in Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development, where he directs the Transformative Educational Studies program. He is the author of The Good Life of Teaching. The book is available Open Access here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 6 mins
  • Timothy P. R. Weaver, "Inequality, Crime, and Resistance in New York City" (Temple UP, 2025)
    Mar 1 2025
    Looking closely at New York City's political development since the 1970s, three "political orders"--conservativism, neoliberalism, and egalitarianism--emerged. In Inequality, Crime, and Resistance in New York City, Timothy Weaver argues that the intercurrent impact of these orders has created a constant battle for power. Weaver brings these clashes to the fore by showing how New York City politics has been shaped by these conflicting orders. He examines the transformation of the city's political economy in the aftermath of the 1975 fiscal crisis through neoliberal real estate development and privatization, the conservative rise of law-and-order politics in the 1970s to 1990s, and the efforts of the city's egalitarians to respond to each of these shifts through social movements such as Occupy and Black Lives Matter. Inequality, Crime, and Resistance in New York City (Temple UP, 2025) belies glib assumptions about the city's liberal character. Weaver reveals the metropolis not as a homogenous political whole, but as a site in which the victories and defeats of rival political forces change the terms of local citizenship for the millions of residents who call the city home. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy
    Show More Show Less
    30 mins