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The United States has historically played an important role in promoting democracy to countries across the globe. But is the role of the U.S. as a leading advocate for democracy now diminished following the recent U.S. election and mob attack on the U.S. Capitol? 

The panel for this event will feature democracy activists from around the world, all of whom are graduates of the Draper Hills Program at the Center for Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). In a discussion moderated by Professor Francis Fukuyama, they will offer their perspectives on the need for democracy promotion in their home countries at the current moment, particularly what role the new Biden administration could constructively play. Professor Michael McFaul’s recent series of articles [https://www.americanpurpose.com/articles/sell-it-again-uncle-sam/] in American Purpose, an online magazine recently launched by Professor Fukuyama, about the need for democracy promotion, will be the starting point for the discussion. Professor McFaul will offer introductory remarks.

PANELISTS:

 

Kondo Moussa, Class of 2018, Mali - Director Accountability Lab Mali . Kondo founded and runs the Mali chapter of the Accountability Lab, a U.S.-based nonprofit that promotes public accountability in six African and Asian countries. Rather than condemning corrupt leaders, it works to boost the influence of their honest counterparts, running grassroots “Integrity Idol” campaigns to celebrate their good work. Communities nominate local civil servants, and the Lab then profiles the top five on TV. The movement reaches a broader audience, as viewers across the country vote for their favorite candidates. It also runs in-country incubators to train and mentor “accountrapreneurs” who launch their own accountability projects. Kondo, a journalist, started Mali’s Lab after spending six months embedded with Liberia’s team during his 2015 Mandela Washington Fellowship. While Accountability Lab is not new, Kondo has successfully adapted it to a new and challenging context.

 

 

Shaili Chopra, Class of 2019, India - An Indian journalist turned entrepreneur whose work is focused on championing real women and their stories across India. Chopra is the founder of SheThePeople.TV, which is India's only women's channel. SheThePeople.TV is a form of digital democracy where women get to choose, speak up, and set the agenda. Chopra uses the internet to spotlight issues of women's rights, their role in a democracy, and empower them in a digitally connected world. Chopra is the recipient of India's highest honor in journalism and counted among the top 50 most influential women in media in India and is a Vital Voices fellow. She holds a BA in Economics from Delhi University and a Masters diploma in Journalism from the Asian College of Journalism in Chennai.  

 

 

Mohamad Najem, Class of 2019, Lebanon - Mohamad is the executive director of the Beirut–based digital rights organization Social Media Exchange (SMEX), the Middle East and North Africa’s leading digital rights research and policy advocacy organization. His work includes local and regional advocacy campaigns, research on privacy, data protection, and freedom of expression. Najem organized “Bread & Net”, the first unconference in the Middle East and North Africa region that tackled topics related to technology and human rights. Najem’s career began in the humanitarian aid arena. Najem was a 2014 New America Foundation Fellow and an alumnus of the Arts, Sciences, and Technology University in Lebanon where he completed his Masters in Business Administration. 

 

 

Anna Dobrovolskaya Class of 2019, Russia – is a human rights activist based in Moscow, serving as the executive director of the Memorial Human Rights Center (MHRC). The Center is the biggest Russian human rights NGO, working to provide legal aid and consultation for refugees and asylum seekers, monitoring human rights violations in post-conflict zones and advocating for a human-rights based approach in fighting terrorism; as well as raising awareness about politically-motivated repression in Russia and maintains its own list of political prisoners. Dobrovolskaya’s areas of expertise include human rights education and awareness-raising activities and programs for young people and activists since 2008. She is a member of the Council of Europe pool of trainers. Her work currently lies in NGO management and providing consultancy to various human rights groups and initiatives. Anna was the author of the first Russian play about the life of human rights defenders, which is being performed in Teatr.doc since 2017.

 

 

This event is co-sponsored by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Center for Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law.

**Please note all CDDRL events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone

 

About the Event: Following the Allied invasion of Iraq in 2003, the U.S. government and military officials revived counterinsurgency doctrine and practice—widely employed, though not invented, during the era of decolonization—in service of the nation’s ongoing War on Terror. This revival was dramatized during a widely publicized screening at the Pentagon of Gillo Pontecorvo’s classic film The Battle of Algiers (1966). What insights into (Algerian) insurgency and (French) counterinsurgency did U.S. officials hope to glean from Pontecorvo’s film? And how would these insights be mobilized, if at all, for the occupation of Iraq and other insurgent geographies? 

This talk revisits this historical moment and the questions it raises about the relationship between U.S. militarism and the uses of literature and film in the management of insurgency in Africa and Western Asia.

 

About the Speaker: Vaughn Rasberry is Associate Professor in the Department of English and Academic Director of the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity at Stanford. He is the author of Race and the Totalitarian Century: Geopolitics and the Black Literary Imagination (Harvard UP, 2016), winner of the Ralph Bunche Award from the American Political Science Association and an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. 

 

 

This event is open to Stanford undergraduate students only. 

The Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) will be accepting applications from eligible juniors on who are interested in writing their senior thesis on a subject touching upon democracy, economic development, and rule of law (DDRL) from any university department.  The application period opens on January 11, 2021 and runs through February 12, 2021.   CDDRL faculty and current honors students will be present to discuss the program and answer any questions.

For more information on the Fisher Family CDDRL Honors Program, please click here.

**Please note all CDDRL events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone

**Please note all CDDRL events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone

 

About the Event: How does the widespread frustration that often accompanies democratic transitions shape the political cleavages underlying the party systems that emerge from them? Nine years after the 2010–11 uprising, Tunisia’s 2019 elections took place against a backdrop of widespread frustration with the party system that emerged during the ensuing transition. The elections presented opportunities to a diverse set of outsiders, many of whom brandished antiparty system messages, including unapologetic boosters of the former ruling party, a would-be plutocrat jailed on charges of corruption, and a broad set of antiparty independents. Drawing upon campaign materials and a nationally representative postelection survey, this presentation will describe the differences in the antiparty system messages and the ways that nostalgia underlies them. Through this analysis, I will consider a set of theoretical propositions arising from the literature on the dynamics of political cleavages in party systems in new democracies. 

About the Speaker: 

Nate Grubman is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. In the fall, he will receive his PhD in political science from Yale University. His dissertation uses the case of postuprising Tunisia to explore the question of why party systems in many new democracies furnish few economic policy choices, as well as the consequences of this absence of choice. More broadly, his research focuses on political nostalgia, ideology, corruption, and authoritarian legacies in new democracies. 

**Please note all CDDRL events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone

About the Event:

Can intergroup contact build social cohesion after war? I randomly assigned Iraqi Christians displaced by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) to an all-Christian soccer team or to a team mixed with Muslims. The intervention improved behaviors toward Muslim peers: Christians with Muslim teammates were more likely to vote for a Muslim (not on their team) to receive a sportsmanship award, register for a mixed team next season, and train with Muslims 6 months after the intervention. The intervention did not substantially affect behaviors in other social contexts, such as patronizing a restaurant in Muslim-dominated Mosul or attending a mixed social event, nor did it yield consistent effects on intergroup attitudes. Although contact can build tolerant behaviors toward peers within an intervention, building broader social cohesion outside of it is more challenging.

 

About the Speaker:

Salma Mousa is an Egyptian scholar of migration, conflict, and social cohesion.  Prior to joining CDDRL, Salma held fellowships at the U.S. Institute of Peace, Stanford's Immigration Policy Lab, the Freeman Spogli Institute, the Stanford Center for International Conflict and Negotiation, the McCoy Center for Ethics in Society, and the Stanford Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society.  Her research is forthcoming as a cover article in Science, and has been covered by The Economist, the BBC, and Der Spiegel, and featured on the front page of the Times of London and PBS NOVA.  Salma received a PhD in Political Science from Stanford in 2020.

* Please note all CDDRL events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone

 

About the speaker:  Ahmet T. Kuru is Porteous Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University. Kuru received his PhD from the University of Washington and held a post-doc position at Columbia University. He is the author of award-winning Secularism and State Policies toward Religion: The United States, France, and Turkey (Cambridge UP) and the co-editor (with Alfred Stepan) of Democracy, Islam, and Secularism in Turkey (Columbia UP). His works have been translated into Arabic, Bosnian, Chinese, French, Indonesian, and Turkish. His 2019 book, Islam, Authoritarianism, and Underdevelopment: A Global and Historical Comparison (Cambridge UP) became the co-winner of the American Political Science Association's International History and Politics Section Best Book Award.