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Luke Reader, Ph.D. – Instructor and SAGES Teaching Fellow in the Department of History |
Friday October 25, 2019
12:30-1:30 p.m.
Dampeer Room
Kelvin Smith Library*
Case Western Reserve University
Dear Colleagues:
The Witching Hour Approaches. Perhaps.
The literature about public policy includes some discussion of “wicked problems.” A wicked problem is difficult or impossible to solve for a mix of reasons; one list emphasizes incomplete or contradictory knowledge, the number of people and opinions involved, large economic burdens, and the interconnected nature of these problems with other problems. Climate change, educational achievement, energy supply and antibiotic resistance are among the issues that have been described as “wicked.”
Brexit, British exit from the EU, certainly involves intense disagreement, especially about whether Brexit is a “problem” or a “solution.” The battling politicians sometimes (especially in the Labour Party) have trouble figuring out their own opinions. The economic stakes are huge (unless you think they’re not!) and the interconnection with other problems, especially the (temporarily?) former “troubles” in Northern Ireland, are central to debate. Most important, Brexit does not seem to have a “solution” that anyone but its most fervent proponents views as acceptable.
But Brexit is unusually wicked because there isn’t even agreement on how to decide – creating a seeming constitutional crisis in a country with no constitution. And some would say it is not a wicked problem but a stupid problem, totally unnecessary and created by dumb choices.
In March, October 31 was set as the date for Brexit. Luke Reader, a scholar of British politics and especially British party politics, joins us again to discuss whatever the situation will be less than a week before the deadline.
All best regards,
Joe White
Luxenberg Family Professor of Public Policy and Director, Center for Policy Studies
About Our Guest
Luke Reader (Ph.D., UC Irvine) is a SAGES Teaching Fellow in the department of history at CWRU. He studies Brexit and internationalism in the British Labour Party in the first half of the 20th century. He has a particular interest in how policymakers communicate through the media. Luke Reader teaches contemporary history. Recent courses have discussed Brexit, human rights, the global novel, and democracy and populism. Luke Reader has published in a wide range of academic and public venues and has been a guest speaker on the Pacifica radio shows The Attitude with Arnie Arnesen and Rising Up with Sonali Kolhatkar. He is currently writing a cultural history of Brexit.
Where We Meet
The Friday Public Affairs Lunch convenes each Friday when classes are in session, from 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. Our programs are open to all and no registration is required. We usually meet in the Dampeer Room of Kelvin Smith Library.
* Kelvin Smith Library requires all entrants to show identification when entering the building, unless they have a university i.d. that they can magnetically scan. We are sorry if that seems like a hassle, but it has been Library policy for a while in response to security concerns. Please do not complain to the library staff at the entrance, who are just doing their jobs.
Parking Possibilities
The most convenient parking is the lot underneath Severance Hall. We regret that it is not free. From that lot there is an elevator up to street level (labeled as for the Thwing Center); it is less than 50 yards from that exit to the library entrance. You can get from the Severance garage to the library without going outside. Near the entry gates – just to the right if you were driving out – there is a door into a corridor. Walk down the corridor and there will be another door. Beyond that door you’ll find the entrance to an elevator which goes up to an entrance right inside the doors to Kelvin Smith Library.
Schedule of Friday Lunch Upcoming Topics and Speakers:
November 1: Local News: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow. With Joseph Frolik, Senior Vice President for Communication, Community Relations and Government Relations, MetroHealth.
November 8: TBA. With Peter Shulman, Associate Professor of History.
November 15: Will We Ever Have Paris? The U.S. and the International Politics of Climate Change. With Matthew Hodgetts, Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science.
November 22: The (New?) Israeli Government. With Peter J. Haas, Abba Hillel Silver Professor Emeritus of Jewish Studies.
November 29: Thanksgiving break
December 6: Papers Please: Challenging Citizenship in the United States. With Cassandra Burke Robertson, John Deaver Drinko – Baker Hostetler Professor of Law and Director, Center for Professional Ethics. |
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October 20, 2019
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Upcoming Events
Military Medical Ethics: Battlefield Care for Compatriots, Host-Nation Nationals, and Captured Persons
A discussion with Michael L. Gross, Ph.D., Professor of Political Science at the University of Haifa, Israel, Thursday October 24, 2019, 1:00 – 2:15 p.m., Tinkham Veale University Center, Inamori Center Classroom 280F, 11038 Bellflower Rd, Cleveland, OH 44106.
Professor Gross’s most recent books include The Ethics of Insurgency (2015) and Soft War: The Ethics of Unarmed Conflict (2017, co-edited with Tamar Meisels). He has led workshops on battlefield ethics, medicine, and national security for the Dutch Ministry of Defense, the U.S. Army Medical Department, the U.K Defense Medical Services, the U.S. Naval Academy and War College, and the Israel National Defense College.
Assigning Protection: Can Refugee Rights and State Preferences be Reconciled?
A discussion with James C. Hathaway, Law Professorand Director of the Program in Refugee and Asylum Law, University of Michigan School of Law, Monday November 11, 12:00-1:00 p.m., Moot Courtroom (A59), 11075 East Blvd., Cleveland, Ohio 44106.
The theoretically global responsibility to protect refugees is today heavily skewed, with just ten countries – predominantly very poor – hosting more than half of the world’s refugee population. Refugee protection has moreover become tantamount to warehousing for most refugees, with roughly half of the world’s refugees stuck in “protracted refugee situations” for decades with their lives on hold.
Professor Hathaway’s lecture argues that both concerns – the unprincipled allocation of responsibility based on accidents of geography and the desperate need for greater attention to resettlement as a core protection response – cry out for a global, managed system to protect refugees.
James C. Hathaway, the James E. and Sarah A. Degan Professor of Law, is a leading authority on international refugee law whose work is regularly cited by the most senior courts of the common law world. He is the founding director of Michigan Law’s Program in Refugee and Asylum Law and the Distinguished Visiting Professor of International Refugee Law at the University of Amsterdam.
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