The Rebirth of White Rage

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Heather Ann Thompson- Pulitzer Prize winning author and Professor of History at the University of Michigan - about her new book “Fear and Fury: The Reagan Eighties, the Bernie Goetz Shootings, and the Rebirth of White Rage”. In their conversation they discuss: the 1984 subway shooting of four black boys - Barry Allen, Darrell Cabey, Troy Canty, and James Ramseur -  by a white gunman, Bernie Goetz, what the media narratives and public perception of the event tell us about that time in the country,  Ruport Murdoch’s role and motivations in influencing the public narrative, how the politics of the Reagan era speak to today’s political landscape, and the legacy of the Goetz trial. Heather Ann Thompson is a historian and the author of “Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy”, which won the Pulitzer Prize and the Bancroft Prize. Thompson has written about the criminal justice system for myriad publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time, Rolling Stone, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker. She has served on the National Academy of Sciences blue ribbon panel that studied the causes and consequences of mass incarceration in the United States, co-runs the Carceral State Project at the University of Michigan, and has been the recipient of numerous honors including a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Creative Nonfiction Grant, and a Racial Justice Fellowship from the Carr-Ryan Center for Human Rights at Harvard University. She is currently a Professor of History at the University of Michigan. You can find her new book here:  Fear and Fury: The Reagan Eighties, the Bernie Goetz Shootings, and the Rebirth of White Rage”.  

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, co-host Maggie Gates speaks with Neha Sanghrajka, Kenyan negotiator, mediator, and scholar whose career has shaped some of the most consequential peace processes of our time — from working alongside Kofi Annan during Kenya's 2007 post-election crisis to serving as a key architect of the landmark 2019 Maputo Accord that ended decades of conflict in Mozambique. Together they discuss: the role of mediation in conflict resolution, insights from the Mozambique peace process, peace listening vs. peace talks, building trust in the process, navigating post-agreement challenges, and her advice for emerging negotiators.   Neha Sanghrajka is a senior conflict sensitivity advisor at UNOPS and serves on the boards of the Kofi Annan and Berghof Foundations. She is a Yale University Peace Fellow, Senior Advisor and Fellow at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, and a fellow at the Weatherhead Center at Harvard University. A founding member of Women Mediators across the Commonwealth, she holds a Degree in Law as well as a Master’s Degree in International Relations. Neha has authored several publications including the book “Back from the brink: The 2008 mediation process and reforms in Kenya.”

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Tirza Leibowitz, Deputy Director of Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) about the organization's decades of work providing medical services in Israel-Palestine.  Together they discuss: Tirza’s background in disability rights in Israel-Palestine before joining PHRI, the difference between the international organization Physicians for Human Rights and PHR Israel, the role of the Palestinian and Israeli physicians and medical staff and volunteers who make up the organization, PHRI’s position among the other local human rights organizations in Israel-Palestine, how they go about providing medical services in conflict areas, PHRI’s involvement in Gaza over the last decades and how that’s changed in recent years, the nature of the ongoing conflict in Gaza, how PHRI’s on the ground knowledge led it to understand the situation as a genocide, the reactions of other Israeli organizations to PHRI’s stance on Gaza, the work of understanding the number of casualties in the conflict, and what their perspective on the current situation in Gaza says about the state of the conflict.

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, co-host Maggie Gates welcomes Omer Shem Tov and Leat Corinne Unger, cousins who rose to prominence following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023. Omer is a survivor of the Nova Music Festival massacre who was held hostage by Hamas in Gaza for 505 days. Leat is his American cousin who dropped everything to advocate for the hostage families following the attack and abductions. She became a leader and central voice in the fight to release the hostages. Together the two have been speaking on US College campuses. On today’s episode they discuss: Omer’s memories of the attack at the Nova Music Festival on October 7th, his experience of captivity for 505 days including 50 days in total isolation below ground, how he found the strength to survive, Leat’s memories of October 7th watching from the US, her experience as an advocate for her cousin and other hostages, speaking in a political climate where narrative is instrumentalized as a political tool, how Omer and Leat came to speak on US college campuses, their experience of talking to US college students about October 7th, the importance of dialogue, the challenges to peace, and the complexities of hope and a peaceful path forward.

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Dr. Christos Christou, outgoing president of Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières or MSF) a medical humanitarian organization that coordinates tens of thousands of medical staff to provide emergency aid to people in crisis in over 75 countries. Together they discuss: Dr. Christou’s background that led him to humanitarian medical work, his early days working as a physician in Sub-Saharan Africa during the HIV pandemic and with migrant communities, how he thinks about the concept of humanity as a practical commitment, the changing environment of humanitarian aid, the practicalities of the extensive work MSF has done in Gaza, how MSF navigates the political terrain of this conflict as an organization committed to humanitarian aid, and what lessons he’s learned that give him hope. Dr. Christos Christou graduated from Aristotle University’s medical school and has a PhD in surgery from the Kapodistrian University of Athens. After serving as a surgeon at Evangelismos Hospital in Athens, he became a senior clinical fellow at King’s College Hospital in London and was later awarded a fellowship from the European Board of Surgery in Coloproctology. Dr. Christou joined MSF in 2002 and has held several roles. His first assignment was in Greece as a field doctor, working with migrants and refugees. He then worked as a doctor in an HIV/AIDS project in Zambia in 2004 and 2005. He later served in a number of conflict zones and insecure contexts, including South Sudan, Iraq, and, most recently, Cameroon, as an emergency and trauma surgeon. With MSF he has held roles including general secretary, vice-president, and president of MSF Greece's Board of Directors, and finally, as MSF international president from 2019 to 2025.

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, guest host Timothy Patrick McCarthy - faculty chair of the Global LGBTQI plus Human Rights Program - speaks with Laura Murphy, about forced labor and human rights. Laura Murphy is a professor at Sheffield Hallam University in the UK and one of the leading global experts on forced labor.   Together they discuss: what led Laura to this work,  the role of storytelling in human rights work, the complexity of violence in freedom movements, the terminology and uses of “forced labor” and “modern slavery”, forced labor among the Uyghur population in China, difficulties faced by academics and activists in addressing human rights abuses, and hope amidst the backlash. Laura Murphy is a Professor of Human Rights at Sheffield Hallam University in the UK, and was recently a Biden administration appointee at the Department of Homeland Security, working on implementation of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. Her research currently focuses on forced labor in China and in international supply chains. She has written several books on forced labor globally including Freedomville (Columbia Global Reports, 2021) and The New Slave Narrative (Columbia University Press, 2019).

On today’s episode of Justice Matters, co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Brandon Terry, a political theorist at Harvard University whose work seeks to reshape how we understand African-American political thought, especially the memory and meaning of the civil rights movement. Today they discuss topics related to his recently published book, “Shattered Dreams, Infinite Hope: A Tragic Vision of the Civil Rights Movement.” Together they discuss: why Brandon wrote the book, his reasons for choosing the title, different interpretations of Martin Luther King Jr’s role., the different narratives of the Civil Rights movement including the romantic view, the afro-pessimist view, and Brandon’s tragic vision that he lays out in the book, and Brandon’s reflections on the current state of politics in the United States. Brandon M. Terry is John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard University and Co-director of the Institute on Policing, Incarceration, and Public Safety at the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research. He is the coeditor, with Tommie Shelby, of “To Shape a New World: Essays on the Political Philosophy of Martin Luther King, Jr.” and editor of “Fifty Years Since MLK.” Terry has published work in Modern Intellectual History, Political Theory, The New York Review of Books, Time, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Boston Review, Dissent, The Point, and New Labor Forum and been interviewed by The Ezra Klein Show, Vox, the New York Times, and other media outlets. “Shattered Dreams, Infinite Hope: A Tragic Vision of the Civil Rights Movement” is available from Harvard University Press: https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674271289

On today's episode of Justice Matters, co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Yuval Shany, fellow at the Ethics in AI Institute at the University of Oxford. They discuss his recent white paper, “The Need for and Feasibility of an International AI Bill of Human Rights,” and the topics it touches on around AI’s profound impact on the understanding and implementation of rights. Other topics they discuss include: the impact of AI on society, opportunities and challenges the technology poses for human rights, why the need for a new International AI Bill of Human Rights,  what the new bill would entail, the political liability of an international bill, the future of AI regulation, and the importance of integrating human rights principles into AI development and deployment. Yuval Shany is the Hersch Lauterpacht Chair in International Law and former Dean of the Law Faculty of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He was a member of the UN Human Rights Committee from 2013 to 2020, and served for one year during that time as Chair of the Committee. Professor Shany also serves as a Senior Research Fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, and a Visiting Professor in the Center for Transnational Legal Studies (CTLS) at King’s College, London and the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva. His current research focuses on international human rights law and new technology and he leads a European Research Council group of researchers investigating the three generations of digital human rights (3GDR). White Paper: The Need for and Feasibility of an International AI Bill of Human Rights By Professor Yuval Shany

On today's episode of Justice Matters, co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Dr. Kelsey Leonard, a water scientist and legal scholar from the Shinnecock Indian Nation. They discuss the fundamental role of water in life, ecosystems, and human rights, particularly focusing on Indigenous perspectives on water justice. Dr. Kelsey Leonard is a water scientist, legal scholar, policy expert, writer, and enrolled citizen of the Shinnecock Nation. Her work focuses on Indigenous water justice and its climatic, territorial, and governance underpinnings for our shared sustainable future. Dr. Leonard represents the Shinnecock Nation on the Mid-Atlantic Committee on the Ocean, which is charged with protecting America's ocean ecosystems and coastlines. She also serves as a member of the Great Lakes Water Quality Board of the International Joint Commission. Dr. Leonard has been instrumental in safeguarding the interests of Indigenous Nations for environmental planning, and builds Indigenous science and knowledge into new solutions for sustainable water and ocean governance.On today’s episode they discuss: water as an essential part of life, the Shinnecock Indian Nation, Indigenous led water justice movements, current challenges facing water defenders, how a human rights frameworks can be applied to water protection, Indigenous knowledge as integral for effective water management, the Great Lakes and indigenous governance, and Dr. Leonard’s current research.

On today's episode of Justice Matters, co-host Maggie Gates speaks with Judith Abitan, international human rights advocate and the executive director of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, about her work in fighting for the freedom of political prisoners in entrenched systems of oppression.Judith has been at the forefront of some of the most pressing human rights issues of our time, immersed in the pursuit of justice internationally, the promotion and protection of human rights, and the betterment of the human condition. She has made representations to international bodies and governments in relation to the rescue and resettlement of some of the most vulnerable and at-risk populations, political prisoner cases, and asylum seeker applications. Judith’s advocacy work has encompassed, inter alia, the case and cause of Biram Dah Abeid, leader of the international anti-slavery movement and president of the Initiative for the Resurgence of the Abolitionist Movement in Mauritania; Dawit Isaak, dual Eritrean-Swedish citizen known to be, with his colleagues, the longest detained journalists in the world; and a series of Burundian journalists and human rights defenders convicted on trumped-up charges for criticizing the government. Judith has also written for major publications including the National Post, the Globe and Mail, the Times of Israel, the Washington Post, and Time.On today’s episode they discuss: how Judith came to be involved in such a wide range of geopolitical contexts, the case of journalist Dawit Isaak who has been detained since 2001 in an Eritrean prison and what it says about the state of press freedom globally, what levers of accountability are most effective in working for release of political prisoners, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s imprisonment of Dr. Ahmadreza Jalal, the issue of modern slavery and why it persists despite international law, the balance of moral urgency and pragmatic strategy in human rights work, and Judith’s personal reflections on cultivating resilience in an increasingly restrictive world.