While events are postponed at The Graduate Center of the City University of New York in the heart of Manhattan, videos of recent public programs from its archive will be featured here for your enjoyment. The videos offer illuminating discussions in two main categories: insights into current events and conversations with leading writers and artists.
Capitalism and democracy were once seen as symbiotically related: a broadly market economy embedded within a liberal, representative demos. With inequality rising, as those at the top take more of the economic winnings, and with capitalism losing its luster, a majority of millennials in the U.S now say they prefer socialism. Also many of those being left behind are angrier and more desperate. Meanwhile, populism is rising on both the political left and right. If the partnership between capitalism and democracy is in question, partly due to the perceived failure of democratic institutions to generate shared economic prosperity, what’s next? State capitalism? Socialism? A basic income?
An expert panel discusses these provocative issues, featuring: Leslie McCall, presidential professor of sociology and political science and associate director of the Stone Center on Socio-Economic Inequality at The Graduate Center; Vanessa Williamson, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and author of Read My Lips: Why Americans Are Proud to Pay Taxes; and Andrew Yang, tech entrepreneur, philanthropist, founder of Venture for America, and, mostly recently, erstwhile candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination. The discussion is moderated by Richard Reeves, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, author of Dream Hoarders, and curator of the The Guardian’s “Broken Capitalism” series.
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Take a look back at an another event from last spring. Upon publication of Julia Alvarez’s most recent novel Afterlife, the program celebrated the 25th anniversary of her haunting In the Time of the Butterflies, a fictional account of three sisters involved with a resistance movement against an oppressive government that fatally silenced them, and a story that continues to resonate today. Alvarez speaks with Elizabeth Acevedo, winner of the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature for her novel written in verse The Poet X. These two leading Latinx voices in the American literary canon read from their work and join in an intergenerational conversation on craft, legacy, and literature.
