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Begin New Search Topic COVID-19 Content Type Video

1. Polling London: Londoners' Priorities ahead of the Local Elections

Publication Date:
03-2022
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Mile End Institute, Queen Mary University of London
Abstract:
On Thursday 5 May, Londoners will go to the polls to elect nearly 2000 councillors and 5 new mayors across 32 boroughs, for the first time since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. In association with YouGov, the Mile End Institute has polled Londoners to find out how they intend to vote on 5 May, how living in the Capital during the Covid-19 pandemic has changed their perception of the City and how much trust they have in the Metropolitan Police. At this Breakfast Webinar, held on Thursday 24 March, Farah Hussain (Polling London Project Manager) and Dr Patrick Diamond (Director of the MEI) present our findings, before Lewis Baston, Jenna Goldberg, and Sadiya Akram give their thoughts on the significance of these results and what they tell us about politics and policy in London.
Topic:
Elections, Domestic Politics, Local, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
United Kingdom, Europe, and London

2. The Wuhan Lockdown

Author:
Guobin Yang and Qin Gao
Publication Date:
02-2022
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
In this book talk, the author tells the dramatic story of the Wuhan lockdown in the voices of the city’s own people. Using a vast archive of more than 6,000 diaries, the sociologist Guobin Yang vividly depicts how the city coped during the crisis. He analyzes how the state managed—or mismanaged—the lockdown and explores how Wuhan’s residents responded by taking on increasingly active roles. Yang demonstrates that citizen engagement—whether public action or the civic inaction of staying at home—was essential in the effort to fight the pandemic. The book features compelling stories of citizens and civic groups in their struggle against COVID-19: physicians, patients, volunteers, government officials, feminist organizers, social media commentators, and even aunties loudly swearing at party officials. These snapshots from the lockdown capture China at a critical moment, revealing the intricacies of politics, citizenship, morality, community, and digital technology. This event is part of the 2021-2022 lecture series on “COVID-19 Impacts and Responses in China and Beyond” and is co-sponsored by the Weatherhead East Asian Institute and the China Center for Social Policy.
Topic:
Crisis Management, Pandemic, Domestic Policy, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
China and Asia

3. Chinese Trust in Government: A Response Pattern Approach

Author:
Cary Wu and Yao Lu
Publication Date:
02-2022
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
Chinese citizens have high trust in their government is well documented. Recent data show that this remains true during the COVID-19 crisis. Nonetheless, a long-standing debate is whether Chinese trust in government is genuine or simply a reflection of political fear. To offer further insights, in this article I adopt a response pattern approach that shifts the focus from how much people trust (the level of trust) to how people trust (the pattern of trust). Analyzing data from multiple sources, I consider the homogeneity and heterogeneity in how political trust is expressed among diverse populations (e.g., children vs adults) and in different situations (e.g., taped vs. not taped). I identify ten specific patterns that consistently suggest Chinese trust in government may not be simply reduced to a misrepresentation out of political fear. This study illustrates that examining the often-overlooked patterns of how people express their attitudes within different segments of the population and in different contexts provides a means to test whether the expressed attitudes are fake or genuine. This event is sponsored by the Weatherhead East Asian Institute and cosponsored by the China Center for Social Policy.
Topic:
Government, Public Opinion, Citizenship, COVID-19, and Trust
Political Geography:
China and Asia

4. How Transnational Education Transforms Privilege

Author:
Yingyi Ma and Yao Lu
Publication Date:
03-2022
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
This study examines two cohorts of Chinese international students studying in the U.S. whose privilege is challenged and sometimes upended before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. This research questions the dominant framing of privilege centering on the notion of ease, as informed by the western scholarship on elite education. Drawing from the power structure of international education and rising geopolitical tensions between the U.S. and China, this study concludes that transnational education infuses much anxiety and fragility into the lived experiences of international students, who have experienced the status loss from the privileged majority to the marginalized minority. COVID had exacerbated this loss. This study contributes to the scholarship on elites by interrogating the western-centric notion of privilege. This event is part of the 2021-2022 lecture series on “COVID-19 Impacts and Responses in China and Beyond” and is sponsored by the Weatherhead East Asian Institute and cosponsored by Columbia's China Center for Social Policy.
Topic:
Education, Geopolitics, Students, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
China and United States of America

5. Migrant Worker Rights in Singapore: Advocacy, Legal Frameworks and Prospects for Change

Author:
Debbie Fordyce and Laavanya Kathiravelu
Publication Date:
12-2022
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
Debbie Fordyce, President of Transient Workers Council Too, and Laavanya Kathiravelu, Associate professor at Nanyang Technological University, will discuss their advocacy and research on migrant worker issues in Singapore. COVID-19 highlighted some of the structural problems faced by the large population of migrant workers in Singapore. Systemic problems include high recruitment costs, restricted job mobility, employer’s right to terminate the worker at will, and weak wage protection. Our speakers will address these issues and what might be done to protect the rights and needs of migrant workers in Singapore.
Topic:
Advocacy, COVID-19, Migrant Workers, and Migrants
Political Geography:
Singapore and Southeast Asia

6. Lecture: The Evolution of the Civic Space in Modern African Democracy

Author:
Idayat Hassan and Kwame Karikari
Publication Date:
11-2022
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Ghana Center for Democratic Development
Abstract:
Over the last decade, the world has witnessed a decline in democracy and the closing of civic spaces – the bedrock of democratic society through which citizens and civil society organizations are able to organize, participate and communicate without hindrance. These two phenomena have dominated conversations on various platforms globally and have intensified since the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Democratic backsliding and shrinking civic space in our part of the world represent a major setback for the region and its people. This lecture seeks to deliberate on these evolving issues and offer practical recommendations aimed at influencing urgent interventions that will help halt democratic backsliding and the closing of democratic civic spaces.
Topic:
Civil Society, Governance, Democracy, COVID-19, and Democratic Backsliding
Political Geography:
Africa and Ghana

7. Stories of Kinship, Care, and COVID-19: Connecting Nepal and Himalayan New York

Author:
Sienna Craig
Publication Date:
04-2021
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
For centuries, people from Mustang, Nepal, have relied on agriculture, pastoralism, and trade as a way of life. Seasonal migrations to South Asian cities for trade as well as temporary wage labo abroad and Mustang-based tourism have shaped their experiences for decades. Yet, more recently, permanent migrations to New York City are reshaping lives and social worlds. Drawing on more than two decades of fieldwork and friendship with people in and from Mustang, The Ends of Kinship: Connecting Himalayan Lives between Nepal and New York, the book on which this presentation is based, combines narrative ethnography and short fiction to explore how individuals, families, and communities care for each other and carve out spaces of belonging in and through diaspora, at the nexus of environmental, economic, and cultural change. This presentation will also discuss how COVID-19 has impacted the lives of Himalayan and Tibetan New Yorkers, and how regional cultural practices and Tibetan Buddhist philosophies are shaping responses to this pandemic. This event was organized by the Modern Tibetan Studies Program and cosponsored by the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University.
Topic:
Agriculture, Environment, Diaspora, Ethnography, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
New York, Asia, Nepal, and Tibet

8. New game in the (post)covid Balkans?

Author:
Engjellushe Morina, Florian Bieber, Vuk Viksanovic, Jovana Marovic, Faruk Ajeti, and Vedran Dzihic
Publication Date:
03-2021
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Austrian Institute for International Affairs (OIIP)
Abstract:
The global pandemic is changing the world. The Western Balkans were hit severely and are currently struggling with the rapid increase in numbers of Covid-19 infections. The state-of-the-play in the region is shaped by the dynamics of the pandemics but also by underlying structural problems, by the “return of geopolitics’ in the Balkans and question marks put behind the EU-Enlargement and new transatlantic relations. What we see at display right now is a sort of 'vaccine nationalism' threatening to replace the European solidarity. We see China rapidly increasing its influence, EU struggling to find a strong common policy towards the region and new expectations (for some) or even fears (for some others) related to the new Biden Administration. The debate seeks to explore this new game in the (post)covid Balkans. Are non-Western players using the pandemic with their ‘vaccine politics’ to fill Western’s gap or to challenge Western’s influence in the Balkans? What is the role of the EU and what the future prospects for enlargement? Will China’s increased influence in the Western Balkans hinder its transatlantic aspirations? How will the Biden administration meet the new challenges in the region? In cooperation with the Ministry of Defense (bmlv), the Austrian Marshall Plan Foundation, and the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR)
Topic:
Geopolitics, Transatlantic Relations, Vaccine, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
China, Europe, and Balkans

9. After the Virus: Lessons from The Past For A Better Future

Publication Date:
11-2021
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Mile End Institute, Queen Mary University of London
Abstract:
Hilary Cooper and Simon Szreter have published a powerful manifesto for change post-Covid-19. It argues that the world needs ‘a new morality’ to recover from the pandemic and to prepare for future crises - and that Britain’s own history points the way. In 'After the Virus', they show how decades of neoliberalism and austerity left us vulnerable to the effects of Covid-19; they show how important history is for British and global public policy today, going back 400 years to look at Elizabeth I’s innovative Poor Laws, the world’s first universal welfare system; and they present practical proposals, inspired by our own history, that will promote a morality of nurturing, not exploiting, people and the planet.
Topic:
Governance, Neoliberalism, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
United Kingdom and Europe

10. Where Next for the Liberal Democrats?

Publication Date:
07-2021
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Mile End Institute, Queen Mary University of London
Abstract:
In partnership with the think-tank Social Liberal Forum, we were delighted to welcome you to ‘Where Next for the Liberal Democrats?’. The panel considered the recent electoral performance of the Liberal Democrats in UK-wide, national, and local elections, the role of the Party in shaping the policy agenda in British politics, and the broader challenges to political liberalism in the aftermath of Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic.
Topic:
Brexit, Domestic Politics, Liberalism, Political Parties, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
United Kingdom and Europe