Commonwealth Club of California Podcast

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Paul Belonick: Restraint, Conflict, and the Fall of the Roman Republic Mar 01, 2024

Show notes

Strongly held values can stabilize a society. They can also splinter it. Paul Belonick explores the moral paradoxes of republican Rome and describes how aristocrats engaged in "performative politics," aggressively seeking self-advancement with a competitiveness that fueled the expansion of an empire. At the same time, Roman orators and authors emphasized the need for self-control, moderation and temperance. Scholars have long suggested that this moral obsession with self-control was merely a social marker of aristocratic status, but Belonick argues that the Roman focus on self-control was responsible for solidifying their peculiarly competitive, semi-formal government.

As conflicts arose in Rome over how to apply these cultural values to novel circumstances, competitors saw each other as desecrating republican principles and therefore as targets to be eradicated. Belonick presents a fresh perspective on the republic’s collapse, by illustrating both sides of this Roman paradox: how values of self-control legitimized the Romans' competition and supported their fluid social structure and political institutions—but then tore the Republic apart.

Join us, at a time when almost no one even mentions restraint, to rediscover how the values associated with restraint can both stabilize and de-stabilize political systems.

MLF ORGANIZER: George Hammond

A Humanities Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums.

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CLIMATE ONE: What More Can I Do? Mar 01, 2024

Show notes

If you’re a climate-conscious person, you likely already know some of the main ways you can reduce your contribution to greenhouse gasses: buy less, eat less meat, ride your bike.

But there are other, less obvious methods we don’t always think of: voting, having climate conversations, engaging with your local government, changing where your money is invested. And while our role as individuals does matter, we’re more powerful when we work together in collective action.

Guests:

Jon Foley, Executive Director, Project Drawdown

Eliza Nemser, Executive Director, Climate Changemakers

This episode also features excerpts from Cory Booker, Anna Lappé, Frances Moore Lappé, Saul Griffith, Monique Figueiredo, Jonathan Chapman, Jennifer Anderson, Tanya Gulliver Garcia, Vernon Walker, Abrar Anwar, Slater Jewell-Kemker, Kyle Gracey and Alec Loorz.

📞 Have you moved within the United States for climate-related reasons? Tell us about it!

For the chance to have your climate migration story shared on Climate One, give us a call at 650 382-3869. Please keep your voicemail under two minutes and include your name and contact information so we know how to reach you if we decide to feature your story.

For show notes and related links, visit our website.

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Week to Week Political Roundtable: February 22 Feb 27, 2024

Show notes

It's the 12th anniversary of the Week to Week political roundtable! Come celebrate with us.

The courts are issuing rulings on presidential contenders and ballots; primaries and caucuses are underway, Congress just completed one of its least productive years in history, San Francisco is voting on mayors and propositions—how will we ever think of anything to talk about on this program?

As usual with Week to Week, our panelists will discuss the latest political developments in an informed, civil (and fun) manner.

Join us for a whole new year of lively political discussion at Commonwealth Club World Affairs of California.

See other upcoming Week to Week political roundtables, as well as audio and video of past Week to Week programs.

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The Pursuit of Happiness: Jeffrey Rosen, President and CEO of the National Constitution Center Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

What did “the pursuit of happiness” mean to our nation’s founders and how did that famous phrase become the foundation of our democracy?

The Declaration of Independence identifies “the pursuit of happiness” as one of our unalienable rights, along with life and liberty. In a new book, National Constitution Center President and CEO Jeffrey Rosen profiles six of the most influential founders—Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton—to show what pursuing happiness meant in their lives.

By reading the classical Greek and Roman moral philosophers who inspired the Founders, Rosen uncovers how they understood the pursuit of happiness as a quest for being good, not feeling good—the pursuit of lifelong virtue, not short-term pleasure. Among those virtues were the habits of industry, temperance, moderation and sincerity, which the Founders viewed as part of a daily struggle for self-improvement, character development and calm self-mastery. They believed that political self-government required personal self-government. For all six Founders, the pursuit of virtue was incompatible with the enslavement of African Americans—though the Virginians betrayed their own principles on that issue.

Join us as Rosen not only elucidates the meaning of the Declaration’s famous phrase, but also takes us on a revelatory journey into the minds of the Founders, providing a deep, rich and fresh understanding of the foundation of our democracy.

MLF ORGANIZER: George Hammond

This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation.

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Future of SF: Town Hall + March Election Roundup Feb 25, 2024

Show notes

Come join WE SF and Commonwealth Club World Affairs for a one-of-a-kind, high-energy town hall presentation plus discussion, the likes of which San Francisco hasn’t recently seen!

Not only will we present a nonpartisan multimedia breakdown of each of the ballot measures and candidates on the March 2024 election ballot, but we will have many of the city’s top elected officials, leaders, and key stakeholders on both sides of the aisle on hand to present the “pros” and “cons” of each issue. The event schedule is as follows:.The event combines WE San Francisco’s unique ability to inspire civic engagement and explain complex issues, with the “big ideas” thought leadership of Commonwealth Club World Affairs, the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum whose mission is to bring people together to connect, learn and act on issues that impact our community.

Presenters include:

Matt Dorsey, member, San Francisco Board of Supervisors (District 6)
Joel Engardio, member, San Francisco Board of Supervisors (District 4)
Ahsha Safai, member, San Francisco Board of Supervisors (District 11)
And many more!.

The result is a celebration of San Francisco’s future, but one that is grounded in the realities of the present and what we can individually and collectively do to enable a better tomorrow.

Co-hosted with WE SF. This program is part of the Guggenhime Speakers Series, sponsored by the The Stanley S. Langendorf Foundation.

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Gretchen Sisson with Sen. Laphonza Butler: The Politics of Adoption and the Privilege of American Motherhood Feb 24, 2024

Show notes

Abortion and adoption are twinned in the minds of many Americans who have endured the never-ending heated debates over abortion. Now, in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, sociologist Dr. Gretchen Sisson releases the results of her decade-long study of adoption, revealing what she says is the grief of American mothers for whom the choice to parent was never real.

Adoption has long been viewed as a beloved institution for building families, as well as mutually agreed common ground in the abortion debate. But little attention has been paid to the lives of mothers who relinquish infants for private adoption. For her book Relinquished, Sisson draws upon hundreds of interviews with mothers who placed their children for domestic adoption. She finds their voices to be powerful and heartrending, deserving to be heard.

Join us for a timely and provocative look at the flip side of the fight over abortion, adoption, rights and the American family.

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CLIMATE ONE: Geothermal: So Hot Right Now Feb 23, 2024

Show notes

When most people hear the phrase renewable energy, they imagine fields full of solar panels or giant spinning wind turbines. But another source may be heating up: geothermal. Twenty years ago it was thought that geothermal could provide at most 10% of any given area’s electricity, and only in very limited regions. There were also environmental concerns about depleting groundwater.

But new technological advances may have unlocked the potential for scalable geothermal energy just about anywhere. And in a bit of irony, those technological advances came from the oil and gas industry.

Guests:

Amanda Kolker, Laboratory Program Manager for Geoscience and Geothermal Technologies, NREL

Jamie Beard, founder of Project InnerSpace

Lauren McLean, Mayor of Boise

Contributing Producer: David Condos

For show notes and related links, visit our website.

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"The Sugar ""Fix"": The Addiction and the Treatment Feb 21, 2024

Show notes

Dr. Robert Lustig and Dr. Nicole Avena will have a conversation about sugar, based on many years of scientific and clinical experience.

They will begin with a brief history of the evolution of sugar in our food environment and move on to where we are today regarding types of sugar and sweeteners, as well as the pervasiveness of these in our food supply. Questions explored will include: How do various types of sugar and sweeteners affect your brain and body systems? Is moderation possible when evidence suggests sugar may be "addictive"? What are the options if you want something sweet? You will have an opportunity to ask questions and will gain valuable insights to help you understand sugar and reduce your intake if need be.

Dr. Nicole Avena is an associate professor of neuroscience at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City and a visiting professor of health psychology at Princeton University. She is a research neuroscientist and expert in the fields of nutrition, diet and addiction, with a special focus on nutrition during early life and pregnancy, and women’s health. She has done groundbreaking work developing models to characterize food addiction and the dangers of excess sugar intake.

Robert H. Lustig, M.D., M.S.L. is emeritus professor of pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology, and member of the Institute for Health Policy Studies, at UCSF. Dr. Lustig is a neuroendocrinologist, with expertise in metabolism, obesity, and nutrition. He is one of the leaders of the current “anti-sugar” movement that is changing the food industry. He has dedicated his retirement from clinical medicine to helping fix the food supply any way he can, to reduce human suffering and to salvage the environment.

MLF ORGANIZER: Patty James

A Nutrition, Food & Wellness Member-led Forum program. Forums at the Club are organized and run by volunteer programmers who are members of The Commonwealth Club, and they cover a diverse range of topics. Learn more about our Forums.

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Paul Starobin: The Fight for a Better Russia Feb 20, 2024

Show notes

Russia’s future lies outside of Russia.

That’s the verdict offered by Paul Starobin, a veteran analyst of Russia. Since Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine, some 1 million Russians have fled the country and gone into exile. Motivated by opposition to the war, by guilt for their country’s deeds, by personal hatred for the czar-like Putin, and by a vision of a better Russia shorn of autocracy, the exiles have mounted an organized resistance to Putin’s rule.

Starobin says that the resistance includes followers of the imprisoned Putin opponent Alexi Navalny, dissident Russian Orthodox priests, and journalists feeding Russians back home the kind of coverage that is censored by Kremlin-controlled media. Most aggressively, some exiles are actively aiding the Ukrainian fight against Russia’s armed forces in hopes of hastening Russia’s defeat and Putin’s demise.

Starobin traveled to places like Armenia and Georgia to meet with exiles and had conversations with prominent figures throughout Europe and America, as he took measure of this rebellion—and its potential to fix a nation plagued by revanchist imperial dreams.

He reported his findings in his new book Putin’s Exiles, and he’ll tell you what he found and what might be coming next for Russia. Join us for a special online-only program that goes beyond pro-Putin propaganda and the tightly controlled narrative inside the country, and looks outside its borders to the diaspora of Russian exiles, who are imagining and fighting for the future of their country.

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'20 Days in Mariupol' Film Screening Feb 19, 2024

Show notes

Join us for a special discussion with filmmaker Mstyslav Chernov.

20 Days in Mariupol, nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film, presents a visceral, first-person view of the early days of Russia’s invasion of the city of Mariupol, Ukraine. An Associated Press team of Ukrainian journalists is trapped in the besieged city, where they struggle to continue their work documenting atrocities of the Russian invasion. As the only international reporters who remain in the city, they capture what later become defining images of the war: dying children, mass graves, the bombing of a maternity hospital, and more.

This is the first feature film from Chernov, who spent nearly a decade covering international conflicts, including the Russia-Ukraine war, for The Associated Press. The film draws on Chernov’s daily news dispatches and personal footage of his own country at war. It offers a vivid, harrowing account of civilians caught in the siege, as well as a window into what it’s like to report from a conflict zone, and the impact of such journalism around the globe.

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