Politics and Polls

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#35: The Future of Conservatism in a Trump Era Mar 16, 2017

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The election of President Donald Trump has challenged the political machine of conservativism. Now, many on the right are grappling with how to make sense of "Trumpism" and whether it fits into the conservative movement that's been developing over the past few decades. A new policy and political journal, "American Affairs," aims to intellectualize the Trumpism movement as it unfolds. The publication is led by Julius Krein, a 2008 Harvard University graduate, who joins professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang on this episode of Politics & Polls. Krein is an American political writer and the founding editor of American Affairs. He first went into a career in finance, working for several firms, including Bank of America and the Blackstone Group, before leaving finance to found and edit American Affairs.

#34: How Normal is the Trump Presidency? Mar 09, 2017

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The start of Donald Trump's presidency has been anything but predictable. So far, his first 100 days in office have been filled with a lot of heat, noise — and executive orders. But is this that abnormal? Or is it par for the course? Where do we draw the line between what is unprecedented, and what we've seen before? Professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang discuss these questions — which are based on a recent article in The Upshot, a column for The New York Times— in this episode.

#33: Trade in a Trumpian World Mar 02, 2017

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President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to withdraw from the negotiating process of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and has vowed to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement. Both moves signal to foreign nations that the United States may have a very different outlook on international trade under President Trump. In this episode of Politics & Polls, professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang interview (Ret.) Amb. Michael B.G. Froman '85 about his outlook for international trade in a 'Trumpian World.' Amb. Froman served in President Obama's cabinet as the U.S. Trade Representative from June 2013 to January 2017. There, he worked to open global markets for U.S. goods and services, enforce America's rights in the global trading system and foster development through trade.

#32: Peace in the Middle East? Feb 23, 2017

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Almost every U.S. president has struggled to broker peace agreements in the Middle East, especially among Israel and Palestine. For many, the possibility of a peace agreement seems dire, with a two-state solution that seems to be fleeting. But what can we expect to see from President Donald Trump? To unravel these complex issues, Amb. Daniel Kurtzer joins this episode of Politics & Polls with co-hosts Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang. Kurtzer is the S. Daniel Abraham Visiting Professor in Middle Eastern Policy Studies at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Following a 29-year career in the U.S. Foreign Service, Kurtzer retired in 2005 with the rank of career-minister. From 2001 to 2005, he served as the U.S. ambassador to Israel and, from 1997 to 2001, he served as U.S. ambassador to Egypt.

#31: The Cognitive Science of 'Trumpology' Feb 16, 2017

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Donald Trump's presidency has evoked strong emotional and psychological responses from both the public and the president himself, raising issues not often brought forth in public policy and governance. Many, including members of the media, are trying to make sense of this complicated web of anger, passion, rationality and irrationality. Among those reporters is Jesse Singal of New York Magazine, who is bringing the social sciences into the news amid an often-heated environment. In this episode of Politics & Polls, professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang interview Singal and discuss, among other topics, his recent articles on fear among conservatives and how the "contact hypothesis" — when members from different groups interact — can diminish prejudice and hatred. Jesse Singal is a writer-at-large at New York Magazine, where, among other things, he covers social science, politics and weird internet subcultures. He's an alumnus of Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

#30: Immigration & Border Control with Doug Massey Feb 10, 2017

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A federal appeals court has blocked President Donald Trump's executive order issuing an immigration ban barring people from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Trump also has made moves toward building a border wall with Mexico, which recent figures suggest may cost an estimated $21 billion. If implemented, what would an immigration ban and a border wall accomplish? In this episode, professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang take a deep dive into immigration and border control with Doug Massey, one of the country's leading experts in this field. Throughout the discussion, Massey busts many myths, including the question of whether the effect of a border wall is to keep people out of the United States - or cage them inside. Massey is the Henry G. Bryant Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He studies international migration, race and housing, discrimination, education, urban poverty and Latin America, especially Mexico.

Wide Data Nets: The Dilemma of Catch & Release Feb 08, 2017

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The digital revolution is generating massive amounts of information. And while this big data certainly benefits researchers and consumers, it also poses significant privacy concerns. In this WooCast episode, Tim Lee of Vox interviews Princeton professors Prateek Mittal and Matt Salganik about the benefits, risks and concerns related to big data. This episode is part of a series featuring moderators and panelists who will participate in the Princeton-Fung Global Forum: "Society 3.0+: Can Liberty Survive the Digital Age?" The conference, to be held March 20-21 in Berlin, is being organized by the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Timothy B. Lee is a senior correspondent at Vox.com, where he covers technology and economics. He previously covered technology policy for The Washington Post and Ars Technica. He holds a master's degree in computer science from Princeton. Follow him on Twitter: @binarybits Prateek Mittal is an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering at Princeton University, where he is also affiliated with the Center for Information Technology Policy. His research aims to build secure and privacy-preserving communication systems. His research interests include the domains of privacy enhancing technologies, trustworthy social systems and internet/network security. His work has influenced the design of several widely used anonymity systems. Matthew Salganik is professor of sociology at Princeton University, and he is affiliated with several of Princeton's interdisciplinary research centers including the Office for Population Research, the Center for Information Technology Policy, the Center for Health and Wellbeing and the Center for Statistics and Machine Learning. His research interests include social networks and computational social science. He is the author of the forthcoming book "Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age."

#29: The Trump Show Feb 02, 2017

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It seems as if America is watching two shows in parallel. On one hand, we're seeing the political process unfold with cabinet nominees being appointed and executive orders being signed. On the other hand, the country has front-row seats to The Donald Trump Show, a gripping drama filled with unexpected twists and turns. Are we seeing the birth cries of an authoritarian regime? Or is it the gang that couldn't shoot straight? Professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang debate this and more in episode #29.

#28: The Women's March on Washington with Katha Pollitt Jan 26, 2017

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Hailed as one of the largest protests in American history, the Women's March on Washington gathered hundreds of thousands of people both the district and millions in sister marches across the world. Held just a day after President Donald Trump's inauguration, the protest was an opportunity for Americans to bring gender and reproductive rights to the forefront, an issue many feel is under threat by a Trump administration. In this episode of Politics & Polls, professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang discuss the march and reproductive rights with Katha Pollitt, a columnist for The Nation. Pollitt's column, "Subject to Debate" has been cited as "the best place to go for original thinking on the left." Pollitt is an American feminist poet, essayist and critic. In 2007 Random House published her collection of personal essays, "Learning to Drive and Other Life Stories." Her most recent book is "Pro: Reclaiming Abortion Rights," which The New York Times listed as a Notable Book of 2014. Pollitt has also written essays and book reviews for The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New Republic, Harper's, Ms., Glamour, Mother Jones, The New York Times and the London Review of Books.

How the Digital Cookies Crumble Jan 25, 2017

Show notes

Can liberty survive the digital age? In this episode, Princeton University professors Jennifer Rexford and Janet Vertesi discuss internet infrastructure and its effect on how people use the web as a vehicle for communication and information. This episode is part of a series featuring panelists who will participate in the Princeton-Fung Global Forum: "Society 3.0+: Can Liberty Survive the Digital Age?" The conference, to be held March 20-21 in Berlin, is being organized by the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Jennifer Rexford is the Gordon Y.S. Wu Professor of Engineering, professor of computer science and chair of the Department of Computer Science at Princeton University. Before joining Princeton in 2005, she worked for eight years at AT&T Labs—Research. Jennifer received her bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Princeton University in 1991 and her Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of Michigan in 1996. She is co-author of the book "Web Protocols and Practice" (Addison-Wesley, May 2001). She served as the chair of ACM SIGCOMM from 2003 to 2007. Jennifer was the 2004 winner of ACM's Grace Murray Hopper Award for outstanding young computer professional. She is an ACM fellow (2008) and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2013) and the National Academy of Engineering (2014). Janet Vertesi is a sociologist of science and technology at Princeton University, where she is an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology. At Princeton, she teaches classes on the sociology of science and technology, technology in organizations and human-computer interaction. Vertesi has spent the past decade as an ethnographer of spacecraft missions at NASA, and is the author of "Seeing Like a Rover: How Robots, Teams and Images Craft Knowledge of Mars." In addition to her research on complex technical organizations, she nurtures a passion for public understanding about the intersection of technology and society, especially with respect to online privacy. Best known publicly for her "opt out" experiments that reveal underlying assumptions embedded in computing technologies, she is an advisory board member of the Data & Society Institute in New York City, has blogged extensively on the topic at Time.com and is a faculty affiliate of the Center for Information Technology Policy.

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