Growing homelessness has fueled bitter conflicts in hundreds of neighborhoods across California. The drought is renewing generations-old local wars over water. Schools have become political and cultural battlegrounds, with parents and teachers at odds. And fights over pandemic response, from Shasta to Orange Counties, have escalated into violent threats between citizens and local officials. Why are so many Californians falling into fights with their neighbors? How much do social media and our polarized national politics contribute to local divides? And what are the best strategies to extract ourselves, and our neighbors, from intense conflicts so that we might work together to solve problems?
“High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We Get Out” author Amanda Ripley, UCLA sociocultural anthropologist Kyeyoung Park, and mediator and former California Superior Court judge B. Scott Silverman visited Zócalo to discuss how we can stop contentious disputes from escalating and taking over our communities. This Zócalo/California Wellness Foundation event, co-presented with the Natural History Museum of LA County, was streamed live from the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum on April 13, 2022 and was moderated by Los Angeles Times columnist Erika D. Smith.

Read more about our panelists here: https://zps.la/3cjL6OA


Visit https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/ to read our articles and learn about upcoming events.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/thepublicsquare
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepublicsquare/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zocalopublicsquare
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/z-calo-public-square

How Can Our Communities Escape Polarizing Conflict?

Early this year, an uncrewed Chinese-operated high-altitude balloon floated across U.S. airspace, stoking anxiety and fascination among Americans, who assumed it was spying on them, and ultimately provoking President Biden to order the Pentagon to shoot it down. Just as alarming as foreign espionage, though, is the fear of information-gathering turned inward. American anxieties around the “surveillance state” have only grown since the Watergate scandal; with the post-9/11 passage of the USA PATRIOT Act; and with revelations that federal agencies sift through ordinary Americans’ phone and email communications, financial information, and Internet usage. Add in the rise of artificial intelligence, and our addictions to smartphones and sharing personal data, and pressing questions arise: Is Big Brother watching, and do we like it? What is the role of surveillance in our democracy, and to what ends do government and business use it? Does being watched keep us safe, or are we being snookered into becoming our own unwitting informants? What standards for digital privacy do we even want? 
 
ArtCenter College of Design art and tech scholar Mashinka Firunts Hakopian, Brennan Center government surveillance expert Faiza Patel, and ACLU SoCal attorney Mohammad Tajsar—experts working in and thinking deeply about surveillance and what it means for our 21st-century public and private lives—visit Zócalo for a timely discussion moderated by Ramesh Srinavasan, tech and society scholar at UCLA and director of the UC Digital Cultures Lab.

This discussion was co-presented by Zócalo Public Square, ACLU of Southern California, and The Progress Network.

What Is The State Of Surveillance?

The state of California has some of the nation’s strongest legal protections for workers. But Californians continue to suffer from various forms of abuse by their employers—from unpaid overtime to dangerous working conditions; from wage theft to racial, ethnic, gender discrimination. What are the biggest challenges for agencies and communities as they seek to turn pro-labor legislation into better workplace realities? To what extent do our systems—from the courts to workers’ compensation to federal and state labor enforcement—create obstacles to realizing California’s promises to workers? And what steps could state and local governments, and workers themselves, take to make jobs safe from discrimination and abuse?

California State Senator Maria Elena Durazo, warehouse worker Sara Fee, and California Labor Commissioner Assistant Chief Daniel Yu talk with Zócalo on the Capitol steps in Sacramento to discuss how to make jobs more fair for workers. Introductory comments by Don Howard, President & CEO of The James Irvine Foundation.

This program is part of “What Is a Good Job Now?”, a series supported by The James Irvine Foundation, focusing on workers in the low-wage sectors of California’s economy, in communities across the state. Public programs and essays, grounded in workers’ experiences and realities, will explore how to make the hardest jobs more rewarding, and make life better for those who do them.

What Is A Good Job Now? For Fairness In the Workplace

Environmental activist and hip-hop artist Xiuhtezcatl Martinez (Xochimilco), L.A. LGBT Center communications officer and former editor-in-chief of Out magazine Phillip Picardi, and “On Being” founder, executive producer, and host Krista Tippett visit Zócalo to discuss how society might draw strength and coax vision from the shortcomings and failures of its collective past, moderated by University of Pennsylvania historian and author of Hattiesburg, William Sturkey. Featuring a special live performance by the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arktet. 

This is the final program in Zócalo's series, “How Should Societies Remember Their Sins?,” supported by The Mellon Foundation. 

Find all essays and previous programs in the series here: https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/feature/societies-sins-mellon/

Follow Zócalo: 
X: https://twitter.com/thepublicsquare
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepublicsquare/ 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/z-calo-public-square

How Does Confronting Our History Build A Better Future?

Can artists shield themselves from the demands of politics and polarized discourse or—in places and periods where activism puts their life and liberty at risk—from bodily danger? Does all their work, in a moment of crisis, have to address that crisis? And how can they know when that moment has come?

Two women artists—social-practice artist Suzanne Lacy and photographer Catherine Opie—discuss the role they see themselves, their work, and their peers playing in sustaining, enhancing, or even strengthening democracy when it feels like everything is going up in flames. Moderated by Karen Mack, Founder and Executive Director of LA Commons. 

This program was co-presented with the Thomas Mann House and Los Angeles Review of Books    as part of “Arts in Times of Crises: The Role of Artists in Weakened Democracies,” on November 18, 2023. 

Follow Zócalo:
X: twitter.com/thepublicsquare
Instagram: www.instagram.com/thepublicsquare/
Facebook: www.facebook.com/
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/z-calo-public-square

Must Artists Be Activists?

How are institutional leaders navigating the warring tides of politics and public opinion—tides that may steer them toward uncertain futures? Can organizations help artists, patrons, and the public find common ground, or productive ways to discuss their differences, in this moment of deep democratic and cultural conflict? And, even as they themselves struggle to stay afloat, how do arts institutions serve as spaces of civic engagement, community, and inclusion?

MOCA director Johanna Burton, Center Theatre Group artistic director Snehal Desai, former Oregon Shakespeare Festival executive artistic director Nataki Garrett, and Whitney Museum director emeritus Adam D. Weinberg discuss how the culture wars have impacted their work, and where they see institutions, and the arts at large, going next. Moderated by Kristin Sakoda, Director of the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture.

This program was co-presented with the Thomas Mann House and Los Angeles Review of Books as part of “Arts in Times of Crises: The Role of Artists in Weakened Democracies,” on November 18, 2023. 

Follow Zócalo:
X: twitter.com/thepublicsquare
Instagram: www.instagram.com/thepublicsquare/
Facebook: www.facebook.com/
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/z-calo-public-square

How Should Arts Institutions Navigate The Culture Wars?

Artists across disciplines have harnessed generative AI as mind-extenders, expanding the possibilities of their work, and unleashing new ways to see the world. But as bots get more adept at human-like thought, writers, actors, and others protest in lawsuits and on picket lines, asking: What’s left for artists? Should tech companies be allowed to use existing art to train AI engines? Who gets credit—and paid—for AI-assisted creative work? What do we lose when machine brains take over aspects of our creativity, once a defining feature of humanity? And, tantalizingly, what do we gain?

LACMA’s Art + Technology Lab program director Joel Ferree, Concept Art Association co-founder Nicole Hendrix, Writers Guild of America AI working group member John Lopez, and interdisciplinary artist Sarah Rosalena join Zócalo, Arts for LA, the ASU Narrative and Emerging Media program, and LACMA to discuss whether AI heralds the end of humans making art to make sense of the world, or a new key to being and seeing. Moderated by Anuradha Vikram, art curator and author of Use Me at Your Own Risk. 

This program was co-presented with Arts for LA, the ASU Narrative and Emerging Media Program, and LACMA on November 28, 2023. 

Follow Zócalo:
X: twitter.com/thepublicsquare
Instagram: www.instagram.com/thepublicsquare/
Facebook: www.facebook.com/
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/z-calo-public-square

Is AI The End Of Creativity—Or A New Beginning?

What are the best ideas and models for finding good jobs for the formerly incarcerated? How can we improve the low pay and challenging working conditions in those industries that are most likely to employ people who have been in the system? And what policies and economic changes would open more possible career paths and economic opportunities for this population?

Amity Foundation president and CEO Doug Bond, Root & Rebound executive director Carmen Garcia, and Anti-Recidivism Coalition executive director Sam Lewis visit Zócalo to discuss how to build better career pathways for formerly incarcerated people. 

This is the fourth program in Zócalo's series “What Is a Good Job Now?” supported by the James Irvine Foundation, and was presented on January 24, 2024. 

Visit https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/ to read our articles and learn about upcoming events. 

Follow Zócalo on X: https://twitter.com/thepublicsquare 
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepublicsquare/ 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zocalopublicsquare 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/z-calo-public-square

What Is A Good Job Now? For The Formerly Incarcerated

Maxwell L. Stearns, constitutional law professor and author of the new book Parliamentary America, visits Zócalo to outline a three-part plan to turn the United States into a multi-party parliamentary democracy that could make our politics less maddening, more collaborative—and perhaps even more fun. What are the legal, constitutional, and political steps needed to modernize American democracy and reignite civic zeal and joy? And how different might the U.S. look if governed by a parliament of multi-party coalitions? 

This program is co-presented by the Los Angeles Times, and is moderated by Los Angeles Times columnist Erika D. Smith. 

This program is part of Zócalo’s inquiry, “Can Democracy Survive This Election Year?,” an editorial and event series about voters’ experiences around the world in 2024, the biggest election year in history.

Would Parliamentary America Have More Fun?

Live from the New Parkway Theater in Oakland, CA: Gig worker and advocate Sergio Avedian, Gigs founder and CEO Allen Narcisse, and the Workers Lab chief research officer Shelly Steward visit Zócalo to help us understand how we might make gig work good work. This is the fifth event in Zócalo's series “What Is a Good Job Now?,” co-presented with the James Irvine Foundation. This discussion is moderated by CalMatters reporter Levi Sumagaysay.

Visit https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/ to read our articles and learn about upcoming events.

What Is A Good Job Now? In Gig Work

Live from SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, CA: Artist and Bloom & Plume founder Maurice Harris, sports agent and former NFL player Jacques McClendon, and poet aja monet visit Zócalo and Kinsey Collection at SoFi Stadium to discuss what one of the world’s largest private collections of Black art and historical objects is doing at one of the world’s grandest football stadiums, why it matters, and where similar efforts are scoring big. This discussion is moderated by Khalil Kinsey, curator of the Kinsey African American Art & History Collection.

Can A Football Stadium Be A Black History Museum?

Zócalo Public Square’s podcast connects people to ideas and to each other through an innovative blend of ideas journalism and live events. Listen to conversations on topics ranging from politics and science to art and pop culture.

How Can Our Communities Escape Polarizing Conflict?

Zócalo Public Square

Related tracks