Breaking the Cycle captures the political awakening among Thais after the rise and fall of Thanathorn, a young politician who calls to end the cycle of coups d’etat. The film explores the 2019 election in Thailand, which marked the end of five years of full military rule and a new group of young politicians who campaign against an authoritarian constitution, sparking hope and a once-in-a-generation youth movement.

Screenings of the film will be held simultaneously at nineteen (19) university campuses across North America. Following the screenings, each campus will come together via Zoom for a discussion with the filmmakers, Aekaphong Saransate and Thanakrit Duangmaneeporn.

The Southeast Asia Program will host a screening at the Kahin Center, 640 Stewart Ave. A virtual-only option for the event will take place via Zoom at https://bit.ly/BreakingTheCycleSimulcast.

Good governance is contingent on the development of political systems that gives citizens ownership of the political process.

A SEADL webinar featuring Amrina Rosyada and I Gde Agus Darma Putra, hosted by Emily Zinger, Southeast Asia Digital Librarian, Kroch Asia Collections Cornell University Library.

How can we use archives to build a narrative about behind-the-scene actors in research?

From the US to Indonesia, local research assistants have helped anthropologists with navigating their field sites. However, in the history of the discipline, many of their contributions and life histories remain obscure. In this webinar, we will discuss how we can use archives to highlight the contributions of local research assistants in knowledge production. Rosyada will focus on her research on I Made Kaler, superstar anthropologist Margaret Mead’s Balinese “native secretary” during her historically important fieldwork in Bali, Indonesia (1936 – 1939). Drawing from archives at the Library of Congress and the American Museum of Natural History, her research finds that Made Kaler was tremendously involved in Margaret Mead’s research through intellectual, language training, and domestic labor. Putra, who is fom Bali and translated Made Kaler’s archives into Bahasa Indonesia, will discuss how we can treat archives as “alive” by reflecting on his experience in exploring the traces of Made Kaler’s life in modern-day Bali. We hope to invite you to a conversation about the opportunities and challenges in using archives to build a narrative about important actors in academia who are historically invisible.

About the Speakers

Amrina Rosyada is a PhD candidate in Anthropology at Northwestern University. She wrote her master’s thesis on the invisible labors of a Balinese research assistant—named I Made Kaler—who contributed tremendously to the research work of cherished anthropologist Margaret Mead in Indonesia from 1936 to 1939. Her research has won three prestigious prizes from Asian studies and anthropology professional associations. She is currently doing fieldwork for her dissertation project on the politics of waste in Indonesia.

I Gde Agus Darma Putra is a lecturer at the Hindu Indonesia University. He is also a member of the IBM Dharma Palguna Foundation, which focuses on philological studies of texts written in the Kawi and Balinese languages. In recent years, he has also begun researching Balinese inscriptions written in the ancient Balinese script and language. He translated I Made Kaler’s Balinese fieldnotes into Bahasa Indonesia.

About the Photo

Credit to Margaret Mead Papers and the South Pacific Ethnographic Archives at the Library of Congress.

CANCELLED!!!

Ecuador is renowned for its extraordinary biodiversity, offering a rich mosaic of landscapes and ecosystems. Despite its small size, the country boasts the Amazon rainforest, the Andean highlands, coastal lowlands, and the unique Galápagos Islands. Each region supports a wide variety of flora and fauna, making Ecuador one of the most biodiverse countries on Earth. Cultural diversity is also remarkable, indigenous groups in all areas, have developed a profound relationship with these ecosystems, shaping their livelihoods and cultural traditions around the natural environment. This harmony between nature and culture makes Ecuador a unique nation, both ecologically and culturally.

Sadly, the contamination of food and marine life by heavy metals in Ecuador is an issue of growing concern, primarily linked to urban development, mining, industrial, and agricultural activities. Water bodies and rivers serve as conduits for these contaminants toward marine ecosystems, affecting key species for food security, such as fish and mollusks. The bioaccumulation of metals like mercury, cadmium, and lead in the food chain poses serious risks to human and ecosystems health.

Dr. Hugo Navarrete has been a scholar, professor, and Director of Research, among other roles, at Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador (PUCE). His efforts have focused on connecting civil society in general with academic activity, as well as disseminating the results of scientific research through the publication of informational material that is accessible for the general public. Furthermore, he has worked to strengthen ties with ministries and other governmental agencies to establish a fluent dialogue and mutual trust, which has allowed science to influence policy and public opinion. Navarrete’s research focuses on environmental contamination with heavy metals, biodiversity, and food safety. He is currently a researcher at PUCE and the Director of the Center for Applied Chemistry Studies (CESAQ-PUCE) at PUCE. With around 70 publications that have garnered more than 4000 academic citations, he is among the 100 most cited authors in Ecuador.

Spring 2025 ICM Events Series Samera Esmeir will speak on "Territorial Imperatives, Revolutionary Leanings: Thinking with the Palestinian Revolution." Please note that the date for this lecture has been changed to Wednesday, March 26, 2025. About the Speaker Samera Esmeir is associate professor in the Department of Rhetoric at UC Berkeley. Her research is at the intersection of law, political thought, and Middle Eastern studies. She is the author of Juridical Humanity: A Colonial History (Stanford University Press, 2012) and is currently working on a book with the working title The Struggle that Remains: Between the World and the International.

Go global in summer 2025! Global Internships give you valuable international work experience in fields spanning global development, climate and sustainability, international relations, communication, business, governance, and more.

This session will discuss opportunities with the Universidad San Francisco de Quito, a Cornell Global Hubs partner in Ecuador.

Register for this virtual session.

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The Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies hosts info sessions for graduate and for undergraduate students to learn more about funding opportunities, international travel, research, and internships. View the full calendar of fall semester sessions.

How do activists use historical memory? Examining the narratives expressed in recorded oral histories, I argue that Indigenous labor leaders from the haciendas of Cayambe, Ecuador constructed an empowering narrative politics that guided their allies as well as future activists in preserving and revitalizing the history of their local activism. In light of critiques from across the political spectrum about the waning salience of Marxist projects, I aim to show how, in mid-20th century Ecuador, Indigenous activists’ understandings of the significance of their communism were radically unorthodox, and in fact–because of the ways in which they recorded and archived their experiences of resistance– their perspectives continue to offer lessons about spaces for indigenous empowerment in the present. Understanding historical documentation as part of wider political projects allows for an analysis of historical self-representation as political action.

Marlen Rosas is assistant professor of History at Haverford College in Haverford, PA. She received her M.A. and Ph.D. in History from the University of Pennsylvania. Her book project, Recording Indigenous Resistance: Literacy, Memory, and Narrative Power in Twentieth-Century Ecuador, employs critical archive scholarship, oral history, and memory studies approaches to the examination of Indigenous mobilization in twentieth-century Ecuador, arguably the most organized Indigenous movement in the history of the Americas. She is the co-founder and convener of the Thinking Andean Studies Interdisciplinary Conference.

Bartels World Affairs Lecture

The bestselling author of Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World joins us for a personal journey down the conspiracy rabbit hole to explore why our political sphere has become dangerously warped.

When author and social activist Naomi Klein discovered a writer with the same first name but radically different political views was chronically mistaken for her, it seemed too ridiculous to take seriously—until suddenly it wasn’t. As the pandemic took hold, she absorbed a barrage of insults from her doppelganger’s followers.

Klein’s 2023 book Doppelganger follows Other Naomi into a digital underworld of conspiracies, anti-vaxxers, and right-wing paranoia. Klein’s journey reveals mirrored concerns and unlikely connections between well-meaning liberals and the right-wing voices that relish “owning” them.

After a talk sharing her insights, Klein joins distinguished global democracy experts from Cornell to lift the lid on this surreal election moment and examine how our politics have become so twisted and polarized. What can we do to escape our collective vertigo and get back to fighting for what really matters?

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Panelists

Read election remarks from the panelists in Chronicle coverage of global democracy activities on campus.

Thomas Garrett, Einaudi Center Lund Practitioner in Residence, Distinguished Global Democracy Lecturer (Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy)Suzanne Mettler, John L. Senior Professor of American Institutions, Department of Government (College of Arts and Sciences)Kenneth Roberts (moderator), Einaudi Center Democratic Threats and Resilience faculty fellow, Richard J. Schwartz Professor, Department of Government (A&S)

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This event is sold out.

All free tickets are reserved. If you don’t have a ticket but would like to attend, please arrive 15 minutes early to be put on our wait list.

A reception with refreshments will follow the lecture and panel.

Lecture and Panel: 5:00 | G10 Biotechology BuildingReception: 6:30-7:30 | Biotechnology Building Atrium

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About Naomi Klein

Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist and international bestselling author of nine books published in over 35 languages, including No Logo, The Shock Doctrine, and her most recent book Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World (2023). A columnist for The Guardian, her writing has appeared in leading media around the world. She is a tenured professor of climate justice at the University of British Columbia, founding codirector of UBC’s Centre for Climate Justice, and honorary professor of media and climate at Rutgers University.

About the Bartels World Affairs Lecture

The Bartels World Affairs Lecture is a signature event of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies. This flagship event brings distinguished international figures to campus each academic year to speak on global topics and meet with Cornell faculty and students, particularly undergraduates. The lecture and related events are made possible by the generosity of Henry E. Bartels ’48 and Nancy Horton Bartels ’48.