Human Centered

Political conflicts related to immigration are thorny enough on their own. The issues and challenges intensify once we add to the mix our warming planet and its relationship to migration, immigration, and human displacement. Two 2024-25 CASBS fellows – Maureen Eger, a sociologist of immigration, and Alice Farmer, a refugee lawyer specializing in climate change and displacement – discuss scholarly and policy dimensions of the climate migration landscape in conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Markoff (CASBS fellow, 2017-18).

Maureen Eger: USC faculty page | personal website | Google Scholar page |

Alice Farmer: LinkedIn page | 

Read John Marko...

Urban settings are the grounds upon which immigration stress-tests the strength of democratic values, institutions, and practices. In this audio version of a live event hosted by CASBS on May 6, 2026, CASBS board member and Stanford sociologist Tomás Jiménez, Oxford economist and 2025-26 CASBS fellow Ian Goldin, and Welcoming America executive director Rachel Perić discuss what we can learn from the experience of immigrant cities, especially those that intentionally decide to enable newcomers and long-time residents to flourish together. Hosted in partnership with Stanford's Institute for Advancing Just Societies.

Watch the event video and read an art...

Matthew O. Jackson is perhaps the world’s most renowned scholar of the economics of networks; as a 2005-06 CASBS fellow, he wrote most of his still-influential book Social and Economic Networks. In this wide-ranging conversation with 2025-26 CASBS fellow Rajiv Sethi, Jackson discusses his foundational work on strategic modeling of networks, empirical applications on the role of economic connectedness in influencing people’s life trajectories in the U.S., related multi-disciplinary and cross-national work he is undertaking at the Santa Fe Institute, and recent cutting-edge work using large language models to gain insights into human motivations and behaviors.

Human interactions occur in a variety of contexts. When interactions are marked by conflict, misunderstanding, bias, or aggression, 2024-25 CASBS fellow Katy DeCelles illuminates the micro-sociological and social-psychological dynamics that contribute to the sub-optimal interaction outcomes, enabling the formulation of corrective solutions and better organizational design. DeCelles discusses a sampling of her innovative work in conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Markoff (CASBS fellow, 2017-18).

Katherine (Katy) DeCelles: Univ. of Toronto faculty page | Google Scholar page | Poets & Quants profile | 

DeCelles work discussed & relevant resources:

"Scale Dichotomization Reduces Customer Racial Discrimination and Income Inequality," N...

In his first visit since to CASBS since his 1996-97 fellowship, UC Berkeley economist David Card lifts the veil behind the innovative empirical work on the labor market effects of immigration, minimum wages, and education that earned him the Nobel Prize in 2021. In conversation with 2024-25 CASBS fellow Dylan Connor, Card also explores issues and questions involving the relationships among geography, social and labor mobility, and wealth inequalities.

DAVID CARD: UC Berkeley page | Berkeley economics page | Wikipedia page | Nobel Prize page | Google Scholar page | Berkeley Nobel Prize article | 

DYLAN CONNOR: ASU page | Google Scholar page | 

Philosophers Michael Brownstein (CASBS fellow 2019-20) and Dan Kelly (2018-19), two of the coauthors of "Somebody Should Do Something: How Anyone Can Create Social Change," discuss their book's framing and key concepts with Damon Centola (2014-15), an expert in social network dynamics. The book offers a pragmatic guide for connecting individuals to their role as change agents, illuminating the social feedback processes through which structures, individuals, and social movements interact, unlocking the potential for systemic change.

The book is Somebody Should Do Something: How Anyone Can Help Create Social Change (MIT Press, 2025)

Explore the book's...

Economist Paul Milgrom is celebrated for his Nobel Prize-winning work on auction theory and design. But he has published a wide range of other innovative, influential research throughout his career – including a book and articles emerging from his 1991-92 CASBS fellowship. Gani Aldashev (CASBS fellow, 2024-25) engages Milgrom on highlights of this often-collaborative or cross-disciplinary work on organizational behavior, the institutional roots of trust and cooperation, social choice for environmental policy, and more.

PAUL MILGROM: Stanford faculty page | Personal website | Nobel Prize page | Nobel bio | Wikipedia page| CASBS page |

Gani Aldashev: Georgetown faculty page | CASBS pa...

Edward Said famously wrote most of "Orientalism" during his 1975-76 CASBS fellowship. The book criticized Western worldviews and representations of the East (or 'Orient') and their perpetuation of romanticized or colonial mindsets. A half-century later, "Orientalism" continues to shape scholarship, frame debates, and resonate in disparate regions and contexts. Four 2024-25 CASBS fellows representing different disciplines – A. Shane Dillingham, Thomas Blom Hansen, Camilla Hawthorne, and Shirin Sinnar – discuss the enduring influence and impact of Said and his landmark book.

EDWARD SAID WORKS REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE
Orientalism (Pantheon, 1978)
"The One State Solution," New York Times, 10 Janu...

An absorbing conversation featuring Colin Camerer (CASBS fellow, 1997-98), among the world's most accomplished scholars in both behavioral economics and neuroeconomics, with economist Stephanie Wang (2024-25). Camerer discusses his groundbreaking work on the neuroeconomics of self-control and habit formation; offers insights on generating ideas for, building, then scaling behavioral models; and explains why neuroscience remains a wide-open field awaiting the contributions of so-far mostly reluctant economists and other social scientists.

COLIN CAMERER: Caltech faculty page | Camerer research group | on Google Scholar | Wikipedia page | bio at the Decision Lab | bio at MacArthur Foundation | 

STEPHANIE WANG: Pitt f...

For decades, Alejandro Portes (CASBS fellow 1980-81) has been among our most distinguished scholars elucidating the causes and consequences of immigration and assimilation. René D. Flores (CASBS fellow 2023-24) engages Portes in a conversation spanning large swaths of Portes's formidable intellectual biography, including his personal journey from Cuba and its influence on his academic trajectory, as well as his approach to social science inquiry and its delivery of insights leading to some of his most celebrated and consequential works.

ALEJANDRO PORTES: Princeton faculty page | CV | Univ. of Miami faculty page | Wikipedia page | on Google Scholar | 

Bi...

Generative AI tools built on large language models are increasingly "intelligent" yet lack a baby's common sense – the ability to non-verbally generalize to novel situations without additional training. What can developmental science contribute to AI? Tech journalist and former CASBS fellow John Markoff chats with 2023-24 CASBS fellow David Moore, a developmental scientist with expertise in infant cognition, on evaluating the efforts of DARPA's Machine Common Sense program as well as prospects and concerns associated with creating AIs with common sense.

DAVID MOORE: Personal website | Claremont Infant Study Center | Wikipedia page | 

DARPA Machine Common Sense pro...

Given deeply polarized domestic politics and insufficient international commitment to the Paris Accord, can we reduce greenhouse gas emissions and avert some of the worst effects of climate change before it's too late? It's an elemental question that warrants despair, yes, but plenty of hope too. Political scientist Leigh Raymond, a 2021-22 CASBS fellow, explores the implicated issues through a conversation about "Into the Clear Blue Sky: The Path to Restoring Our Atmosphere" with its author, sustainability scientist Rob Jackson. Jackson launched the book project as a 2019-20 CASBS fellow.

ROB JACKSON: Faculty page | Stanford profile | CASBS...

Two-time CASBS fellow and renowned anthropologist Tanya Luhrmann discusses her past and current work as an anthropologist of the mind, both in religious and psychological contexts, in conversation with 2023-24 CASBS fellow Erica Robles-Anderson. Luhrmann's award-winning work investigates visions, voices, psychosis, the supernatural, and other unusual sensory experiences and phenomena, found often at the borderlands of spirit, culture, and the mind.

TANYA LUHRMANN: Stanford faculty page | Stanford profile page | Personal website | Wikipedia page | on Google Scholar | CV |

Luhrmann, Of Two Minds. Winner of: the Victor Turner Prize in Ethnographic Writing, the Bryce Boyer Prize for...

There never will be enough independent fact checking of online political advertising and their ecosystems. Can we develop methods and tools to demonetize or at least disincentivize the behaviors of disinformation producers as well as the ad firms and content providers in business with them? 2023-24 CASBS fellow Ceren Budak navigates the disinformation marketplace and illuminates pathways for better design of online communities and platforms in conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning tech journalist and former CASBS fellow John Markoff.
 

CEREN BUDAK: Faculty webpage | Personal website | 

Referenced in this episode:

"Misunderstanding the harms of on...

Are jobs requiring high levels of human interaction worth preserving in the age of automation? Can we design machines to achieve something profound – the mutual recognition that occurs when human beings truly "see" each other? CASBS faculty fellow Mitchell Stevens explores these questions with Allison Pugh, author of the 2024 book The Last Human Job: The Work of Connecting in a Disconnected World. Pugh launched work on the book as a 2016-17 CASBS fellow.

ALLISON PUGH
 website | Google Scholar page | Interview with Allison Pugh on building a society of connection (CASBS in partnership with Public Books) |

Santi Furnari (CASBS fellow, 2023-24) engages renowned political sociologist & 2015-16 fellow Elisabeth Clemens on the role of private civic volunteer organizations in co-constructing national identity and state capacity as well as serving as tools of governance, solidarity, and inclusion for much of American history. In what form does civic benevolence and philanthropy operate in the contemporary landscape? This absorbing conversation draws inspiration from the multi-award-winning book "Civic Gifts," much of which Clemens wrote during her CASBS year.

ELISABETH CLEMENS: Univ. of Chicago faculty page | Clemens wins 2023 Gordon J. Laing Award | on Wikipedia |

The book is...

Legendary tech journalist John Markoff (CASBS fellow, 2017-18) chats with 2023-24 CASBS fellow Young Mie Kim on her groundbreaking efforts to identify how shadowy groups use algorithms and targeted disinformation campaigns during presidential election cycles; measure their real-world distorting effects on voter mobilization or suppression; and illuminate our understanding of resulting political inequalities and their implications for American democracy.

YOUNG MIE KIM: CASBS bio |  Univ. of Wisconsin faculty page |  "The Disinformation Detective" (On Wisconsin magazine) |

Kim leads Project DATA (Digital Ad Tracking & Analysis) at UW. | Project DATA on X |

Kim is lead author of...

Stefan Link, a 2023-24 CASBS fellow, chats with Barry Eichengreen, a 1996-97 CASBS fellow and world renowned for his expertise at the nexus of international economics and economic history. They discuss some of Eichengreen's most prominent works — including "The European Economy Since 1945," which emerged from his CASBS experience, and "Golden Fetters," his most cited book — interrogating their durability and applicability to contemporary industrial, financial, and monetary policy challenges and governance.

BARRY EICHENGREEN: UC Berkeley faculty page | Homepage & CV | on Wikipedia | 

STEFAN LINK: CASBS bio | Dartmouth faculty page | 

Mentioned in the episode:

Eichen...

Labor historian & 2023-24 CASBS fellow Gabriel Winant in conversation with 2018-19 CASBS fellow Ruth Milkman, among the nation's most renowned sociologists of labor. In addition to interrogating divisions within and segmentation across labor markets in recent decades, Milkman also has remained attuned to the complexity of the overall working class experience, essential for illuminating ways in which workers can unite and organize.

RUTH MILKMAN: CUNY faculty page | personal website | ASA bio |

Milkman's book Immigrant Labor and the New Precariat (2020) | Polity Press Q&A |

GABRIEL WINANT: CASBS bio | Univ. of Chicago faculty page |  f...

Pulitzer Prize-winning tech journalist John Markoff chats with 2022-23 CASBS fellow Nathan Matias about often-overlooked public interest questions and concerns regarding the deployment of tech platform algorithms and AI models. Specifically, Matias is a player in filling the two-way knowledge gaps between civil society and tech firms with an eye on governance, safety, accountability, and advancing the science — including the social science — of human-algorithm behavior.
 

Nathan Matias: Cornell University faculty page | CASBS bio | Personal website |

Citizens & Technology Lab

Coalition for Independent Technology Research

Select Matias publications

"Humans and Algor...

Recorded before a live audience, Margaret Levi, Alison Gopnik, & Anne-Marie Slaughter discuss a CASBS project, "The Social Science of Caregiving," which is reimagining the philosophical, psychological, biological, political, & economic foundations of care and caregiving. The goal is a coherent empirical and theoretical account or synthesis of care that advances understandings and policy discussions. [The episode notes provide links for further exploration.]

Article on CASBS's project on The Social Science of Caregiving

Web page for the project on The Social Science of Caregiving

Related: Human Centered episode #61, "Developing AI Like Raising Kids" (Alison Gopnik...

Pulitzer Prize-winning tech journalist & 2017-18 CASBS fellow John Markoff chats with 2022-23 CASBS fellow Rebecca Slayton on how the field of computing expertise evolved, eventually giving rise to the niche of professionals who protect systems from cyber-attacks. Slayton's forthcoming book explores the governance & risk implications emerging from the fact that cybersecurity experts must establish their authority by paradoxically revealing vulnerabilities and insecurities of that which they seek to protect.

REBECCA SLAYTON

Cornell University faculty page | |  CASBS page | 

Slayton's book Arguments that Count: Physics, Computing, and Missile Defense, 1949-2012 (MIT Press)

Slayton's ar...

Two-time CASBS fellow Fred Turner engages CASBS board of directors chair Abby Smith Rumsey before a live audience to discuss her new book "Memory, Edited: Taking Liberties with History." When the erasure or distortion of collective memory through storytelling hijacks fact, truth, and history itself, what kind of information infrastructures can effectively confront those false narratives? Turner and Rumsey explore the tensions between history and storytelling and resulting implications for political beliefs, actions, and our collective sense of reality.

ABBY SMITH RUMSEY

CASBS website bio | Personal website | Talk at Long Now Foundation in partnership with...

Renowned sociologist Michèle Lamont (CASBS fellow, 2002-03) discusses her new book, Seeing Others, with former CASBS director Woody Powell. The book assembles decades of Lamont’s scholarship, engaging some of contemporary society’s most elemental challenges and advancing key building blocks toward a shared human experience marked by greater inclusion, belonging, dignity, empathy, and equality.

MICHÈLE LAMONT:

Harvard University faculty page | Harvard sociology page

Personal website | Simon & Schuster page for Seeing Others

The Successful Societies project, which held its first convening at CASBS in 2003

WALTER "WOODY"...

Fully understanding and regulating our complex information ecosystems will require creating new cultures and modes of collaborating, new organizational frameworks and, yes, working with generative AI models in service of aggregating actionable scientific knowledge. Angela Aristidou (CASBS fellow, 2022-23) navigates the crucial questions and challenges with Phil Howard (CASBS fellow, 2008-09), a renowned scholar of tech innovation and public policy as well as co-founder and chair of the new International Panel on the Information Environment (IPIE).

PHIL HOWARD:

University of Oxford page | Wikipedia page |  Personal website |

INTERNATIONAL PANEL ON THE INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT:

Dan Simon, a 2022-23 CASBS fellow and USC law professor, joins in conversation with Elizabeth Loftus, a 1978-79 CASBS fellow and Distinguished Professor at UC Irvine. Loftus is known in the public sphere through her decades-long study of memory – specifically, its malleability and fallibility – as well as her application of findings as an expert witness or consultant in hundreds of legal cases. Loftus's book "Eyewitness Testimony," completed at the Center, charted the course of her career that followed and serves as this episode's launching point.

ELIZABETH LOFTUS

UC Irvine faculty page
Wikipedia page
TED...

While you're listening to this episode, 2016-17 CASBS fellow Jonathan Jansen likely will write another few thousand words. As a scholar of education & leader of education institutions, Jansen is South Africa's most towering figure. To call him prolific is a gross understatement. He writes a steady stream of books & more books. As a public intellectual he writes a separate steady stream of columns & essays. And he's written a family memoir too. We bring 2022-23 CASBS fellow Zimitri Erasmus, a social anthropologist who is working on a book on writing praxis, in conversation with Jansen to unlock some secrets & insights...

What are the most effective collective actions that social protest movements can or should undertake in the context of deep societal conflict and polarization? CASBS fellows Eran Halperin (2022-23) & Robb Willer (2012-13, 2020-21) compare their cross-national research findings and explore Halperin's real-time applied work with the dramatic, ongoing protests in Israel.

ERAN HALPERIN links:

Psychology of Intergroup Conflict and Reconciliation Lab (PCIL)

Halperin on Google Scholar

aChord: Social Psychology for Social Change


ROBB WILLER links:

Willer's Stanford faculty page

Willer's personal web page
<...

Drawing upon a career of scholarship extending from studies of labor, citizenship, and the state in Africa to explorations of global empire, colonialism, and globalization, three-time CASBS fellow Frederick Cooper – in conversation with 2022-23 fellows Jean Beaman and Martin Williams – gives a master class on how critical and relational thinking serve historical inquiries that advance our understandings. 

Frederick Cooper, CASBS fellow 1990-91, 1995-96, 2002-03
NYU faculty page
Wikipedia page
 

Fred Cooper books

Citizenship, Inequality, and Difference: Historical Perspectives (2018)

Citizenship Between Empire and Nation: Remaking France and French Africa, 1945-1960...

This episode is  produced in association with the CASBS project "The Social Science of Caregiving," and draws further inspiration from the CASBS project "Imagining Adaptive Societies." Learn more about both:
https://casbs.stanford.edu/programs/projects/social-science-caregiving
https://casbs.stanford.edu/programs/projects/imagining-adaptive-societies

CASBS program director Zachary Ugolnik served as co-producer of this episode.

Ted Chiang on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Chiang

Ted Chiang in The New Yorker
"Why Computers Won't Make Themselves Smarter"  https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-inquiry/why-computers-wont-make-themselves-smarter
"ChatGPT is a Blurry JP...

This is a podcast version of a live CASBS webcast event. View video of the event here.

The event was produced in association with CASBS's program on Creating a New Moral Political Economy. Learn about the program here.

CASBS's moral political economy program guest-curated the Winter 2023 issue of Dædalus, a publication of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The entire issue is open access here. Panelist John Ahlquist's essay in the issue provided impetus for the organization of the event this podcast episode draws from.

CASBS: website|Twitter|YouTube|LinkedIn|podcast|l...

Glenn Loury on Google Scholar

Coate & Loury (1993), "Will Affirmative-Action Policies Eliminate Negative Stereotypes?"

Loury, The Anatomy of Racial Inequality (The Du Bois Lectures)

The Tanner Lectures at Stanford (2007) Lecture 1 | Lecture 2

Loury (2008), Race, Incarceration, and American Values

Loury (2019), "Why Does Racial Inequality Persist?"

Somanathan and Allen, eds. (2020) Difference without Domination: Pursuing Justice in Diverse Democracies

Loury public symposium at CASBS (2016), "Racial Inequality in 21st Century America" (video)

CASBS webcast (2020), "The Persistence of Racial Inequality" (video); panel featuring Glenn Loury, Joshua Cohen, Francis Fukuyama, Alondra...

Robert Keohane bios: CASBS | Princeton | Wikipedia

Comparative Politics of Climate Change Policy workshops at CASBS

Complex interdependence

After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy

2016 Balzan Prize | prize speech

Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research

Johan Skytte Prize

Keohane & Ostrom, Local Commons and Global Interdependence

CASBS: website | Twitter | YouTube | LinkedIn | podcast | latest newsletter | signup | outreach​

Follow the CASBS webcast series, Social Science for a World in Crisis

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sc...

Emerging Trends in The Social and Behavioral Sciences

Bob’s Introduction to the project

About the Robert A. Scott Lectureship Fund

The classic mud volleyball photo (click then scroll to the bottom of the article)

Human Centered episode featuring Richard Wrangham

CASBS in the History of Behavioral Economics

CASBS

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

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Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gaetani | Audio engineer...

Causal Inference for Social Impact Lab

EGAP

Jake Bowers

Carrie S. Cihak

Dan Hopkins

Ruth Levine

Piyush Tantia

CASBS
 

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

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Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gaetani | Audio engineer & co-producer: Joe Monzel

Moderator Debra Satz

Panelists

Elizabeth Anderson University of Michigan

Samuel Bowles Santa Fe Institute

Nobel laureate Sir Angus Deaton Princeton

Amy Kapczynski Yale Law

CASBS

@CasbsStanford

Creating a New Moral Political Economy program at CASBS

Social Science for a World in Crisis

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

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Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gae...

Sid Tarrow

"Movements and Parties: Critical Connections in American Political Development" - Cambridge University Press

Ed Walker

CASBS

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Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

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Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gaetani | Audio engineer & co-producer: Joe Monzel

Jacob Ward

Kristian Hammond

Daniel Ho

Jennifer Logg

CASBS
@CASBSStanford

Social Science for a World in Crisis

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

Explore CASBS: website | Bluesky | X | YouTube  |LinkedIn | podcast  | latest newsletter | signup | outreach​

Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gaetani | Audio engineer & co-producer: Joe Monzel

Don Norman

Piyush Tantia's Ideas42

CASBS

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Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

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Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gaetani | Audio engineer & co-producer: Joe Monzel

"Gen Z Explained: The Art of Living in a Digital Age"

Roberta Katz

Sarah Ogilvie

Jane Shaw

Linda Woodhead

Kat Tenbarge

CASBS

CASBS project: Understanding the iGeneration

Social Science for a World in Crisis

@CASBSStanford

Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford University

Explore CASBS: website | Bluesky | X | YouTube  |LinkedIn | podcast  | latest newsletter | signup | outreach​

Human Centered
Producer: Mike Gaetani | Audio engineer & co-producer: Joe Monzel