Freshwater Ecosystems: Ballast water management is reducing the flow of invasive species into Great Lakes
By Anthony Ricciardi, Professor of Biology, Redpath Museum & Bieler School of Environment, McGill University Freshwater ecosystems are threatened by a host of environmental stressors from human activities. Among the most insidious and impactful of these is...
Global Target: Fears grow that Russia will attack undersea cables to disrupt Internet infrastructure
By David Stupples, Professor of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and Director of Electronic Warfare, City, University of London It may never be possible to determine definitively if underwater explosions on September 26 at the two Nord Stream gas pipelines were...
Beginning of the End: With all of Russia’s war failures it might be time to imagine a world without Putin
By Matthew Sussex, Fellow, Strategic and Defense Studies Centre, Australian National University Vladimir Putin’s bizarre ceremonies formalizing Russia’s illegal annexation in September of some 15% of Ukraine once again revealed the yawning chasm between Kremlin...
Some crimes no longer pay: Trend shows bank robberies in decline with shift to cashless economy
By Jay L. Zagorsky, Clinical associate professor, Boston University Bank robbery is a high-profile crime that fascinates many people. Movies have been made about famous bank robbers like Bonnie and Clyde, JohnDillinger and Butch Cassidy. There is even a new movie that...
A cycle of escalation: At some point the nuclear threats by Kim Jong Un will need to be taken seriously
By Sung-Yoon Lee, Professor in Korean Studies, Tufts University As the West frets over the possibility of Vladimir Putin turning to nuclear weapons in Ukraine, there is a risk that similar threats posed by another pariah leader are not being treated as seriously,...
Costs of incarceration: Wisconsin inmates and their families feel the financial squeeze of rising inflation
Across the nation, prison commissaries are raising prices on items that many consider basic necessities, from deodorant to fresh fruit, not provided by the state department of corrections. The markups come as decades-high inflation is also squeezing inmates’ families,...
Locked Away: Why the system of solitary confinement is dehumanizing and breeds racial resentment
By Angela Hattery, Professor of Women & Gender Studies/Co-Director, Center for the Study & Prevention of Gender-Based Violence, University of Delaware; Earl Smith, Professor of Women and Gender Studies, University of Delaware The United States leads the...
Retaining a Constitutional Right: Thousands of eligible Wisconsin voters face ballot barriers in jail
Within a few years of returning from two traumatic combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, David Carlson lost his voting rights. He spent about four years in prison on felony charges that in Wisconsin result in disenfranchisement. What Carlson did not realize is that...
Education behind a Wall: How college in prisons are challenging professors to rethink the way they teach
By Mneesha Gellman, Associate Professor of Political Science, Emerson College When it comes to education in prison, policy and research often focus on how it benefits society or improves the life circumstances of those who are serving time. But as I point out in my...
Barriers to benefits: When ex-prisoners go hungry from being denied access to social safety programs
By Margaret Lombe, Associate Professor of Social Work, Boston College; and Von Nebbitt, Associate Professor of Social Work, Washington University in St Louis Around 600,000 people are released annually from the sprawling prison network across the United States. Many...
Law and Order: Why the midterm message from the GOP is at odds with its support of criminal behavior
A campaign ad from Mehmet Oz, candidate for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, is vintage Republican strategy: casting a Democratic opponent as soft on crime. The party is zeroing in on fears over public safety ahead of November’s midterm elections in an effort to...
Embracing Demagogues: Why the vital signs of a healthy democracy are in decline around the world
Voters in Sweden recently gave a leading role to a far-right party with neo-Nazi roots. Italy also put a party in power that has fascist origins. And of course, in the United States, one party has increasingly embraced election denialism and attempted to undermine the...
