Tel Aviv Review

Prof. Oren Harman, a historian of science and the Chair of the Graduate Program in Science, Technology and Society at Bar-Ilan University, discusses his book Evolutions: Fifteen Myths that Explain Our World and Talking about Science in the 21st Century, a lecture series he directs at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.

Will Israel's democratic institutions prove resilient? How is the party system changing and is Israel headed for a tyranny of the majority? Yohanan Plesner, President of the Israel Democracy Institute, examines the ramifications of the unprecedented indictment of an incumbent Prime Minister in Israel. This episode of the Tel Aviv Review was brought to you by the Israel Democracy Institute, an independent center of research and action dedicated to strengthening the foundations of Israeli democracy.

Dr. Cecile Kuznitz, director of Jewish Studies at Bard College and author of YIVO and the Making of Modern Jewish Culture: Scholarship for the Yiddish Nation retraces with host Gilad Halpern the history of the 90-year-old Yiddish Scientific Institute from Interwar Poland to Postwar America. Song: Tuna ft. Shlomi Saranga - Lama Lo Achshav This episode originally aired on Oct. 16, 2015

Yossi Dahan, a law and philosophy professor at the Ramat Gan College of Law and Business and at the Open University, and the chairman of the Adva Center for equality and social justice, discusses his new book "Justice, Privatization and the Objectives of the Education System," published by the Van Leer Institute press. How has education in Israel been influenced by the encroachment of capitalism, on the one hand, and the growing awareness of multiculturalism in society, on the other? What is educational justice, and how should policymakers address it? This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.

When do people to commit mass violence against an ethnic, religious or racial group in their midst? Does the demand for minority rights inevitably spark existential fears and violent reactions from the majority group? In his book Intimate Violence, co-author Jeffrey Kopstein of University of California, Irvine looks at pogroms against the Jews of Poland to explain when and why ethnic violence occurs. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.

Nurit Novis-Deutsch, a psychologist of religion, values, morality and identity, believes that people who perceive themselves as having a complex identity might be more tolerant of the "other" in society. Her research advances much-needed anecdotes to angry tribalism in the world today. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.

Before human rights was a universally accepted concept, and before there was Israel, there were prominent Jews who supported both. Some would contribute to the evolution of modern human rights concepts and conventions in place today. James Loeffler's Rooted Cosmopolitans: Jews and Human Rights in the Twentieth Century, tells the story of human rights pioneers and how their commitment grew out of the Jewish diaspora experience. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.

Prof. Yoav Alon, a historian of the Middle East, discusses his award-winning book The Shaykh of Shaykhs: Mithgal al Fayiz and Tribal Leadership in Modern Jordan. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.

From Hungary to Brazil, to Italy, the UK and US a special style of nationalist politics seems to be taking over. But is the current wave of national-populism new, or rooted in older historic trends? Can its supporters be de-demonized, humanized or at the very least understood? Co-authors Roger Eatwell and Matthew Goodwin analyze the causes of the trend in their book National Populism: The Revolt Against Liberal Democracy. This episode of the Tel Aviv Review was brought to you by the Israel Democracy Institute, an independent center of research and action dedicated to strengthening the foundations of Israeli democracy.

Neil McGregor, the former director of the British Museum, analyzes the enduring validity of museums in the age of technological upheavals and fake news. He recently visited Israel to deliver the inaugural lecture of the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute's Tom de Swaan Series on the Role of Ideas and the Responsibility of Intellectuals in Contemporary Society. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel.