Zócalo Public Square

Even in a city where people dare to be different, Zev Yaroslavsky stands out. Zev, now director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs and the Department of History, has packed several lives into one lifetime, reshaping himself along with his fast-changing city. The child of immigrants from what is now Ukraine, Zev first drew notice as a UCLA student activist on be...

Nearly two-thirds of Americans say it has become more common for people to express racist or racially insensitive views since the current administration took office. Majorities of Americans, across all demographics, say race relations have worsened and reports of hate crimes are soaring. Are these trends the short-term product of an angry era, unregulated digital media, and divisive political lead...

In 2016, Californians voted to legalize the sale of recreational marijuana. But three years later, the very basics of regulating legal weed remain uncertain, and the new markets for marijuana have become another confounding California mess. It’s unclear how much marijuana can be consumed before police can make an arrest for driving under the influence, or whether the state can guarantee that marij...

Earlier this century, President George W. Bush’s administration sought to celebrate the U.S.-Mexico border as America’s front door. But in the years since, the border has been widely portrayed by politicians as a source of problems. Today most news is about illegal immigration, abuses of migrants by Customs and Border Protection, or President Trump’s family separation policy. This deluge of negati...

Los Angeles leaders have developed billion-dollar plans to boost services and build housing for the homeless. But such plans are now stuck in political quicksand, with neighborhood activists blocking shelters and new housing. Meanwhile, living in a city with a homelessness emergency is an everyday struggle, and there is no guidebook to dealing with sidewalk squalor or witnessing human suffering on...

The history of modern Hawai‘i has been defined by immigration, from the Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese, and Puerto Ricans imported to work on 19th-century plantations, to the Filipino, Korean, and Micronesian migrants who make possible today’s growing tourism and hospitality industry. Arrivals from around the world have shaped and reshaped the islands’ economy and culture, and made Hawai‘i a global...

No sector in the state of California relies more on immigrants than health care. One-quarter of the health workforce—from nurses to pharmacists to home health aides—and nearly one-third of all doctors and surgeons‚ are foreign-born. And, according to some studies, patients of foreign-trained health providers actually do better than patients who rely on native-born Americans. How have immigrants wo...

Is Politics Really Tearing America Apart?

Is Journalism About Social Justice?

More than 17 million adults in America—7 percent of people 18 and older in the U.S.—have at least one major depressive episode annually. An estimated 15 percent of all people on Earth are expected to experience depression during their lifetimes. In 2015, UCLA launched a campus-wide initiative to cut the global burden of depression in half by 2050. Are we suffering more from depression than we used...

Did Americans Ever Get Along?

Can Phoenix Become Remotely Green? by Zócalo Public Square

Margaret Wertheim, “Space Versus Spirit: Why the Battle Between Science and Religion Is Driving Us Crazy” Science and religion are often viewed as two competing and utterly opposed worldviews–one based on faith, the other on reason. Yet both are systems that attempt to make sense of the world and of humanity’s place within a wider cosmological scheme. Religions usually posit that the material real...

Last May, Michael Tomasky published an essay in The American Prospect, the respected liberal opinion magazine he edits, that set Washington on its ear. "Party in Search of a Notion" was Tomasky’s call for the Democrats to rise above the politics of interest-group particularism and become the party of the common good. The influential essay got front-page treatment in The New York Times and is one o...

The razor thin margin of its recent presidential election has left Mexico deeply divided and the future of its democracy in question. Mexican political scientist and columnist Denise Dresser visits Zócalo to discuss candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s challenge to the election’s outcome and the credibility gap that a Felipe Calderón presidency would inevitably face. Known for her bold, insight...

The subject of social class may the last taboo. No one likes to talk about it, but we spend a lot of time thinking—and worrying—about where we fit into the culture of conspicuous consumption. But is “class” really a matter of money? What do tastes and values say about our relationship to our own social class? Does anyone really believe America is a “classless society”? Does Los Angeles still subsc...

Acclaimed actress, Amy Brenneman, creator and star of CBS’ hit series “Judging Amy,” and Brad Silberling, director, writer and producer whose films include “City of Angels” and “Lemony Snickett’s A Series of Unfortunate Events”, visit Zócalo to discuss what role morality plays in the creative process. Husband and wife and occasional coworkers, Brenneman and Silberling will compare notes, assess th...

One of America’s most formidable intellectuals, Francis Fukuyama, visits Zócalo to discuss his new book America at the Crossroads and to explain his very public break with neoconservative foreign policy. Always brilliant, incisive, and compelling, Fukuyama will outline his vision of a “Realistic Wilsonianism” that he thinks ought to guide America’s future relations with the outside world.

Are private foundations doing enough to help improve the quality of life in Los Angeles? Robert K. Ross, M.D., President and CEO of The California Endowment, the state’s largest private health foundation, will visit Zócalo to discuss the challenges the philanthropic community faces in LA.

Historian William Deverell, the director of the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West, visits Zócalo to deliver a groundbreaking lecture on the role that the American West played in healing the wounds inflicted by the Civil War. After all, it was questions about the future of the West that provoked the war in the first place. Unable to reconcile antagonistic positions regarding the e...

Moderated by Jon Healey of the Los Angeles Times Editorial Board Dan Glickman, the Chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), joins us to discuss the state of the film industry at a pivotal moment in its history. As Hollywood’s point man in global capitals from Washington to Beijing, Glickman works to open markets to the studios’ goods, battle piracy and promote the movi...

Is the Age of Gutenberg finished?  Has the Internet now become so widespread as to render books obsolete?  Are publishers dinosaur institutions? Is the crisis of American literacy also a crisis of American democracy? Does it matter? Steve Wasserman, former editor of the Los Angeles Times Book Review, will argue that books will survive as long as the human species is defined by its opposable thumb...

Moderated by Andrés Martinez, Los Angele Times Editorial Page Editor Immigration may be a national issue, but its economic implications are felt locally. Is it true that immigrants are taking jobs away from U.S.-born Angelenos? Or do those who come across the border take the work that Americans just won’t do? Join Jack Kyser, chief economist for the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation, ci...

Greg Critser, “Generation Rx: How Prescription Drugs Are Altering American Lives, Minds, and Bodies” by Zócalo Public Square

An Evening with Jorge Castañeda by Zócalo Public Square