Leadership for Society: Race and Power

Stories tell us who we are and help us understand others. They also suggest who we can be, if we overcome the ongoing divides in this country. In this podcast episode, Professor Brian Lowery sits down with American journalist and publishing executive Dana Canedy, dubbed by the New York Times as “one of the most powerful Black women in the literary world” who is “poised to alter the culture and the divisions she leads and shape the landscape.”In this conversation, Lowery and Canedy touch on the difference between living a story and telling a story authentically. Canedy shares her goals of giving publishing contracts to voices often unheard, always aiming, she says, “to engage people in conversations that enrich our understanding of one another, foster real communications” and eventually lead to policy change. This is Leadership for Society: The Podcast, a series of conversations hosted by Brian Lowery, senior associate dean for academic affairs at Stanford GSB, that focuses on the most pressing issues of today. In this season of the podcast, Lowery explores the role of race in society, how race interacts with structures of power, and how systemic racism manifests itself in day-to-day business and policy decisions.

In a conversation with Professor Brian Lowery, Dr. Spencer Crew, professor of history and art history at George Mason University joins Dr. Clayborne Carson, professor emeritus of history at Stanford and the director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute, to discuss the role history plays in our identity as a country. Historical statues and monuments, the men say, tell very different narratives depending on who gets to tell the story.“Many statues were created after the Civil War, at a time when Jim Crow was being implemented in the South,” says Carson. “Efforts to create these memorials were specifically designed to say, ‘You may think that things have changed since the Civil War, but we’re here to remind you that things haven’t changed.’” This is Leadership for Society: The Podcast, a series of conversations hosted by Brian Lowery, senior associate dean for academic affairs at Stanford GSB, that focuses on the most pressing issues of today. In this season of the podcast, Lowery explores the role of race in society, how race interacts with structures of power, and how systemic racism manifests itself in day-to-day business and policy decisions.

Economic and social inequalities between white and Black people gained global attention again this year. In this podcast episode, Rashad Robinson, president of Color Of Change — the largest online racial justice organization driven by more than 7.2 million members — spoke on the global racial reckoning of 2020 and how his nonprofit is working to fix the systems and structures that have hurt, harmed, and held the Black community back.In a conversation with Professor Brian Lowery, Robinson discusses the importance of technology in channeling activism and why it’s important to create long-term infrastructure to harness people’s energy in productive ways. And he warns, in an age of social media, to not mistake visibility and awareness for the ability to change the system.This is Leadership for Society: The Podcast, a series of conversations hosted by Brian Lowery, senior associate dean for academic affairs at Stanford GSB, that focuses on the most pressing issues of today. In this season of the podcast, Lowery explores the role of race in society, how race interacts with structures of power, and how systemic racism manifests itself in day-to-day business and policy decisions.

Just a week before a divisive presidential election, Deval Patrick, the former governor of Massachusetts, and a candidate in the Democratic primaries for the 2020 presidential election, and Jeff Flake, the Republican former U.S. Senator from Arizona and former member of the House of Representatives, shared their insights on the state of the American government as it struggles to maintain its institutions in the face of deep racial inequities.In a rare across-the-aisle conversation about racial equity, Patrick and Flake talked frankly with Professor Brian Lowery about how race has affected their experiences as politicians in Washington, examined why political parties must reinvent themselves, and discussed the urgent need for citizens and business to re-engage with the political process.This is Leadership for Society: The Podcast, a series of conversations hosted by Brian Lowery, senior associate dean for academic affairs at Stanford GSB, that focuses on the most pressing issues of today. In this season of the podcast, Lowery explores the role of race in society, how race interacts with structures of power, and how systemic racism manifests itself in day-to-day business and policy decisions.

As the U.S. gets closer to becoming a nation where the majority of its citizens are people of color, Angela Glover Blackwell, the founder in residence of PolicyLink, is focused on innovating and improving public policy to ensure opportunity for all low-income people and communities of color. In this wide-ranging pre-election discussion, she explains the potential impact of California ballot measures; the need for radical solutions in employment, law enforcement, and education; and how local civic leaders across the nation are stepping forward to expand today’s equity moment into a revolutionary movement.This is Leadership for Society: The Podcast, a series of conversations hosted by Brian Lowery, senior associate dean for academic affairs at Stanford GSB, that focuses on the most pressing issues of today. In this season of the podcast, Lowery explores the role of race in society, how race interacts with structures of power, and how systemic racism manifests itself in day-to-day business and policy decisions.

In the midst of a powerful social justice movement, Quita Highsmith, VP and Chief Diversity Officer at Genentech, and Simone Hill, MBA/MA ’14, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) strategist at Omidyar Network, work to steer their organizations toward a new definition of corporate responsibility and leadership. Moving the needle in the direction of racial equity, they say, will require a long-term investment, a willingness to “stop tiptoeing” around issues of race, and an updated corporate culture that allows all employees to be their authentic selves. Leadership for Society: The Podcast, is a series of conversations hosted by Brian Lowery, senior associate dean for academic affairs at Stanford GSB. In this season of the podcast, Lowery explores the role of race in society, how race interacts with structures of power, and how systemic racism manifests itself in day-to-day business and policy decisions.