Thursday, Sept. 24, 2009 6:30pm
C. Walsh Theatre 55 Temple Street, Boston
Paul Polak, writer and founder of International Development Enterprises, joins Jasmine Waddell, senior officer for research and learning at Oxfam America, to discuss how entrepreneurial innovations empower those addressing poverty at its roots.
Presented by the Distinguished Visiting Scholars series at the College of Arts & Sciences and the Ford Hall Forum at Suffolk University. For more information, please e-mail info@fordhallforum.org or call 617-557-2007.
A Ford Hall Forum Event on Tuesday March 5th, 6:30 to 8:00 p.m., Old South Meeting House:
For the past 28 years, the Ford Hall Forum’s Louis P. and Evelyn Smith First Amendment Award has honored individuals or organizations that demonstrate extraordinary commitment to promoting and facilitating the thoughtful exercise of our right to freedom of expression. This year, the Forum will honor Gwen Ifill, moderator and managing editor of Washington Week and senior correspondent forNewsHour. She joins us tonight to receive the award and share her thoughts on her life, her work, and what freedom of speech means today.
Prior to the Award Ceremony and discussion, we hope you will join us for a reception at 5:00 p.m. at the offices of Prince, Lobel, Glovsky, and Tye LLP on the 22nd Floor of 100 Cambridge Street. Wine and appetizers will be served.
A Ford Hall Forum Event on Thursday, November 6th, 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., C. Walsh Theater:
Can one really do well by doing good? Savvy corporations of all sectors and sizes are now embracing an environmentally friendly outlook. Adobe is striving to make its campus carbon neutral. Car manufacturers are flocking to catch-up with Toyota’s hybrid Prius. Even Wal-Mart has retrofitted its stores with high-efficiency lighting systems. What are the incentives for entrepreneurs and business owners to “go green”? And what are the challenges they face as they seek to provide value for shareholders while staying true to their mission and morals? Gary Hirshberg, Chairman, President and CEO of Stonyfield Farm, joins Professor Nancy F. Koehn, Harvard Business School, to discuss how businesses are leveraging quality products, creative marketing, and cost-saving efficiencies to both enrich shareholders and make the world a better place.
A Ford Hall Forum Special Event Thursday, October 30th, 6:30-8:30pm, C. Walsh Theater :
Why are intolerance, violence and war so deeply ingrained in religion? Constantine’s Sword, the latest film by Oscar-nominated documentarian Oren Jacoby, follows James Carroll, Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence at Suffolk University, Boston Globe columnist, and author of the forthcoming book Practicing Catholic, in his search for answers to this question. Looking to his own past and that of his religion, Carroll addresses the darker side of Christianity and explores the consequences of the religion’s influence on United States foreign policy. In what ways can religion inspire us to be better people? How can it lead us astray? And where do we, as a society, draw the lines between our religion and public life? James Carroll joins us to screen the film and address the blessings and perils of religion.
A Ford Hall Forum Event Thursday, October 23rd,6:30 to 8:00 p.m., Old South Meeting House:
The following warnings appeared in a 2002 Bush administration memorandum:
• “US could fail to find WMD on the ground in Iraq.”
• “Post-Saddam stabilization and reconstruction efforts by the United States could take not two to four years, but eight to ten years.”
• “Iraq could experience ethnic strife among Kurds, Sunnis, and Shia…”
The author? It was Donald Rumsfeld, former United States Secretary of Defense, in a powerful analysis of the downsides of going to war in Iraq. Why then, did one of the decade’s most important foreign policy decisions go the other way?Douglas J. Feith, former United States Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (2001 – 2005), joins Jules Crittenden, Boston Herald city editor and former embedded journalist in Iraq (2003), to tonight to discuss the dynamics of the first Bush term, and how we make foreign policy decisions. (Book signing will follow lecture and discussion.)
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This program is presented in collaboration with the Old South Meeting House as part of the Partners in Public Dialogue Series.
A Ford Hall Forum event on Sunday, October 5th, 6:30 to 8:00 p.m, at C. Walsh Theater:
“The Bluest State: How Democrats Created the Massachusetts Blueprint for American Political Disaster”. Massachusetts. It is the proud birthplace of modern-day liberalism, and the nation’s foremost test kitchen for its agenda and political practices. It is also, some say, home to sluggish economic growth, insular political culture, and a government that often fails to deliver relief for the working-class people it claims to help the most. Are Massachusetts politics an ideal others should strive toward? Or have we led the rest of the country (or at least its Democrats) dangerously off course? Tonight Jon Keller, WBZ-TV News’ Political Analyst, joins Jeff Jacoby, Boston Globe columnist, to review the ups and downs of our beloved state’s political culture and what can be done to carve out a “new frontier” of American leadership.
A Ford Hall Forum Event: Thursday, September 25th 6:30 to 8:00 p.m, Suffolk Moot Court Room:
Between the lines of our parchment Constitution, renowned legal scholar Laurence Tribe argues, there is an “Invisible Constitution.” Tribe purports that some of our most cherished and widely held beliefs about our constitutional rights are not even included in the written document. How does this “Invisible Constitution” impact the central constitutional debates of our time - from gun control to abortion to wire-tapping? How has this framework for reading the Constitution evolved, and how does it work? Professor Laurence Tribe, Harvard Law School, joins us to discuss how we interpret our country’s most important document.
A Ford Hall Forum Event on Thursday, Sept. 11th, 6:30-8:00pm, C. Walsh Theater:
Across the globe we are building, editing, and contributing to a growing body of knowledge and tools at everyone’s fingertips. Volunteers in leaderless organizations contribute to online initiatives and articles. Software developers spend their free time collaborating with complete strangers. Amazingly, these efforts are creating products of extraordinary quality, sometimes better than that of large for-profit organizations. Why do we do it? Why does it work? Join us tonight as Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales joins journalist Christopher Lydon to address these questions, where “Web 2.0” will take us next, and how Objectivist philosophy guides his vision.
Suffolk University celebrates a new partnership with the Ford Hall Forum with a Kickoff Reception, featuring addresses by James Carroll, Distinguished Scholar in Residence, Boston Globe columnist and a former Ford Hall Forum speaker, Ken Greenberg, Dean of the College of Arts & Sciences, and Shelly Green, President of the Ford Hall Forum.
Following the reception, Jimmy Wales, founder and CEO of Wikipedia, and Christopher Lydon, American media personality, lecture on “Free Speech, Free Minds, Free Markets: Competition and Collaboration.”
