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Dear EPDers,
This week's newsletter includes:
- [Opportunities] OECD: Innovation for Development Facility Intern
- High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development
- Opportunities on SIPAlink with Approaching Deadlines
- Faculty Spotlight
- Student Summer Story
- Book & Film/TV Recs
- What's Happening in New York City!?
[Opportunities] OECD: Innovation for Development Facility Intern
The intern will work as a member of the Innovation for Development Facility, situated within the
Development Co-operation Directorate (DCD), on supporting the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) to carry out its mandate to help increase financing for development and to improve the quality and effectiveness of development co-operation. Through inclusive partnerships for development, we help ensure better lives for people in the developing world by understanding development finance, strengthening aid delivery, improving development policy, and building partnerships for development.
The Innovation for Development Facility is located within the Reviews, Results, Evaluation and
Development Innovation Division in DCD. The selected candidate would work on contributing to
the design of a strategy and implementation of the work programme, mainly through carrying
out research assignments. The selected candidate will have the opportunity to engage with a
wide range of stakeholders, ranging from bilateral development agencies to innovators from
low- and middle-income countries. She/he will work under the guidance of the Head of the
Innovation for Development Facility.
Send your CV and a max. one-page letter of motivation along with a sample of writing in English to asha.meagher@oecd.org by 18 July 2021. Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted for an interview and asked to submit their application through the Internship Generic Vacancy in Taleo.
For more information on the background, main responsibilities, preferred candidate profile, requirement, and other details on the internship, please check out the Terms of Reference here.
High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development
The High-level Political Forum, United Nations central platform for follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals, provides for the full and effective participation of all States Members of the United Nations and States members of specialized agencies. The meeting of the HLPF in 2021 will be held from Tuesday, 6 July, to Thursday, 15 July 2021, under the auspices of the Economic and Social Council. This includes the three-day ministerial meeting of the forum from Tuesday, 13 July, to Thursday, 15 July 2021. The HLPF will discuss ways to ensure a sustainable and resilient recovery from COVID-19 that puts us on track to realize the 2030 Agenda. For more information on the program, please refer to the official website HERE.
One of the side events organized by UNESCO, Group of Friends for the Protection of Journalists, and the International Coalition for the Safety of Journalists:
In partnership with UNESCO, the UN Group of Friends for the Protection of Journalists (GoF), Civil Society organizations aim to present the results of their documentation of data and trends on safety of journalists and provide recommendations of Civil Society to protect Public Access to Information and the work of media and journalists. Civil Society organizations will share regional reports from South Asia, Sub Sahara Africa and Latin America which zoom in on Shadow Voluntary National Report Contributions from Colombia, Indonesia and Pakistan.
Contributors to these reports will provide an overview of challenges and results based on their efforts and experiences in order to provide best practices in the framework of Voluntary National Reporting mechanisms. In addition, the session will produce recommendations to ensure more comprehensive reporting on the SDG target 16.10. and provide input to the review of the UN Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists.
Please register here to participate.
Opportunities on SIPALink with Approaching Deadlines
Faculty Spotlight - Rumela Sen
 Can you tell us about the course you are teaching this fall and what you plan to teach in the spring?
I’m teaching Politics of Policymaking (PoP) in developing countries this Fall. This course is designed to cover the conceptual foundation of as well as the policy tools that public policy professionals would need. As part of the course, I’m doing memo writing and op-ed workshops in class as well to give students some hands-on practice before they do their assignments. In the recitations, the TAs will use a case study approach to give students a chance to demonstrate their ability to apply theoretical concepts to real world problems, thus bridging the gap between theory and practice. For example, in our second class this semester we’ll learn about evidence-based policy making and the policy tool of the week is randomized control trials (RCTs). In the recitation, students will discuss the application of RCTs in evidence generation in two different cases, one in the case of pollution control reform in India and the other in the case of enforcing payments for water and sanitation services in Nairobi. I have a fabulous teaching team, and I have worked with the TAs to facilitate as spontaneous case discussions as possible, while also ensuring that the learning outcome of the week (ethical debates around RCTs) are not lost. I think such active learning is particularly suited to SIPA students who bring their diverse experience and expertise to the classroom. The idea is to encourage them to learn not only from the readings I have in the syllabus, but also from each other. I’m excited about teaching this course during my first semester at SIPA.
In Spring I teach two courses. One course, titled Persistent Problems in the Global South: Making Politics and Policies Work, will focus on one policy challenge every week, specifically in developing countries. We will discuss policy challenges around issues like food insecurity, public health, gender inequality, ethnic diversity, populism, corruption, social unrest and so on. The readings will include both theoretical literature on the topics as well as case studies illustrating the policy challenges and proposed solutions on the problem in question.
The other course I’m excited to offer next semester will be called State-Building in South Asia: Institutions, Identities, and Interests. This course will draw on my regional expertise in South Asia. In this course we will look at the South Asian experience to address some central puzzles of our times. For example, how did India despite being a “weak” state, promote audacious reform? What role does civil society play in a democracy? When can states deliver on the promise of inclusive growth? Why did different South Asian countries, emerging from the same colonial experience, follow very different political trajectories?
Can you share any current research that you are working on right now that might be of interest to students?
The last few months have been really challenging in terms of research productivity, particularly because my research is fieldwork heavy. I had done some fieldwork in Nepal earlier that I wanted to follow up this Summer, but I had to cancel my plans. But on the positive side, my first book just came out from Oxford University Press (Modern South Asia Series) around January 2020. It is titled Farewell to Arms: How Rebels Retire without Getting Killed. The book shows how rebels quit extremist organizations. It is based on interviews with current and former Maoist rebels, various government actors as well as ordinary citizens in the two conflict zones in North and South India. The book offers a critique of surrender and rehabilitation programs that assume that lucrative offers of job and cash can lure rebels away from extremism. So students interested in understanding conflict zones, post-conflict reconstruction and grassroots peace building would find it useful to see a critique of existing policies from the rebels’ perspective. The book also shows how factors like local cleavages, land relations, and grassroots civic associations play important roles in the process of rebel democratic transition. That will be of interest to students focusing on economic and political development issues in developing countries.
Are there any fun facts or any other information that you'd like us to include?
I recently consulted with John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight for his episode on India. I worked out of their NY office, met the team, and was in the studio during the shoot. I have a small John Oliver figurine in my office to remind me of my experience.
Student Summer Story
 Paloma is a first-year MPA-EPD student with a specialization in UN studies. Born and raised in Mexico, she received her Bachelor in International Relations from Tecnológico de Monterrey. She worked for Innovations for Poverty Action in Mexico, contributing to the implementation of a focused deterrence of violence strategy in Mexico City.
Paloma is spending the summer in the Dominican Republic, which she also likes to call her second home. She’s volunteering at the DR government’s Family farming program, organizing saving groups and designing the program’s M&E framework. Having lived there six years ago, she’s also catching up with friends and of course, enjoying all the natural wonders the DR has to offer.
Her favorite part are the field trips she takes to visit small farm producers around the country.
Book & Film/TV Recs
 Brooklyn - Colm Tóibín
Colm Tóibín’s New York Times bestselling novel—now an acclaimed film starring Saoirse Ronan and Jim Broadbent nominated for four Academy Awards including Best Picture—is “a moving, deeply satisfying read” (Entertainment Weekly) about a young Irish immigrant in Brooklyn in the early 1950s.
“One of the most unforgettable characters in contemporary literature” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette), Eilis Lacey has come of age in small-town Ireland in the hard years following World War Two. When an Irish priest from Brooklyn offers to sponsor Eilis in America, she decides she must go, leaving her fragile mother and her charismatic sister behind. Eilis finds work in a department store on Fulton Street, and when she least expects it, finds love. Tony, who loves the Dodgers and his big Italian family, slowly wins her over with patient charm. But just as Eilis begins to fall in love, devastating news from Ireland threatens the promise of her future.
 Summer of Soul
In 1969, New York producer and impresario Tony Lawrence masterminded the Harlem Cultural Festival, a summer-long live music series that would be held over six weekends in Upper Manhattan’s Mount Morris Park (now also known as Marcus Garvey Park). Sometimes called the “Black Woodstock,” the concerts ultimately drew more than 300,000 people to see acts ranging from the Staple Singers to Hugh Masekela; from Gladys Knight & the Pips to Sly and the Family Stone; and from Nina Simone to the 5th Dimension.
Interviewing attendees who came to the Harlem Cultural Festival as young people, as well as the performers themselves, Thompson immediately plunges the audience into the action in “Summer of Soul". It would be valuable if only because it preserves such a sublime moment of Black expression, pleasure and autonomy. But Thompson cleverly interweaves present-day interviews into the archival images, creating an illuminating palimpsest of equally moving and eerily timely narratives. Whereas most filmmakers — especially musicians — would let the performances play uninterrupted, Thompson carefully overlays interviews with critics, observers and sometimes the artists themselves, to create thumbnail histories of everything from New York politics and the moon landing (which also happened that summer) to the intersection of Black and Latin culture in Harlem and the role of gospel music in coping with collective trauma (“We didn’t have therapists,” Al Sharpton notes. “But we did have Mahalia Jackson.”)
What's Happening in New York City!?
 Try the city's best bites at Smorgasburg
Smorgasburg is the food bazaar spectacular that unofficially announces summer in New York City every year. Founded by Brooklyn Flea’s Eric Demby and Jonathan Butler, the culinary extravaganza typically spotlights about 100 vendors across its locations. Smorgasburg World Trade Center opened on Friday, May 21 and operates every Friday from 11am to 7pm all summer with Mao’s Bao, Carlitos Barbecue Taqueria, Bona Bona Ice Cream, Wood Fired Edibles and Rooster Boy. Check out the details HERE.
Smorgasburg is the largest weekly open-air food market in America, attracting thousands of people to Brooklyn, Manhattan, Jersey City, and Los Angeles each weekend to eat from dozens of local vendors.
Summer Office Hours
Have any questions? Our Program Assistant, Saiful Salihudin MIA'21 holds office hour every Friday 9AM-10AM EST. Email him at sas2409@columbia.edu to make an appointment!
Best Regards,
The EPD Team
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