Brian Levy
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brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy
@brianlevy387.bsky.social
71 followers 100 following 39 posts

Practitioner. Researcher. Humanist. Professor of Practice, SAIS JHU 2012-24. Academic Director, Mandela School of Gov, U of Cape Town 2012-19. Governance & growth World Bank1989-2012. Now UCLA. Website & blog at http://workingwiththegrain.com .. more

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Economics 26%
Political science 25%
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brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · 16d
In translating Abundance’s vision into practice, is civil society’s primary role to engage with the state adversarially or to enter into (sometimes) uneasy, problem-focused coalitions with reformers in government? Some surprising insights in link below. workingwiththegrain.com/2025/12/08/p...
Problem-focused coalitional governance in action – three case studies
(Abundance series #3) Ideas can help break an accelerating downward spiral of polarization by offering inspiration – but to be credible, a positive vision also needs to be accompanied by a pr…
workingwiththegrain.com

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · 18d
In Abundance, Ezra Klein & @dkthomp.bsky.social lay out a compelling positive vision & a stark wake-up call for progressive governance. But how does that vision become an agenda for action? The post below begins a short series that wrestles with the gap. workingwiththegrain.com/2025/12/08/a...
Achieving ‘Abundance’  –  from vision to action
(part of a series) Increasingly, we seem trapped in an accelerating downward spiral of polarization, with no way out. What will it take to break the spell? In their best-selling book, Abundance, Ez…
workingwiththegrain.com

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · 20d
History rhymes. I came of age in apartheid South Africa. What is happening around me feels all-too-familiar. "All the hatred, all the persecution, seems like the panic of racists pretending they can stop the future of this country no longer being majority white through sheer cruelty."
rebeccasolnit.bsky.social Rebecca Solnit @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social · 20d
The persecution of huge numbers of brown people and even the mass deportations will not create the white country of far-right fantasy. It’s coupled with an attack on reproductive rights that is sometimes openly intended to make white women have more babies....
Trump wants to recreate a white America that never existed | Rebecca Solnit
The persecution of brown people and mass deportations will not create the white country of far-right fantasy
www.theguardian.com

Reposted by Brian Levy, James Connelly

rebeccasolnit.bsky.social
Rebecca Solnit @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social · 20d
The persecution of huge numbers of brown people and even the mass deportations will not create the white country of far-right fantasy. It’s coupled with an attack on reproductive rights that is sometimes openly intended to make white women have more babies....
Trump wants to recreate a white America that never existed | Rebecca Solnit
The persecution of brown people and mass deportations will not create the white country of far-right fantasy
www.theguardian.com

Reposted by Cas Mudde, Brian Levy, Jay Shambaugh

drodrik.bsky.social
Dani Rodrik @drodrik.bsky.social · 29d
Another shameful Trump act. South Africa has serious problems but it remains exemplary both in its peaceful democratic transition from a racist regime and in its more recent bounce back from corrupt populism. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/26/w...
Trump Says South Africa Is Not Invited to G20 Summit in U.S. in 2026
www.nytimes.com

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Oct 3
Good & bad news re LA homelessness.
Good news: Bold governance reforms provide a promising new platform for action.
Bad news: Trump budget cuts could produce a homelessness tsunami.
A trial by fire is coming. Will the reforms be up to the task ahead?
workingwiththegrain.com/2025/10/01/h...
Hope in the dark? LA’s bold governance reforms to address homelessness
The drumbeat of dispiriting daily news makes it difficult to look beyond immediate crisis. Where to find hope? Los Angeles’ ongoing homelessness crisis might seem an especially unlikely place to lo…
workingwiththegrain.com

Reposted by Timothy Snyder, Brian Levy, Henry Jones

gtconway.bsky.social
George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸 @gtconway.bsky.social · Sep 28
Occam's Razor always rules. Always.

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Aug 11
Some role reversal here, Filipe - feeling especially bleak this morning, I find the solace of some optimism in your post 😢😎😇

Reposted by Brian Levy

davidakaye.bsky.social
David Kaye @davidakaye.bsky.social · Aug 11
this is not how the ICJ works, but the sentiment is admirable.
'Jews, rebel!': Ex-Knesset speaker calls on world Jews to take Israel to ICJ over Gaza
***
www.haaretz.com

Reposted by Brian Levy

zealerous.bsky.social
cool calm and collected @zealerous.bsky.social · Aug 9

Reposted by Brian Levy

twpcommunity.org
TWP Community of Practice @twpcommunity.org · Feb 18
January - February Newsletter now out.
Read the newsletter here 👉 open.substack.com/pub/twpcop/p...

Reposted by Brian Levy

thomaszimmer.bsky.social
Thomas Zimmer @thomaszimmer.bsky.social · Mar 16
Sunday reading: What Authoritarianism Means
 
I wrote about why even critical observers underestimated the speed and scope of the Trumpist assault, why they overestimated democratic resilience – about what America is now, and what comes next?
 
New piece:
What Authoritarianism Means
Even critical observers underestimated the speed and scope of the Trumpist assault, they overestimated democratic resilience. What is America now, and what comes next?
thomaszimmer.substack.com

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Jul 25
Happily, because in times like these "hope" matters a great deal, these are BIG "ONLY"'s ...........

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Jul 25
Filipe: even more than I feared a few months ago, we certainly are living under a government that acts with impunity, ignores all guardrails, and has repressive intent. But having lived for decades in a repressive, authoritarian (apartheid) state, this is not (yet) that. For now 11/26 matters.

Reposted by Shawn Cole, Brian Levy

adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com
Adam Gurri @adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com · Jul 1
It’s one thing to say they want to deport 20 million people, it’s even one thing to go nuts brazenly doing whatever you can as the executive branch to make it happen, but the fact that they’re going to give ICE an additional 45B shows how committed they are to seeing this through.

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Jun 20
I've lived through this before. Forced removals in Cape Town set in motion decades of protest, repression & dehumanization, & destroyed the city's soul. In vibrant, diverse LA, the consequences of forced removals will be devastating. How to avoid catastrophe? workingwiththegrain.com/2025/06/20/u...
‘Undocumented’ in LA – some stubborn facts
I’ve lived through this before. My first two decades of life were during peak apartheid  in Cape Town, South Africa. Beneath the glistening surface of the city’s sunshine, mountains and ocean…
workingwiththegrain.com

Reposted by Kjeld Schmidt, Brian Levy

atrupar.com
Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · Jun 9
Jeffries: "We will not be lectured by Donald Trump and anyone in the Republican Party about issues of law and order ... he pardoned hundreds of violent felons, criminals, who brutally assaulted police officers and attacked the Capitol on January 6. That's what Donald Trump did on day one."

Reposted by Brian Levy

drodrik.bsky.social
Dani Rodrik @drodrik.bsky.social · Jun 1
I’m saddened to learn of Stanley Fischer’s passing. He is known as a top economist of course. But I was lucky to observe him, long time ago, also as a diplomat and peacemaker getting Israelis and Palestinians to work together. His talents will be much missed.

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · May 10
A thought: Instead of an ongoing flood of annoying, thinly-disguised fundraising text messages, might it perhaps be helpful to the Democratic Party to send text messages that connected credibly with the substance and concrete organizing tasks of our current moment? One can dream......

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Apr 29
And here's a link to the earlier piece, written in February. workingwiththegrain.com/2025/02/13/p...
Protecting the guardrails of America’s democracy –  some lessons from South Africa
Now what? Four weeks into the Trump administration, a wrecking ball threatens to wreak havoc with millions of peoples’ lives. A  sense of urgency is in the air. Indeed, we urgently need to bea…
workingwiththegrain.com

brianlevy387.bsky.social
Brian Levy @brianlevy387.bsky.social · Apr 29
Here is an 'update' I wrote yesterday to an earlier piece on Trump's rule through a South African lens. It points to a more accelerated trajectory to authoritarianism than I'd anticipated. workingwiththegrain.com/2025/04/28/1...
100 DAY UPDATE: Protecting the guardrails of democracy – some lessons from South Africa
In early February, I wrote a blog post that laid out some lessons for today’s USA’s from South Africa’s efforts to protect the guardrails of democracy. Here is a link to the piece.  A hundred days …
workingwiththegrain.com