The Conversation

Supreme Court sides with Starbucks in labor case that could hinder government’s ability to intervene in some unionization disputes

Written by Michael Z. Green, Professor of Law and Director, Workplace Law Program, Texas A&M University

The coffee company pushed back against a step the National Labor Relations Board took tied to a store in Memphis.AP Photo/Joshua Bessex

The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Starbucks in a case that could make it harder for a federal agency to enforce labor laws in disputes that can arise during organizing campaigns. On June 13, 2024, the court...

An homage to the dad joke, one of the great traditions of fatherhood

Written by Ian Brodie, Professor of Folklore, Cape Breton University

Sometimes lameness – not laughter – is the point.AHPhotoswpg/iStock via Getty Images

“Dad, I’m hungry.”

“Hi, hungry. I’m Dad.”

If you haven’t been asleep for the past 20 years, you’ll probably recognize this exchange as a dad joke.

The term dad joke is credited to a June 20, 1987, editorial...

The US is losing wetlands at an accelerating rate − here’s how the private sector can help protect these valuable resources

Written by Steph Tai, Professor of Law and Associate Dean, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Roads divide what once was a larger wetland into four smaller pools in east-central North Dakota.AP Photo/Charlie Riedel

Wetlands aren’t the most eye-catching ecosystems. They include swamps, bogs, fens and other places where soil is covered by water most of the time. But they perform a huge range of valuable services, from soaking up...

Supreme Court justices secretly recorded – the legal issues and what they mean for the rest of us

Written by Anne Toomey McKenna, Visiting Professor of Law, University of Richmond

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Jr., left, and his wife, Martha-Ann Alito, photographed in 2018.AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais

Posing as a “Christian conservative” at the Supreme Court Historical Society’s members-only, black-tie gala, liberal journalist and filmmaker Lauren Windsor secretly recorded her conversations with...

Space weather forecasting needs an upgrade to protect future Artemis astronauts

Written by Lulu Zhao, Assistant Research Scientist in Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, University of Michigan

The Sun can send out eruptions of energetic particles.NASA/SDO via AP

NASA has set its sights on the Moon, aiming to send astronauts back to the lunar surface by 2026 and establish a long-term presence there by the 2030s. But the Moon isn’t exactly a habitable place for people.

Cosmic rays from distant stars and galaxies and solar energetic...

Ukraine’s draft woes leave the West facing pressure to make up for the troop shortfall

Written by Nicolai N. Petro, Professor of Political Science, University of Rhode Island

Ukrainian soldiers unload supplies from a truck in Kharkiv Oblast.Diego Herrera Carcedo/Anadolu via Getty Images

Ukraine’s current military recruitment campaign is not going according to plan.

Announced on April 16, 2024, the drive was aimed at enlisting hundreds of thousands of young Ukrainian men to help push back against a Russian invasion...

People ambivalent about political issues support violence more than those with clear opinions

Written by Joseph Siev, Postdoctoral Fellow in Consumer Behavior, University of Virginia

Many people who hold political views are uncertain about their opinions.GSO Images/The Image Bank via Getty Images

Choices about political candidates and issues are inherently limited and imperfect, leading many people to feel mixed emotions, and even conflicting opinions, about which candidate or position they prefer.

In general, being ambivalent...

Civil rights leader James Lawson, who learned from Gandhi, used nonviolent resistance and the ‘power of love’ to challenge injustice

Written by Anthony Siracusa, Assistant Professor of History and Community Engagement, St. John Fisher University

Civil rights activist James M. Lawson Jr. speaks in Murfreesboro, Tenn., in 2015.AP Photo/Mark Humphrey, File

Rev. James M. Lawson Jr., who died on June 9, 2024, at the age of 95, was a Methodist minister and a powerful advocate of nonviolence during the Civil Rights Movement.

Lawson is best known for piloting two crucial civil rights campaigns...

Philadelphia’s 200-year-old disability records show welfare reform movement’s early shift toward rationing care and punishing poor people

Written by Nicole Lee Schroeder, Postdoctoral Fellow, Kean University

Drawing shows men making shoes at the Philadelphia Almshouse, circa 1899.Alice Barber Stephens/Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Alfred Bendiner Memorial Collection

Charles Kingley was a widower and a single father of four who lived in the Northern Liberties neighborhood of Philadelphia in 1829. He worked at a brewhouse but...

Cities with empty commercial space and housing shortages are converting office buildings into apartments – here’s what they’re learning

Written by John Weigand, Professor of Architecture and Interior Design and Interim Dean, College of Creative Arts, Miami University

Rooftop construction at a high-rise building undergoing conversion to apartments in Manhattan's financial district in New York City, April 11, 2023. AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews

It took a global pandemic to convince American businesses that their employees could work productively from home, or a favorite coffee shop. Post-COVID-19, employers are struggl...