CRWS Mini-Grant Recipient Hilary Lynd Uncovers Important History from South Africa's Transition to Democracy

During the course of my dissertation research, funded in part by a mini-grant from ISSI's Center for Right-Wing Studies in 2018, I stumbled upon an important untold story of South Africa’s transition to democracy. On the eve of the country’s first democratic elections in 1994, black and white right-wing formations were planning to boycott the elections. Had they done so, the cost in human lives would have been tremendous. The Zulu nationalist Inkatha Freedom Party was convinced to participate in elections due to the last-minute transfer of 2.8 million hectares of land to the Zulu King. Many have long suspected that such a deal took place, but my research has provided the first comprehensive account: names, dates, documents, linkages between Zulu politics and the Pretoria-based white minority government. A short version of this research appeared in the South African Mail & Guardian in August 2019.

Investigating Health of Residents in the Rural South

Berkeley Center for Social Medicine faculty affiliate Dr. Mahasin Mujahid is playing a key role in a new six-year, $21 million study probing the causes of the disproportionately poor health outcomes of people from rural communities in the southern United States. Dr. Mujahid, Associate Professor of Epidemiology at UC Berkeley, is serving as a principal investigator (PI) of the Risk Underlying Rural Areas Longitudinal (RURAL) study to investigate the factors at play in cardiovascular health issues among white, Black, and Latino residents living in the most rural counties in Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Dr. Mujahid is PI of the Social Determinants Core which is responsible for assessing multi-level contextual, psychological, social, and environmental determinants of health among participants.

CRSC-Affiliated Professor Franklin Zimring Wins Top Criminology Award

Berkeley Law Professor Franklin Zimring has won the top international honor in criminology, the Stockholm Prize. Noted among his accomplishments cited by the award committee were his books, Crime is Not the Problem: Lethal Violence in America (with Gordon Hawkins) and The City That Became Safe. Professor Zimring joined the Berkeley Law faculty in 1985. He shares this award with Duke University economist Philip Cook, who earned his Ph.D. at UC Berkeley. The full story is here.