Featured Work

We Belong to Each Other: A Call To End the Violence

With the death toll in Gaza climbing past 8,500 people, including more than 3,500 children, and hundreds more being killed each day in Israel's relentless bombardment of homes and other civilian infrastructure, we at OBI join a growing global chorus...

Belonging Without Othering

The root of all inequality is the process of othering – and its solution is the practice of belonging. We all yearn for connection and community, but we live in a time when calls for further division along the well-wrought lines of religion, race...

Targeted Universalism Case Study: Vision for Baltimore

Vision for Baltimore (V4B) is a successful program at Baltimore City Schools (BCS) designed to provide annual vision screenings for all students and, when necessary, to provide follow-up eye exams and eyeglasses at no cost to families. Download PDF...

Areas of Work

The faculty, staff, researchers, and affiliates of the Othering & Belonging Institute work together with multidisciplinary approaches to learn, research, and construct solutions for society's most pressing issues. Our programs and initiatives are all designed to effect transformative change.

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Areas of Work

The faculty, staff, researchers, and affiliates of the Othering & Belonging Institute work together with multidisciplinary approaches to learn, research, and construct solutions for society's most pressing issues. Our programs and initiatives are all designed to effect transformative change.

SEE ALL AREAS

Featured Publications

In the Media

Washington Post: What to know about Juneteenth and its historical significance

June 19 became a kind of July 4 celebration for African Americans, john a. powell, the director of the Othering and Belonging Institute at the University of California at Berkeley, told The Post. “It’s particularly important for African Americans...

The Chronicle of Philanthropy: A Hopeful New Way to Pursue Racial Equity

When john a. powell arrived at the University of California at Berkeley about a decade ago, he found a competition that spoke to a struggle outside academia. The nationally renowned civil-liberties scholar (who spells his name all lowercase) had been picked to lead...

Berkeley News: Facing legal peril, Trump stokes racial resentment in his base

UC Berkeley scholars, including Othering & Belonging Institute Director john a. powell, say that by attacking the prosecutors and judges in his cases, the former president is trying to discredit the charges, rally supporters — and undermine the rule...

Berkeley Public Health: The legacy of eugenics

Professor Osagie Obasogie has teamed up with the Los Angeles Review of Books (LARB) to launch a two-year project called Legacies of Eugenics. It’s a national conversation on the history of eugenics and the ways it still shapes various aspects of...