A group photo of OBI staff
WE ALL BELONG IN THE CIRCLE OF HUMAN CONCERN

Othering is the problem of our time. Belonging is the solution.

The Othering and Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley advances groundbreaking approaches to transforming structural marginalization and inequality. We are scholars, organizers, communicators, researchers, artists, and policymakers committed to building a world where all people belong.

Read More
Email Sign Up
Featured Content

Real Solutions

Welcome to Real Solutions, a special 8-episode podcast series from the Othering & Belonging Institute featuring people leading efforts across the country that show what bold policy solutions would move the country towards belonging and wellbeing for...

Featured Work

  • Blog
  • November 24, 2025

Lessons and Lingerings

I find myself back at the library to begin to express the deep learnings conveyed to me through that late literary giant Dr. Gloria Jean Watkins, better known by her pen name, bell hooks. I had a unique and cherished opportunity to spend time with the published and unpublished works of bell hooks at the Special Archives Library at Berea College. It seems only right that now...
  • Blog
  • November 26, 2025

Driving the “Vibe Shift”: Harnessing Narratives on Family, Care, and Gender

In a 2024 podcast interview with Joe Rogan, Mark Zuckerberg mentioned that corporate culture in America is neutered, taking the grandstand view that the workplace needs more “masculine energy.” At the time, in some circles, Zuckerberg’s comments were the source of both outrage and mockery...
  • Video
  • October 30, 2025

Video: What I Saw in Gaza

On October 30, 2025 OBI's Health Disparities Cluster in partnership with the Medical Anthropology Program and The Berkeley Center for Social Medicine hosted Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a trauma surgeon based in California's Central Valley, to present a talk...
  • Publication
  • September 10, 2025

(En)Gendering Authoritarianism

A Six-Strategy Framework Examining How Political and Cultural Leaders Weaponize Gender in Ways that Advance Authoritarianism.
  • Blog
  • October 8, 2025

Fighting Forward Essay Series

FIGHTING FORWARD is a new essay series OBI is releasing over the month of October authored by director john powell on the ongoing assaults on our democracy and communities, and how we may respond to and confront them. Essay 1: What We Share The...
  • Podcast
  • October 24, 2025

Real Solutions

Welcome to Real Solutions, a special 8-episode podcast series from the Othering & Belonging Institute featuring people leading efforts across the country that show what bold policy solutions would move the country towards belonging and wellbeing for...
  • Blog
  • September 25, 2025

Housing for Belonging

Join us in learning from UC Berkeley’s graduate students in two new policy memos on housing policy for belonging, adapted from their much longer student projects! These memos offer lessons for advocates, funders, legislators, and other change-makers...
  • Publication
  • October 1, 2025

The Roots of Structural Racism Project [2025 Update]

Note: This is our 2025 update to the our report published in 2021. Click here to view the original. -- The Othering and Belonging Institute is pleased to unveil a major update and extensive addition to our “Roots of Structural Racism” project...

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

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
Arts and Cultural Strategy
Othering & Belonging Conference
Bridging
Climate Justice
Health
Food Systems
Housing
Islamophobia
Narrative Strategy
Targeted Universalism
Featured Content

Transformative Research Toolkit

Introduction We have seen and participated in transformative research strategies that defeated proposed jail expansions, won millions of dollars for community-prioritized programs, and built new community-led organizations that changed a political...

Featured Publications

Racial Disparities Dashboard

This project provides data on critical life outcomes for American society, and highlights areas of progress and regress in closing disparities.
Read More

Fear, Grievance, and the Other

The goal of this paper is to provide a primer on key concepts that help us understand the rise, strategies, and tactics of exclusionary, nativist, and populist movements today, and to advance the framework of authoritarian populism as an analytical tool that informs practical efforts to combat these movements, address structural marginality, and advance democracies rooted in belonging.
Read More

Principles for Reframing the National Security Narrative

Our public discourse is seeded with dangerous and counterproductive ideas concerning national security that are so deeply embedded we may often be unaware that we, as story tellers, are invoking or reinforcing them in our own narrations. Thus, over...
Read More

Rebuilding Public Power

This 90-minute workshop dives into the history of how corporate power is organized in the United States and contemporary cases of how growing corporate power has rolled back successful gains in democratic rights, environmental justice, migrant...
Read More

Global South Lab

The Global South Lab intends to unearth the wealth of Global South experiences, perspectives, and visions to foster mutual understanding and deeper bridging, improve people's lives, and preserve our planet. To this end, the Lab intends to bring together a wide range of perspectives and visions from the Global South’s social movements, civic institutions, and public intellectuals to engage with global citizens in the South and the North on contemporary challenges and envision a future of belonging for all.
Read More

The Structural Racism Remedies Repository

This a repository of policy-based recommendations for addressing structural and systemic racism or advancing racial equity drawn from a vast array of published material.
Read More

In the Media

  • Podcast
  • October 16, 2025

john a. powell interviews Columbia Journalism Dean Jelani Cobb

On Oct. 16, 2025, OBI Director john a. powell interviewed Columbia Journalism School Dean Jelani Cobb about his new book, Three or More is Riot, and the climate at his university amid the attacks being waged against it by the Trump administration...
  • November 2, 2025

The Good Apocalypse Podcast: Can bridge building save democracy?

Miriam Juan-Torres González, a leading expert on polarisation and democracy, joined The Good Apocalypse Podcast to discuss the evolution of political polarisation since 2016, the rise of authoritarian populism and strategies for building bridges and defending democracy in turbulent times.

‘Gender issues’ are being used as cover to erode democracy, UC Berkeley report finds

Engineering nebulous threats like “gender ideology” can convince unruly coalitions to support authoritarian practices, says the Othering & Belonging Institute’s Míriam Juan-Torres González.

Ashland.news: Building a bigger ‘we’

An internationally recognized expert in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties spoke and anchored a panel discussion Monday that drew a packed house to Angus Bowmer Theatre in Ashland for the launch of “All.Together.Now,” envisioned as a “multi-year, multi-generational, multi-cultural collaboration to strengthen our community for the future.”
  • September 25, 2025

Nonprofit Quarterly: Who Is Included in and Who Will Fight for “We the Civic”?

Growing up in Detroit, I remember a time in junior high when a group of older boys came onto our playground looking for a fight, and to claim our grounds. They asked, “Who’s the toughest kid here?” Someone pointed to a boy sitting quietly under a tree. The high schoolers sent word: We’re here to kick your ass.
  • August 14, 2025

Berkeley News: Watch a Berkeley scholar explain structural racism

Structural racism — or the way systems like housing, education, employment and justice create racial disparities without overtly racist actors — is a concept that is often “deeply misunderstood,” according to Stephen Menendian.
  • July 28, 2025

Berkeley News: This Berkeley scholar wants everyone to understand what ‘structural racism’ really means

In this Berkeley News feature, OBI Research Director Stephen Menendian discusses his newly released book "Structural Racism: The Dynamics of Opportunity and Race in America," which examines how American systems and structures perpetuate racial inequality beyond individual prejudice.
  • June 30, 2025

EL PAÍS USA Edition: ‘When fear wins, democracy crumbles’

OBI Director john a. powell was profiled in this comprehensive article with the US edition of the Spanish newspaper El Pais, titled, " john a. powell: ‘When fear wins, democracy crumbles’." The article reads: "[powell's] books contain an arsenal of...
  • May 12, 2025

KALW: Fair Housing in Bay Area, feat. Stephen Menendian

In KQED's State of the Bay episode: " Butterflies Back in Presidio, Fair Housing in Bay Area, Travel Tips with Matt Kepnes", OBI Assistant Director Stephen Menendian shares his expertise on fair housing challenges in the Bay Area, providing key...
  • January 21, 2025

Berkeley News: 'There’s a term for Trump’s political style: authoritarian populism'

Research by Mi­riam Juan-Torres Gonzalez from our Democracy & Belonging Forum was covered in this Berkeley News feature, titled, " There's a term for Trump's political style: authoritarian populism." It reads: "Reading global political headlines over...
  • November 12, 2024

NYT: Why ‘Affordable Housing’ in New York City Can Still Cost $3,500 a Month

The New York Times cites our national segregation research in a November 19 article, titled, " Why ‘Affordable Housing’ in New York City Can Still Cost $3,500 a Month." The article reads: "Some of the most popular neighborhoods are affordable to only...
  • December 9, 2024

john a. powell talks to Star Tribune, KQED about new book on bridging

The Minnesota Star Tribune earlier this month published an interview with OBI Director john a. powell about his new book, The Power of Bridging: How to Build a World Where We All Belong. “What bridging says is, ‘Let’s take the time to be curious...
  • September 23, 2024

Berkeley News: Bridging divides: from anger and mistrust to belonging — and hope

In this Berkeley News story, Othering and Belonging Institute director john a. powell and OBI Campus Bridging Project leader Julia Mckeown share expertise and perspective around ways to bridge at UC Berkeley during a polarizing time.

Nonprofit Quarterly: A conversation with john a. powell on how to achieve belonging without othering

OBI Director john a. powell speaks with Nonprofit Quarterly about his new book, co-authored with OBI Assistant Director Stephen Menendian, Belonging Without Othering: How We Save Ourselves and the World. This is the first of a two-part interview.

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...