How Do We Fix It? Creators & Guests

Thanasi Dilos is the co-founder at Civics Unplugged.

Michael Shellenberger is an author.

Samantha Shireman is the director and information Architect at AllSides.

Dr. Vivian S. Lee is a radiologist and health care executive. A Senior Fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and an NIH-funded investigator at the University of Utah.

Emily Chamlee-Wright is an economist and president & CEO of the Institute for Humane Studies.

Kylie Carlville is a researcher and epidemiologist.

Maya MacGuineas is a president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

Dr. Roy Grinker is an author and professor of anthropology.

Richard Young is a co-founder and director at CivicLex.

Erica Komisar is a psychoanalyst, coach, and author of the book Being There.

Jerry Michalski is a technology consultant, futurist, thinker, and founder of REX.

Seth Flaxman is a social entrepreneur, civic technologist, and co-founder and CEO of Democracy Works.

Dr. Rachel Kleinfeld is a researcher and consultant on troubled democracies facing problems such as polarized populations, violence, corruption, and poor governance in the United States and internationally. Currently, she is a senior fellow in Carnegie’s Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program.Prior to joining Carnegie, Kleinfeld co-founded and directed the Truman National Security Project.Kleinfeld's writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and the Atlantic to the Journal of Democracy and the Annual Review of Political Science. Her first book, "Let There Be Light: Electrifying the Developing World with Markets and Distributed Energy," co-authored with Drew Sloan, was published in 2011. Her second book, "Advancing the Rule of Law Abroad: Next Generation Reform," was published in 2012. Her third book, "A Savage Order: How the World’s Deadliest Countries Can Forge a Path to Security," was published in 2018. Her TED talk on improving violent democracies has been translated into 17 languages and viewed over a million times.Kleinfeld received her B.A. in Ethics, Politics, and Economics from Yale University, and her M. Phil and D. Phil in International Relations from the University of Oxford.

Daryl Davis is a blues musician, activist, author, actor, and bandleader.

Meghan Daum is an author, essayist, and journalist.

Lenore Skenazy is an author, speaker, blogger, and columnist. She is the founder of the Free-Range Kids movement, which followed a 2008 article she wrote about her decision to let her 9-year-old son ride the New York City Subway alone. She was named "America's Worst Mom."Skenazy began the blog "Free-Range Kids," and followed with her first book, "Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry," which was published in 2009. Later, she co-founded Let Grow, a non-profit promoting childhood independence and resilience.Before her controversial parenting article, Skenazy was a columnist for the New York Daily News, followed by The New York Sun.Skenazy was featured in the Bravo series Tabloid Wars, and was the host of the reality television show "World's Worst Mom" on Discovery Life. She continues to give talks about parenting around the world.Skenazy received her undergraduate degree from Yale University, and her M.A. from Columbia.

Geraldo Cadava is an associate professor of history and Latina and Latino studies at Northwestern University.

Wade Roush is host and producer of Soonish, a narrative nonfiction podcast with the motto “The future is shaped by technology, but technology is shaped by us.” He writes a monthly column about innovation for Scientific American magazine, is the author of Extraterrestrials (forthcoming from MIT Press, April 2020), and is the co-founder of the Boston-based Hub & Spoke audio collective. He has contributed radio pieces to WBUR and WHYY, and has worked as a freelancer, audio producer, and consultant for numerous shows, publications, and startups. His works of science and technology journalism have appeared in Science, MIT Technology Review, Xconomy, and many other publications. In 2014-15 he was acting director MIT’s Knight Science Journalism program, and in 2018 he was the editor of the hard science fiction anthology Twelve Tomorrows from MIT Technology Review and the MIT Press. He has a B.A. in history and science from Harvard College and a PhD in the history and social study of science and technology from MIT.