Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This past spring, a volunteer from the Digital Democracy Project reached out to me about its founder and this week’s guest, Ramon Perez. I’d never heard of the project and as a podcast about the many dimensions of citizenship, this was a very necessary conversation exploring innovative ways to enhance citizen participation and reform democracy using technology like AI, blockchain, and mobile voting. As an AI technology executive and US military veteran, Ramon founded the Digital Democracy Project as an accountability system and mobile voting platform that connects voters directly with their legislative representatives to address systemic problems in the electoral system that result in hyper-partisanship and widespread voter alienation. To achieve better outcomes, he believes technology can be used as a catalyst for building a more modern, representative system of government giving greater control directly to voters. #Listenandlearn more as we discuss systemic challenges in US politics and how technology can create a more transparent, accountable, and inclusive democratic process.

Where to find Ramon and the Digital Democracy Project?
On LinkedIn
On Instagram
On Facebook
On Bluesky
On YouTube

What’s Ramon Listening to?
The Lord of the Rings Series Audiobooks
Empire Podcast

Other topics of interest:
On the Enduring Legacy of 9/11
About OneVirginia21
What is Gerrymandering?
About ranked-choice voting
What is Hyperledger Fabric?
Homomorphic encryption explained

Chapters
00:06 Intro and Guest Bio
01:54 Ramon Perez's Background and Motivation
03:14 Defining Democracy in the 21st Century
03:22 Limitations of Current Electoral Systems
05:30 Civic Responsibility and Voter Engagement
07:16 Educating Voters with Technology
09:50 AI's Role in Legislative Summaries
13:57 Systemic Problems in US Elections
16:16 Verifiability, Accountability, and Transparency
17:54 Ramon Perez's Career Path and Transition to AI
20:06 Public Perception of AI and Ethical Use
21:14 Tools and Innovations in Digital Voting
26:07 Global Examples of Democratic Success
35:34 Glocal Speak: Transparency as a Key Value
37:19 Organizing and Operating a Nonprofit Project
42:51 Historical Progress of Voting Rights
44:34 Future Goals and Expansion of the Project
46:44 Ramon Perez's Leisure and Personal Interests
47:42 Reflections on the Evolution of AI and Democracy

Special Guest: Ramon Perez.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week, as the summer heat inches up across the northern hemishphere, we’re hosting our youngest guest yet on the podcast. Augusta Barlow is a 14-year old change agent. Born and raised in Maryland in the United States, with family roots in Cape Verde, she believes in assistance through advocacy and service through sharing. She recently completed her freshman year at Northwestern High School, a public comprehensive and magnet school in Hyattsville, Maryland known for its rigorous Center for the Visual and Performing Arts (CVPA) program. This year, in addition to starting high school she took on another new challenge as one of 12 participants globally in The Kuda Vana Partnership International’s, Youth Advocacy Voice Amplifiers-YAVA group which kicked off it’s inaugural cohort in October of 2025. YAVA is KVPI's youth program, where students learn to advocate for the mission and amplify it responsibly online. This cohort is running a capstone project driven by a set of interviews plus a coordinated push to grow the organization's reach the right way. In a why the where teaser, when her mother, friend to the podcast and colleague of our guest in Episode 93, Sef Ashiagbor, suggested she join YAVA so she could use her new Instagram account to help people, she agreed wholeheartedly. When not in school or doing work for YAVA, Augusta enjoys theater, movies, cooking and baking.

Where to find YAVA?
@ KVPI
On Instagram
On TikTok
On YouTube
On GoFundMe

What’s Augusta reading?
None of This Is True by Lisa Jewell

…watching?
The Knives Out Trilogy

…listening to?
Lyn Lapid Music

Other topics of interest:
What is KVPI? Kuda Vana Partnership International is a US nonprofit supporting family-based care for vulnerable children in Zimbabwe, working to strengthen families and communities so fewer children become vulnerable in the first place. Full picture and the Theory of Change: kudavana.org.
Take a culinary tour of Cape Verdean Cuisine

As you'll hear in the beginning of the episode, with the recent devastating floods that happened across Accra on June 28th-29th, conversations like this with young people challenging themselves to action and understanding around issues outside of themselves and their comfort zones, give us hope that the future is in good hands. For information on how you can assist those in need here in Accra visit the following:

Joy FM
Direct Aid

Special Guest: Augusta Barlow.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week in our continuing Glocal Citizens x Black Women in Real Estate and Green For All, and in 2017 opened the Boogie Down Grind — a hip-hop-themed coffee and craft beer spot, the first commercial "third space" in Hunts Point since the mid-1980s. Her 2022 book, Reclaiming Your Community: You Don't Have to Move Out of Your Neighborhood to Live in a Better One, argues that communities thrive when they retain talent and investment rather than losing both to brain drain — a line from the book is now quoted on the walls of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

This conversation was truly a treat as trip down memory lane to my early career working across the five boroughs in New York City. I have watched an admired Majora’s economic development acuman since visiting Sustainable South Bronx in the early 2000’s as I was getting my start managing and tech-focused industry development project at the New York City Economic Development Corporation. It speaks to the spirit of this BWRE collaboration bringing together Black women in the real estate sector showcasing the personal and professional journeys and highlight how Black women in the industry invest and structure value in/around land/property across global markets and so much more.

Where to find Majora?

On LinkedIn
On Instagram
On Facebook
On YouTube

What’s Majora reading?
All the Shah’s Men by Stephen Kinzer

Other topics of interest:
Hunts Point, Bronx
Coro Fellowship
The Burning Bronx
US Green Building Council
Meet Winona Leduke
About the White Earth Reservation
Reconstruction: The Unfinished Promise Podcast
Where were America’s Black Wall Streets
What is Birch Coffee all about?
Cass Gilbert, Architect
Bronxlandia

Special Guest: Majora Carter.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week on the podcast, we re-presenting an episode that first posted nearly five years ago in the summer of 2021. At the time, my guest, Elizabeth Ann [Campbell Parks] Rollins-Moskowitz, Liz Campbell for short, was empty nesting and remote grandmothering while diving ever deeper into her art using her Mill Valley, California setting as a constant muse. Today she’s hands on grandmothering, establishing herself in the Nairobi art scene and making new friend across generations. At 87, Grandma Liz continues to be an examplar of what Glocal Citizenship is all about. She relocated to Nairobi--her new muse, to join fellow podcast alum and son, Salim Rollins three years ago, and with a borderless mindset hasn’t looked back. Last weekend she held [her first exhibit in Nairobi]([https://www.instagram.com/p/DZmt2RWOQSA/) and we couldn’t be happier to celebrate this dynamic diasporan!

Where to find [Liz]([https://glocalcitizens.fireside.fm/guests/elizabeth-rollins-moskowitz) and Salim?

Special Guest: Elizabeth Rollins-Moskowitz.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week, Chef Mawuli Dzansi allows us the honor of being his first podcast appearance. And we definitely count that as a win with this rising start in the Ghana food movement.

Rooted deeply in his Ghanaian heritage, his passion for food grew as he explored flavors, techniques, and ingredients he discovered while living with his Aunt in Accra. Chef Mawuli’s expertise is largely self-taught, honed through years of dedication and an unrelenting curiosity about food. His experiences as an Executive Chef and his time at a Michelin-starred Kitchen in Amsterdam have shaped his innovative approach to showcasing the vibrancy of African ingredients.

He has always been considered unconventional, having led impactful projects like Dawadawa at Impact Hub Accra and The Kitchen By Ghana Food Movement, a food hub designed to train young chefs and promote Ghanaian and West African cuisines globally. He currently works as a private chef and consultant to some of Africa’s bold thinkers and organizations.

His serial entrpreneurship journey started from the moment he discovered how to please people’s palatte’s and Prekesse, a hospitality practice focused on private dining, brand activations and culinary consulting, is the culmination of his journey so far—a bespoke dining concept celebrating Ghana’s rich culinary heritage while embracing sustainability and modernity. Working across concept development, sourcing, menu design, and execution of immersive experiences for brands and private individuals his focus is on building considered hospitality that connects food, people, and place through African ingredients and contemporary dining formats.

Where to find Mawuli?
@Prekesse
On LinkedIn
On Instagram

What’s Mawuli listening to?
Omawumi’s In the Music

Other topics of interest:
Where is Ho, Ghana?
Visit Ashaiman
On Ewe languages
About Ga Fisherfolk Culture
Out and about in Surulere, Lagos
On “Continental” Cuisine
Dikan Center, Accra
Akuna Pod
The story of the Clubhouse app
Chef Mawuli at Odo Valley

Special Guest: mawuli dzansi.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week we have an encore episode inspired by the many pitch decks that I’ve been reviewing from companies based in Egypt as part of my Dream VC Investor Accelerator Fellowship. Back in 2020, while we were still in the thick of the pandemic, I connected with Samir Abbass. I connect with my guest, Samir Abbass, while he was studying in Spain and when tours of any kind were on hold all over the world. Take a virtual tour with us into his real Egypt in this is two part conversation that I couraage you to visit or revist from the beginning.

Special Guest: Samir Abbass.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

Exiting news…according to the Million Podcasts database platform We’re ranked #25 among change agent podcast thanks to listeners like you!

In this week’s change agent conversation we’re visiting with Odile Tevie, co-founder and director of Nubuke Foundation, a visual arts and cultural institution, based in Accra and Wa in Ghana.

In the early 2000’s she set up and ran the Black Swan gallery in London introducing Ghanaian, Togolese and Nigerian artists into the diaspora. Under her vision and drive, Nubuke Foundation, set up in 2006, has become an internationally acknowledged arts institution whose robust and engaging programming calendar has been seminal in supporting the career of many of the mid-career Ghanaian artists and promising ones like Na Chainkua Reindorf, Isaac Opoku and Gideon Appah.

Nubuke Foundation has become a creative community hub in the city of Accra, where informal learning programmes, talks, exhibitions, drama, spoken word etc. In Wa, the Foundation focuses on promoting strip weaving artisans and textile and fibre-based arts practice.

As you'll hear our surround sound is the long story of the raining season in Ghan and it was well worth the rainy commute to have this conversatio with Odile.

Where to find Odile?
On LinkedIn
On Instagram
On Facebook

What’s Odile reading?
African Women & Feminism by Oyèrónkẹ́ Oyěwùmí
The 28th February House by Demi Letsa
The Longest Week by Nick Page

Other topics of interest:
A bit about Tesano in Accra
The Wa Upper West Region, Ghana
Ghana A Portrait
About the University of Applied Arts Vienna
More about Ghana's Centers for National Culture
About Sensibilités intellectuelles africaines in The Conversation
What is the Myriad Alliance?

Special Guest: Odile Tevie.

Greetings Glocal Citizens!

This week we commemorate Africa Day across the African Diaspora. Reflecting on the journeys of liberation that Black people have endured in trial and triumph, I am ever reminded that those that laid the groundwork will never in my heart, mind or acts have done so in vain. As the pillars of imperialism are finally weakening--though, not without reverting to its tried and tested battle techniques--the new next is taking shape in all manner of action and practice across the globe. So today, as I do in some way every day, I salute us all for staying the course and redirecting the path as necessary on the #PanAfricanProgress mission that is imparative to human evolution and a sustainable existence here on earth.

Speaking of existence here on earth and the ways that we inhabit it, I came across my guest this week via a connection that I made last year at the Charter Cities Summit in Nairobi. Remi Adeleke, a former U.S. Navy SEAL and entrepreneur, serves as Chairman and Co-Founder of the Small Farm Cities Africa Resilience Fund, a for-profit venture developing sustainable, agricultural communities to combat poverty and human trafficking. He is actively scaling this model across Africa, including projects in Malawi, Zambia, and other regions, focusing on economic empowerment through infrastructure and land ownership for local farmers.

Following a successful career as a Navy SEAL, in 2016 he found himself pursuing a careers in writing, speaking, and acting, including the 2017 franchise film Transformers: The Last Knight, SEAL Team CBS, and the 2022 Universal thriller Ambulance. He served as a consultant on Netflix’s 6 Underground and Apple+ TV series Invasion.

As an educator he co-founded Muskegon Michigan’s OPS Academy which opened to inner city students K-8th grade in Fall of 2022. His story is captured in his HarperCollins bestselling autobiography, Transformed: A Navy SEALs Unlikely Journey From The Throne Of Africa, To The Streets Of The Bronx, To Defying All Odds.

As you’ll hear in our conversation, Remi is also the founder of Kejo Wear a brand changing negativity to positivity one shirt at a time and where he is marrying this social entrepreneurial enterprises with activism; a portion of proceeds go toward supporting efforts to end human trafficking.

Where to find Remi?
Small Farm Cities
Civil Watch Technologies
On LinkedIn
On IMDB
On Instagram
On YouTube
On the Down Range Podcast

What’s Remi watching?
Bad Boys
The Rock
The Unexpected Short Film

Other topics of interest:
The Story of Banana Island and the late Chief Adebayo Adeleke
Victoria Island, Lagos
About San Diego, California
About the making or the Small Farm Cities Resilience Fund
What are Critical Minerals?
About the game of Monopoly

Special Guest: Remi Adeleke.