The story of ECSP’s own John Thon Majok was the most read last month. The rising number of displaced people around the world is an immense tragedy, he writes, but refugees also depict the “maximum example of the human capacity to survive despite the greatest losses and assaults on human identity and dignity.” The concept of “refugee resilience” can help people see the strengths in those that survive such ordeals and give hope to those struggling through it.

Just a few years ago, progress on global family planning and reproductive health policy seemed to be stuck in a rut. “For 20 years, development money for health had been directed to fight HIV and poverty, and as a result, momentum, interest, and funding for family planning had dwindled,” said Susan Rich, vice president of global partnerships for the Population Reference Bureau (PRB), at the Wilson Center on July 15. “Unmet need for family planning was high all over the world, but especially in Africa.” [Video Below]

Since President Lyndon B. Johnson created the USAID population program in 1965, it has evolved in tandem with the global discourse on population and demography. “The agency’s family planning program is as relevant today as it ever was, and is necessary,” said Jennifer Adams, deputy assistant administrator of the U.S. Agency of International Development’s Bureau for Global Health. The bureau houses the Office of Population and Reproductive Health, which implements U.S. development and relief efforts to expand access to modern contraceptives, fight HIV/AIDS, reduce unsafe abortions, and protect the health of women and children. [Video Below]

Wildlife trafficking has exploded in recent years and now contributes significant funds to major criminal organizations and even terrorism. That puts it squarely in the realm of national security, according to a research project by the University of Texas, Austin. Cameron Lagrone and Josh Busby explain the connection in last month’s most popular post.

Psychological disorders following childbirth are incredibly common among women around the world, but are routinely ignored. It’s a “topic that has had to work hard to provide evidence about its fundamental importance,” said Jane Fisher at the Wilson Center. A Maternal Health Initiative panel on so-called perinatal common mental health disorders was the most popular story on the blog last month.

“The dynamics at play in Florida – massive infrastructure projects with unintended consequences, intensifying effects of environmental change, and political resistance – are a microcosm of what makes adjusting to climate change such a vexing societal challenge,” wrote Wilson Center Fellow Katrina Schwartz in April’s most popular post.

I distinctly remember the night I saw An Inconvenient Truth in 2006. The film essentially did what no high school teacher could: gave me a purpose to structure my studies, setting me on course to earn a degree in environmental studies, an advanced degree in natural resource conservation, and eventually working here, at the Wilson Center.

At the close of a meeting of G7 foreign ministers in Lübeck today, ministers announced a stronger collective commitment to tackling climate-related risks in states experiencing situations of fragility.