Understanding the Political Backlash Against Diversity 
Tuesday, April 1, 2025 
 

Transcript generated by an AI tool and lightly edited for clarity. 
 

Hello and welcome to this edition of Breakthroughs on Monthly podcast on the latest academic studies coming out of HEC Paris. I'm the school's chief editor Daniel. Today we discuss research on diversity, equity, and inclusion with these two HEC scholars. Hi, my name is Marcelle Laliberté. I'm the Chief Diversity Equity and Inclusion Officer for HEC Paris.  
 

Hello, my name is Matteo Winkler. I am a professor at HEC Paris in the Law and Tax Department and the academic director of Cems. We've ended the tyranny of diversity, equity and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government and indeed the private sector and our military. My administration has taken action to abolish all discriminatory diversity, equity, and inclusion, nonsense.  
 

And these are policies that were absolute nonsense throughout the government and the private sector. With the recent, our country will be woke no longer. We believe that whether you are a doctor, an accountant, a lawyer, or an air traffic controller, you should be hired and promoted based on skill and competence, not race or gender.  
 

Very important. Donald Trump outlining in his typically colorful way how he aims to dismantle DEI programs in the US. Executive orders like one entitled ending Radical and wasteful government, DEI programs and preferencing are being implemented at breakneck speed. President Trump signed that one just five days after he took office.  
 

Before we get to our guests, I asked a few students on the HEC campus how they see developments in the United States, so I don't know what they're offering anymore as a country. Also, they're gonna just slowly roll back because they're not looking at the fundamental, which is humanity. From what I know on a personal level, it's like a lot of my classmates wanted to go to the US for exchanges or whatnot, and then now they're just contemplating staying in Europe because of the DEI policy assessment going on.  
 

That's all I can say on the matter. Society is about competition. So how can we compete if we concentrate power in the group that already has it? So I don't think this is helpful. Our innovation toward disruption. Genuine innovation comes from questioning the status quo. I think that's the heart of entrepreneurship and if you supreme diversity, you're basically destroying entrepreneurship.  
 

So these policies do not align to the values of competition of innovation. They completely destroy that I'm from the East Asia. For me, it's definitely going backwards in terms of the DEI issues in the United States. So I'm a bit pessimistic about the whole situation in the US for now. A small.  
 

Sample of voices here, also reflecting the geographical diversity of our students on campus. Matteo Winkler has been researching the rights of Plus ever since he joined HC Paris in 2014. The associate professor in the school's law department has joined forces with HEC Chief, DEI, officer Marcelle LaLaliberté.  
 

Together they explore the current developments in this domain. In a wide ranging discussion, we began with the ramifications of this anti DEI drive in the us. I'm delighted to have joined the Marcelle and Matteo in Matteo's office here in the s building of the S campus to discuss a topic which is getting more and more prevalence at the moment as we hear of reports of Donald Trump's actions, which basically seems aimed.  
 

To dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion programs the orders labeled DEI initiatives as illegal and immoral forms of discrimination. First of all, what are your initial thoughts on this characterization and its implications for organizations committed to DEI? There is a shift in the narrative because until January this year, we have thought that.  
 

We needed DEI programs in corporations not to discriminate against minorities and people from unprivileged backgrounds who were unable to reach positions of power in the corporate settings. Now we are told all these. Executive orders tell us that it's the contrary. We need to dismantle all the DI programs in order not to discriminate.  
 

And these comes from a famous case in the Supreme Court in 2023, where the US Supreme Court said that the programs of Harvard and UNC, North Carolina University, who used the race. As one of the many criteria for admission of new students I was saying the Supreme Court said that the system of admission were considered discriminatory, enhancing, legal, and even if the decision was really about using race to admit students in preference to others.  
 

The narrative that the extreme right and the conservatives have taken is that all programs of any kind who in a sense use criteria like equity, diversity, and inclusiveness within a certain corporate settings are illegal. Now, this is a narrative that's been destructive disruptive. Therefore it's something we need to investigate from a research standpoint.  
 

Claudine Gay is officially out at Harvard, but the fight over DEI has only just begun. What started on college campuses is now hitting boardrooms across corporate America, but instead of standing their ground. Many executives are turning their backs on DEI instead bring. So what are the implications?  
 

We're talking on the 24th of March, 2025, and the date perhaps is important because it's two months almost to the day since Donald Trump took office and the speed with which he's implementing his policies and his executive orders is quite unprecedented. So what are we seeing as the implications for organizations that are committed to DEI on the ground of.  
 

These eos as they're called on DEI, to join what Matteo was saying, I think it's important to really master the context. We've seen, we've followed some researchers from a law department at NYU in the us The risk of litigation and the risk for companies who do not comply or who are off the mark in terms of law are quite high.  
 

As opposed to regulation here in Europe, for example, we're talking millions of dollars as opposed to politely being told that you're not in compliance with current EU regulations. In fines. In fines. Exactly. And so I think understanding that nuance of the reality in the US versus what has happening here in Europe is important.  
 

Another element, and then to Matteo's point is we're talking about anti-discrimination law, and the Trump administration is trying to put forward the idea that protected groups have had privilege, which. We can debate in all sense, but by law this is where he's targeting and the narrative choices that he's making.  
 

The language used in these executive orders plays on that gray zone of, I'm trying to counter the effect of these people that have been protected or have been given beneficial treatment or privilege, and it's not fair to another group of people. That's what he went in on his platform, and these are the elements of language that he uses to defend his position.  
 

Playing with language, playing with the gray zones of the law, throwing people back because you're getting a barrage of these changes, one after the other. So you're having a hard time getting your head around them. Add that to the component of if you have a contract with the government. So if you have one US dollar with the Trump administration, it has real consequences within your organization, gray Zones and playing with the language.  
 

Matteo, as a qualified lawyer, is this a distinction that needs to be made between the letter of the law and the spirits of the law in the us? So the every law tells a story and these executive orders, which have been signed by Trump to accelerate the thing, because in many of the fields that are covered by these executive orders this should be a competence exclusively of Congress and not of the precedent.  
 

But he's doing that anyway because he knows that the Congress would bow to his will at some point. This said. We can distinguish the spirit of the law and the letter of the law. I think the spirit of the law is to be as broad as it can to get rid of all the I programs, even in private entities.  
 

But the letter of the law, they cannot do it because corporations have autonomy from the government. The government legisl over corporations, but certainly there are. Some fields, there are some angles of the companies that, of course, it's a decision making of corporate actors. Now the narrative is invasive that private parties, which is a stunning thing, are abiding because they are afraid of retaliation because they know that even if the law is ineffective to them, there is an entire army of X users social media trolls. And other actors who will be starting a campaign. Can we say like a shit storm is a form of pressure, putting pressure to actors to behave in a certain way.  
 

So corporations are abiding even if they don't get any federal funding, for example. So we need to distinguish companies who have federal funding, they need to abide because the government decides who. They want to they want to get, give the money to. In, in the past it was the opposite. Biden decided that to participate in a federal funding, companies must have DEI programs, because obviously you want to be a pluralistic open.  
 

And also a company with a vision about how talents can develop within the company itself. You don't want to be a closed company to participate in something that is, involves the public interest and collective interest as the government. And so now that the narrative has changed, the problem is that companies and big tech, and not only them.  
 

Are abiding even if they have no direct contact with the federal government. And this is the caring thing. HEC, breakthroughs and Knowledge. At HEC Podcast, I'd like you to listen to a testimony from an A CLU attorney called Chase Strand. Shortly after one of the first executive orders was declared by President Trump, as the last month has really been characterized.  
 

For trans people by one attack after another from this administration and post January 20th, it seems every day there is some new executive action restricting the rights of trans people and really zeroing in on efforts to prevent us from having jobs, going to the bathroom, going to school, joining the military, accessing healthcare.  
 

This is really a. Full scale assault on trans people being able to really live freely in this country. And so for the trans community, this is a time of great anxiety and fear and concern for the future. Will Medicaid be cut? Will we continue to see the executive unilaterally try to cut off grant funding that Congress has allocated to institutions to the states?  
 

So this is a time of. Significant precarity and I'm very concerned about the sustainability of our separation of powers in this country, as well as the ability of trans people to survive in the face of these attacks. Strong words from chase, Gio Marcelle, what kind of mobilization have you seen in the US to try and counter or at least analyze the consequences of the Trump administration's actions?  
 

What we've seen examples of court cases. Coming to light. We have two examples that we looked at in Maryland and Washington State, if I'm not mistaken, but essentially this organization effort to be able to challenge. What is being put it forth in these executive orders and also launch new approaches in terms of research Matteo Winkler in terms of trying to find or dismantle or understand better the approach from this new administration and its new language?  
 

Yes. I want to get back to the concept of narrative because I think it's very important. We need to ask ourselves, what is the narrative behind this attack? On the trans community we can say, but it's also an attack to the L-G-B-T-Q community. So what distinguishes democracy from an authoritarian regime or a dictatorship if you want, or a liberal democracy?  
 

People in power target minorities to create, to unite. The majority against something that is perceived as an obstacle to, genuine growth or political trajectory or simply because it's a crafted as an enemy and therefore something that is against the patriotism that is behind the populist movement.  
 

So attacking different people from those in power is a way to preserve those in power and their privileges. It's also a matter of wealth transfer. When you attack a minority, you basically impoverish it, and so the resources are redistributed. To favor those in power. That is the concept of privilege.  
 

And so what's the fact that the transgender or the trans communities, the target is even more brutal and violent because minorities by definition is vulnerable because they need to get through a very harsh path to be themselves, which is the transition. They have to change their documents now.  
 

Trump has as a first move declared that the documents that were changed will not be recognized. They have to back to the document that were issued at birth. And then it's also introduced a new concept of biology, of sexuality, of sex, which is based on the reproductive cells at conception. This is really thring, 200 years of science because.  
 

We all know that when the embryo is developing, the sexual reproductive cells do not develop until the six to eight weeks. And of course, if you talk about conception as something impossible to say. Also, sexual minorities. There is the intersex minority, which is also very fragile. People who do sport, we are talking about 40 people 80 people in the entire us.  
 

System. Yeah. If you can imagine, someone tells you, yes, this is a minority that is destroying our society. They are corrupting our children. They are destroying the integrity of the female category in sport. You wonder, right? Yeah. I mean this is a narrative that might be effective, but it doesn't stand the scrutiny by the scientific testing of these theories, right?  
 

So they, they don't stand. Marcelle, if I may, also, to Matteo's point, when we're talking about 40 students at the ncaa, for example, now we're talking about removing research funding from universities who support transgender students. So like the University of Pennsylvania has been told, you need to shift your policy on trans athletes, or we're gonna remove your funding.  
 

And those have catastrophic consequences for organization. And again, on the redistribution of wealth, when you target a small population out of millions. But the impacts are going to be catastrophic and longstanding because research today is on cardiac support or genetic changes. All these topics that H-I-V-H-I-V, for example, cancer treatments, all these have fundamental implications because if we come back to the Trump administration, we also know that there's been approximately 200 words that have been discouraged from using in me in media or in federal agencies such as. 
 

Such as women, gender, transgender trans, LGBT, removing the T. The New York Times did a long list of those words that were removed. Now to be fair, each administration has words that they would like to see removed or enhanced, but the scale of these words and the implications that they represent in terms of future funding and current funding for research are.  
 

Rather shocking and a little scary. If we think about the progress that has been done in the scientific field in general, these are discoveries and experiments that have been done in universities. So the federal government's money is not because they capriciously decide that you are good or bad, but because you good, you do things that are good for collectivity, and when you stop that, you stop the progress that has been done in science as you said, Marcelle cancer treatment, HIV.  
 

So we, we won't have that anymore. And we must ask ourselves why is this stopping? What is the purpose of stopping this? And I think that the answer is that universities have always been an anti power. Institution, it's in universities that students are educated to be open, educated to praise, diversity, educated, to find social justice where there isn't, and if you stop universities from working, you basically prevent students from being in touch with all these issues that are super important.  
 

So you basically cancel all social justice that exists, cancel all types of diversity. You really create a monolithic society where people think all the same way. And the same way is I do my own business. I don't care about collectivity. When society is an issue, the government will take care of it, and the government means people in power and no one else.  
 

This is a horrible world, is 1984 world or even George was, yeah, George. Or even worse because it's real now. It's not a fiction. Welcome to the newsfeed. I'm Paris Jackson. Since taking office, president Trump has signed a series of executive orders among them, summed to dismantle diversity equity inclusion initiatives at the federal level.  
 

We talk to Seattle University, political science professor and attorney, Angelique Davis, who calls the administration's actions racial gaslighting. What is it? And in the context of DEI, how does it relate to merit? Yes, so I did this research with Rose Ernst and Racial gaslighting. It's a process that normalizes racism.  
 

By making those who resist racism, the enemy. So for example, you asked about the term merit, right? That term has been manipulated to support an anti DEI agenda. So now when merit's used, it becomes racial gaslighting when they make those who support DEI, the enemy, right? So it's used to paint a picture that all of those who benefited from DEI are the problem.  
 

Essentially calling them incompetent or freeloaders, right? Which the data doesn't actually support. And they're painting diversity initiatives as un-American. So right now the administration is intentionally creating confusion using diversionary tactics in order to make those who don't fit their agenda, the enemy, right?  
 

This was actually talked about back in 2018 by former White House chief strategist. Steve Bannon when he talked about flooding the zone. And so that's exactly what they're trying to do and they're trying to disorient their opponents because it actually doesn't allow a chance for them to catch their breath or to respond, and almost impossible to correct the narrative.  
 

As academic researchers, how must you adapt to these realities? It sounds like there's a need, for example, of a lot of interdisciplinary approaches where narratives makes you think of philosophy and linguistics even. You were talking about the origins of which sex, it means biology, how interdisciplinary.  
 

Is your research becoming as a result of this new world, Marc? I think diversity has always been at the intersection of disciplines because I think to gain strength and give the different perspectives, you can't just focus in a very narrow sort of field of discipline and need to be able to work across disciplines to be able to get that perspective.  
 

Just the work that we've been doing with Shaina, Jean Raj, who's a professor here in Qatar, and I thank her immensely because I think she's helped me also open my eyes to different value systems. Yes. You've written a working paper with her called Navigating, DEI in a shifting climate. So therefore, very relevant to what we're discussing at the moment.  
 

Completely. And some of the work that I've also done with the UN on AI was that introduction concept around. Different value systems from Aboriginal people in different countries like Australia and Canada, for example, to our different sets of values based on community or based on the individual.  
 

None of them are better with one than the other. They're just different. But how do we integrate those different. Perspectives or cultural systems to better understand how societies move forward. And part of the research that we've been doing with Shaena was to track about 130 companies across four regions.  
 

So the us, the uk, Europe, and the Middle East, and see how people signal, how they report out on gender, disability, different metrics. To be able to better capture it. Not necessarily to say, oh, you're not doing it as good as the others, but to understand within their local context and their culture, how are they progressing and how are they signaling and talking about these topics.  
 

And we were really happy to see how gender equality, for example, is. Is addressed locally from the Middle East to the us how there's a sectoral expectation across industry and something that Matteo and I have also seen or witnessed. And then of course, how the societal values. Play into those different elements, breakthroughs and knowledge.  
 

At HEC Podcast, Matteo Winkler, before being an associate professor of law at HEC you worked 12 years as an international attorney and now you're really focused a lot on your research. And it includes reflections on cross border recognition of formalized same. Sex relationships. And you've also published a legal analysis of the far right attacks on LGBT youth in Italy.  
 

How did this research help you understand the kind of pressures that the LGBT communities are experiencing at the moment and how much are you having to change? So it's very interesting to see how the shift in the narrative, again on the L-G-B-T-Q people has distinguished nowadays. Between the west and the rest.  
 

In my last paper, I examined the criminalization of sexual minorities in Africa, and this is a very interesting case because many countries basically governed by populist forces or autocrats who are in power since many decades. I think you were focusing on Uganda. Yes, it was Uganda, but also Nigeria.  
 

Also the Ghana, Kenya countries that are involved in this sort of wave of criminalization. So what we see is in fact the criminalization. But unlike in the past where you had this notion of unnatural offenses, now we, you have a more sophisticated legal arsenal which punishes many things like the same sex marriage.  
 

The fact of holding hands. In public, the touching, the reciprocal touching of people of the same sex. The problem is that, in fact, if you confuse any kind of touching between people of the same sex with something criminal, you really prevent people from relating to each other, and you also expand the scope of criminal law beyond any reasonable.  
 

Possible scope. So this said, my paper investigates how these new criminalization is ground and in fact on human rights legislators who criminalize sexual orientation and gender identity. Maintain that they're doing this to protect culture, to protect society to protect children. So they really express a legitimate interest in legislating against sexual minorities.  
 

And this is an extremely interesting field that for research to understand how this is possible, how, governments can use human rights. Not to protect minorities or vulnerable individuals, but to assert their right to repress their right to power their right to dominate. There is a beautiful book called The Human Rights Dominate which has been published 10 years ago.  
 

Who discusses this human, the language of human rights has changed, and now we see more and more that human rights are considered as siding. With those in power and not with those who are oppressed. This is a total narrative shift compared to the past. Mohamed Ali doesn't believe gay Africans exist.  
 

He's also a lawmaker in Kenya's parliament. He's keen to see his country follow in the example of neighboring Uganda, which recently enacted one of the harshest anti L-G-B-T-Q laws on Earth. Martin. Kenya has its own bill mirroring many aspects of Uganda's law. We are waiting for it like nobody's business, like Uganda's law, the bill includes the death penalty for aggravated homosexuality.  
 

Gay sex and promoting homosexuality would potentially be punished with lengthy jail terms. Ma you talked about this work with Shaina Jivraj and this is centered on an article where the two of you introduced a model called Cadence, and that's a very long acronym for a seven step roadmap to reframe the DEI.  
 

In the world of business, specifically for major global companies in the West and the Middle East, we're in a business school. Could you elaborate on its key components and how it addresses the challenges posed by the current political climate? So the way I like to picture it is imagine that you're steering a global organization through really rapidly shifting water.  
 

In one region, like parts of the US political tides are really pushing back on diversity efforts. While as in Europe, you're facing regulatory currents that require you to give details in terms of pay gap. Meanwhile, in the Middle East, you're aiming to integrate global DI standards like I was sharing at the sectoral level.  
 

Into your local context so it can feel like you're navigating really a complex sea without a solid map. The reason that we came about with cadence is because we wanted to be able to capture the localities, the sectoral expectations, and the shifts in terms of socio-legal narratives to some examples that Matteo was sharing earlier on.  
 

But how do you understand these different layers that are at play? While you're trying to bring in a value around diversity or inclusion or a better sort of work environment for your employees, depending on your context. So Cadence tries to capture seven elements. First, many organizations will face compliance, be it local or international.  
 

Then there'll be a bit of an alignment in terms of between what the employees are expecting or expecting and leadership deployment. If we put out. Programs around diversity, equity, and inclusion. Should we stay on that theme? That's the D of Cadence deployment. Exactly. E is the evaluation. How do we measure, how are we progressing?  
 

So again, we looked at what companies are signaling on. So it doesn't necessarily account for what they are following inside, but what are they reporting out on through their financial statements, through diversity reports, for example, or industry sector expectations. Then we go to end in. The normalization, like how does it become part of their daily operations?  
 

Because we strongly believe that diversity is. A great potential in terms of innovation and organizational performance. Then catalyzing, again, coming back to that notion of the innovation and inclusive practices, so how does that sort of catalyze that effect? And then finally, of course, it's not just a program.  
 

The end game is a long-term source of resilience for organizations and to be able to meet performance needs in a context where right now the C is quite hefty. Have you seen successful examples of the implementation of Cadence? Can you name an organization? Pragmatically speaking, Matteo and I were looking at companies in terms of their responses to diversity, equity, and inclusion.  
 

And an easy example that comes to mind is Santander Benko, who've made it very clear in press releases that they will not tie their executive bonuses to diversity targets in countries that have political issue with diversity. So again, playing with language, but in other areas, we'll continue to tie those performance measures around diversity for their executive.  
 

Very good example of, okay, I've got this sort of socio-legal storm going on. How do I adjust my maintaining my value systems around diversity, equity, and inclusion for an international organization? So Santander is a multinational, we, I think it's implanted in dozens of countries. I dunno how many, how challenging.  
 

To have a general policy be applied in the sort of decentralized way that it does where there are different cultures in the Middle East compared to the us compared to Latin America or Sub-Saharan Africa, Matteo. So actually, when you have a transnational activity across border economic activity, which is the activity of a multinational company, you cannot really insulate everything that happens in a, in an entity from another.  
 

But you can do something. So what we see with Marcelle in our last work we have seen that companies are engaging in more practices. These are more, like more approaches or can we say contingent strategies because actually. It's difficult to say what will happen in the long term because the Trump administration has become so unpredictable because it's based on one individual, of course, because again, the collectivity dimension is missing that it's hard to say.  
 

But let's say that we have found like a threefold approach. The first approach is creating an internal firewall, which is typical of different regions, and this there is already. Something like that in, in place. And you basically have some context where you cannot do DEI. So you rename it, you reshape it, you change it while you continue to do it with the very same name in other parts of the world.  
 

Second approach we call it cultural divergence, which is the idea that you position the company differently on the stances. By adapting basically to local norms, but at the same time maintaining the dialogue, right? For example, gender equality. You can do it in Africa, in countries that we mentioned already, like Uganda, Kenya, you cannot do L-G-B-T-Q because you risk your business.  
 

But at the same time, you can continue. Developing a pro L-G-B-T-Q policy at home without prejudice your activity overseas. And the third is a full retreat Is very sad by some companies, like Target, for example. They have decided not to implement DI anymore. So what will happen with this company? So this is a very shortsighted move because the reason why we develop DI in companies, not because.  
 

It's a very well window dressing thing to have, but it's because companies that are more open attract more talents from backgrounds that are usually remain in. That don't have access to economic power and to companies. So the idea of getting rid altogether of DI is insane because it goes very much against the very first purpose of the companies, which is to make money and to make more money, you need to attract more talents.  
 

If you stop attracting talents, you impoverish. Yourself, a impoverished society. That is what will happen, unfortunately. Going from the global to the local you were on a jury here at HEC Paris in early March at Capgemini for a DEI class that, that you teach Matteo and HEC students discuss the topic of d and i, fatigue.  
 

And backlash. What take homes were there for you both in terms of student awareness of the issues at stake and what perhaps they were proposing to remedy it? First of all, I want to thank very much Capgemini's, DEI team Karin Valan, Richard Thompson who helped us with this exercise because student, I think one of the added value of the courses we have on DEIH hcs that we work with corporate partners.  
 

This said the students, they presented in six groups and there was no one. Who said that we should dismiss, we should dismantle di They still think that these are the generations that care about sustainability. They care about environment, they care about being international open and smart minded.  
 

So these students clearly said that they need to be expedient in the sense that they, it is like the companies need to be expedient in the sense they need to. Reshape themselves and rethink the things they do. But companies have purposes and coming back to that purposes and retro pedalling on those purposes is neither the zero ball nor practicable because at the end of the day, you risk really lose your added value, your talents in companies, and this is, will be very bad and nonsensical from a leadership standpoint.  
 

And Marc Lib, you were there as a member of the jury. What did you take home from the students' attitudes and approach to these issues? I can only echo what Matteo has just shared, and of course a big thank you to our colleagues at Capgemini. 'cause I think they had a brilliant approach of we having students work on different themes around diversity and how organizations can think about their strategies, but also bringing awareness to localities.  
 

So they worked at the Middle East, north America, Europe, for example, and it allowed everyone to be able to explore what's going on locally, to be able to then link it back up to a larger strategy. So back to your question around, for these multinationals, this is exactly where they're at in terms of how do I take something that's part of my value system or part of my strategies embedded.  
 

And adapt to these different regions or local localities to be able to have the effective change that I want to have. Get the great talent, get the performance and the innovation with diverse inclusive teams and work environments, and just push forward. One of the challenges here at HEC Paris is there are so many events at the same time, and unfortunately I couldn't make that event at Capgemini, but I was able to get a notion of student awareness on DEI issues through a small vox pop on the on ze campus here totally at random.  
 

This is not scientific. It's a little qualitative experiment. I'd like you to listen to an extract. I'm come from Mexico. I'm one of the most exposed nations in the world to these type of policies. And sincerely, they're very blind toward the sources of value they are losing. So I, I don't support the vision, I don't share it.  
 

And I think as a younger generation, we should push to empower people. And I think diversity and recognizing it is very powerful in that sense. There is a lot of value in recognizing diversity because it empowers people. So right now we are empowering the wrong people. For the wrong reasons and we're losing a lot of value from the contributions solar patients can provide.  
 

A lot of my friends, I know that they went to the US because they had opportunities there as being like they were part of a community, like the LGBTQ plus community in India and then they went to the US because they thought they had an opportunity there where they could be perceived as an equal. And now like with the policies that's been going on in the US and I have friends here, I have friends back home and I feel I keep seeing them being so upset about it. It like genuinely evokes my empathy. But again, as someone who is also a woman trying to break into business in India, which is very hard, I can completely see that. You think that you scraped the eyes and got in, but then it's so frustrating to see that it's going back to where it all began.  
 

Like you left your entire life to find a space for you and create a niche for you where you thought you would be perceived as an equal. But then you are, you're just seeing humanity roll back to what you were fighting against, and it's very upsetting. It's very frustrating, and I think that this the country that was founded on the pri, like the, on the foundations of we offer you opportunities in a better life, that is not the offer anymore on the table.  
 

But I don't think like in the end, it depends on people's mindset, like what people really thinks instead of, the policy direction. So this could be an issue that can be still like, be changed by education and culture. Voices from Korea, India, and Mexico, not in that order, which I think reflects also the diversity of this HEC campuses, something like 120 plus nationalities represented here.  
 

Matteo, your reaction to some of these thoughts from the younger generation you mentioned earlier? First of all, they are. Informed on what is happening in the world. This is, I think generally our students are like that. It is not the case everywhere. There are people who think that being informed they don't believe that there is any truth in being informed.  
 

So they don't believe it simply, and I think it's wrong. I had a session with the MBA in January. After the first executive order signed by Trump and they were all interested, evaluations were stellar because students understood the importance of di e in a moment where DI is highly contested because they recognized there is value in cultivating di not just in a, in a.  
 

Corporate setting, but also in, in schools and in society in general. And I think that this was very important to me. This mattered a lot to me because I felt that the subject is still relevant for academic career of most of our students. And this is super important. So I wish that for the next year I have more.  
 

Students subscribing to my courses of DI because this is the right thing to do to cultivate a subject which is the only way we can change the narrative of privilege and power, which is now becoming dominant in the light of the challenges that we're facing. What. Actionable steps. Can organizations and individuals here in Europe where we are take to continue advocating for and implementing effective DEI initiatives?  
 

Matteo Winkler. We have allotted already the three strategies that companies are adopting today. I think that we need to start from the consideration that companies are not what we see when we read about Elon Musk or Donald Trump or Mark Zuckerberg. These seem to be companies that, are represented by one individual and individual does whatever they want.  
 

Including burning billion of dollars because of, political inaccurate and crazy decisions. But the truth is that companies are collective entities. People work there on a daily basis. There are people who are devoted to the company brand. There are people who lead. These companies with great vision, and sometimes, there are conflicts within these companies, but the good thing is that they remain a very nice, I don't wanna say democratic experiment because obviously they are based on power relationships, but it's a collective, it's a teamwork.  
 

It's a team building, a constant team building now. If you want to react to what's happening now, I think the first step will be to reconsider. The way you do business, the way you treat your employees, to democratize a little bit more, the companies and to take care of your employees more. Because I think the wellbeing of your employees is an asset that has a value, even if remains intangible.  
 

So invest more in untangible values such as employee wellbeing. Autonomy no micromanagement, respect of people's perimeter of action. And also, develop collective projects such as the ERG, the employee resource groups, the LGBT groups, the neurodiversity groups, the gender equality groups, and continue working in that direction.  
 

Marte, when you were listening to the students, I saw you scribbling down a few notes and underlining other points. So for you what marked you in terms of what they said from a company standpoint? I wanted to say these are Tamara's talents. This is what they're talking about in terms of inequality, unfairness concerns about tomorrow.  
 

These are your employees. And so how do you respond to that? How do companies support or attract these top talents? And then to Matteo's point, create the inclusive environments of employee wellbeing. And I think, one of the things that we took away from the exercises that we've worked on is this notion of language.  
 

It's core. Erasing languages has have been done by the Trump administration. Is erasing a view of the inequalities? How do you name those inequalities if you can't use the terms anymore? And this to me is easy ways. For companies to be able to address inclusive environments and for and of course, inform and listen.  
 

I think to Matteo's point, it's important to be able to listen to our employees concerns and how do we address and move those forward to create a performing, innovative environments that companies seek to have. My thanks to both of you for spending the time in sharing your research and reflections.  
 

Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. HEC, chief Diversity, equity and Inclusion Officer Marcelle LaLaliberté and Matteo Winkler, associate professor at HEC Paris's Law Department. Marcelle has recently published a position paper for the UN's Collective book governing AI's Future Co-written with HEC graduate.  
 

Claudia Schultz. Meanwhile, Matteo Winkler's latest publications include a legal analysis of the far right attacks on LGBT youth in Italy, and the discrimination of intersex athletes in sports competitions. That wraps up this month's breakthroughs. Tune in again next month. For more insights into what the school's academics are researching, tell them why not look up some of our other podcasts on the knowledge at HEC pages, and please do send in your comments and questions to me.  
 

The address is Brown D at HEC. Fr. That's Brown D at HC fr. Goodbye and thanks for listening.