Aldo Civico, Ph.D., co-founder and director of the International Institute for Peace and professor of anthropology at Rutgers University, Newark, NJ, presented "Democracy as a Political Project: Reflections from Palermo and Colombia" on Wednesday, February 13. The lecture examined the relationship between politics and violence and the influence of organized crime on the cultural, social, economic and political life of a society. The lecture was sponsored by The Schemel Forum.