We speak with historian Dirk Moses about the origins of the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide: the lawyer behind it (Raphael Lemkin), its influence on the public understanding of genocide, how it has been used, and how political the process of accountability has become. 

For further reading: The Problems of Genocide, by Dirk Moses and the Genocide Convention.

This episode is supported by Indiana University's Presidential Arts and Humanities Program, the Tobias Center, the African Studies Program, the Center for the Study of the Middle East, and the Huh Jum Ok Human Rights Foundation.

Sound editing by James Dorton and Emily Leisz Carr, mixing by Seth Olansky, music "Souffle Nocturne" by Ben Cohen.

Production by Shilla Kim and Clémence Pinaud.