There are many things that author, thinker and New Yorker staff writer Malcolm Gladwell remains unconvinced by, from the notion of innate genius to the social utility of America’s elite colleges. But, as Gladwell himself likes to say, here’s the strange thing: Did you know that when it comes to some of the most challenging and divisive issues of our day, he is largely convinced we can come together to find solutions? 

“The path to a better world is hard,” Gladwell cautions his listeners in his new podcast, Revisionist History. “Is that depressing? I don’t think so.” And this perspective includes the current protests, tensions and controversy swirling in America over the police shootings of unarmed African-Americans. Leave it to Gladwell, in this recent interview with OZY’s Carlos Watson at OZY Fusion Fest in Central Park, to place the significance of the Black Lives Matter movement into a larger, more hopeful perspective.