Upcoming Conferences
There are no Upcoming Conferences
Past Conferences
What's Left of the Left: Liberalism and Social Democracy in a Globalized World
Organized by George Ross, Jim Cronin, James Shoch
May 9, 2008
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The Nordic Model: Solutions for Continental Europe’s Problems?
Organized by Andrew Martin & Jon Erik Dølvik. Co-sponsored by the Minda de Gunzberg Center for European Studies at Harvard University and the Harvard Program on Inequality and Social Policy at the Kennedy School of Government, the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung of Germany, the Research Council of Norway, and the Fafo Institute for Applied Social Science, Oslo.
May 9-10, 2008
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Sex, Politics, and Culture in Contemporary Europe: A Symposium
The aim of this symposium is to investigate the role of sexual politics - issues of gender, sexuality, and family - in current debates about Europe and "European" identity. It will examine the intersections and contradictions at work in a host of coincident debates about sex, marriage, kinship on the one hand, and religion, culture, and national and European belonging, on the other. In bringing together historians and sociologists, whose work is both based in national cultures and reaches beyond them (specifically France, Holland, Poland, Germany, and Turkey), the symposium examines how gender and sexuality are central categories for representing cultural and religious differences and how they in turn operate in the construction of the limits of "Europe." We explore what internal tensions have been suppressed or occluded in recent discussions as well as how scholars of gender and sexuality can productively intervene in these debates. A concluding roundtable will put these debates in transatlantic perspective, with a comparative account of "American" and "European" secularisms and their conceptions of sexual rights.
April 25, 2008
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Schumpeter Conference
This colloquium, mounted in cooperation with the Schumpeter Society of Austria, will consider Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter's background, his theories on economics, politics and sociology, and the history of his reception.
April 18, 2008
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Challenges of the Twenty-first Century: European and American Perspectives Series
Challenges of the Twenty-first Century is a speakers series that brings high-ranking officials from the European Commission and other international organizations to Harvard to discuss issues of concern for the future of the European Union and the transatlantic relationship. Since its inception in 1996, the series has examined topics such as common foreign and security policy, European Monetary Union, EU enlargement, the state of transatlantic relations, and trade and competition strategy. In the fall of 2007, visitors include Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs in the European Parliament; Jean-Claude Trichet, President of the European Central Bank; and Andris Piebalgs, Commissioner for Energy, Commission of the European Union.
Organized by Renée Haferkamp. Co-sponsored by the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, the Harvard University Center for the Environment, the Kokkalis Program on Southeastern and East-Central Europe, and the Fletcher School of Diplomacy at Tufts University.
Fall, 2007
Global French: A New Approach to French Literary History
An international conference at Harvard University
Organized by Christie McDonald and Susan Suleiman, and sponsored by the Department of Romance Languages & Literatures, the Florence Gould Foundation, the Bacon Fund, the Center for European Studies, and the French Cultural Services in Boston. Unless otherwise specified (Friday morning sessions), all sessions will take place in Fong Auditorium, Boylston Hall.
For more information, please see: Complete Program
or contact Sara Kippur: kippur@fas.harvard.edu
December 7th & 8th, 2007
Internationalizing the History of Eastern Europe
As Eastern Europe "rejoins" Europe in our contemporary political imagination and institutions, it must also rejoin Europe in our historical imagination and practice. This conference will bring together a generation of scholars of Central and Eastern Europe who are forging new approaches to European history by integrating the history of the East into a broader European history. Rather than playing the role of the straggling younger sibling of German, Soviet, or French history, the history of Eastern Europe can suggest challenging new insights and approaches to scholars across fields who are interested in themes such as nations and nationalism, war and occupation, borderlands, Empire, migration, ethnic cleansing, gender, citizenship, the environment, violence, and human rights.
Organized by Alison Frank and Tara Zahra. Co-sponsored by the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs
May 11th and 12th, 2007
For more information, please see: http://www.wcfia.harvard.edu/res_activities/conferences/afrank_07/program.html
Art and Empires
April 23rd, 2007
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"Europe, America and the World: The European Union at 50"A symposium featuring Jonathan Faull, Director General for Justice, Freedom and Security, European Commission
Co-sponsored by the Fellows Program of the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs
April 11th, 2007
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Muslims in Europe and in the United States: A Transatlantic Comparison
In Europe, the perception of the international and political manifestations of Islam was a significant factor in shaping the condition of Muslim minorities long before the events of September 11, 2001. In the United States, on the other hand, a political distinction has generally been maintained between Islam in the Muslim world and Muslim immigrants living in the West. Recently, however, the convergence of European and American political discourse posits an automatic correlation between the war on terrorism, internal security measures, and immigration policy. Such a correlation increasingly invalidates the distinction between international and domestic policy, and has consequences not only for the status of Muslim minorities, but also for more general issues of secularism and multiculturalism in the democratic nations concerned. This conference presents the results of a six-nation study conducted in Europe on the condition of Muslims and includes scholars who are currently working on the status of Muslims in the US to offer a comparative perspective and offer directions for future comparative research.
Organized by Jocelyn Césari. Co-sponsored by the Center for Middle Eastern Studies and French Cultural Services, Boston.
December 15th and 16th, 2006
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A Long Good Bye to Bismarck?
Countries that share a particular social protection system, of Bismarckian inspiration and based on social insurance, seem to encounter similar and particularly arkward difficulties. They also seem to be following parallel trends in reforms, with respect to timing, content, and process.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Conference Website here
Challenges to the European Welfare State
This workshop deals with a broad set of interconnections that have far-reaching implications for the future of the welfare state in Europe. Starting from recent theoretical approaches, papers will link ethnic diversity, xenophobia, immigration, inequality and redistribution, labor supply, and economic performance to questions of fundamental relevance for welfare states. These include how such factors condition popular support for states, how state programs are financed, and whether programs are economically viable in the long-run.
Organized by Jim Alt, Torben Iversen, and Alberto Alesina
Friday, May 5, 2006
Conference Website here
Please contact us if you have any questions.
Small States in a Global World: Austria in Comparative Perspective
How do small states respond to increased economic and political interdependence? This conference looks at Austria and other small European states as they grapple with issues such as the impact of new political cleavages on the consociational elements of politics, challenges to the system of representation, and the adjustment of neo-corporatist wage bargaining mechanisms to European Monetary Union. The occasion for this conference is the fifteenth anniversary of the Schumpeter Program at Harvard, named for the renowned Austrian economist who taught at Harvard and was crucial in shaping twentieth-century economic thought.
Organized by Peter Hall and Dieter Stiefel
Friday, 7 April 2006
Conference Website here
Comparing Separations: State and Religion in France and the United States
Across the West, the traditional separation of church and state in many secular democracies is being called into question. This conference will examine the principle of secularism in light of multiculturalism and identity politics with special focus on France and the US. Bringing together sociologists, political scientists, historians, legal scholars, and philosophers, it will shed light on new political realities and discuss the debates over secularism today in the context of particular historical and institutional arrangements.
Organized by Stanley Hoffmann and Riva Kastoryano
December 9 - 10, 2005
Program and details here
Comparative Political Economy Workshop
Program and papers available here. Organized by Torben Iversen
October 7 - 8, 2005
Exchanges of Ideas and Culture Between South Asia and Central Europe in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
While scholarly attention to imperialism has greatly increased in recent years, there is less appreciation for the differentiation of European imperialism and its internal contradictions, which mirrored those of the continent as a whole in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. By examining the relationship between South Asia and Europe through the lens of the broader international framework, this conference is able to go beyond the limits to understanding posed by formulations of imperialism based on the nation-state or the fixed axis of center and periphery and focus on the ways in which specific forms of encounter between Europeans and South Asians were constituted and defined.
Conference Website - www.fas.harvard.edu/~euroconf Organized by Sugata Bose and Kris Majapra
October 13 - 14, 2005