Balsillie School of International Affairs

PhD Dissertation Defence: Tweeting Strategy - Military Social Media Use as Strategic Communication
2018-07-25 10:00 - 14:00 (America/Toronto) | In Person, Balsillie School of International Affairs, 67 Erb Street West, Waterloo, ON, N2L 6C2, Canada
Rupinder (Tina) Mangat’s PhD Dissertation Defence.
Advisor: Alistair Edgar
Committee: Jeremy Hunsinger, Roger Sarty
Internal/External: Mark Humphries
External: Kim Nossal
Notice of Doctoral Dissertation Examination

PhD Dissertation Defence: Defence in Depth - An Anatomy of Containment from Quarantine to Resilience
2018-08-30 13:00 - 17:00
Jessica West’s PhD Dissertation Defence.
Advisor: Simon Dalby
Committee: David Welch, Veronica Kitchen, Sara Matthews
External: David R. Mutimer, York University
Notice of Doctoral Dissertation Examination

Detecting spatial determinants of wet market vendors’ profit: a case study of Nanjing, China
2018-09-05 12:00 - 13:30
Wet markets play an important role in urban food security in many Asian countries. Although the American Planning Association (APA) proposed that food planning should focus on the business status and potential of food retailing, existing research pays more attention to the food accessibility of urban residents and limited research has been conducted on the profit of wet market vendors and factors determining its spatial variations. Therefore, based on the survey data of 1,119 small food enterprises in Nanjing, this study employs the spatial analytical method Geodetector to explore the spatial differentiation of the vendor’s profit and its determinants. The results show an obvious spatial variation of the profit of wet market vendors in Nanjing. In addition, the study generates four other major findings. Firstly, the profit is mainly influenced by the demographic features of vendors, their business expenses and payment schemes. It is also affected by socioeconomic factors such as the GDP, income level, number of metro stations and residential neighbourhoods, as well as the “location entropy” level of the district where the business is located. In comparison, the features of vendors have a more significant impact on business profit than socio-economic factors. Secondly, we also identified strong mutual enhancement effects among these factors. Thirdly, almost all determinants have greater impacts on the profit in peri-urban areas than those in urban areas. Therefore, there will be a greater potential for the increase of vendors’ profit in peri-urban areas compared to their urban counterparts. Finally, based on the analysis of the determinants affecting vendors’ profit, policy recommendations are proposed for urban food planning to foster urban and peri-urban inclusive growth.
About the speaker
Xinxian Qi is a Doctoral Candidate at Nanjing University and a Queen Elizabeth Scholar-AS Visiting Researcher at the Hungry Cities Partnership and Wilfrid Laurier University.
This seminar is sponsored by the Hungry Cities Partnership and the Queen Elizabeth Advanced Scholarship Program.

Orientation Day 2018
2018-09-07 09:00 - 16:00
Orientation Day activities will include a welcome by Balsillie School Director, Dr. John Ravenhill and the School’s founder, Mr. Jim Balsillie, along with program information, a campus tour, photo shoot and lunch.
We look forward to meeting our new students!
Agenda

Reflections on Refugee Health Work: Clinical, Research, Education and Advocacy
2018-09-14 12:00 - 13:30
In this talk hosted by the International Migration Research Centre (IMRC), Dr. Neil Arya reflects on a career in migrant and refugee health locally, regionally, and globally.
Lunch will be provided.
RSVP to imrc.wlu@gmail.com
About the speaker
Neil Arya is a family physician in Kitchener Ontario. He is the president of the Canadian Physicians for Research and Education in Peace (CPREP), Chair of the PEGASUS Global Health Conference. Recently he has become a fellow at the International Migration Research Centre and Scholar in Residence at Wilfrid Laurier University. He remains Assistant Clinical Professor in Family Medicine at McMaster University (part-time) and Adjunct Professor in Environment and Resource Studies at the University of Waterloo.
He is a past Vice-President of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), which won the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize, and of President of Physicians for Global Survival (PGS) and has written and lectured around the world about Peace through Health. He was the founding Director of the Global Health Office at Western University and has conducted research around international experiences as well as the impact of overseas electives on host communities and students.
Dr. Arya continues as founder Director of the Kitchener/Waterloo Refugee Health Clinic in collaboration with the Kitchener Waterloo Reception Centre where he provides case-specific care to newcomers and those in need of specialized care and received the Advocacy award from KW Reception House at their quarter century celebration in 2011. He was lead physician developing the Psychiatric Outreach Project, providing mental health for those homeless or at risk in St. John’s Kitchen in Kitchener, tasks which led to him receiving the 2009 College of Family Physicians of Canada Geeta Gupta Award for Equity and Diversity.

10th Anniversary Celebration: 10 Years of Global Impact
2018-09-14 14:00 - 17:00
Invitation only.
Join us for “10 Years of Global Impact”, a celebration of the BSIA’s 10th anniversary, on Friday, September 14th.
The formal program begins at 3:00 PM.
Visit the City of Waterloo site for parking near the School.

Globalizing the Historical Roots of IPE
2018-09-17 13:30 - 15:30
In recent years, leading IPE scholars have been calling for more of a ‘global conversation’ in their field involving greater attention to contemporary IPE scholarship from beyond the regions of Europe and North America. At the same time, however, teaching and research about the historical roots of IPE thought have remained focused on the writings of European and North American political economists from the late 18th to the early 20th century. In this talk, Eric Helleiner explores some ways in which the historical foundations of IPE might be ‘globalized’ to complement and reinforce efforts to strengthen contemporary global conversations in the field.
About the speaker
Eric Helleiner is a professor in the Balsillie School of International Affairs and Department of Political Science at the University of Waterloo.

Researching Western Foreign Terrorist Fighters in Syria and Iraq
2018-09-20 12:00 - 13:30
Lorne Dawson will provide a snapshot of the results of three years of research involving interviews with Westerners who have traveled to Syria and Iraq to support various jihadist groups, and the family members and friends of such fighters. He will discuss how this unique body of primary data is helping to develop a more refined understanding of who these foreign fighters are, how they became foreign fighters, and their motivations.
About the speaker
Lorne L. Dawson is a Professor in the Departments of Sociology and Legal Studies, and Religious Studies, at the University of Waterloo. He has written three books, edited four books, and published seventy academic articles and book chapters. Most of his research was in the sociology of religion, but work on why some religions become violent led to research on the process of radicalization leading to terrorism. He is the Project Director of the Canadian Network for Research on Terrorism, Security and Society (www.tsas.ca), and the Principal Investigator of a project studying Western foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq. In recent years he has published on various aspects of the role of religion in motivating religious terrorism, the social ecology of radicalization, and jihadist uses on the internet and social media. He makes numerous invited presentations to academic and government groups, and is frequently interviewed in the media about terrorism.

When Would Capitalism End? Marx's Changing conception of the 'Critique of Political Economy'
2018-09-20 19:00 - 20:30
This event is sold out. To join the waitlist, click here.
In recognition of Karl Marx’s 200th birthday, the Waterloo Centre for German Studies (WCGS) is honoured to welcome distinguished Professor Gareth Stedman Jones for the Grimm Lecture 2018. He is Professor of the History of Ideas at Queen Mary University of London and author of Karl Marx: Greatness and Illusion (2016).
Abstract
In order to separate what is living from what is dead in Marx’s theory, it is necessary to separate Marx from ‘Marxism.’ Throughout the 20th century, Marxism has been associated with the assumption that capitalism would necessarily end in collapse. Engels certainly believed this. But was this Marx’s position? Marx’s thought changed. Professor Stedman Jones examines three phases in Marx’s picture of capitalism and how it might end – the period ending in the 1848 Revolutions, the period ending 1859, and the period 1864-1869. He concludes by examining Engels’ editing of Marx’s unfinished manuscript Capital.
For related reading/viewing about this lecture, visit the WCGS site.
The 2018 Grimm Lecture is co-sponsored by the Balsillie School of International Affairs, the Dean of Arts at the University of Waterloo, the departments of History, English, Sociology and Legal Studies, Philosophy, and the Global Engagement Program.

PhD Defence - Yes but No: Havana Peace Agreement's Ambiguous Sway on Colombia's Rural Development Policy
2018-09-25 09:00 - 13:00
Andrés Garcia’s PhD defence.
Advisor: Jennifer Clapp
Committee: Reina Neudeldt, Derek Hall, Yasmine Shamsie
External Examiner: Cristina Rojas, Carlton University
Notice of Doctoral Dissertation Examination

Policy Analyst Recruitment and Development Program, Natural Resources Canada
2018-09-25 16:00 - 17:00
Natural Resources Canada has for the last few years organized a comprehensive, department-specific program to recruit policy analysts and economists. Through our Policy Analyst Recruitment and Development Program (PARDP), we are creating opportunities for creative, passionate and talented Canadians to make a contribution to the sustainable stewardship of natural resources at home and overseas.
As always, we are hoping to recruit a pool of highly motivated, energetic and analytically minded people at the Master’s or PhD level for our 2017-2018 campaign. Fields of study include: Economics, Statistics, Sociology, Agricultural Economics, Forest Economics, Resource Economics, Public Administration, Resource Management, Environmental Studies, or other related disciplines.
This information session will provide you with a quick overview of the program and the opportunities it presents for soon-to-be graduates like yourself. It is also an opportunity to ask any questions you might have to people that have successfully navigated the application process.
The link for this year’s competition can be found here: https://www.nrcan.gc.ca/careers/85
The deadline for applications is October 8, 2018.

What's Next for NAFTA… and North America? A Panel Discussion
2018-09-26 12:00 - 13:30
The renegotiation of NAFTA has roared back into the headlines since late August. At this panel discussion, experts from CIGI, Wilfrid Laurier University and the University of Waterloo will shed light on the talks and their implications for Canada, North America, and the world.
A light lunch will be served.
About the panelists
Hugo Perezcano Díaz is the deputy director of International Economic Law with the International Law Research Program (ILRP) and was previously a CIGI senior fellow with the ILRP. Prior to joining CIGI, he was an attorney and international trade consultant in private practice. Hugo worked for the Mexican government’s Ministry of Economy for nearly 20 years, serving as head of the trade remedy authority, and formerly as general counsel for international trade negotiations. Hugo was lead counsel for Mexico in investor-state dispute settlement cases under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and other international investment agreements.
Patricia Goff is Associate Professor and Chair of political science at Wilfrid Laurier University and Senior Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), both in Waterloo, Ontario. She specializes in international political economy, international relations theory, and international organizations, with a particular interest in trade and the cultural capacity of international organizations. She is the author of Limits to Liberalization: Local Culture in a Global Market Place (Cornell University Press) and co-editor of Identity and Global Politics: Empirical and Theoretical Elaborations (with Kevin Dunn) and Irrelevant or Indispensable: The UN in the 21st Century (with Paul Heinbecker).
John Ravenhill is Director of the Balsillie School of International Affairs and Professor of Political Science at the University of Waterloo. His work has appeared in most of the leading journals of international relations including International Organization, World Politics, Review of International Political Economy and Review of International Studies. His most recent books are The Oxford Handbook of the International Relations of Asia (co-edited with Saadia Pekkanen and Rosemary Foot) and the fifth edition of Global Political Economy (both from Oxford University Press). In 2016, he received the International Studies Association’s International Political Economy Section’s Distinguished Scholar award.
Debora L. VanNijnatten is Professor, Political Science and North American Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University, Associate Faculty with the Balsillie School of International Affairs, and Research Partner with the Great Lakes Policy Research Network Her research and publications have focused on transboundary environmental governance in North America, Canada-U.S. environmental relations and Canada’s international environmental policy.

Re-Imagining Borders Technologies; Designing New Political Forms
2018-09-27 12:00 - 13:30
This paper will explore the nature of an alter-politics emerging around borders and border walls. Much of the debate on borders – both academically and politically – has revolved around a dichotomy: whether they should be open, or closed. The open borders argument is about free and unfettered movement for all; and the closed borders argument suggests people should be able to create and maintain an inside and an outside. I will argue for an emerging speculative politics that imagines borders beyond this dichotomy, using different terms — such permeable, temporary, multi-layered; and different forms – such as welcome lounges, or flyways. I trace various political movements that are re-articulating the meaning of borders in theory and in practice, including the new sanctuary movement, while pushing anthropological methods into the speculative: how might we imagine, design and amplify some of these possible alternate political forms?
About the speaker
Miriam Ticktin is Associate Professor of Anthropology at The New School for Social Research. Her research has focused in the broadest sense on what it means to make political claims in the name of a universal humanity. She is the author of Casualties of Care: Immigration and the Politics of Humanitarianism in France (University of California Press, 2011) and In the Name of Humanity: The Government of Threat and Care (co-edited with Ilana Feldman, Duke University Press, 2010), along with many other articles and book chapters. She is a founding editor of the journal Humanity: An International Journal of Human Rights, Humanitarianism and Development. Ticktin is currently at work on two related book projects: 1) a short book on innocence as a political concept, and how it produces an unending search for purity; 2) a book on practices of containment at the border, from border walls to spaces of quarantine.

Scholarship Proposal Writing
2018-09-28 10:00 - 11:30
This session will focus on the tools students need to approach scholarship proposal writing with confidence. Working from samples of winning OGS, SSHRC, and NSERC proposals written by graduate students, it will examine common features of successful proposals, and will teach students to apply these writing strategies to their own proposals.
This workshop is being led by the Laurier Writing Centre.
Students from both Laurier and UW are welcome to attend.

Visible Yet Invisible: The Disciplinary Mechanism of Self-surveillance Among Undocumented South Asian Men in Rural Greece
2018-10-04 12:30 - 14:00
“We go to the farm, work, and then come back to spend the rest of the time in the ‘dera’ (residence). We do not go anywhere else. This is the story of my life here for 12 years.”
“I feel like I am living in a prison without walls. I dare not step out of the dera for fear of police arresting me.”
– Undocumented South Asian male migrants
During the day, large groups of undocumented male migrants from India and Pakistan are visible as agricultural workers in the farmlands of rural Megara and Thiva regions of Greece. Come evening, their labouring bodies become totally invisible from the rural landscape. In this talk, Reena Kukregja relates the Foucauldian biopolitics of power and the disciplinary mechanism of self-surveillance to the contradictory (non)presence of racialized labouring bodies of South Asian men in rural Greece. She draws upon interviews of South Asian male migrants there to reveal the processes through which the disciplinary mechanism of the state, exercised through the threat of arrests and deportations, works efficiently to make them conform to a certain set of societal behaviours, erase their presence from Greek public spaces, and extract productive labour efficiently from them. The invisible coercive power of the state’s gaze makes the men self-surveil and regulate their movements by ‘containing’ themselves in the residences after work. It also does away with the need for overt displays of punishment and disciplining. Further, the sequestering of the men in isolated physical spaces of residences or deras that are located in the farms of local Greek farmers reinforces their “othering,” and prevents local Greeks from building solidarity with them.
About the speaker
Reena Kukreja, an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Global Development Studies and Cultural Studies, Queen’s University, divides time between teaching, research, and filmmaking. She has directed several award-winning documentaries on rural women in India and South Asia. Her current research focuses on two strands of South Asian masculinities: the first examines the intersections of xenophobia, Islamophobia, securitization of citizenship, and border controls on undocumented South Asian male migrants in Greece; and the other examines the role of religion, caste, and political economy in shaping relational male identities and masculinity among lower classes of rural Indian men in contemporary North India. She has published in Modern Asian Studies and the Journal of Intercultural Studies. She is currently completing her book manuscript, Partial Truths, Negotiated Existences: Examining Dispossession of Matrimonial Choice in Cross-Region Marriages in India (Cornell University Press).

In Conversation with The Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship
2018-10-11 19:15 - 20:45

Twitter, AI and Cybersecurity
2018-10-16 14:45 - 16:15
This event is open to the BSIA community only. Please email events@balsillieschool.ca to register.
Social media is having a profound effect on political, economic and social systems, both positive and negative. Join us for a conversation with Michele Austin, Head of Government, Public Policy and Philanthropy at Twitter Canada, as she discusses Twitter’s work as it relates to cybersecurity and the use of artificial intelligence in the twenty-first century.
About the speaker
Michele Austin joined Twitter Canada in April 2018. She is the Head of Government, Public Policy and Philanthropy, where she works closely with government partners and policy stakeholders to help create good public policy and meaningful content on Twitter.
Michele has been helping organizations work with governments for more than 20 years. She was a senior advisor at Summa Strategies for five years where she helped clients successfully navigate a broad range of legislative, policy and regulatory issues.
A lifelong conservative, Michele served as Chief of Staff to Conservative Party Leader Rona Ambrose when she was Minister of Public Works and Government Services and Status of Women. She also served as Chief of Staff to Maxime Bernier while he was the Minister of Industry.
She has also been very involved in Alberta politics. Michele served as former Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith’s membership chair in 2009 and, most recently as the senior political strategist for Drew Barnes in the 2015 Wildrose Leadership race.
For the 10 years prior to joining Twitter, Michele regularly appeared as a conservative pundit on the CTV’s national news network, in print, and on satellite and talk radio.
She lives in Kanata with her husband and three unruly teenagers.

CANCELLED: An Anishinaabe Politics of the International: Odaenuah, Akina, miniwaa Gchi’naaknigewin
2018-10-18 14:30 - 16:00
CANCELLED: Due to unforeseen circumstances, this talk has been cancelled.
Indigenous thought and agency have long been excluded from the discipline of International Relations (IR). Even with the turn towards “decolonization” few IR scholars are engaging with Indigenous or settler colonial frameworks. It is very likely that the discipline is irredeemable. Amid this realization Indigenous thinkers are re-articulating alternatives to IR theory’s orthodox and critical impoverishment. Building on this movement, this presentation offers counter-conceptualizations of the state, sovereignty and anarchy in pursuit of new/old visions of Indigenous futurity.
About the speaker
Hayden King is Anishinaabe from Beausoleil First Nation on Gchi’mnissing in Huronia, Ontario. The Executive Director of Yellowhead Institute and Advisor to the Dean of Arts on Indigenous Education at Ryerson University, Dr. King is also an adjunct professor at Carleton University and senior fellow at Massey College as well as the co-founder of the Ogimaa Mikana Project.

Recruitment of Policy Leader Program, Government of Canada
2018-10-22 13:30 - 15:00
Philippe Roseberry, Senior Policy and Research Analyst in the Broadcasting and Digital Communications Branch of the Department of Canadian Heritage, will introduce graduate students to the opportunities available in the Federal Government through the Recruitment of Policy Leaders program.
Recruitment of Policy Leaders flyer

Levers for Food Systems Change: A Panel Discussion on Urban Food Security, Food Justice, and International Agreements
2018-10-23 08:30 - 10:30

What Can We Learn from the South American GPE? Puzzles of Global Insertions, Inequalities and Political Instability
2018-10-24 13:00 - 14:30
The point of this presentation is to examine how there is a growing Global Political Economy (GPE) of South America that is reconceptualizing the framework of the regional IPE traditions in the light of current global shifts, conflicts and developments. A framework that, however, cannot be confined to the limitations of North American and European IPE approaches. The work will be presented in three parts: First, it outlines the major international and regional IPE perspectives concerning the academic understanding of Latin American political economy. Secondly, it will explore the central components of the concept of Latin America, as an iron cage, to contrast this with the historical evidence that the regional configurations of development have provided. Finally, to conclude, it will consider some key points for a Global South American Political Economy, based on the research lines and agendas growing in the region.
About the speaker
Ernesto Vivares PhD, University of Sheffield, UK, Professor of IPE in the Department of International Studies, FLACSO Ecuador. He is currently a visiting scholar in the Balsillie School of International Affairs and the Department of Political Science at the University of Waterloo.

Documentary Screening: Searching for Winnetou
2018-10-24 19:00 - 20:30
This event is sold out
There is a peculiar relationship between Germany (and other European countries) and the First Nations people of North America. It all goes back to the writings of Karl May, a 19th-century author who created one of the most popular characters in German literature, Winnetou. While visiting Germany on numerous occasions to give lectures, Mr. Taylor was confronted by the legacy of these real and imaginary people. And as a First Nations man, it made an impression on him. On a trip last year, he took a film crew and documented this phenomenon. This is the result.
This is a free event, but please register by ordering a ticket.
This event is co-sponsored by the Waterloo Centre for German Studies and the Balsillie School of International Affairs Research Cluster for Indigenous Peoples, Decolonization and the Globe.

Canada’s Natural Resources: Let’s Not Abandon Our Strengths
2018-10-25 12:00 - 13:30
It has become difficult to initiate natural resource extraction projects in Canada. Construction-aggregate mining in southern Ontario has been subject to unpredictable and cost-prohibitive regulation, as are major pipelines in western Canada. Natural gas development is prohibited in eastern Canada because of fear of fracking; fracked gas is thus imported from Pennsylvania. The cost to our economy is significant in terms of foregone tax revenue and lost opportunities for rural Canadians, who might not aspire to urban life, and for the country’s professional engineering and geoscientific communities, which are “high tech” players internationally.
About the speakers
Maurice Dusseault is a Professor, Engineering Geology at the University of Waterloo and a registered professional engineer in Alberta and Ontario. He frequently works with governments and industry as an advisor and instructor. He carries out research in petroleum geomechanics (drilling, hydraulic fracturing, reservoir geomechanics), and is a world expert on new production methods, deep waste sequestration in sedimentary basins, and reservoir geomechanics.
Richard Jackson is a Fellow at Geofirma Engineering and Adjunct Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences at the University of Waterloo.

Conflict & Security Research Idea Speed Networking
2018-10-26 10:00 - 11:45
This event is primarily aimed at connecting new researchers in the field of conflict and security to potential supervisors and established researchers who may be able to provide insight on their topics.
Through a process of speed-networking, graduate students will have an opportunity to explain their topics to several different faculty members and advanced graduate students for quick feedback.
The formal speed-networking portion of the event will conclude with a period of open networking where students can connect with those they weren’t able to speak to, or wish to follow up with.
Graduate students developing research proposals should prepare a two-minute elevator pitch describing their proposed research topic.
PhD students who have passed the proposal stage and faculty members should prepare either:
a) A two-minute elevator pitch describing their existing research agenda or project;
b) A two-minute elevator pitch describing a potential new project.
Please register, but last-minute attendees are also welcome.

China in Africa: A Model for Africans or a New Colonialism?
2018-10-26 12:15 - 13:30
There have been contacts between China and African states that extended over centuries. During the Cold War, China played a role supporting anti-colonial/anti-apartheid struggles across the continent. Since 1978, China has undergone a rapid process of modernization that catapulted the country into a leading role in international trade, investment, political influence, and even as a growing military power.
Nelson Mandela’s role in South African relations is of special interest, and his views on the People’s Republic of China are noteworthy.
As China’s role in the international system expands, Beijing’s relations with countries of the African continent continue to deepen. Against the context, a distinct but important question is whether or not the Chinese model of development can or even should be applied to African circumstances?
African views, both of governments and peoples vary widely, from a welcome embrace of an alternative to Western powers, particularly former colonial powers, to a resentment of Chinese trade dominance and investment policies.
The variance in views, raises yet another question: whether Sino-African relationship is one of equality or one that is manifested in what some have described as ‘neo-colonial’ policies that seek to extend and cement Chinese dominance of the region? Answers to this question will vary depending within the range of African countries, as well as polling undertaken on this point.
What is clear, however, the profile of China within Africa continues to rise, and there is reason to believe that China will maintain a high-profile, and even an expanded role on the African continent in the 21st century.
About the speaker
Professor Houlden is the Director of the China Institute, Professor of Political Science and Adjunct Professor of the Alberta School of Business at the University of Alberta. He has also served as a Governor of the International Development Research Centre’s (IDRC) Board of Governors and was a Member of the Government of Alberta’s Asia Advisory Council. He was born in Calgary, Alberta, and attended the University of Calgary where he received his B.A., and subsequently did graduate work at Carleton University in Ottawa, and at the University Nacional in Lima, Peru.
Professor Houlden joined the Canadian Foreign Service in 1976, and has served in the East Asian, China, Caribbean, Latin American and Defence Relations, and as Director of the Eastern and Southern African Divisions of the then Department of Foreign Affairs . Abroad he has been posted to Havana, Hong Kong (twice), Warsaw, Beijing (twice – most recently as Minister 2001-2004), and as Executive Director of the Canadian Trade Office in Taipei (2004-2006). While a Foreign Service officer, Prof. Houlden studied at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (1981-1983), and at the National Defence College in Kingston (1992-1993). Twenty-two of his years in the Canadian foreign service were spent working on Chinese affairs for the Government of Canada. His last assignment before joining the University of Alberta in 2008 was as Director General of the East Asian Bureau of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.
Under Professor Houlden’s leadership, the China Institute has focused on contemporary China studies, with an emphasis on Canada’s trade, investment and energy linkages with the People’s Republic of China.
Professor Houlden has written two co-edited volumes on the South China Sea, published in 2012 and 2018. The Director is a frequent media commentator on Asian affairs, with Canadian, Chinese and other international news organizations.

Where They Matter – Human Rights at the Local Level: Opportunities and Challenges
2018-10-29 13:00 - 14:30
Within the process of urbanization, cities are becoming ever more important venues for human rights promotion and protection. Local authorities have begun to accept human rights obligations in delivering socio-economic services, managing space, providing security and enabling participation in politics and culture. In doing so, they effectively implement international human rights law in a practical way and close to the citizens, complementary (and sometimes contrary to) the respective central government. International legal and policy frameworks indicate that human rights at the local level will be one of the key themes for the coming years. This development begs questions as to the status of cities and local authorities as human rights actors, individually (e.g. as human rights cities) or in international human rights coalitions.
About the speaker
Gerd Oberleitner is Professor of international law and UNESCO Chair in Human Rights and Human Security at the Faculty of Law, University of Graz, Austria. He is also the Head of the Institute of International Law and International Relations of the University of Graz and the Director of the European Training and Research Centre for Human Rights and Democracy at the University of Graz. He served as Legal Adviser in the Human Rights Department of the Austrian Foreign Ministry and was Lecturer in Human Rights at the London School of Economics and Political Science and Visiting Fellow at the LSE’s Centre for the Study of Human Rights, Visiting Scholar at the European Inter-University Centre Venice and the Université du Quebéc à Montréal and Visiting Professor at the Universities of Ljubljana and Rutgers University. He teaches in the European Regional Master Programme in Democracy and Human Rights in South-East Europe (Sarajevo), the European Master’s Programme in Human Rights and Democratisation (Venice) and the Master Programme of Human Rights and Democratisation for Latin America and the Caribbean (Buenos Aires). Publications include Global Human Rights Institutions: between Remedy and Ritual (Polity 2007), Human Rights in Armed Conflict: Law, Practice, Policy (Cambridge University Press 2015), (as co-editor) Blurring Boundaries: Human Security and Forced Migration (Brill 2017) and (as editor) Human Rights Institutions, Tribunals and Courts (Springer 2018).

Combating Illicit Financial Flows: Global Governance and Its Limits
2018-11-01 12:30 - 14:00
International efforts to curb illicit financial flows (IFFs) resemble post-Cold War collaboration in other issue areas that have risen on the global agenda: climate change, global health, internet governance, and cybersecurity. In the absence of a single institutional or legal foundation, actors and organizations compete, collaborate, and act in parallel to pursue an expanding collective agenda. Combating IFFs also differs in its complexity from other, similar issue areas. Defining and identifying IFFs is often contested. Effectiveness of counter-IFF policies remains uncertain. Political attention fluctuates. These characteristics shape global governance to combat IFFs and limit its success.
About the speaker
Miles Kahler is Distinguished Professor at the School of International Service, American University and Senior Fellow for Global Governance at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D. C. From September through December 2018, he is a Distinguished Fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto. Previously, he was Rohr Professor of Pacific International Relations and Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the School of International Relations and Pacific Studies (IR/PS) and the Political Science Department, University of California, San Diego (UCSD).
He is a member of the editorial boards of International Organization, Global Governance and Global Summitry. Kahler has been a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (2012-2013) and the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University (2007-2008). He has published widely in the fields of international politics and international political economy, including articles and books on global governance, international financial institutions, and Asia-Pacific regionalism. His current research projects include the development of institutions of complex governance, the changing role of emerging economies in world politics and global governance, and the sources of cosmopolitanism and parochialism in contemporary politics.

IMRC's 10th Year Anniversary
2018-11-07 17:00 - 20:30

Restraining Great Powers: Soft Balancing from Empires to the Global Era
2018-11-08 11:30 - 13:30

International Humanitarian Law 2018 Conference: Instruments of Peace
2018-11-13 08:30 - 17:00
Conference Report

Join us as we uncover the role that International Humanitarian Law plays as an instrument of peace.
This conference will address disarmament and arms control, the importance of education in conflict and peace times as well as health and disability in armed conflict. We will hear from experts in the field, including academics, practitioners and representatives from the Canadian Red Cross Society.
This workshop is co-hosted by
Balsillie School of International Affairs
Canadian Red Cross
Conrad Grebel University College
Global Affairs Canada
Laurier University
Project Ploughshares
Conference Flyer
