Contributor(s): Professor Iver Neumann | One origin of the social sciences lies in opposition to the discipline of history. Rather than speculating about the course of history generally, the idea was to look at the variation in forms of social life. The social sciences are not alone in attempting this. Other approaches to such a study may be found in psychology and biology. Drawing on Durkheim and Mauss, Professor Iver Neumann will begin with a discussion of how these different but overlapping a...
Feb 13, 2013•1 hr 15 min
Contributor(s): Professor Athar Hussain, Dr Debin Ma, Professor Arne Westad | The 18th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party held last November saw a wholesale replacement of the old with a new Party leadership. More than two-thirds of the old team has stepped down, and the change has yet to run its full course. March this year is going to witness the appointment of a new government leadership, including the President, the Prime Minister and the State Council. In time, the impact of this chang...
Feb 13, 2013•1 hr 33 min
Contributor(s): Miroslav Lajcák | Miroslav Lajcák is Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic, a position he has held since April 2012. Prior to this he held a series of senior diplomatic postings including managing director for Europe and Central Asia, European External Action Service (Dec 2010-April 2012); High Representative/European Union special representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina (July 2007-January 2009); and personal representative of...
Feb 13, 2013•58 min
Contributor(s): Professor Anne Applebaum | Containing elements of managed democracy and corporate capitalism – and reflecting the culture and values of the 1980s KGB – Putinism is now taught to Russian children and propagated in the media. It has an ostensible goal: along with protecting the power and wealth of Putin and his inner circle, it proposes to make Russia strong and feared again. Anne Applebaum is the Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs for the 2012-13 academic ye...
Feb 12, 2013•1 hr 21 min
Contributor(s): Emily McTernan | Questions of responsibility play a central role within contemporary political debate. This lecture will revise the currently impoverished conception of responsibility within theories of justice. Emily McTernan is a fellow in the Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method at LSE.
Feb 12, 2013•1 hr 24 min
Contributor(s): Enrique García | What are the new challenges and opportunities faced by Latin American countries and the New Global South in the 21st Century? Enrique García has been president and CEO of CAF (Development Bank of Latin America) since December 1991. Dr Chris Alden is a Reader in the Department of International Relations at LSE.
Feb 12, 2013•1 hr 24 min
Contributor(s): Matthew Oakley | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Feb 11, 2013•1 hr 19 min
Contributor(s): Phyllis Bennis | While US policy towards Israel remains unchanged, the long-standing assumption that most Americans – even most Jewish Americans – agree with that policy no longer holds. In the media, in popular culture, in universities and particularly within the Jewish community, there are signs of major shifts. In conversation with MEC Director Professor Fawaz Gerges, writer, analyst and activist Phyllis Bennis discusses these changes with reflection on her own political evolu...
Feb 08, 2013•1 hr 30 min
Contributor(s): Professor Sarah Coakley, Professor John Cottingham, Professor John Worrall | The idea that nature displays an inherent purpose, and more generally the hand of a wise designer, may have suffered a blow from Darwinian science, but it seems not to have been a death-blow. Indeed, from both academic and popular wings of theist opinion there is still considerable interest in arguments from design. The classic arguments contended that the natural world is so complex and suited to our su...
Feb 07, 2013•1 hr 29 min
Contributor(s): Professor Neil Walker | The EU’s early success owed much to the law’s understated role as the motor of integration, but a more emphatic legal approach to the recent European crisis has been less successful. What does this mean for the future of European law, and the EU itself? Neil Walker holds the Regius Chair of Public Law and the Law of Nature and Nations at the University of Edinburgh.
Feb 06, 2013•1 hr 26 min
Contributor(s): Megan MacInnes, Fred Pearce, Dr Subir Sinha | The theft of land is a global phenomenon. This event will provide an overview of global land grabbing, an analysis of its nature, and discussion of its impact on human rights. Megan MacInnes is the head of the Land Campaign at Global Witness. Fred Pearce is environment consultant at the New Scientist and author of The Land Grabbers: the new fight over who owns the Earth. Subir Sinha is senior lecturer in institutions and development a...
Feb 06, 2013•1 hr 30 min
Contributor(s): Professor Dominic Lieven | Dominic Lieven asks whether new trends in German and English language scholarship together with the opening of the Russian archives require a fundamental re-thinking of Russia’s role in the outbreak of the First World War. Dominic Lieven is senior research fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge.
Feb 05, 2013•1 hr 35 min
Contributor(s): Professor Donatella Della Porta | While liberal democracy is losing trust and legitimacy, social movements of different types are calling for alternatives. This lecture will discuss the potential of participatory and deliberative models of democracy. Donatella Della Porta is professor of sociology at the European University Institute.
Feb 05, 2013•1 hr 41 min
Contributor(s): Professor Valerie Bunce | Why do publics decide to challenge authoritarian rulers; why do they take different approaches to achieving these ends; and what explains the spread of such challenges across state boundaries? In this lecture, Professor Bunce will compare these three waves of popular challenges to authoritarian rulers providing insights into the MENA dynamic and important issues related to cross-national diffusion. Valerie Bunce is the Aaron Binenkorb Professor of Intern...
Feb 04, 2013•1 hr 22 min
Contributor(s): Gerhard Weiss | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Feb 04, 2013•1 hr 15 min
Contributor(s): Professor Tim Besley, Professor Francesco Caselli, Sir Richard Lambert, Rachel Lomax, Professor Lord Stern and Professor John van Reenen | Having sifted through the evidence throughout 2012, the distinguished group of LSE Growth Commissioners launch the report of their findings on the design of a strategy to support UK growth. Tim Besley is LSE professor of economics and political science; co-chair of the commission. Francesco Caselli is professor of economics at LSE. Richard Lam...
Jan 31, 2013•1 hr 28 min
Contributor(s): Heriberto Araujo, Juan Pablo Cardenal | Frustrated by the facile, pro-business commentary of so much writing on China and the evasions of Beijing's official pronouncements, two China-based journalists made a drastic decision to see for themselves just how rapidly China is spreading its influence around the world. Many thousands of miles and twenty-five countries later, China's Silent Army is the result: an unprecedented attempt to meet the many Chinese who, through hard work, ing...
Jan 30, 2013•40 min
Contributor(s): Professor Craig Calhoun | Craig Calhoun took up his post as LSE Director on 1 September 2012, having left the United States where he was University Professor at New York University and director of the Institute for Public Knowledge and President of the Social Science Research Council. Professor Calhoun is a world-renowned social scientist whose work connects sociology to culture, communication, politics, philosophy and economics. Professor Calhoun is an American citizen but has d...
Jan 30, 2013•1 hr 27 min
Contributor(s): Professor Hanspeter Kriesi | Professor Kriesi will explore the reactions of Europe’s citizens to the Great Recession, and how the political and economic context is shaping the aftermath of the crisis. Hanspeter Kriesi holds the Stein Rokkan Chair of Comparative Politics at the European University Institute.
Jan 30, 2013•1 hr 16 min
Contributor(s): Lord Malloch-Brown | Ryszard Kapuscinski exposed the follies of Africa’s rulers and officials while showing an intense emotional identification with the continent’s people. Would he see the current state of Africa as a further triumph of the elites or the redemptive emergence of a more just continent? Mark Malloch-Brown is a former UN deputy secretary-general and was head of the UN Development Programme. He is the author of The Unfinished Global Revolution.
Jan 30, 2013•1 hr 33 min
Contributor(s): Dr Bonnie Ayodele, Professor Zhongying Pang | As Africa-China ties have grown tighter in the past few years, China’s engagement with the continent has evolved from being mostly economically focused to more sensitive socio-political fields. This talk provides in-depth discussion of African security issues in relation to China’s long-held non-interference policy. Bonnie Ayodele is lecturer in the Department of Political Science at the University of Ado Ekiti, Nigeria. Zhongying Pan...
Jan 29, 2013•1 hr 27 min
Contributor(s): Professor James Jasper | On those rare occasions when democracy has emerged in history, emotions have been used to define who is a full citizen. Can a new vision of emotions help us protect, repair, and extend democracy rather than curtailing it? James Jasper is professor of sociology at The Graduate Center, City University of New York.
Jan 29, 2013•1 hr 31 min
Contributor(s): Dr Joseph Hanlon, Dr Jeanette Manjengwa, Teresa Smart | A discussion with the authors of the new book, Zimbabwe Takes Back its Land which offers a nuanced assessment of land reform, countering the dominant media narratives of oppression and economic stagnation in Zimbabwe. Joseph Hanlon is a visiting senior fellow at the LSE and an honorary research fellow at the University of Manchester. Jeanette Manjengwa is deputy director of the Institute for Environmental Studies at the Univ...
Jan 28, 2013•1 hr 27 min
Contributor(s): Dr Rabah Aissaoui | In colonial Algeria, the social, ethnic and religious dividing lines of colonial society remained marked in the interwar period, and the political tensions that traditionally characterised the colonial relationship became particularly acute in the context of the rise of Algerian nationalism during the 1930s. The emergence of Algerian nationalist activism during that period coincided with the celebrations marking the apogee of the French colonial empire. This p...
Jan 28, 2013•1 hr 20 min
Contributor(s): Otto Dov Kulka, Sir Ian Kershaw | In this event Otto Dov Kulka will discuss his new book Landscapes of the Metropolis of Death: Reflections on Memory and Imagination in conversation with historian Sir Ian Kershaw. Auschwitz is for Otto Dov Kulka a vast repository of images, memories, and reveries: “the Metropolis of Death” over which rules the immutable Law of Death. Amidst so much death Kulka finds moments of haunting, almost unbearable beauty (for beauty, too, says Kulka, is an...
Jan 28, 2013•1 hr 20 min
Contributor(s): Alexander Jan | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Jan 28, 2013•1 hr 18 min
Contributor(s): Professor Eve Mitleton-Kelly, Professor Dr Paul Lukowicz, Nestor Alfonzo Santamaria | The scientists behind a crowd safety app, and the City of London Police who use the app in emergencies, will discuss the difference it can make to policy-makers and the emergency services. Eve Mitleton-Kelly is director of the Complexity Research Group at LSE and organised the trial of the app. Paul Lukowicz is scientific director at the Embedded Intelligence German Research Center for Artificia...
Jan 24, 2013•1 hr 31 min
Contributor(s): Professor Luis Garicano, Professor Wouter Denhaan, Professor Paul de Grauwe, Professor John Van Reenen | It is still possible to find a way out of the Eurozone crisis if policy-makers address two problems: dealing with the legacy costs of the initially flawed design of the Eurozone, and fixing the design itself. Luis Garicano is professor and head of the Managerial Economics and Strategy Group in the LSE’s Department of Management. Francesco Caselli is Norman Sosnow chair in econ...
Jan 23, 2013•1 hr 40 min
Contributor(s): Dr Tariq Tell | Dr Tell will provide context to contemporary politics in Jordan by examining the history of the emergence and consolidation of the modern state in Jordan under Ottoman, British, and Hashemite rule. He will explorehow the sources of Hashemite social power in Jordon were forged and why they have proven more durable than those fashioned under more auspicious circumstances elsewhere in the Arab east. The talk will focus on the historical political economy of Trans-Jor...
Jan 23, 2013•1 hr 24 min
Contributor(s): Professor John Coatsworth | John Coatsworth will talk about the major foreign policy challenges facing the second Obama administration: the decline of international norms and institutions; the drift toward deeper recession in Europe, the obstacles to demilitarization of Middle Eastern policy, the pressures toward militarization of the US “pivot” to East Asia, and the lack of coherent approaches to Africa and Latin America. John Coatsworth is provost and professor of international...
Jan 22, 2013•1 hr 24 min
