Political Economy of the Contemporary Middle East Working Group II
2019-09-29 09:30 - 16:30 (Europe/Moscow)
On September 29, 2019, the Center for International and Regional Studies held the second working group under its research initiative on “Political Economy of the Contemporary Middle East.” During the meeting, the convened scholars presented and received feedback on their papers that tackled a wide array of issues, including: economic integration in the Levant and GCC, the Iranian economy under sanctions, fiscal decentralization in the Islamic Republic of Iran and anti-extractivist social movements and re-envisioning the political economy in North Africa.

Ashraf Mishrif commenced the working group discussion with his paper on, “The GCC’s Unsettled Policy for Economic Integration.” The paper presents a broad picture of the political-economic (dis)integration of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) since its inception in 1981. The study suggests that the GCC’s ineffective institutional structure and the lack of political will among its member states to implement and reinforce coordinated policies are the main factors that have led to a lack of meaningful integration. Mishrif suggests that currently, at a global level, there is a retreat from regionalism, as can be seen in some of the leading organizations such as the EU and NAFTA. While to retain relevance for its regional integration mission, the GCC must strengthen its institutional structure. Currently, the domestic political environment of its member states makes it unlikely that this can occur. GCC member states lack fundamental institutional components, such as elected parliaments and legislative bodies, which are needed to institute supranational policy-making. Mishrif also states that ideological differences, the rise of ambitious young leaders in Gulf ruling families, and differing foreign policy interests demonstrated by GCC member states have shown that politics and national interest trump economic logic when it comes to the GCC. The paper concludes that there is a low interregional trade between the member states (sixten percent in total) and that there is a need to reexamine and reevaluate the process of integration.

Angela Joya shifted the discussion to North Africa, with her paper, “Alter-globalization in the Middle East and North Africa: The Case of Anti-Extractivism in Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco.” Joya argues that the rise of new grass root rural movements in North Africa indicates that marginalized communities in the Middle East are beginning to press against processes of globalization and neoliberal economic logic. Joya’s paper presents a series of case-studies of different rurally-based social movements in Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria, as examples of how people are rejecting neoliberal authoritarianism. The case studies suggest that local communities are mobilizing around environmental concerns and resource-extraction projects, and are demanding an alternative development model that better serves public needs. Mobilization against phosphate mining in the Gafsa basin in Tunisia, silver mining in Imider, Morocco and the fracking of shale gas in Ain Salah in Algeria, demonstrates that anti-extractivism lies at the core of these social movements. People are protesting against government policies that have not brought enough economic development at the local level, not significantly enhanced the quality of life for the people living in these regions where natural resources are being extracted. Conversely, some of these resource-extraction projects have led to deepening inequality among the local population, have had adverse environmental consequences, depleted local natural resources such as water, and negatively affected health conditions as a result of pollution. Joya argues that these people’s movements in North Africa show that the public is questioning the effectiveness of the growth-based economy model, which, while meant to counter unemployment and bring in investment to the country, has been capital intensive and has had negative consequences for rural communities. Joya states that these movements are broadening the demands for economic, social, and political justice and inclusion of local preferences and knowledge with environmental protection to bring about a change in the current development model.

Kian Tajbakhsh discussed his paper on “The Political Economy of Fiscal Decentralization under the Islamic Republic of Iran.” The article looks at the fiscal decentralization of local government in over 90 cities and municipalities in Iran. Using descriptive data and empirical analysis, the paper provides a detailed study of Iranian municipal finances and examines the extent to which fiscal decentralization has led to strengthening local government. In particular, Tajbakhsh questions whether the decentralization policy has created structures of local governance that are more responsive and accountable to voters’ preferences. In 1999, a new reform of establishing elected local government was implemented and backed by four political actors; the ruling Islamists, the Islamic reformists, the developmental Islamists, and the apolitical technocrats. Each had their motivation for supporting decentralization, which led to three distinct projects. The study conducted reveals that the elected municipalities have a narrow set of responsibilities and limited legal autonomy from the central government. Many of the municipalities collect revenues from local sources; however, this revenue decentralization is not accompanied by expenditure decentralization, which has led to a system of “perverse economy.” The author argues that the evolution of the local government in Iran, over the past two decades, can be explained by the theory of local electoral authoritarianism, in which the central government aims to install local electoral institutions to enhance its influence rather than allow dispersal of autonomy.

Esfandyar Batmanghelidj’s paper, “The Ins and Outs of Iranian Industrial Resiliency under Sanctions,” looks at the Iranian economy and industrial resiliency under sanctions and examines the relationship between the availability of industrial inputs and total industrial output and growth of the non-oil exports in Iran. Batmanghelidj argues that the sanctions imposed on Iran have been effective in cutting back Iran’s energy exports. However, for the past fifteen years, Iran has steadily increased its non-oil exports, through which the country is earning its foreign exchange. The increase in non-oil exports also has paved the way for Iran to trade with regional countries, such as Iraq and Afghanistan. The paper looks at how Iran’s imports are being sustained to maintain industrial output. The author identifies a process of “import reflection” through which Iran is able to maintain the availability of industrial input (intermediary and capital inputs) and steadily increase its industrial output. The study examines the trade data of Iran’s main partners, EU, China, UAE, and Turkey and Total Productivity Index of Central Bank of Iran, and demonstrations that the sanctions on Iran temporarily affected the relationship between European industrial exports to Iran and Iranian industrial productivity. However, Iran was able to substitute European industrial inputs with Chinese inputs and re-export required European goods via UAE and Turkey further, which enabled it to stabilize industrial productivity and bypass sanction pressures.

Misba Bhatti presented Imad El-Anis’s article on “Transport Infrastructure and Regional Integration in the Levant.” This chapter contributes to the study of regionalism by investigating the relationship between hard infrastructure and economic integration in the Levant. The author argues that regionalism and economic integration relies on the development of domestic and cross border transport infrastructure. The author assumes that a higher level of trade leads to economic integration, which leads to interdependency and political cooperation and stability. Despite the presence of commercial institutes, tariffs, and international institutions, such as Greater Arab Free Trade Agreement (GAFTA), any previous initiatives to deliver regional public goods and enhance domestic economic progress have been unsuccessful in the Levant. The chapter investigates the physical transportation infrastructure in the Levant and its impact on regionalism by addressing two main questions: 1) What is the condition of domestic and cross-border transport infrastructure in the Levant?; and, 2) What is the relationship between domestic and cross-border transport infrastructure? As a result of the study conducted, the chapter concludes that domestic and cross-border transport infrastructure performance is weak in several of the countries studied and that this weakness hinders regional economic integration.

To view the working group agenda, click hereTo read the participants’ biographies, click hereRead more about this research initiative

Participants and Discussants:

Adel Abdel Ghafar, Brookings Doha Center, QatarZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarEsfandyar Batmanghelidj, Bourse & Bazaar, IranMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarAngela Joya, University of Oregon, USMehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarSuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarAshraf Mishrif, Sultan Qaboos University, OmanAbdul Rehmaan Qayyum, Georgetown University in QatarKhushboo Shah, Georgetown University in QatarJackie Starbird, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarKian Tajbakhsh, Columbia University, USElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

CURA Workshop: The Art of Hearing and Seeing Data
2019-10-10 12:00 - 16:00
On October 10, 2019, CIRS hosted a CURA workshop titled, “The Art of Hearing and Seeing Data: Introduction to Qualitative Research Methods,” by Assistant Professor of Government at GU-Q, Dr. Uday Chandra. The workshop provided participants with an insightful breakdown of the practical fundamentals of qualitative research and data observation. Ranging from freshmen to seniors, the participants actively engaged with the material and discussions led by Prof. Chandra, enabling them to build upon each other’s interpretations of the significance of plausible data across various forms of qualitative research. Through a simple ethnography-inspired observation exercise that students were required to complete prior to the workshop, students were able to contextualize the role of hearing and seeing data at the most rudimentary level, within the overarching theme of conducting qualitative research. As part of the discussion, students compared the sights and sounds they observed in public spaces at various campuses, in comparison with the audio-visual elements of the social atmosphere at the atrium in GU-Q itself, and explored the interactions between independent variables such as academic concentrations and gender ratios.

The workshop initially delved into the basics of quantitative and qualitative research, emphasized that each method has shortcomings, and can be used only to answer certain, specific research questions. Recognizing the “seduction of quantification” and the difficulty of demonstrating causation, not just correlation, and to accurately reflect social reality, enabled participants to contextualize the role of qualitative research methods within the wider framework of data observation. Prof. Chandra also highlighted the pitfalls of qualitative research in its inability to identify macro trends, geospatial mapping of micro-level data, establish patterns for large numbers of cases or variables, or even solve existential problems. Students learned that different methodological approaches should be used to strengthen the certainty of their theses.

Prof. Chandra used a personal example of his doctoral research titled, “Negotiating Leviathan: State-making and Resistance in the Margins of Modern India,” to demonstrate the practical workings of qualitative research. He shared his own experience in overcoming challenges pertaining to fieldwork. Salma Hassabou, CURA Administrative Fellow and workshop participant, commented, “I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Prof. Chandra’s personal experience with qualitative research because much of what we study is mostly theoretical in nature that not everyone knows how to apply it in practical research. The example he shared regarding his fieldwork tied the entire workshop together, and I found it incredibly helpful.”

The workshop also addressed concerns regarding the importance of credible research design and the need for a focused research question. The conversational nature of the workshop also allowed students to engage with the topic very closely and clarify areas of ambiguity within the spheres of both qualitative and quantitative research methods.

The workshop had a total of twenty-four participants, and the attendees who successfully completed all required tasks were awarded electronic badges to certify their enrollment and completion of this CURA workshop. CIRS hosts CURA workshops once every semester to encourage student research and to equip the GU-Q student body with the skills and practical knowledge needed to produce original research in the students’ respective fields of interest.

Article by Irene Promodh (class of 2021), CURA Research Fellow

Football in the Middle East Working Group I
2019-10-27 09:00 - 2019-10-28 17:00
On October 27-28, 2019, the Center for International and Regional Studies held the inaugural working group for its research initiative on “Football in the Middle East.” The meeting brought together regional and international scholars and experts to discuss some of the understudied areas related to football in the region and to identify original research questions in their respective areas of focus. Over the course of two days a number of topics were discussed, including, football academies, women’s football in Turkey, the FIFA 2022 World Cup in Qatar, beIN and sports broadcasting rights, football management and administration, football players’ perception of national identity, football clubs in Iran, Palestinian football players in Lebanon, youth refugees and football, football and regime legitimization, and football fans and protests in Algeria.

The working group began with Dr. Valter Di Salvo’s talk on Qatar’s strategies to build a high-performance football environment. Dr. Di Salvo, the Director of Football Performance and Science at Aspire Academy, compared the football environment of three countries, Spain, England, and Qatar, and stressed that building a successful football environment in Qatar needed an understanding of the local social context. A seven-goal plan was implemented by Aspire to develop and strengthen the game in Qatar. This included, data collection on a players’ performance and abilities; recruiting a professional group of staff and trainers; assessing the needs of coaches and players; formulating and implementing a training strategy; building of training facilities and assessment labs; integrating knowledge throughout the process; and finally sharing of knowledge with other partners for development of the game. The last goal led to the formation of the Aspire Fellows Community that presently has representation from 50 globally-renowned football clubs and federations and has 260 presentations in its database for knowledge sharing.

Building on the discussion of Qatar’s football development strategy, Dr. Wadih Ishaq spoke about Qatar’s hosting of the FIFA World Cup in 2022. Dr. Ishaq pointed out that while scholars and analysts have addressed football, politics, and socioeconomic issues, there is little work that offers an internal perspective on the World Cup and its implications for Qatari society, economy, and culture. Among other topics, it is important to study sports and education in Qatar, and the long term educational opportunities and job security for athletes.

Simon Chadwick spoke about the off-field management of football and highlighted a study by Jasoor Institute that measured the size of the sports economy in the Middle East. The study examined the broader sports landscape in the region and drew attention to major clubs and federations in the GCC member states. Chadwick suggested that in order to address the question of football management in the GCC, five areas need to be studied; fan engagement, investment, sponsorship, brands and branding, and industrial networks. Professor Chadwick identified a number of core research questions: How can football in the GCC region establish and build sustainable match day attendances? What role in the development of football in the region should investment play? What purpose do the portfolios of GCC region football sponsors serve? Can football club brands in the GCC region ever rival those of their international rivals? How is football contributing to broader industrial challenges facing the GCC region?

Ross Griffin explored the question of national identity and football players of the Qatari national team. The composition of the Qatari team contains a host of players born in countries such as Sudan, Iraq, Algeria, France, and Portugal. Their success as a national team presents the opportunity to revisit the complicated relationship between nationalism, football, and national identity from a player perspective. The identity dilemmas that inevitably ensue when athletes are naturalized has been given significant consideration by scholars of sport and nationalism. Financial gain, cultural affinity, and professional ambition have all been cited as motivating factors influencing an athlete’s decision to switch allegiances. Nevertheless, the majority of these analyses have been undertaken with the construct of a team, the fan, or the nation in mind. Ross Griffin suggested that there is a need to include the subjective perspective of players themselves in their performance of national identity.

John McManus stated that creating a strong legacy for the World Cup was an inherent component of Qatar’s bidding pitch. Training and development of sports administrators and industry experts are part of this legacy. McManus argued that the literature on sports administration often focuses on mega sporting events, and there is very little attention given to other forms of organized sporting competitions. It was suggested that there is a need to examine Qatar’s wider sporting landscape and to look at organizations such as beIN, Qatar Sports League, and Aspire Academy and address their roles when it comes to sporting legacy building. Some of the research questions that were put forward included looking at expatriate games and their administrations; examining what it means to be a sports administrator; exploring the administration of football clubs and federations; What is an event gypsy?; as well as moving away from western-centric literature and focusing on the Middle East specific context.

Craig LaMay drew attention to the beIN network and broadcasting rights in the Middle East. Pay television has changed the way people watch sports in the region, and other broadcasters often view beIN’s monopoly over broadcasting rights as aggressive. The network has 40 percent of global media rights, and these include copyrights and audio/visual rights over broadcasting. However, the network is not just limited to sports channels but also has several entertainment stations. Sixty percent of the content produced is in Arabic, and according to statistics, 66 percent of total viewership over television for the FIFA 2018 World Cup was through beIN sports channels. An understudied area with regards to the beIN network is the entry of the beOUTQ network, which is a pirate pay-television broadcaster and is an example of industrial level piracy of broadcasting. The network not only pirates channels from the beIN network but also channels from Europe and the US. Craig LaMay suggested the need to examine the nature of pay television and the issue of piracy in broadcasting and its implications for beIN in the long run.

The literature on sports gives examples of how sports can be used as a medium through which refugees can be integrated into the social and political fabric of a country. However, this is not always the case, as seen with Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. The Palestinians in Lebanon are a stateless people, and the football federation in the country has put a cap on the number of Palestinian players that can play in a team. Each club team is allowed to have only one Palestinian player, and they cannot play as a goalkeeper. Palestinian are also restricted from holding property in Lebanon as well as are banned from 30 professions, which is another form of discrimination that they have to face. In response to these restrictions on joining Lebanese football clubs and teams, Palestinians have formed their leagues under which they have formed teams and hold matches. Danyel Reiche’s presentation shed light on these issues and proposed four areas, which could be studied in regards to Palestinian football players, i.e., Palestinian diaspora clubs elsewhere, Palestinian football in Israel, the condition of Palestinians as stateless people in Lebanon and the efforts to gain statehood by recognition. Reiche’s focus would be to examine the cap on players, when and why it was introduced, and discrimination of Palestinian players in Lebanese football.

Middle Eastern rules have frequently used football as a tool for regime legitimization. While much of the literature on this focus on the soft power aspects of football, Abdullah Al-Arian, proposed that there is more to states’ instrumental usage of football than soft power and brand-building. Abdullah Al-Arian suggested that football is used by states to pursue and achieve hard political objectives. States have used football for extending neo-imperial control and power consolidation, regime legitimization, countering threats, political repression, and to mask unpopular regional and domestic policies or sports-washing. None of these forms of legitimization are mutually exclusive, and states have used multiple of these at the same time. Furthermore, emphasis in the literature has been on identifying policies related to the national teams and federations, and not a lot has been written in regards to economic expansion and using clubs and ownership to explain some of these categories.

Maher Mezahi, detailed the history of football in Algeria, with the arrival of the game in the country with colonial rule, the formation of the first Algerian football club and the national team as a tool of protest against the colonizers and the subsequent use of football stadiums to protest against the political regime after independence. Football fans and club ultras express their political, social, and economic demands during matches in forms of songs that they produce and publically distribute. Mehar stated that the protesters who are currently rallying on the streets for regime change replicate the football fan behavior. They gather after Friday prayers, at a famous square, peacefully march around the town in Algiers, sing songs that are produced by football fans, and display anti-government calligraphy and tifos. The support from organized ultras and football fans has enabled the protesters, to organize and execute street protests and overcome the fear of law keepers.

Ramon Spaaij brought the discussion back to football’s role in the development and inclusion of refugees with a focus on youth refugees. Spaaij expressed that there is a Eurocentric focus and bias on the research conducted on the topic and that there is a mismatch between research sites and the locations where the majority of the world’s displaced people reside, with Turkey being the main exception. The reliance on policy categories limits academic research by constraining the type of questions asked, the objects of study, and the methods and analysis adopted. There is a need for research that uncritically accepts the boundaries of the field imposed by policy categories will tend to confirm and legitimize the assumptions made by actors. Some of research gaps that were identified included; over-emphasis on instrumental dimension vs experiential dimension of football, decolonizing research, ethical relationships in research, looking at different innovative methods, strengths-based approaches and reframing of refugees in terms of risk, threat and deficiency and capturing the diverse voices of refugees regarding their own sporting aspirations, needs and achievements as opposed to merely echoing dominant sport policy agendas.

The debate around gender issues and sports, particularly football, is a prevalent theme in the Middle East. The participants looked at female football players in Turkey for the following session. Yagmur Nuhrat identified three areas for further research on the topic; equality for women, with focus on the dynamics of equality rather than justice; knowledge production and better education for female football players; and the issue of space and spatiality and how that relates to the environment of playing fields and neighborhoods. Some of the questions that were put forward were; Can we achieve equality, and what kind of equality are we talking about when it comes to female football players? What are some of the elements of this struggle and resistance? What are the discourses when it comes to physical strength? How women’s’ empowerment is conceptualized by footballers and how they view this discourse? Female athletes may feel physically unsafe if they were not in a structured space. Even if it is exclusionary, how does this structured space create feelings of safety for women?

Alireza Farsi closed the working group meeting, with his presentation on politics and football clubs in Iran. Farsi detailed the playing history of the Iranian national team and explained the structure of the football federation in Iran. Iranian federation has sixteen registered teams, out of which only one is privately owned, whereas the rest of the fifteen teams are owned and managed by the government. It was proposed that the football in Iran needs a component of social responsibility, and the main driver behind should be the privatization of the clubs. Farsi gave an example of the income generated by the Premier League in England and stated that the privatization of the game could bring in economic and industrial growth as well as build up the private sector and cash revenues. The presentation also proposed strategies to initiate social responsibility and privatization plans, which could be applied to various federations across the Middle East.

In conclusion, Mehran Kamrava, Director of CIRS, thanked the participants for identifying key gaps in the literature on football in the Middle East. It is worth noting that the participants will contribute empirically grounded papers addressing these questions, among others, to be published in an edited volume under the auspices of CIRS.

To view the working group agenda, click hereTo read the participants’ biographies, click hereRead more about this research initiative

Participants and Discussants:

Ahmed Abbasi, Qatar Football Association, QatarAbdullah Al-Arian, Georgetown University in QatarNajwa Al-Thani, Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, QatarMohammed Al-Thawadi, Aspire Academy, QatarZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarChaimaa Benkermi, Georgetown University in QatarMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarSimon Chadwick, emlyon Business School, FranceValter Di Salvo, Aspire Academy, QatarAlireza Farsi, Shahid Beheshty University, IranRoss Griffin, Qatar UniversitySalma Hassabou, Georgetown University in QatarWadih Ishac, Qatar UniversityMehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarCraig LaMay, Northwestern University in QatarJohn McManus, Qatar UniversityMaher Mezahi, Independent Football Journalist, Algeria Suzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarYagmur Nuhrat, Istanbul Bilgi University, TurkeyIrene Promodh, Georgetown University in QatarAbdul Rehmaan Qayyum, Georgetown University in QatarDanyel Reiche, American University of BeirutKhushboo Shah, Georgetown University in QatarRodney Sharkey, Weill Cornell Medical College in QatarRamon Spaaij, Victoria University, Australia Betsi Stephen, Georgetown UniversityElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

Sport, Politics, and Society in the Middle East
2019-10-28 18:00 - 19:30
The Center for International and Regional Studies launched Sport, Politics, and Society in the Middle East at a CIRS Dialogue Series event on October 28, 2019. The edited volume examines the role that sports have played in the contemporary socioeconomic, cultural, and political milieus of the region. Danyel Reiche, Associate Professor for Comparative Politics at the American University of Beirut, presented an overview of the CIRS research project and the book, which he coedited with Tamir Sorek, Professor of Sociology at the University of Florida.

Reiche began his talk by emphasizing the growing significance of sports in the Middle East, notably in the midst of Qatar’s preparations for the FIFA 2022 World Cup. The increased attention on sports in the Middle East is reflected not only in the media, he said, but also in academia where a “growing body of scholarship, particularly on Qatar,” is shifting to sport studies. Reiche shared his observations of the close ties between the Middle East and the world of sports in the rising number of mega-sport events hosted in the region, for example, and in the sponsorship of European football clubs by Middle Eastern countries, such as Paris Saint-Germain by Qatar and Manchester City by the United Arab Emirates.

The project’s primary research questions considered the factors behind the establishment of sport in the Middle East, whether there were common patterns and dynamics throughout the region, the different roles of sport, and whether sport is serving societal change. Reiche highlighted the uniqueness of the book in terms of the research process employed. Utilizing a range of interdisciplinary social science approaches, the ten authors drew from ethnographic research, academic literature, archival work, interviews, and surveys. The chapters fall under two broad themes: the “politics and economics of sport” and sport as a “contested terrain where struggles over meaning, resources, and rights are fought.”

“Sports in the Middle East are much more than an interesting angle through which to popularize academic themes. As major political and economic forces, they not only reflect, but also shape both individuals’ lives and large-scale social processes.”

The development of modern sports in the Middle East arose in the early twentieth century in urban areas such as Istanbul, Tehran, Cairo, Beirut, and Damascus. According to Reiche, different dynamics were apparent, where “men mainly played football and basketball, while women were particularly into gymnastics.” In the contemporary era, one author used digital ethnography in researching how female athletes in the Middle East presented themselves to the public through their social media accounts. Among the similarities with Western female athletes were the use of these platforms for “self-branding and to raise awareness on the sport,” however, Middle Eastern women tended to “present themselves in a culturally more appropriate manner,” he said.

An audience member asked whether the World Cup might lead to liberalization in Qatar—in the media, for example. Reiche’s response was, “Qatar will liberalize, but on its own terms.” He also shared a “new trend in hosting mega-sporting events,” that is, co-hosting them. For example, the European Football Championship in 2000 co-hosted by Belgium and Holland, and the 2026 FIFA World Cup co-hosted by the US, Canada, and Mexico, among others. Whether Middle Eastern countries might co-host mega-sporting events given persistent problems in the region, Reiche suggested a scenario where, for example, Qatar could “host a world championship and then give few matches to a country like Lebanon.”

In conclusion, Reiche stated, “sports in the Middle East are much more than an interesting angle through which to popularize academic themes.” As major political and economic forces, sports “not only reflect, but also shape both individuals’ lives and large-scale social processes,” he said.

Danyel Reiche is Associate Professor of Comparative Politics at the American University of Beirut. He graduated with distinction from Leibniz University Hannover and joined AUB in 2008 after working as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. His past research focused on energy as well as sport policy and politics, the latter his recent priority. Reiche published Success and Failure of Countries at the Olympic Games (Routledge, 2016) and edited, with Tamir Sorek, Sport, Politics and Society in the Middle East (Hurst/Oxford University Press, 2019). His peer-reviewed articles have been published in area study journals such as International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics and Journal of Energy Policy, and in broader-oriented journals such as Third World Quarterly and The Middle East Journal. He has written op-eds for international newspapers such as The Washington Post and Spiegel Online and is frequently interviewed and quoted by major media outlets such as Le Monde and The New York Times. Reiche chairs the Political Studies Association’s Sport and Politics Study Group.

Article by Chaïmaa Benkermi, Publications Fellow

Tunisia in the Aftermath of the Arab Uprisings Working Group I
2019-11-10 21:00 - 2019-11-11 17:00
On November 10-11, 2019, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) held the first working group under its research initiative, “Tunisia in the Aftermath of the Arab Uprisings.” This was a Faculty Research Project under the intellectual leadership of a member of the Georgetown University faculty, Professor Mohamed Zayani. CIRS invited a group of scholars to discuss various topics and identify the gaps in the existing scholarship. The presentations took several different approaches ranging from theoretical deliberations to practical implications to historical narratives. Some of the topics discussed by the participants included political Islam, civil society in Tunisia, economic challenges, social justice, youth involvement and identity politics, security challenges, media dynamics, power politics, and authoritarianism in the Middle East. Via a multi-disciplinary approach, the meeting offered an in-depth discourse on post-revolutionary Tunisian state.

The initial discussion focused on the persisting conditions of authoritarianism in the Middle East and how they are affecting the transition in Tunisia. It was argued that when taken into context, the conditions pertaining to transition in the Middle East are very different from other regions, i.e., Latin America and South Africa. The existing literature on transition points towards a degree of awareness on the part of political leaders that a change is required, which is missing in the context of the Middle East and thus makes it more difficult for a transition to take place. Populations all over the Middle East are weary of the current status quo. The uprisings in these second wave of protests have more of a political element than an economic agenda. However, the political elites in many of the countries across the region are not ready to introduce change to the existing political arena. Though transitions have been more successful when guided from the top, in the case of the Middle East, the transition has to happen in a context that is different, i.e., has to come from the bottom. The relative success in the case of Tunisia can be attributed to limited foreign intervention compared to other countries and the non-politicized nature of the military. However, there are elements of the old regime still in place, and the leadership needs to realize that democracy comes with compromise.

The discussion then shifted to the power politics in Tunisia, and scholars looked at methods to transform the deep political power frameworks that currently exist. The overshadowing of politics by the state has had severe consequences in the post-revolutionary Tunisia. Some of the research questions that were proposed included examining how Tunisia political culture can translate into real politics; How and what kind of local leadership can emerge in this second phase of the transition; What does the success of Kais Saeed’s success indicate and point to regard political outsiders? What kind of new conflict resolution tools can be expected in the upcoming period? In addition, the participants discussed the rise of populism in the country and its impact on Tunisian politics.

The conversation was then centered on the topic of political Islam, and it was contended that are no political Islamists nor Salafists exist in Tunisia today and that the present-day situation is a reflection of post-2011 Tunisia. Ennahda became a major topic of study after 2011; however, the question remains as to how much of its Islamists agenda is the party going to pursue now that it is in power. One of the understudied areas in the Tunisian case highlighted was the separation of politics and da’wa and what it meant for Ennahda. Other areas for potential research identified were a reconfiguration of a religious public sphere and examining what is a religious public sphere in Tunisia today, historical account of the Salafists, and their specific categorization in Tunisia and Salafist Jihadists.

The discussion on Tunisia’s reinvigorated civil society expressed the importance of establishing the value of analyzing the formal associational sphere where groups and organizations would, by necessity, register through state-established parameters. It then laid out a working definition of civil society and then contextualized the concept within two broad overarching narratives that often run in parallel to one another, democratization, and neoliberalism. The number of legally registered associations in Tunisia in 2010 was 9,996; in 2012, this number increased by approximately 50 percent to 14,966, and as of October 2019, there are now 22,954. Some of the research questions proposed were; Is the role of civil society in good governance as it relates to time-dependent democratization serving as a mechanism to plant the seeds/lay the groundwork for stronger and more pluralistic engagement; Are Tunisia’s economic grievances being met by civil society organizations by providing social welfare services to marginalized communities the state is unable/unwilling to reach? Is civil society filling a gap left by the state? Following the uprisings, is civil society now ’embedded’ in Tunisia? Which institutions would need to be examined to determine civil society’s engagement in good governance and in holding state institutions accountable?; What can we say about the fabric of civil society today – is this a pluralistic space? Where are the exclusions [marginalized groups outside larger urban centers], and are there surprising inclusions? Where are the rivalries and divergences in post-uprising Tunisia today?

The scholars next discussed Tunisia’s economic challenges and it was stated that per capita income in the country had tripled since the revolution and that major leaps had been made in the education sector. Prior to 2010, Tunisia was in good standing in terms of its macroeconomics with low public debt and inflation rates. However, inequality in terms of income distribution, environmental problems, the impact of globalization, and corruption were some of the factors that led to the uprisings in 2011. Post-revolutionary Tunisia is still dealing with inequality; the young population in the country is demanding radical change but is hardly aware of what that means. The Islamists party has managed to be the strongest party; however, the political landscape is very much divided, and this can impede the democratic transition. There are no plans for an economic strategy and no response to people’s expectations. There is a declining business environment in the country with minimal investments being made. Not much has been done in terms of development; there is higher inflation, much lower growth in the country, and very little has been done in terms of improvement of fiscal resources. The need for a new social contract was expressed with better management of micro finances in the country and improving the quality of the services.

Precarity and social justice were next deliberated. The meaning of the term precarity was debated and examined in the context of Tunisia. An anthropological approach was taken that views precarity as a master term that designates new forms of social mobility and labor regimes. It was expressed that it is applied to a new class of a dangerous heterogeneous group of people and refers to the social condition of vulnerability and capital forms of labor. Precarity in Tunisia can be seen in terms of revolutionary uprisings and may be understood as a resolution of the precariat. The majority of social movements in Tunisia have been about demanding employment from the state, preferably in the public sector. Work in the private sector is often exploitative because of the absence of a contract and legal safety. Another aspect examined was the mobility practices in post-revolutionary Tunisia. Massive waves of Tunisian youth have migrated after the uprising, and it was suggested that in order to better understand the cross border survival strategies and mobilization of jihad as a form of migration, explaining these mobility practices of precarious Tunisian would be necessary. In terms of social justice, it was suggested that corruption under transition needed to be studied as it has become democratized. More nuanced accounts of channels of corruption and marginalized groups, such as women and youth from interior regions, were suggested as an area for further research.

Media dynamics and freedom was also discussed and was categorized into four main areas in post-revolutionary Tunisia, the quasi-non-governmental organizations, particularly the political talk shows on TV and radio, the political structures and electoral debate, the advocacy groups, such as closed Facebook groups and the revival of the Tunisian cinema. Some of the research questions proposed included looking at in what conditions have these quasi-non-governmental organizations have been created in Tunisia? What are some of the strategies that they employ? Which sector has more priority, and how can we account for these priorities? How could the presidential debate be a precedent for the re-appropriation of TV shows? Looking at the participatory politics of media through these talk shows; studying the performance of citizenship via facebook groups; and lastly examining how the revival of the cinema in Tunisia was the way the movie directors set themselves free from ongoing moral codes, in terms of the subjects they chose and the type of films they made.

The discussion was then shifted to Tunisian history and some of the legacies that impact the current political and social dynamics in Tunisia today. Two significant vestiges, both from the Ottoman and the French colonial eras that are relevant are the land distribution and people’s identity either as an Islamist or secularists. Awqaf was a religious, administrative institution established during the Ottoman era, which was demolished during the colonial rule. Ennahda has introduced the idea of reestablishing the system under the current administration, which has had some opposition. It is seen as a political body that could operate outside the control of the state system and has serious consequences. The two political figures, Salah ben Youssef and Habib Bourguiba that rose to prominence during the French rule and introduced two different sets of ideologies also have impacted the political system today. It was proposed that further research could look into Tunisian history in three different ways; examine the different periods of history and their impact; look at the development of the political parties in Tunisia; and study the mechanism of reproduction of political alliances and affiliations that are passed down either through familial channels or educational institutions.

The attention was then shifted to youth involvement and identity politics, and it was specified that the youth mobilization in a current period different from in 2011. The ongoing narrative among the youth is that the revolution never took place in reality as some elements of the Ben Ali regime are still evident. The majority of the youth and street activism lack leadership and have not been developed into political engagement. The current wave of mobilization is driven by the question of dignity and the struggle for recognition. Some elements of these mobilization share similarities with the demands that are being voiced in western societies, such as recognition and equal rights of the LGBT community. Youth in Tunisia cannot be perceived as a homogeneous group, and a clear categorization is required. Youth in Tunisia feel as sub citizens where they are often excluded from the political scene. The problems faced by the youth need to be brought to the forefront, and the local context and cultural aspects also need further examinations. Some of the research gaps identified were examining the commonalities shared by the older generation and the young Tunisian, studying and comparing rural youth to their urban counterparts, and deconstructing the educational system and identifying how it contributes to the current economic divide.

The attention was then shifted to contestation and social movement in Tunisia after the revolution. The argument made was that the protests are an ongoing process in Tunisia and can be looked at from three different dimensions, the protests themselves, the interplay between protestor and state sponsors, and the role of international actors. The existing literature has looked at the sociological influence of the protests, and there are different case studies that have been examined. The democratization process has not opened political opportunities and cooperation in Tunisia, and this leads to the question of whether Social Movement Theory can be applied to the MENA region. Protests erupted over substantial injustices, i.e., provision of necessities and rights, as well as procedural injustices, i.e., corruption. This lends to institutional questions when talking about protests, i.e., how people organize and what they want in protests? Another important aspect highlighted was the state’s response to the protests and whether there has been any fundamental change? Examining the limited role of IMF and its impact comparatively was also suggested.

The last topic discussed was Tunisia’s security challenges in terms of policies implemented in the country and radicalization. The group also looked at the help Tunisian security forces have been getting from external actors, namely the EU and the US, since the revolution, such as the creation of G7+ and training programs for the security forces. The various terrorist attacks and political assassination in Tunisian polity have been aimed at creating an international emergency and deem Tunisian as an unsafe state. This leads scholars to question the kind of polity the Tunisian state is leaning to; What are the different rationales behind the various terrorist attacks? As a countermeasure, local security committees have been formed in various regions and introduced new forms of micro surveillance. Some of the questions posed were, Why is there a large number of jihadist Tunisians? What are some of the strategies through which the state is empowering the citizens? How can societal resistance be fostered? What are some of the dominant discourses that shape the security agenda in Tunisia? Moreover, to what extent state security hinders ontological security?

The participants will contribute empirically grounded papers addressing these questions, among others, to be published in an edited volume under the auspices of CIRS.

To view the working group agenda, click hereTo read the participants’ biographies, click hereRead more about this research initiative

Participants and Discussants:

Maram Al-Qershi, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarAlexandra Blackman, New York University Abu Dhabi, UAEAmel Boubekeur, MENA program at the European Council, AlgeriaMongi Boughazala, University of Tunis El-Manar, TunisiaEdwige Fortier, SOAS University of London, UKZouhir Gabsi, Deakin University, AustraliaRuth Hanau Santini, Universita Orientale Naples, ItalySalma Hassabou, Georgetown University in QatarMehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarEnrique Klaus, Galatasaray University, TurkeyFabio Merone, University of Ghent, BelgiumAlyssa Miller, University of Pennsylvania, USSuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarMarina Ottaway, Woodrow Wilson Center, USIrene Promodh, Georgetown University in QatarAbdul Rehmaan Qayyum, Georgetown University in QatarKhushboo Shah, Georgetown University in QatarElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Irene Weipert-Fenner, Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, Germany Mohamed Zayani, Georgetown University in Qatar

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

CIRS Dialogue Series by H.E. Dr. Hamad Bin Abdulaziz Al-Kawari
2019-11-27 18:00 - 20:00
On November 27, 2019, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) invited H.E. Dr. Hamad Bin Abdulaziz Al-Kawari, State Minister of Qatar with rank of Deputy Prime-Minister and Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) Ambassador in Residence, to deliver a talk on his experience with international institutions. In his own words, this experience “started with UNESCO, and ended with UNESCO.”

In his talk, Al-Kawari highlighted the challenges he faced as he built up his career by “choosing the difficult way of knowledge and education.” While holding the position of ambassador, he simultaneously earned degrees from several institutions, including Saint-Joseph University in Beirut, La Sorbonne, and Stony Brook University. During his studies, he became ambassador to five European countries and later became the permanent ambassador to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). He explained that “opportunity comes, but if you don’t hold it well, it goes.”

“The best gift or award that could be given to distinguished Georgetown students would be to send them for one moth to the United Nations during a General Assembly, as they would acquire a lot of knowledge.”

After five years of learning French and two years of studying at La Sorbonne, he moved to New York which, along with the United Nations, are “in themselves some of the biggest schools.” He advised the Georgetown University in Qatar administration that “the best gift or award that could be given to distinguished Georgetown students would be to send them for one moth to the United Nations during a General Assembly, as they would acquire a lot of knowledge.” Al-Kawari is an advocate of the determination to “learn and re-learn,” which is also the World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) motto.

Al-Kawari then discussed the benefits and challenges of working in multilateral organizations, as opposed to a bilateral ones. He emphasized that “all of the ambassadors work in the same building and see each other every day,” so “all of the work is collective work.” During his tenure as Ambassador to the United Nations from 1984 to 1990, Al-Kawari also represented Qatar as official delegate to the UN for the country. He was simultaneously elected Deputy Chairman of the General Assembly of the United Nations at its fortieth session and Chairman of the Special Political Committee (4th Committee) at its 42nd session. As the latter dealt with the Arab-Israeli conflict, “at that time it was not easy for an Arab to be the head of this organization,” he said. He later held multiple ministerial functions in Qatar and wrote a “cultural autobiography,” which he published in the form of a book titled, The Global Majlis: An Intellectual Autobiography (Doha: Hamad Bin Khalifa University Press, 2015).

H.E. Dr. Hamad Bin Abdulaziz Al-Kawari is State Minister with rank of Deputy Prime-Minister and GU-Q’s Ambassador in Residence. He is a Qatari diplomat, statesman, and an intellectual. He has been the Minister for Culture, Arts and Heritage of Qatar from July 2008 to January 2016. He was previously the Ambassador of Qatar for France, the United States, the UNESCO and the UN. He is married and the father of three children. Dr. Al-Kawari was Qatar’s candidate for the post of UNESCO Director General. He led the vote in pole position for 4 rounds and lost the fifth for a single vote, with 28 votes against 30 for the French candidate.

Article by Chaïmaa Benkermi, Publications Fellow

The GCC Crisis: Qatar and its Neighbors Working Group II
2019-12-01 09:00 - 2019-12-02 17:00
On December 1-2, 2019, the Center for International and Regional Studies held the second working group for its research initiative on “The GCC Crisis: Qatar and its Neighbors.” Over two days, the convened scholars presented and received feedback on their papers that tackled a wide array of issues, including: the Regional implications of the GCC crisis, impact of the crisis on Qatar’s Supply Chain, public narratives of nationalism and identity in Qatar after the blockade, Turkey’s role in the crisis, ontological security and the GCC crisis, and post-blockade relations between State and Society in Qatar.

The working group began with Kristian Coates Ulrichsen’s discussion of his paper on “The Regional Implications of the Gulf Crisis.” Ulrichsen argues that the 2011 Arab spring signaled the transition of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and UAE into assertive regional actors. Differing foreign policy trajectories, as well as regional actions, were taken by Doha, Riyadh, and Abu Dhabi during and after the Arab Spring strained relations between the three states and limited the chances of future regional cooperation. The rupture of relations between the three Gulf states has highlighted the inherent weakness of the GCC as a meaningful institution through which member states can mediate regional disputes. The GCC, a loose collection of like-minded states without any significant centralization of authority or decision-making, has always suffered as a result of being viewed as a Saudi-dominated organization. Following the Arab Spring, any chance of building greater regional cooperation was further fragmented by a zero-sum mentality of the member states. Ulrichsen’s paper also highlights the pressure faced by the new Qatari leadership from Saudi Arabia and UAE and how this has raised concerns in other GCC states, namely Kuwait and Oman, over their own vulnerable positions as they too approach leadership transitions. The paper also examines the new relationship between Riyadh and Abu Dhabi and its impact and implications on the regional order.

Frank Himpel and Willy Kempel drew attention to the impact of the GCC crisis on the supply chain in Qatar with their paper on “Supply Chain Management in Turbulent Time.” The paper focuses on how the blockade impacted Qatar’s ability to import goods and how the State addressed the challenges faced. The authors highlight various strategies that states can adopt to manage their supply chain during times of crisis. In the Qatari case, the State sought to diversify the external components of its supply chain, while also developing greater indigenous capacity in areas where this was possible, with the long term goal of making its supply chain independent from its immediate neighborhood. Qatar sought to build new cooperative relationships at the regional and international level and sought to alleviate the pressure on its supply chain by seeking new routes of import and export via air and sea. The authors highlight that due to Qatar’s successful efforts in building and reinforcing its resources, the embargoing countries failed to achieve their purpose, and the long term benefit is that it has led to Qatar further developing its infrastructure and capacities.

Jocelyn Mitchell then presented a discussion of her paper “Narratives of Nationalism and Identity in Qatar after 2017,” which she has co-authored with Mariam Al-Hammadi. In this paper, the authors examine the impact of the ongoing regional crisis on nationalism and national identity in Qatar and argue that the rupture in regional relations has reduced the salience of a Khaliji identity amongst Qataris while increasing expressions of nationalism and national identity. The paper uses the case study of the recently opened National Museum in Qatar to examine society’s response to the narrative of a unified Qatari national identity represented at the Museum. The authors suggest that Qatari identity, as represented at the National Museum, appears to elide historical identity differences amongst Qataris, and in particular, do so by refraining from any representations of previously existing ‘badu’ vs. ‘hadar’ affiliations. This is viewed by the authors as a deliberate effort by the state to consolidate a single Qatari identity with the intent of increasing social unity amongst the public. The authors, through a series of interviews with female Qatari citizens, attempt to discern how this representation of a solidified and singular Qatari national identity expressed at the Museum is received by the Qatari population, and whether there are social tensions around identity that are not captured through the Museum’s depictions.

David Roberts, in his article on “Ontological Security and the GCC Crisis: Uncovering the Bitterness at the Heart of Qatari-Emirati Relations,” attempts to shed light on the UAE’s foreign policy goals and regional behavior by applying the theoretical lens of ontological security. Ontological security argues that individuals and states are driven by the need to secure their complex sense of identity. If a state perceives that its core identity is under threat, then it will engage in behavior to address the source of that threat. Roberts applies this argument to explain UAE’s reasoning behind their current foreign policies to support Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Egypt in their blockade against Qatar. Roberts argued that in the time of regional flux, UAE simultaneously faces internal challenges and concerns in regards to tackling multiple identities within its territory. With UAE focused on promoting a modern and globalized image, Qatar’s regional support for Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated groups and political Islam was considered a threat by the leadership in Abu Dhabi. With Qatar and UAE building identities that are mutually incompatible, it has led to an increase in UAE’s hostility towards Qatar.

Justin Gengler moved the focus to post-blockade State and Society in Qatar with his paper on “Society and State in Post-Blockade Qatar.” With this article, Gengler examines whether the blockade altered relations within society and between society and state or if it rippled some of the changes that were prevalent even before the blockade. The data was collected via multiple surveys conducted in Qatar before and after June 2017. The analysis of the findings demonstrates that the blockade has not given rise to new waves of mutual trust and acceptance between different social groups, however, it has been a factor in decreasing some of the social tensions between different groups. Another result shows that Qatari citizens had a growing interest in politics that experienced an unprecedented spike during the blockade. It is argued that the blockade had a reverse effect than the Arab Spring on the Qataris, who viewed the blockade as a stabilizing force against external aggression.

The discussion was brought to a close by Bulent Aras with his paper on “Turkey’s Diplomatic and Military Role in the Gulf Crisis.” Aras discusses Turkey’s geopolitical positioning and its diplomatic and military role in the Gulf region in light of the 2017 blockade against Qatar. The analytics framework of geopolitical reasoning has been applied to explain the foreign policy decisions made. The leaders in Ankara sought to build a regional foreign policy narrative that could be justified both domestically and internationally. Turkey turned to hard power military foreign policy, which, according to its leadership, would raise its regional profile to a new level. For Turkey, Qatar provides to be an Arab partner that helps deepen its links in the Gulf. In contrast, policymakers in Ankara are often on the rival end to their counterparts in Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. Aras concludes that whether this scenario of partnership with Qatar and schism with Saudi Arabia and UAE will persist will depend on the momentum gained from this geopolitical competition.

It is worth mentioning that CIRS plans to publish the aforementioned papers in either in an edited volume or a special issue of a journal in the near future.

To view the working group agenda, click hereTo read the participants’ biographies, click hereRead more about this research initiative

Participants and Discussants:

Mariam Ibrahim Al-Hammadi, Qatar UniversityBülent Aras, Sabancı University, TurkeyZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJustin Gengler, Qatar University Salma Hassabou, Georgetown University in QatarFrank Himpel, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, QatarMehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarWilly Kempel, Ambassador of Austria to QatarSuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJocelyn Sage Mitchell, Northwestern University in QatarGerd Nonneman, Georgetown University in QatarDavid B. Roberts, King’s College London, UKKhushboo Shah, Georgetown University in QatarKristian Coates Ulrichsen, Rice University, USElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

Polarized and Demobilized: Legacies of Authoritarianism in Palestine
2020-01-13 12:45 - 13:45
Dana El Kurd, Assistant Professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, delivered a CIRS talk on January 13, 2020, on the effects that authoritarian strategies have had on polarization and collective action in Palestinian society. The talk was based on her recently published book, Polarized and Demobilized: Legacies of Authoritarianism in Palestine, which examines the impact of international involvement on political development and state-society relations in the Palestinian territories, particularly in the deterioration of democratic processes.

El Kurd explained that the Palestinian Authority (PA) has been in power in the Palestinian territories since 1993 (and today, just in the West Bank). The PA emerged in the mid-nineties out of the Oslo process, and was meant to serve as an interim government, to govern until the expected Israeli withdrawal from territories in the West Bank and Gaza Strip by 1999. However, Israel did not adhere to this agreement. In the meantime, the PA bureaucracy quickly expanded, created various security and police forces, and became the largest employer in the territory under its control. Furthermore, international organizations became increasingly involved in Palestinian politics, and external funding strengthened the power of the PA, entrenching its position. Numerous Palestinian opposition groups arose to challenge the PA’s centralization of power; these included, for example, Hamas and other Islamist groups.

Some have argued that the Palestinian Authority has “acted as a ‘subcontractor of repression’ for the Israeli occupation, in the sense that they police on behalf of the Israeli occupation. They have become a kind of authoritarian indigenous regime overlaid on top of a foreign occupation.”

According to El Kurd, some argue that the PA has “acted as a ‘subcontractor of repression’ for the Israeli occupation, in the sense that they police on behalf of the Israeli occupation. They have become a kind of authoritarian indigenous regime overlaid on top of a foreign occupation.” The PA has been able to co-opt large segments of the Palestine population and they have increasingly used repression to control people, she said. Their security apparatus has greatly expanded since 2007, following the Hamas victory in the 2006 legislative elections (and subsequent removal from power), and there is greater coordination with the Israeli occupation. “There have been well-documented increases in torture and arrests, and limitations on academic and media freedom,” she said.

“After the Arab Spring, we saw this sort of rise in polarization and fragmentation,” and El Kurd examined the conditions that have divided Palestinians and divested them of political power. “We all know that the main goal of authoritarian regimes is to control their populations, and they utilize different strategies or combinations of strategies, such as cooptation or repression,” El Kurd said. However, regimes target different groups using different strategies, and she suspected those strategies themselves might be at the root of social polarization in Palestine and a decline in political mobilization.

El Kurd conducted a survey experiment in the Palestinian territories in conjunction with the Palestine Survey Research Center, and she held interviews with Palestinian decision makers to collect their views on democracy and accountability to assess the role of international involvement in determining attitudes. She used lab-in-field experiments, qualitative data, and statistical analysis with a protest dataset. Her primary research questions were: What is the effect of varying authoritarian strategies on polarization? And, how does that polarization affect collective action?

Her theoretical argument links authoritarianism and polarization, and she explained that authoritarian regimes use strategies selectively, bringing certain groups into the fold while repressing others. While El Kurd argued that authoritarian strategies generate polarization, she also explained that the type of strategy matters: “cooptation is inclusionary and repression is exclusionary.” Additionally, she found inclusionary strategies generate polarization to a smaller degree than exclusionary strategies. Consequently, she argued that the selective nature of authoritarian strategies is a cause of polarization, translating into a “lack of capacity for collective action through two main mechanisms: insularity within groups, and grievances between them.”

El Kurd was able to measure the Palestinian people’s willingness to engage in collective action in various and diversified ways. Her findings indicate that repression strategies lead to a decline in the willingness to engage in collective action, specifically for what she considers as targeted groups: the Islamists and leftists. This “exclusionary strategy seems to generate less willingness to cooperate” than the cooptation strategy.

El Kurd found that exclusionary strategies had the greatest effect on behavior, with repression causing polarization in society. “In the Palestine case, this helps to explain why different groups—who might have similar ideas about the Palestinian Authority, and similar ideas about the occupation—are not coordinating properly, and they seem to be unable to surmount these coordination problems.” She also explained that this finding applies to dynamics in the broader Arab world, where authoritarian governments have had similar effects on societal cohesion.

Dana El Kurd is a Researcher at the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, and Assistant Professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies in the Critical Security Studies program. She specializes in comparative politics and international relations. She has published in Foreign Affairs, The Washington Post’s Monkey Cage blog, Al-Araby al-Jadeed, and academic journals such as Parameters, Journal of Global Security Studies, Contemporary Arab Affairs, Middle East Law and Governance, and the Journal of Arabian Studies, among others. She is the author of the Polarized and Demobilized: Legacies of Authoritarianism in Palestine (Hurst and Oxford University Press, 2020).

Article by Chaïmaa Benkermi (Class of 2021), Publications Fellow

CURA Open House
2020-01-14 12:00 - 14:00
On January 14, 2020, CIRS hosted its first open house event for GU-Q students to learn more about CIRS and the CURA program for undergraduate research advancement. The CIRS Undergraduate Research Advancement program (CURA) aims to facilitate research opportunities for GU-Q undergraduate students through providing focused mentorship and a chance to publish and present their original research as part of the CURA Paper Series and CURA Lunch Talks.

During the event, Professor Mehran Kamrava, Director of CIRS highlighted that two years ago, CIRS launched the CURA program to advance undergraduate research. He remarked that, “the aim of the program is to enhance the research skills of our students and we do that by offering number of opportunities for our Fellows and for the entire student body.”

One aim of CURA is to enhance the undergraduate experience by helping students develop a range of research skills and publish their original research. To this end, Elizabeth Wanucha, Operations Manager of CIRS announced a new opportunity for GU-Q students under the ongoing CURA Paper Series. The CURA Paper Series opened a paper competition that will span the Spring 2020 semester, with a submission deadline of February 12, 2020. She added, “the winner of this competition will be coached by CIRS staff through the peer review and editorial process to publish the paper by the end of the semester as a distinguished publication under the CURA Paper Series.” The winner will also be issued an electronic certificate that highlights the achievement on LinkedIn and other social media sites.

“The aim of the program is to enhance the research skills of our students and we do that by offering number of opportunities for our Fellows and for the entire student body.”

Ngoc Nguyen (class of 2021) said that she enjoyed meeting the staff of CIRS at the open house. “It was a great opportunity to learn about research opportunities that CIRS is providing for Georgetown students. I will definitely participate in more CIRS events in the future.”

In addition to the paper competition, GU-Q students also have the opportunity to showcase their original research by submitting it for consideration to the CURA Paper Series. The process of selecting papers is rigorous and competitive. CIRS has a wide network of scholars, and publishing with the CURA Paper Series will disseminate the selected research across the globe. CIRS publishes the CURA Papers online, prints and distributes the hard copies, and disseminates the research via the CIRS research e-newsletter.

CIRS also helps GU-Q undergraduate students develop skills related to research through its CURA fellowship program. CURA Fellows provide research assistance in three areas: publications, research and administration. Through the CURA peer mentorship program, fellows learn hands-on about the research field and develop analytical skills by convening one seminar each semester on a current CIRS research project. Fellows are invited to discuss papers written by experts in their respective fields, and share their conclusions with the authors of the papers in the CIRS Working Group organized around that research project.

Chaïmaa Benkermi (class of 2021), a CIRS publications fellow said, “Having been part of CIRS for two years has been continuously rewarding. I have acquired unique skills that I have come to apply in all fields and disciplines, developed new research interests, and simply gained more confidence in what I do and what I deliver to others, which is also part of my CURA fellowship experience.”

Article by Shaza Afifi (Class of 2022), CURA Publications Fellow

Big Data in the Middle East Roundtable
2020-01-19 09:00 - 2020-01-20 17:00
On January 19-20, 2020, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) hosted a Research Roundtable on Big Data in the Middle East. The meeting was held in order to generate an initial conversation on how big data can be meaningfully applied to deepen our understanding of social and political phenomena in the Middle East. With the growing availability and amount of different data and the enhanced capacity of data scientists to use computational tools for analysis, social scientists around the world are increasingly turning to big data to address some of their fields of research. How far these innovative developments in research are being demonstrated in the Middle East and how social science research questions can be explored through these new data sources and analytical tools was the primary purpose of this roundtable. Over the course of two days, participating scholars and experts engaged in a fruitful dialogue that explored several important areas, including: big data and healthcare, social media and user-generated content, analyzing data produced in Arabic language, social science research, food security, big data and museums, opportunities in the defense sector, female employment as well as religious discourse on social media and hate speech.

The discussion was initiated by Dr. Ingmar Weber, Research Director for Social Computing at the Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI). Dr. Weber’s presentation was centered on the topic of changing demographic trends in the Middle East and big data applications to measure these changes. Using Facebook as a platform for accessing user data and using various variables such as places lived and mobile phones used, it was reasoned that researchers could collect data on wealth distribution and income level of the users. These variables can also be used to extract data from other platforms like Twitter and Snapchat to get demographic data. This, in turn, can be used to track, International migration, Poverty, and digital gender gaps. The online digital platforms provide access to over 2 billion users, and the data can be used to address traditional attributes like interest, as well as understand the selection bias of users. However, there are limitations to this as models for bias correction are required and only include people that are online. For future research, a number of topics were identified that included interdisciplinary research efforts, conducting surveys to collect data from hard to reach population, and the use of satellite imagery to get onsite data.

Chiara Bernardi then steered the conversation to user-generated content and social impact. It was stated that social data is intervened with social behavior, and this creates essential knowledge and meaning. The social impact of these can be used to drive policies and legislation. Marketing is one industry where the relevance of this content is widely used; however, there are limits to this. There is a need to understand how this influences the strategy, and mixed frameworks are needed to interact with the industry data with the academics settings. In order to bridge the gap and understand what we can learn from user-generated content, a methodological framework in the Middle East is required. The term big data also needed a clear definition in terms of its volume. Content generated from multiple languages requires mapping and visualizing in order to understand the impact on behavior. Academics need to recognize the role and, at the same time, bridge the gaps in order to contextualize behavior on digital media. The structure of the platform and design was also highlighted as an essential component as it leads to different behaviors.

Challenges to analyze data produced in Arabic was next discussed by Wajdi Zaghouani, who stated that data in Arabic is becoming more and more available, and that data is the new oil. However, analyzing this data is difficult, as Arabic is a very challenging language. There is a lot of ambiguity and variation in the written and spoken format of the language, which requires new processing tools. In addition, the romanization of the language also poses a problem when it comes to processing. It was stated that there was a need for tools to separate the noisy data and convert it into a usable format. Fine graining of tools to analyze dialects and less commonly used Arabic variety was also highlighted as a key area. Speech processing and lack of concentrated collaboration of researchers were also identified as gaps. Zaghouani also identified the detection of hate speech, polarization, and sarcasm as an understudied area that requires further research.

Zahir Irani looked at the topic of food security and big data in the Middle East and argued that much attention has been paid to the food waste from the plate, but very little to food lost during the supply chain. It was argued that food security was a challenge around both availability and accessibility and that efforts were needs that maintain the sustainability of food production and less fluctuation on the viability. It is estimated that our food needs over the next 40 years will be greater than in the past 10,000 years. This is attributed to a number of factors, including food waste and loss, and an increase in the global population. Science and technology can be to understand the issues at hand. New technology and geological surveys can present a better picture of the physical environment and lead to increased food production. Irani highlighted that some of the drivers of food (in)security include population, income, water supply, food supply, soil erosion, imports, wastages, yields, demands, seasonality, consumption, safety and nutrition, and health wellbeing. The question of feeding future generations has become a global challenge and safeguarding food disruption, and consumption through circular economy principles requires quality big data.

The participants then discussed the topic of big data and healthcare in the Middle East. Mowafa Househ highlighted 3 core research areas; privacy and responsibility, the cultural and religious dimension of collecting data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) and big data. AI has huge impacts on healthcare. Computing power and data being generated has changed the way healthcare is practiced, diagnosed, and cured. Narrow AI and better performing computers can help gain insight into different populations of different social and physical conditions. However, this data can help detect correlation but not the causation. In terms of privacy laws, countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Bahrain have certain policies in place however state still have access to the health data of the people, even with the implementation of privacy laws. What the state can do with the data and what kind of approach can be taken, is a question that needs further examination. Many countries in the Middle East have a multiple-tier system that separates the people. Data is collected and disseminated differently from different groups (citizens and residents), which leads to missing data points. How do academics apply ethical frameworks where there is no discrimination among the various groups and what are the values that you put into the algorithm, were some of the research gaps identified? Culture and religious sensitivities also need to be taken into consideration when it comes to health data collection in the Middle East. Engaging the local stakeholders and policymakers and involving them in the conversation was also highlighted as a critical area for future research.

Lisa Singh addressed different ways big data can benefit social science research and stated that there are different kinds of big data that can be used. Currently, every discipline has its own methodology, and there is a need for more integrated ways to use these big data. Researchers need to study big data as a field rather than independently for various case studies. Another area highlighted where big data and social science could collaborate was early warning mechanisms, which are technically challenging, and lacks strong political will. Currently, researchers lack a more holistic picture of the methodology required, which stresses the need for integration of data and various ways that it can be brought together.

The participants also discussed social media and religious discourse in the Arab region. Walid Magdy presented examples of how big data is helping answer questions in social sciences. One of the studies conducted included looking at people’s opinions and the change in perception due to major events and trends. It was highlighted that results from the study indicated that global change in trends does not mean change in individual opinion. In regards to religion and social media, a case study conducted emphasized that many users used social media platforms to have discussions on topics such as atheism, share positive tweets about Islam and religion in general and re-share or re-post tweets as a form of ongoing charity. There is a need to complement these findings with anthropological studies, and innovation and technology are required for sentiment analysis, especially for data generated in Arabic. Social media is vast and represents many people, which in turn presents many opportunities to measure user behavior but requires the collaboration of social and computer scientists.

Marc Owen Jones broadened the discussion on social media by addressing the question of hate speech and propaganda. Jones addressed the issue of data weaponization and colonization, platform manipulation, and the notion of ethics. There are different approaches to data collected from diverse sources; this data can be used to gauge audience usage and behavior on social media. In many of the previously observed cases, hate speech tends to be controlled by automated bot accounts. This leads to the question of who has the power to manipulate the data and how a small number of people have the influence to shape the discussion on social media. In addition, the question of how data is weaponized to promote certain political views and ideas that are held by a group of people and not the general public needs examination. Other areas for future study involve examining the political economy of the technological companies, governance of platforms, and integrity and quality of the data.

Georgios Papoaiannou shifted the focus of discussion to big data and museums and emphasized that museums collect a large amount of data on a daily basis. This data can be used to address some of the challenges and implications of big data and museums. When it comes to big data and museums, there is more than one reality and a number of issues that need academic focus. Qatar museum authority opened 4 new museums in the past 5 years. These institutes generate data on a daily basis that can be used to address ways to help make these museums better in various ways. One of the research areas identified was the need for data-driven museums and policies through which correct and meaningful information could be collected. Papoaiannou also stressed addressing sentiment via textual or image data and the pros and cons of doing this, as a gap in the existing literature.

Eid Mohamed analyzed Egyptian culture through big data and looked at the question of whether Egyptians still cared about the Arab Spring. The cultural data can provide evidence of growing revolutionary consciousness in the general masses. Most excitingly, an analysis of such great masses of source material offers the research community the opportunity to work on the challenge of discovering the appropriate epistemologies for coming to terms with emergent transcultural identities and a transformed Arab world in the making. Digital humanities, in general, offer a new set of methods for dealing with such an abundance of materials. The Arab Spring needs to be explored through an approach of localizing the change by using local stories. The pre-2011 context of significance concerns earlier moments when popular resistance came to the fore, moments that 2011 has been considered to be a continuation of or inspired by. These can be traced to the writings of Taha Hussein and other revolutionary writers. Computational tools are required to analyze the vast body of corpora as well as online and offline activism.

The dialogue then moved to the discussion of big data and female labor in Turkey. Gunes Asik stated that female employment is essential for development and that big data is not just user-generated data but also can mean large administrative data. This includes population data kept by the government in time series. Though this data is reliable, it is very difficult to access as government approval is required. Female employment and labor demand, in general, is affected by a number of factors, including discrimination, government policies, and the emergence of new sectors. Some of the determinants of female employment include education, conservatism, child and elderly care, health, and lack of social protection. Asik identified a number of research gaps, such as the impact of informal employment, the effect of domestic violence, and using Google search and social media to collect the data, as well as the automation of jobs and its impact on different genders.

Charbel Chedrawi talked about opportunities for big data in the defense sector and detailed that defense data is a black box. Data for this sector is not easily accessible, and there are very few scholars working on the topic. Big data is the strategic assets of the 21st century and is a valuable raw material for security and defense. However, there are certain barriers in generating and applying this data, including infrastructure, human barriers, such as lack of IT professionals in the organization, and lack of proper training and financial barrier, as budget is allocated mainly to weapons rather than research and development. Chedrawi identified 5 areas of further study; identifying the resource gaps in defense sector and the limitations associated with it; the hazards of outsourcing; isomorphism of the institutions; the type of technology required for mining the data and the role of big data in reducing the transaction cost and how can the defense sector benefit from such economies.

As a general takeaway, the roundtable discussions indicated that for social scientists studying the Middle East who want to use new data sources, it is of fundamental importance that they bridge the disciplinary divide and develop partnerships with data scientists. In order to make the best use of the variety of new data available and apply them to critical social sciences research questions in the region, there is a need to actively develop interdisciplinary collaborations. Working with data scientists who have the requisite expertise in data analytics will help social scientists make sense of and extract meaning from data from multiple sources. Moving forward with the discussions at this roundtable CIRS plans to launch a research project in the near future with a thematic focus on some of the core issue(s) and big data in the Middle East.

For the roundtable agenda, click here. For the research initiative, click here.
Participants and Discussants:
Shaza Afifi, Georgetown University in Qatar Gunes Asik, TOBB Economics and Technology University Zahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Mongoljin Batsaikhan, Georgetown University in Qatar Chiara Bernardi, University of Stirling Chaïmaa Benkermi, Georgetown University in Qatar Misba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Charbel Chedrawi, Saint Joseph University Salma Hassabou, Georgetown University in Qatar Mowafa Housef, Hamad Bin Khalifa University Zahir Irani, University of Bradford Marc Owen Jones, Hamad Bin Khalifa University Mehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Walid Magdy, University of Edinburgh Eid Mohamed, Doha Institute for Graduate Studies Emad Mohamed, University of Wolverhampton Phoebe Musandu, Georgetown University in Qatar Georgios Papaioannou, University College of London- Qatar Khushboo Shah, Georgetown University in Qatar Lisa Singh, Georgetown University Elizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Ingmar Weber, Qatar Computing Research Institute Wajdi Zaghouani, Hamad Bin Khalifa University
Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

CURA Workshop: Evaluating Credibility: Sources for Academic Research
2020-01-23 12:30 - 16:00
On January 23, 2020, CIRS hosted a CURA workshop titled, “Evaluating Credibility: Sources for Academic Research,” with GU-Q Professor Jim Reardon-Anderson and Librarian Paschalia Terzi. The workshop was focused on scholarly resource analysis and determining the authenticity of sources for research projects. Professor Anderson led the workshop and outlined some of his preferred techniques in determining the authenticity and validity of the sources. The workshop’s interactive nature made it a valuable learning experience. Furthermore, students gained substantial research strategy skills by engaging in this professional and encouraging environment.

Professor Anderson’s primary experience and scholarly insight further added to the meaningfulness of the workshop. He underlined how the right sources build on the internal validity and reliability and help strengthen the quality of the research project. Borrowing from his rich career experiences, Professor Anderson shared how he, as a researcher and historian, uses primary and secondary sources for his research projects. He outlined the necessity of a detail-oriented analysis to the research process, which benefited the students and encouraged them to be reflective of their own research experiences. His reflection prompted the students to understand the limitations of their research process and how to overcome some of the hurdles faced.

“The most useful and inspiring part of the workshop was Prof. Anderson’s personal description of what a researcher’s life is really like.” – Hussam Aitelqadi, sophomore at GU-Q.

Engaging with Professor Anderson, students questioned on how to accommodate the variety of sources available; for example, how to engage with multimedia resources such as newspapers, magazines, websites, and social media platforms, was one of the quires raised. Professor Anderson narrated how intersectional mediums and methods can boost one’s research and how students can benefit from the vast resources the Georgetown library provides. Hussam Aitelqadi, a sophomore at GU-Q who attended the workshop, commented on how participating in the workshop was an enriching learning experience. He reflected that, “the most useful and inspiring part of the workshop was Prof. Anderson’s personal description of what a researcher’s life is really like.” Another student, Jawaher Al-Sulaiti, also reflected on how the workshop helped her to gain a “better understanding of the tools of evaluation.”

In the second half of the session, GU-Q Librarian Paschali Terzi led the workshop through an interactive exercise. Building on Professor Anderson’s valuable insight, Paschalia showed students how to apply their practical learnings from the workshop. Students engaged with scholarly material and used a template to determine the credibility of the source. This was facilitated by accessing journals available on research databases and analyzing how social media can be used as part of research. This hands-on activity solidified the workshop experience; by immediately applying what they learned, students were able to practice new skills and receive feedback on their work from CIRS Staff and Paschalia. All in all, this workshop aimed at improving the overall research process of Georgetown University in Qatar’s undergraduate students.

Article by Khushboo Shah, CURA Administrative Fellow

Qatari Cases before International Dispute Settlement Fora
2020-01-27 18:00 - 19:30
On January 27, 2020, Mohammed Abdulaziz Al-Khulaifi, Dean of the College of Law at Qatar University, presented a talk at CIRS, Qatari Cases before International Dispute Settlement Fora, concerning legal actions following the blockade against Qatar that began on June 5, 2017. On that date, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Kingdom of Bahrain, and Egypt severed diplomatic relations and cut off direct communications with Qatar. Al-Khulaifi outlined the ways in which the four countries have taken coercive measures against Qatar and Qataris that are in contravention of their obligations under international treaties to which they are parties.

Al-Khulaifi said the State of Qatar has sought legal remedies and instituted proceedings against the four states using various international dispute settlement mechanisms. Three of the major cases currently pending are at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and are based on: the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms Racial Discrimination (CERD), the Convention on International Civil Aviation, and International Air Services Transit Agreement. In addition, there are two inter-state complaints before the CERD Committee. Additionally, there are two cases concerning trade that are currently pending before the World Trade Organization (WTO).

The first case that Al-Khulaifi discussed was filed by Qatar against the UAE under the CERD Convention, which deals with matters of human rights. Qatar brought the case against only the UAE because of the four blockading states, only the UAE recognizes the jurisdiction of the ICJ under this Convention. In this case, Qatar alleges that the UAE’s actions—for example, expelling Qatari citizens from the UAE—were based on national origin and therefore the UAE violated its obligations under the CERD. The Convention protects a number of rights including: prohibition on collective expulsion, the obligation to condemn racial hatred and incitement, the right to equal treatment before tribunals, the right to marriage and choice of spouse, and the right to own private property. These rights are outlined in Article 5 of the Convention, and Al-Khulaifi said, “We believe strongly that the UAE has clearly violated those rights.”

“Never has a country decided to submit a complaint in front of a United Nations human-rights treaty body against another state,” he said. “And I am glad that the case Qatar v. KSA is number one in history; and number two is Qatar v. UAE.”

Additionally, Qatar requested provisional measures before the ICJ on June 5, 2018, to receive an urgent order from the court “to preserve the rights of its nationals or the rights of the country itself.” The legal team successfully received the court’s approval for the provisional measures that ensured that families separated by the UAE’s measures were reunited; gave Qatari students the option of completing their education in the UAE, or at least access their necessary records; and allowed Qataris to access UAE courts and tribunals. A fourth measure required “both parties must refrain from any action that may aggravate the dispute during the proceedings of the case.” That the court found in favor of Qatar on these measures was a “clear rebuke of the unlawful discriminatory measures adopted by the UAE,” Al-Khulaifi said.

In March 2019, the UAE submitted its own request for provisional measures, which was an unconventional step and served to delay the process. However, the UAE’s request was rejected by the court in June 2019, Al-Khulaifi said.

The cases that are before the CERD Committee are conciliation procedures and concern racial discrimination. Qatar has filed two communications against the UAE and KSA. It is worth noting that the case against KSA could not be sent to the ICJ, Al-Khulaifi said, “Because Saudi Arabia decided, purposefully, to make a reservation to Article 22 of the CERD, so we could not follow that path.” He noted that this is the first filing of its kind in history. “Never has a country decided to submit a complaint in front of a United Nations human-rights treaty body against another state,” he said. “And I am glad that the case Qatar v. KSA is number one in history; and number two is Qatar v. UAE.” In August 2019, the CERD Committee decided to accept the jurisdiction and look at the two communications submitted by the State of Qatar; the cases is still pending.

Concerning the matter of civil aviation, the four blockading states have prevented Qatari airlines from flying over their territories, and also landing and taking off from their airports. “Those are clear violations of the Convention on International Civil Aviation,” he said. After receiving decisions from the ICAO Council confirming that it has jurisdiction to examine the merits of the cases, the four blockading states decided to appeal those decisions before the ICJ, “which will soon decide on these matters, and hopefully, will send the cases back to the ICAO Council. Then, the ICAO Council will examine the merits of our complaints,” he said.

In conclusion, Al-Khulaifi addressed the trade violations within the framework of the World Trade Organization (WTO). “Part of those coercive measures adopted by the four states—but more specifically the three neighboring states—is to simply prevent import, export, sale, purchase, license, transfer, and all types of commercial deals with the State of Qatar,” he said. Qatar filed complaints against Bahrain, KSA, and UAE arguing violations related to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), and the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). An additional separate case was filed against the KSA over intellectual property rights violations concerning copyright infringement, and more specifically, piracy of the content of beIN Sport.

As far as the case against the UAE before the ICJ is concerned, hearings on preliminary objections will take place soon. Al-Khulaifi said the hearings would be broadcast on the UNTV website. “We expect that a few months after the hearings, the Court will make its final decision on the jurisdiction of the case.

Mohammed Abdulaziz Al-Khulaifi is Dean of the College of Law and Associate Professor of commercial law at Qatar University. He is a member of several academic and professional committees in Qatar, including the Permanent Legislative Committee of the Council of Ministers. He has received numerous awards and fellowships, including His Highness Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, The Emir of Qatar, Ph.D. Award (Education Excellence Award, 2012). In parallel with his academic activities, Al-Khulaifi is a lawyer at Abdulaziz Al-Khulaifi law firm and serves as an independent adjudicator at the Qatar Financial Center, in Regulatory Authority. He acts as legal counsel to HE the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the State of Qatar, and he was appointed as the Agent of the State of Qatar before the International Court of Justice. His research and practice focus on commercial law, and he has authored numerous articles and books on bankruptcy, mergers and acquisitions, commercial law, banking transactions, and arbitration.

Article by Chaïmaa Benkermi (Class of 2021), CURA Publications Fellow

Economic Migration to the United States Roundtable
2020-02-15 09:00 - 2020-02-16 15:00
On February 15-16, 2020, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) held a Research Roundtable on the topic of Economic Migration to the United States with the purpose to deepen our understanding of the challenges and opportunities of skilled immigration flows to the U.S. OECD countries, and, until fairly recently, the U.S. have developed their migration policies and systems to attract skilled and highly-skilled migrants. With the last major immigration legislation being enacted 30 years ago, it is a worthwhile endeavor to analyze the current policy environment and lived experiences of skilled migrants in the U.S. Over the course of two days, participating scholars and experts engaged in a dynamic conversation that explored several important areas, including: transnational migration patterns to the U.S., categories of mobility, migration policy and reform, national security and migration, international student dynamics, and integration and political mobilization of specific migrant populations.

Silvia Pedraza, Professor of Sociology and American Culture at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, started the conversation by presenting the economic, political, and social aspects of transnationalism, as practiced by immigrants in their home and host countries. Instant communication has made an enormous impact on the lives of immigrants, helping them to remain connected to their families and community in their home countries. A particularly interesting phenomenon for the Cuban community is the emerging economic markets that have sprung up with the lifting of U.S. embargo against Cuba. Dr. Pedraza questions how increasing transnationalism and easier communication with the home country has affected the assimilation of Cuban immigrants, and whether it comes at a social or cultural cost to society.

There are many complex categories of immigration visas to the U.S. Payal Banerjee, Associate Professor and Chair of Sociology at Smith College, challenged the participants to consider that the status of highly-skilled migrants is just as precarious as that of low-skilled migrants. Though the common assumption is that low-skilled migrants are more vulnerable than highly-skilled migrants, the dependence on an employer, university, or family member for their legal status produces an unstable situation for highly-skilled migrants. Their status is conditional and terminable at any point, which could be to the benefit of the employer to keep wages low and the workforce flexible. The divide between documented and undocumented, skilled and unskilled, can be challenged when considering that all migrants exist in a state of precarity. Dr. Banerjee argued that immigration and migration policies will need to adapt to the labor ecology of the future, given the trends pointing towards AI, automation, and the use of algorithms in the sectors that are heavily reliant on skilled labor.

Continuing on the theme of immigration policy reform, Katharine Donato, the Donald G. Herzberg Professor of International Migration and Director of the Institute for the Study of International Migration in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, led the group through a discussion on the paradoxical way U.S. government administrations have approached reform. Immigration law has not changed since 1990, but rather, adjustments have been made on an ad-hoc basis through presidential orders and executive actions. On one hand, management of immigration policy by executive order is destabilizing for labor migrants, but it also allows for flexibility for this area where it is difficult to get calibrate the policy in a way that works for all stakeholders. This instability also impacts employers, who find it difficult to match their need with the supply of visas for highly-skilled migrants.

Work towards matching labor flow with employers needs was also a topic under the discussion led by Lindsay Lowell, Adjunct Research Professor in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and Senior Affiliate at the Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM), in the context of workplace mobility for highly-skilled migrants in the U.S. The STEM field is uniquely interesting in this regard and more research is needed to understand how the immigration system could be better organized to meet the need for STEM workers. Dr. Lowell also put forward for discussion the interplay between higher education and immigration. Many universities develop specific programs designed to attract international students, who are a large funding source for universities. Students may come to study in the U.S. expecting that after graduation they will be able to easily transfer to a H-1B visa and find employment. But in reality, this is often not the case.

Elizabeth Ferris, Research Professor at Georgetown University in the Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM), led a discussion on the concept of national security in the U.S. as it relates to migration. The relationship between the two, she argued, largely depends on how national security is defined. According to Dr. Ferris, for those traditionalists who view national security as primarily protecting borders, immigration — both legal and unauthorized — tends to be viewed as a potential threat to U.S. national interests. Others take a broader view of national security to include concepts important to human security. Those who take this view tend to see immigration to the U.S. in terms of long-term economic interests and the soft power of the U.S. Though there is a lot of research on immigration in the context of national security, more work needs to be done bridging the gap between these two parallel views of the topic.

The U.S. has historically been one of the key focal points attracting international students. Terry Wotherspoon, Professor of Sociology at the University of Saskatchewan, led a discussion on the intentions and ability of international students to stay in the U.S. once their education is completed. General trends suggest that a majority of international students have a strong preference to stay in the country of study. Yet fewer than half of those actually end up staying. There can be many reasons behind why students leave despite their wanting to stay, but there is not much evidence to draw strong conclusions. Dr. Wotherspoon argued that as source countries like India and China are going through important labor market, demographic, and technological changes, it is important to understand the implication for international student mobility and settlement in the U.S. and the long-term political economy of the higher education field.

On the second day of the Research Roundtable, the discussion shifted towards looking at economic migration of specific ethnic groups to the U.S. Michael Ewers, Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, opened the day by leading a conversation on skilled migration to the U.S. from the Middle East. For this population, it is interesting to consider migration in the context of securitization, economic benefits, and perceptions of the security threat of migrants. Though the economic and financial impact of immigration in the U.S. is not well-known and widely debated, what is certain is that large Middle Eastern immigrant populations are settling in large cities in the U.S. that are trending towards population loss, such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York. What this could mean for these cities’ economic markets is an interesting area of research.

Migration flows to the U.S. from Latin America in the past have been largely low-skilled, but since 2007, the education levels and English language skills of migrants have increased. René Zenteno, Professor of Demography at The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), led the participants in a discussion on the experiences of undocumented highly-skilled migrants from Latin America. There are more highly-skilled migrants in the flow of undocumented migrants than before, and whether or not they have legal status may impact the ability of the migrant to integrate into the labor market. Highly-skilled Hispanic migrants also experience of workplace discrimination to a greater extent than non-Hispanic highly-skilled migrants, which may also be related to their legal status. The transference of foreign credentials to the U.S. often creates a skill-job mismatch for Latin American migrants who may be highly qualified in their home country, but must take positions in the U.S. that require less qualification due to the non-recognition of their foreign credentials.

The final two sessions of the Research Roundtable discussed the experiences of Asian migrants to the U.S. Sangay Mishra, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Drew University, opened a discussion on the political mobilization of South Asian immigrants, by Indian communities in particular. A unique characteristic of the Indian immigrant population is that the vast majority are foreign-born, not second generation. Indian immigrants are the third-largest immigrant group in the U.S., yet at least 50 percent of Indian immigrants are not U.S. citizens and are on other visa types than just the H-1B visa category. For this community, the parameters of the H4 dependent visa has been an important area of political mobilization. In particular, lobbying groups have taken up the issue of the right of H4 dependent migrants to work, and push for immigration reform in this area. The overwhelming percentage of highly educated women who are in this category forms a unique sub-group of the Indian immigrant population that deserves further examination.

Min Zhou, Professor of Sociology and Asian American Studies, Walter and Shirley Wang Endowed Chair in US-China Relations and Communications, and Director of the Asia Pacific Center at the University of California, Los Angeles, continued the discussion in a comparison of the Indian and Chinese highly-skilled migrants in Los Angeles, California. In terms of visa categories, Indian immigrants mostly migrate to the U.S. on the H-1B visa. For Chinese immigrants, the majority of migrants come on a student visa and then adjust to the H-1B category. Yet, Chinese are the overwhelming majority of the recipients of EB-5 investment visas. The integration patterns of these communities are diverse based on education and profession. Those Chinese migrants who have higher socioeconomic characteristics on arrival seem to integrate much more quickly than others. As the non-Hispanic White population in the U.S. continues to lose the numerical majority, Dr. Zhou suggests that perhaps the power dynamics between races and migrants/non-migrants could shift.

There are several overall themes coming out of the two days of discussion, including: the precarity of immigrants in the U.S., across the skill spectrum; the increasing difficulty with which rigid visa categories can accurately match skilled labor with market needs, especially in the STEM fields; and the long-term career trajectories, workplace mobility, and settlement opportunities for highly-skilled migrants and international students, especially at the intersection of higher education and immigration policies. Immigrant experiences across all nationalities are influenced by gender and generational aspects, especially when it comes to immigrant families and the ability to integrate into the local labor market. More highly-skilled migrants are undocumented than before, and their experiences of labor market and social integration and discrimination are important areas for future study.

CIRS plans to follow on from this roundtable with a more in-depth research project on the topic of economic migration to the U.S. in order to better understand these questions.

For the roundtable agenda, click here.
For the participants’ biographies, click here.

For the research initiative, click here.
Participants and Discussants:
Zahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Payal Banerjee, Smith College Katharine M. Donato, Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) – Georgetown University Michael Ewers, University of North Carolina at Charlotte Elizabeth Ferris, Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) – Georgetown University Mehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar B. Lindsay Lowell, Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) – Georgetown University Sangay Mishra, Drew University Silvia Pedraza, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Elizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar Terry Wotherspoon, University of Saskatchewan René Zenteno, The University of Texas at San Antonio Min Zhou, University of California, Los Angeles
Article by Elizabeth Wanucha, Operations Manager at CIRS

Fascism 2.0: Lessons from Democracy in India
2020-02-25 12:45 - 13:45
Uday Chandra, Assistant Professor of Government at GU-Q, presented on “Fascism 2.0: Lessons from Democracy in India” at a CIRS event on February 25, 2020. The talk drew on his book in progress, Fascism 2.0, which traces how and why India’s heterogeneous, multi-ethnic, multi-religious society has been recast under modern democratic conditions as a homogeneous, mono-cultural, mono-religious polity. Since the 1980s, the rights and freedoms of religious minorities, particularly Christians and Muslims, have eroded steadily with the rise of Hindu nationalism, a movement among the growing middle classes who see Indian society in majoritarian terms as essentially Hindu.

Chandra’s forthcoming book is concerned with what others today call populism. He points to the global rise of fascism, which, he argued, parallels the inter-war period in Europe. Chandra suggested revisiting the “triad of global ideologies—liberalism, socialism, fascism,” which goes back to the contradictory French revolutionary slogan of “liberty, equality, fraternity,” in order to understand the interactions between these ideologies over the past century. By historicizing the politics of the present and using the case of India, he teases out a set of broad comparative generalizations.

The book’s title, Fascism 2.0, reveals both continuities and changes within fascism, particularly its adaptation to our age of “digital capitalism.” One of Chandra’s objectives is to identify the relationship between fascism and democracy. Non-democracies such as China or Saudi Arabia are unlikely to evolve into fascist regimes, he suggests, because popular sovereignty or the rule of the people is not vital to the functioning of these polities. By comparison, it is possible to identify conditions that favor the collapse of the liberal order at home and abroad and triggers the turn towards fascism.

“Fascism seemed more promising to ruling elites because it combined socialism’s antipathy to the old ruling classes with a nationalist vision that promised real change for all.”

The liberal international order, established after World War II, was organized around free markets, multilateral institutions, and liberal democracy. While this project brought economic prosperity and political freedoms to some, especially in the West, it also led to inequalities within these societies and worldwide. Today, we face new political realities with the rise of “a new breed of illiberal politicians” such as Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán, who claim to represent ordinary voters better than career politicians. Chandra argued that there are lessons to be learned from India’s democratic experience under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was first elected in 2014. “These lessons concern how democracy sans liberalism—the new global norm—can be hijacked by ‘fascism 2.0,’ even as we must not lose sight of the ways in which democracy can be restored to a healthy, competitive state.”

Chandra observed that, a century ago, fascism emerged in Europe in response to the failures of Western liberal elites to spread the vast economic benefits of imperialism throughout their societies. Socialism, by contrast, pitted social classes against each other. Fascism seemed more promising to ruling elites because “it combined socialism’s antipathy to the old ruling classes with a nationalist vision that promised real change for all.” Fascism thus combined socialism and ethno-nationalism to offer a modern agenda of mass education, public works, and national rejuvenation. “It is easy to forget today that fascism was astonishingly successful in its own terms,” Chandra said.

In postcolonial India, Chandra explained, democracy began as “a gift of well-meaning upper-caste Hindus to the masses.” The Congress party, which led the anticolonial struggle under Gandhi and Nehru, dominated national politics in India in the 1950s and 1960s. The party reflected the country’s highly diverse polity and emphasized “unity in diversity” within a federal framework. In the mid-1970s, however, “democracy was suspended” by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi after global oil shocks and a rising tide of youthful and left-wing protests. Political opponents were imprisoned, elections suspended, and civil liberties curtailed. Although this authoritarian turn lasted just a year and a half, Chandra suggested that the embryo of fascism emerged in Indian politics: personalized rule, militarism, the primacy of the state over the economy, and empty promises of national renewal.

After the assassination of Indira Gandhi, Chandra explained, the Indian state underwent a crisis of legitimacy, which has been steadily resolved via the rise of Hindu nationalism championed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, literally “Indian People’s Party”). This nationalist ideology, borrowed from Germany and Italy, was explicitly rejected by India’s founding fathers because it was exclusivist, chauvinistic, and socially divisive. The Congress leadership saw India as a mosaic of faiths and cultures, held together by their shared struggle against British imperialism. But, according to Chandra, the BJP has sought to remake India as a Hindu nation out of a vast ensemble of inherited theistic and nontheistic practices and their accompanying philosophies. For the Hindu nationalist elite, he said, these diverse Indic traditions must be replaced by a modern nationalist ideology built around an imaginary majority and pitted against minorities.

“In a digital age, social democracy means fusing together the myriad voices and social fractals that do not share much in common beyond a common antipathy to fascism.”

Under Modi, the BJP has sought to make this ideological fantasy into social reality, online and offline. A new political morality now justifies violence against ideological enemies in pursuit of a national communitas. Social media platforms empower ordinary users to generate words, images, and videos that further the Hindu nationalist project at the expense of minorities and those accused of sympathizing with them.

In a democracy without liberalism, Chandra identified “social democracy” as the main alternative to Hindutva (Hinduness) today. The roots of this challenge lie in caste-based, regionally specific movements for social justice that emerged during the 1980s at the same time as Hindutva. While these regional and caste-based parties allied previously with the Congress party to form national coalition governments, they now offer a distinctive vision of a federal polity committed to the multitude of small voices that make up contemporary India. In state elections over the past two years, this coalition of Opposition parties have, alongside the Congress, outsmarted and defeated the BJP.

Chandra concluded his talk by arguing that India is an ideal case study to understand contemporary fascism. India shows us how fascism, which must be distinguished from the political movements led by the likes of Corbyn and Sanders, has arisen paradoxically out of a long process of democratization. Additionally, it has come at the expense of a small globally oriented and liberal-minded elite at odds with the majority of citizens. Lastly, the antidote to fascism, whether today or in the interwar years, comes less from a return to liberalism than from the tantalizing possibility of social democracy. “In a digital age, social democracy means fusing together the myriad voices and social fractals that do not share much in common beyond a common antipathy to fascism,” he said. Over time, Chandra suggested, we may be cautiously hopeful that social democratic coalitions will succeed at the expense of fascism.

Uday Chandra is Assistant Professor of Government at Georgetown University in Qatar. He is interested in state-society relations, power and resistance, political violence, agrarian change, and the philosophy of the social sciences. His work has been published in the Law & Society Review, Critical Sociology, Social Movement Studies, New Political Science, The Journal of Contemporary Asia, Contemporary South Asia, and The Indian Economic & Social History Review. Chandra has co-edited volumes and journal special issues on caste hierarchies, the ethics of self-making, the politics of the poor, and social movements in India. His first book, Resistance as Negotiation: Making States and Tribes in Modern India, is forthcoming with Stanford University Press. For the academic year 2019/2020, he is a CIRS Faculty Fellow.

Article by Chaïmaa Benkermi (Class of 2021), Publications Fellow

Football in the Middle East Working Group II
2020-04-06 14:00 - 2020-04-13 15:00
Between April 6 and 13 2020, the Center for International and Regional Studies held the second working group for its research initiative on “Football in the Middle East.” In light of the rapidly changing restrictions imposed on international travel as well as to maintain social distancing measures, this working group was held “virtually”. Paper contributors made use of available technological options to meet, present and comment on each of the paper submissions. The Working Group welcome and wrap up brought the scholars together for live interaction via Zoom conferencing, and these group sessions were complemented by asynchronous interaction through prerecorded video discussions using Blackboard. This dual approach enabled CIRS to adapt to the current global situation and ensure the continuation of its research activities and engagement with the academic community.

The presentations and papers discussed are as follow,

Playing in the triple periphery: Exclusionary policies towards Palestinian football in Lebanon- Danyel Reiche

GCC Football Fans and Their Engagement: Establishing a Research Agenda – Simon Chadwick

Education in sports administration from scratch: the case of Qatar – John McManus

Who Kisses the Badge? The Player’s Perspective in the Performance of National Identity in the Qatar National Team – Thomas Ross Griffin

Refugees and Football in the Global and Middle East Context – Ramón Spaaij

Beyond Soft Power: Football as a Form of Regime Legitimation – Abdullah Al-Arian

The National Game: A Political Prehistory of the Egyptian League – Ibrahim Elhoudaiby

Women’s football in Turkey: Trivial, threatening and ultimately unequal – Yagmur Nuhrat

A Study of Football Art as Political Expression in the Algerian Hirak – Maher Mezahi

This CIRS project is an attempt to engage and produce new literature on an understudied area in the Middle East by engaging scholars and experts from multiple disciplines, including political science, anthropology, business, and journalism among others. After final revisions based on peer comments and suggestions, CIRS will gather the final chapter submissions into an edited volume on Football in the Middle East to be published by a university press.

Read more about this research initiative

Participants and Discussants:

Shaza Afifi, Georgetown University in QatarZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarSimon Chadwick, emlyon Business School, FranceIbrahim Elhoudaiby, Columbia UniversityThomas Griffin, Qatar UniversitySalma Hassabou, Georgetown University in QatarMehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJohn McManus, Qatar UniversityMaher Mezahi, Independent Football Journalist, Algeria Suzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarYagmur Nuhrat, Istanbul Bilgi University, TurkeyDanyel Reiche, American University of BeirutRamon Spaaji, Victoria University, Australia Jackie Starbird, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

Sonic Connections and Diasporic Belonging: Malayalam Radio in Qatar
2020-04-14 12:45 - 13:45 | Education City, Al Luqta St, Ar-Rayyan, Doha, Qatar
Irene Promodh, a Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) junior majoring in International Politics and a CURA Research Fellow, presented her research titled, “FM Radio and the Malayali Diaspora in Qatar: At Home Overseas” in a virtual CURA Focused Discussion on Tuesday, April 14, 2020. Promodh undertook this research project as part of the Certificate in Media and Politics (CMAP) program, which is offered jointly by GU-Q and Northwestern University in Qatar. She used a mixed-methods approach in conducting her research, deploying both semi-structured interviews with radio producers and listeners and media content analyses of the radio content broadcast itself. As such, “Malayalis” or speakers of the Malayalam language (the official language of Kerala, a state in South India) form the demographic focus of her research along the axes of gender, class, occupation, and family status.

Promodh traces the ways in which diasporic vernacular radio mediates the everyday lives of Malayali migrants in Qatar across both home and workspaces, particularly for single, lower-income, male, and female migrants. In Qatar, she deploys Radio Yatra FM [pseudonym used] as a case study in her project to examine the role of migrant radio along both radio production and listenership lines and its salience in the everyday work lives of Malayalis in Qatar. Promodh finds that Malayali radio audiences negotiate their “Malayali-ness,” or the ways of being Malayali, along gendered and socioeconomic lines through their engagement with diasporic vernacular radio. Paying attention to sonic waves and networks that bind together radio stations and audiences in Qatar across work and home spaces, she argues that diasporic vernacular radio both reinforces and challenges notions of “Malayali-ness” both within the Gulf Malayali community (bandham) and in non-Malayali urban workspaces in Qatar. Highly affordable and accessible, Promodh argues that radio uses migrant sabdam or “sound” to create and recreate spaces of sonic belonging, territorializing Malayalis’ workspaces along ethnolinguistic and exclusionary lines. She premises her findings, such as the one above, on her interview data with individuals ranging from Malayali beauticians at small salons and limousine drivers to library staff and, of course, radio station staff themselves.

Engaging with the scholarly works of Laith Ulaby, Neha Vora, and Fahad Bishara, among others, Promodh explores the cultural production histories of the western Indian Ocean and the formation of the Arabi-Malayalam language. She examines through ethnographic methods how the current socio-political realities that Malayalis in Qatar face transfigure Malayalam as a “migrant language” and its usage, which is regulated in the public sphere. Promodh observes the musical traditions associated with pearl-diving and shipbuilding, as well as other cross-cultural exchanges between India’s southwestern coast and the Persian Gulf, to explore the long-standing relationships between the two regions. While language in the past represented interconnectedness Promodh argues that today, “language is an exclusionary medium in the creation of non-physical space or, in effect, “soundscapes,” even along citizen-migrant lines, situating just the native speaker within.”

“Radio is central to diasporic Malayalis in Qatar as it creates a space of sonic belonging for them within the community.”

Promodh explores the interaction between the Malayali diasporic community and Radio Yatra, a prominent radio station in Qatar. She details how the 2017 Qatar Blockade transformed the diasporic radio scene in Qatar, bringing Radio Yatra to the forefront of the radio scene. Through her case study of this radio station, Promodh dictates the cross-sections between politics and media narratives which exist in trying to cater to the Malayali audience in Qatar. She argues that Radio Yatra is “central to diasporic Malayali life [because it creates a] sonic belonging . . . within the Malayali community.” She quotes Neha Vora, an anthropologist, to suggest that the Malayalis in Qatar experience a “state of permanent temporariness.”[1] The final segment of her presentation reiterates the gendered dynamics at play between radio jockeys and their audiences, as well as between the female jockeys themselves and their male managers. Through her interviews, she examines the professional realities of female radio jockeys, their workplace hierarchies, and their relationship with their male superiors. Promodh also explores the politics of the “ideal” Malayali family construct and how female Malayali radio jockeys construct and redefine their perceptions of womanhood and diasporic belonging according to norms associated with Malayali femininity and family life in the Kerala context.

In all, Promodh’s research deconstructs and demonstrates the symbolism of diasporic vernacular radio in the lives of Malayalis living in Qatar. Promodh concludes that Malayalis in Qatar experience “home away from the Kerala homeland via diasporic vernacular radio.” The radio, which may be perceived as an ordinary infotainment medium, accentuates the blurred nature of “work-leisure” boundaries and its profound role in the lives of the Malayali diaspora in Qatar. Through her empirical observations and findings, Promodh steers towards a refreshing narrative of migrant life in the Gulf beyond parochialisms of migrants as purely “labor.”

[1] Vora, Impossible Citizens: Dubai’s Indian Diaspora, 3.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Irene Promodh is a junior at GU-Q majoring in International Politics and is originally from South India. She works as a CURA Research Fellow and assists CIRS Director, Professor Mehran Kamrava, and Associate Director for Research Zahra Babar with their research centered on the region, while also working to advance the newly established CURA program. Her personal interests are rooted strongly in researching the dynamics of the media in influencing labor migration trends from South Asia to the Gulf, and she hopes to pursue further research in this field.

Article by Khushboo Shah, CURA Administrative Fellow

CURA Spotlight on Undergraduate Publishing
2020-04-23 12:45 - 13:45
On April 23, 2020, CIRS hosted an online CURA workshop titled, “CURA Spotlight on Undergraduate Publishing,” featuring presentations by Suzi Mirgani, Assistant Director for CIRS Publications, Jackie Starbird, CIRS Publications and Projects Assistant, and Chaïmaa Benkermi, CIRS Publications Fellow. The workshop was centered around supporting undergraduate research and publishing, with a focus on the path towards academic publishing, its benefits, as well as its difficulties. Overall, the workshop aimed at offering interested students useful resources and information to promote more undergraduate research and publication.

Suzi Mirgani led the workshop by sharing her professional experience and advice on research and publishing. Additionally, the workshop actively engaged participants to share their ideas, questions, and concerns. She recommended various venues in which to publish, including peer-reviewed academic journals, and advised against engaging with vanity presses or those that demand a fee to publish. She encouraged students to practice their academic writing skills by regularly writing and submitting book reviews to academic journals, which are relatively short in length and can be smartly integrated into a student’s regular university reading and writing workload. Mirgani shared her experience, both as an author and as an editor, regarding the peer-review process, which she acknowledged to be an exhausting, but worthy process that becomes easier with practice. Over time, students learn scholarly writing requirements and the best ways to execute them. Mirgani emphasized the importance of keeping an open mind when it comes to reviewer criticism as well as patience regarding the often-lengthy process. She also stressed the importance of understanding the power relation between author and publisher when entering the publication field. Moreover, Mirgani engaged students by questioning their research interests and current projects and received questions on how to transform a class paper to a ready-to-be-published submission and how to avoid biased writing.

Jackie Starbird expanded the discussion and included examples of publishing sites, offering platforms such as the CURA Paper Series to gain valuable experience in the review and publishing processes. She also gave examples of undergraduate research journals and explained the selection criteria for submissions and requirements for publishing such as word count, formatting, and recommendation letters. Starbird concluded with helpful tips on writing and publishing, including using resources offered by CIRS’s CURA program and GU-Q, such as seeking out professors for advice and mentorship and setting goals like presenting a paper at a conference.

Chaïmaa Benkermi, Annual Undergraduate Research Conference (AURC) President, followed with an introduction of AURC as a way to voice, present, and publish original research for undergraduate students. This year’s conference theme was “The Road to Peace: Challenges and Opportunities for Peacebuilding.” She explained the process of application and review but also encouraged students to be part of the AURC team.

The workshop concluded with helpful tips on writing and publishing including using resources offered by CIRS and GU-Q, such as seeking out professors for advice and mentorship and setting goals like presenting a paper at a conference. Overall, this workshop aimed at offering interested students useful resources and information to promote more undergraduate research and publication.

Article by Salma Hassabou, CURA Administration Fellow

Tunisia in the Aftermath of the Arab Uprisings Working Group II
2020-06-22 16:00 - 2020-06-29 17:00
Between June 22 and 29 2020, the Center for International and Regional Studies held the second working group for its faculty research initiative on “Tunisia in the Aftermath of the Arab Uprisings.” This CIRS project is a faculty-led initiative, under the intellectual guidance of Professor Mohamed Zayani. Adopting a hybrid model the group met and discussed the submitted chapters virtually. The group met for two short sessions of live group interaction using Zoom conferencing and discussed and provided feedback on the submitted chapters via asynchronous interaction through prerecorded videos hosted on the Blackboard platform. Taking a multi-disciplinary approach, the meeting offered an in-depth discourse on the post-revolutionary Tunisian state.

The paper presented and discussed are as follows:

Tunisian Youth: Catalyst for Socio-Political Change and Emergence of Identity Politics in post-Arab Spring Tunisia – Zouhir Gabsi

Tunisia’s Reinvigorated Civil Society – Zuzana Hudáková

Transitional Bodies, Modern Politics and Anti-Democratic Potential: The Case of HAICA – Enrique Klaus

Women’s Rights in Tunisia from 1900 to 2020: From Taboo to Totem – Lilia Labidi

Tunisian Transition in the Context of Middle East Persistent Authoritarianism- Marina Ottaway

From Political Protest to Contention against Austerity: Mobilization in Tunisia Post-2011 – Irene Weipert-Fenner

Ennahda and Post-Islamism Politics in Tunisia – Fabio Merone

What can Tunisia’s Past Tell us about its Future? – Alexandra Blackman

Under the intellectual lead of Professor Zayani, this CIRS project seeks not only to identify and better understand trends that characterize the country’s uneasy transition 10 years after the revolution but also to examine what some of these intricate and intertwined changes of transition mean for the future of the Tunisian state. The contributions to this research project are embedded in imperially grounded research from the perspective of various disciplinary specialty and research focus. CIRS plans to publish the outcome of this timely project in an edited volume in the near future.

Read more about this research initiative.

Participants and Discussants:

Zahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarAlexandra Blackman, New York University Abu Dhabi, UAEAhmad Dallal, Georgetown University in QatarZouhir Gabsi, Deakin University, AustraliaZuzana Hudáková, Sciences Po, ParisMehran Kamrava, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarEnrique Klaus, Galatasaray University, TurkeyLilia Labidi, Association of Tunisian Women for Research and Development (AFTURD), TunisiaFabio Merone, University of Ghent, BelgiumAlyssa Miller, University of Pennsylvania, USSuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarMarina Ottaway, Woodrow Wilson Center, USJackie Starbird, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarIrene Weipert-Fenner, Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, GermanyMohamed Zayani, Georgetown University in Qatar

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

The 2022 World Cup in Qatar in Historical Perspective
2020-10-06 18:00 - 20:00
The FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ breaks new ground—the first World Cup to be held in the Middle East, the first in a Muslim majority society, and the first to be held in November. David Goldblatt, a sociologist, journalist, and bestselling author examined the economics, politics, and urban development that have accompanied the upcoming event and compared these to past World Cups.

Goldblatt explained, “The 2006 World Cup in Germany was the first one to have a proper dimension for the environmental aspects of the major sporting event. The 2014 and 2018 World Cup editions had full-scale carbon analysis. 2022 is genuinely different. The commitment of the Qatari government towards the environment is really noteworthy for a carbon-zero event. The seriousness towards this commitment is seen in the construction as well as in the public transport arrangements for the World Cup.”

Speaker: David Goldblatt, is an honorary fellow at the International Centre for Sports History and Culture, De Montfort University, Leicester, U.K., teaches for the Geneva based Football Business Academy, and is a visiting Professor at Pitzer College, Los Angeles.

Moderator: Danyel Reiche, Visiting Associate Professor at GUQ.

Economic Migration to the United States Virtual Working Group
2020-10-19 17:00 - 2020-10-20 19:30
On October 19-20, 2020, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) held the second working group for its research initiative on Economic Migration to the US. The virtual meeting brought together scholars who presented draft papers on important themes related to immigration reform, transnationalism, education, and labor market participation and employment. In addition, several papers provided focused case studies of economic migrants from particular regions such as South Asia, East Asia, and Latin America.

The working group commenced with Payal Banerjee’s paper on “Economic Migration to the US: An Exchange with Data-Capitalism, Surveillance and Other Considerations in Immigrant Incorporation.” In this paper Banerjee critiques a terminology that frames and conceptualizes international migrants to the US within a bounded idea of “economic.” What constitutes economic migration is informed by broader social and political mechanisms and dynamics. This paper seeks to expand the economic lens and press against it so that it captures the social and historical making of immigrants and their labor contributions in the US. The Banrjee paper suggests that it is essential to address issues of inherent inequality between labor and capital through a structured discussion of capitalism and its new forms. A particular scrutiny of the impact that automation, digitization, and surveillance technologies are having on migrants is needed at the current juncture. Banerjee states that new forms of automation, as well as data capitalism and the algorithms it produces are reshuffling the circulation of capital and influencing immigration management in the country.

Terry Wotherspoon presented his paper on “International Student Mobility and Settlement,” stating that until fairly recently there was limited scholarship and policy attention focused on international students as potential future immigrants. In his paper, Wotherspoon focuses on the relationship between national immigration policies and the aspirations or desires of the students themselves, and studies the factors that either facilitate or inhibit students’ permanent settlement. While for the most part international students are still seen by the state primarily as temporary visitors, policy developments reflect the fact that internationals students have also been considered as a useful means by which to address short-term labor market needs. There is a significant gap between the number of students who express a desire to remain in the host country and those who find employment and actually stay on after completing their studies. The paper looks at various pathways available for international students to facilitate their stay in the US and how this is informed by global trends.

In his presentation on “South Asian Migrant Communities and US Politics,” Sangay Mishra questions the political deficit that temporary migrant workers faces as a result of limitations to political and civic participation that the visa regime imposes on them. The H-1B is essentially a guest worker visa that is designed around the concept of temporariness. This visa regime produces a democratic and civic deficit in the United States, as those living and working in the country under this visa category are relegated to non-participation. In the US inclusion and participation are assumed to be privileges available to those who “earn it,” usually through contributing to the economy and abiding by the system and their legal status for a certain duration of time. However, for those who remain on the H-1B there is no guarantee of acquiring permanent status or becoming eligible for citizenship, despite years of staying on US soil. In the empirical section of the article, Sangay looks at a particular situation that is created for Indian H-1B visa holders when they apply for a green card and the waiting time.

Silvia Pedraza’s paper on “Transnationalism Among Immigrants: Economic, Political, Social,” outlines the various immigrant experiences such as assimilation, incorporation and transnationalism. Pedraza argues that while immigrants to United States have always demonstrated forms of transnationalism, current advances of in communication technology have changed the nature and scope of their transnational behaviors. The present day American immigrant lives across two or more nations as well as different time spans, tied to the past and the present, in both host and sending country. Pedraza’s paper breaks down the different types of transnationalism that demonstrate distinctly economic, social, and political elements.

Min Zhou shared her research on “Contemporary Immigration to the US from East Asia.” Professor Zhou’s paper focuses on the migration of three major ethnonational groups, Japanese, Chinese and the Koreans, and their distinct histories of migration to the United States. Zhou states that while these three groups have their own distinct migration stories, they are often racialized and treated as single consolidated group in the US. This paper provides an analytical overview of the immigration trends of the three Asian migrant communities, and how their diasporas have evolved. The paper provides a structured discussion of contemporary trends of cross-border mobility, socioeconomic characteristics of migration and patterns of social mobility for each of the Asian communities. Zhou suggests that old and new stereotypes have continued to influence the lives and identity formation of East Asian Americans.

In her presentation of a paper jointly authored with Catelina Amnuedo Dorantes on “The US Visa System without Legislative Change: Growing Complexity and Difference,” Professor Katherine Donato addressed the issue of variations in the US visa systems across presidential administrations. She maintained that the legal visa systems that were created by the Immigration Act of 1990 remain unchanged and still define the way legal immigrants enter the US. She provided an overview of the visa admission system, defining its goals, composition and reforms that have occurred under successive administrations. Using immigrant entry data, covering the 2002 through 2017 as well as trends in nonimmigrant visa issuances she maintained that visas differ in important ways across various US administrations. The variations have intended and unintended consequences, which are important for any policy proposals drafted in the future to improve the legal immigration system in the US.

Lindsey Lowell continued the discussion on the visa systems by focusing on H-1B visa category. In his paper titled, “Preferential Hiring and the US Earnings of Skilled Foreign Temporary Workers,” he maintained that the theory of preferential hiring drives our understanding about sector-specific earnings of H-1B workers. Employers often prefer to hire foreign workers and temporary visa systems such as H-1B offer advantages in hiring and control over employment. In this paper Lindsey proposes that the when it comes to the earnings of H-1B the correct comparison should be to all domestic workers i.e. natives and foreign born. Combing data on H-1B with a large sample of US workers, full time domestic worker, Lindsay’s research concluded that while H-1B earn more than native born workers, their earnings are less than that of domestic workers.

Misba Bhatti addressed the question of degree devaluation with her paper titled, “Devalued Credentials: Pakistani Female Highly Skilled Migrants in the United States.” This work examines and nuances the experiences of highly skilled women from Pakistan and details the issues they face in the United States in regard to the devaluation of their foreign earned degrees. There is a gender skew with women often being placed at a greater academic or occupational disadvantage than their male counterparts. This is more visible in sectors that hire certain sets of skilled migrants and are usually tipped in favor of male skilled migrants. Likewise, the foreign credentials of female migrants from South Asia are treated differently, as that of having lower standards, than that of women skilled migrants from developed economies. As a result highly skilled female migrants from developing economies face systematic dual dichotomy when it comes to their foreign earned credential recognition in the U.S.

The last discussion of the working group was led by Rene Zenteno, who presented a paper on “Latin American Skilled Workers’ Socio-Economic Integration.” Using data from 1990 to 2018 the paper constructs an updated demographic and provides an understanding of the recent transformations of the Latino immigration to the U.S. The data collected yields a picture of significant changes in the characteristics and qualities of Latino Immigrants as this wave of migration from Latin America declines quickly. The paper states that this decrease in the flow of Latin immigration has effected student migration largely, as well as the supplies of high-skilled Latino immigrants. Professor Zenteno also argues that despite changes in cohort quality, the successful integration of Latino immigrants into the U.S. society is still hindered by the large presence of un-skilled workers, the lack of a path to legalization, the low rates of naturalization, and the ethno-racial profiling of U.S. immigration enforcement.

For the roundtable agenda, click here.For the participants’ biographies, click here.For the research initiative, click here.

Participants and Discussants:

Maram Al-Qershi, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarPayal Banerjee, Smith CollegeMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarAhmad Dallal, Georgetown University in QatarKatharine M. Donato, Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) – Georgetown UniversityCatalina Amuedo-Dorantes, University of California, MercedAnatol Lieven, Georgetown University in QatarB. Lindsay Lowell, Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) – Georgetown UniversitySuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarSangay Mishra, Drew UniversitySilvia Pedraza, University of Michigan, Ann ArborElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarTerry Wotherspoon, University of SaskatchewanRené Zenteno, The University of Texas at San AntonioMin Zhou, University of California, Los Angeles

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

Qatar's Football Journey: From First Games on Sand to Hosting the World as Asian Champions
2020-11-16 18:00 - 19:30
Qatar has no football history, or so the critics say. In this moderated lecture, Doha-born journalist and author Matthias Krug debunks that myth by telling the inside story of the country’s most cherished football and sporting moments and players over the past six decades.

Krug expressed, “Qatar has become a capital of world sports which will host global football fans in 2022. So in order to gain a full understanding of this development it is important to look at the history and where this rapid development and incredible sports vision has come from.”

Speaker: Matthias Krug is an author and journalist who was born and raised in Qatar, where he lives with his family. Matthias has written extensively about football, society, politics and culture for over 18 years for some of the biggest publications around the world, including for the BBC, CNN, ESPN, The Huffington Post, The Irish Examiner, Al Jazeera English, 442, El Pais, Arts Monthly Australia, and many others. His most recent book is titled Journeys on a Football Carpet, published by HBKU Press in Qatar, won awards at the International Book Awards and Living Now Awards. His creative short stories have been published in literary magazines across numerous countries.

Moderator: Danyel Reiche, Visiting Associate Professor at GUQ.

A New Political Strategy to Limit Climate Change
2021-01-18 16:00 - 18:00
Watch the Video

In this moderated discussion based on his latest book, Climate Change and the Nation State: The Realist Case, Anatol Lieven sets out a new political strategy to mobilize support for the effort to limit climate change. He argues that while international agreements and movements are valuable, in the end, their purpose is to get states to act, because (as the pandemic response demonstrated) only states can take the measures and mobilize the resources required. For this to happen, states and their populations have to be convinced that climate change is not just a threat to humanity in general, but a danger to the vital interests and the long term survival of their own nations.

By refocusing the debate about climate change on the national rather than the global level, Anatol Lieven concentrates on the states and institutions that can take effective action, and on how mass support for such action can be motivated. This involves a recognition of climate change as an existential threat to existing nation-states and an appeal to progressive nationalism in response. He provides a Realist frame for the threat of climate change and the necessary response to this threat. This response will require radical changes to our economies and societies, but he reminds us that in the past we have faced and overcome such immense challenges: the total wars of the 20th Century, and the creation of social programs to civilize industrial society and save capitalism from itself.

Lieven shows how in this emergency our crucial building block is the nation-state. The drastic action required to change our societies may be inspired in part by internationalist idealism but can only be carried out by the institutions of effective nation-states, backed by public legitimacy. This requires different national versions of what has been called the “Green New Deal”: to rebuild social solidarity, not only in order to justify the sacrifices that will be necessary in the fight to limit climate change but in order to strengthen our societies so as to withstand some damaging effects of climate change that are already inevitable. This will also require new policies to limit migration and deal with the impact of artificial intelligence.

Speaker: Anatol Lieven is a professor at Georgetown University in Qatar and a Fellow of the New America Foundation in Washington DC. He was previously a professor in the War Studies Department of King’s College, London. He worked for twelve years as a British foreign correspondent, reporting from South Asia, the former Soviet Union, and Eastern Europe for The Times and other publications. His other books include Chechnya: Tombstone of Russian Power (1998); Ethical Realism: A Vision for America’s Role in the World (2006); America Right or Wrong: An Anatomy of American Nationalism (2011) and Pakistan: A Hard Country (2012).

Moderator: Ahmad Dallal, Dean, Georgetown University in Qatar.

The Away Game: The Epic Search for Football’s Next Superstars
2021-02-14 18:00 - 20:00
Reporter Sebastian Abbot discussed his critically acclaimed book, The Away Game, which tells the gripping story of a group of boys discovered in what may be the largest talent search in sports history. Over the course of a decade, an audacious program called Football Dreams held tryouts for millions of 13-year-old boys across Africa looking for football’s next superstars. Led by the Spanish scout who helped launch Lionel Messi’s career at Barcelona and funded by the State of Qatar, the program chose a handful of boys each year to train to become professionals—a process over a thousand times more selective than getting into Harvard. In The Away Game, Abbot follows a small group of boys as they are discovered on dirt fields across Africa and join the glittering academy in Doha where they train and compete for the chance to gain fame and fortune at Europe’s top clubs.

Speaker: Sebastian Abbot is the author of The Away Game: The Epic Search for Football’s Next Superstars, which tells the story of the largest talent search in football history. The book was a finalist for The Telegraph Football Book of the Year and the PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing. Prior to publishing the book, Mr. Abbot spent over a half dozen years working as a foreign correspondent for The Associated Press in the Middle East and Asia. He has also worked for over a decade in investment banking and private equity for firms like J.P. Morgan and Affiliated Managers Group. Mr. Abbot has a bachelor’s degree in economics from Princeton University and a master’s degree in public policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

Moderator: Danyel Reiche, Visiting Associate Professor at GUQ.

The FIFA World Cup: Football, Citizenship, and National Identity 1930-2022
2021-03-21 18:00 - 19:30
Gijsbert Oonk, Director of the Sport and Nation research program at Erasmus University Rotterdam, discussed his study exploring the relationship between national belonging, acquiring citizenship, and migration. Taking high profile examples from international sports events, he sought to unveil the complexities behind the question: who may represent the nation? The historical models of jus sanguine (blood ties) and jus soli (territorial birthright) are well-known markers and symbols of citizenship and nationality. Oonk proposed an ideal-type model of thick, thin, and in-between forms of citizenship.

Speaker: Gijsbert Oonk holds the endowed Jean Monnet chair on Europe in Globalizing World: Migration, Citizenship and Identity. This chair promotes education and research in the field of Global history, European studies, and national identity. The Jean Monnet chairs are an initiative of the European Commission to promote education, research, and reflection in the field of European integration studies at higher education institutions. The Sport and Nation research program at Erasmus University Rotterdam focuses on talented athletes with a migrant background within football and the Olympic Games in the context of changing citizenship, multiple citizenship, and elite migration.

Moderator: Danyel Reiche, Visiting Associate Professor at GUQ.

The Gospel of Work and Money: Global Histories of Industrial Education Virtual Working Group
2021-03-22 17:00 - 19:30
On March 22, 2021, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) held a virtual working group under a faculty-led research initiative on The Gospel of Work and Money: Global Histories of Industrial Education. This book project is being led by Georgetown University-Qatar’s Professor Karine Walther and Professor Oliver Charbonneau from the University of Glasgow. Over the course of the two-hour meeting, fourteen scholars participating in this project presented their preliminary chapter abstracts. The assembled group of scholars through their various chapter contributions will be exploring industrial education in different global contexts, from multi-disciplinary perspectives, including both historical and contemporary case studies.

Laura Mair’s chapter will be focusing on the ragged schools’ movement in Britain in the mid 19th century that were an Evangelical response to address child poverty. These schools provided impoverished children with a free education delivered by volunteer teachers, and by 1868 there were approximately 560 ragged schools teaching 50,000 children. In the earliest years of the movement, literature suggests that the focus was on providing children with the “three Rs” i.e. reading, writing, and arithmetic. But increasingly industrial schooling became a core component of the education offerings at these institutions. Dr. Mair’s chapter will trace the shift towards industrial building that occurred in these ragged movement schools from the 1840s asking whether this shift was financially or ideologically driven. Dr. Mair will also be studying the linkages between industrial education and the emergence of the ragged school emigration scheme, to shed light on broader social and economic attitudes towards poor children.

Janne Lahti’s chapter will focus on industrial education in native American boarding schools, and how materiality entangled with ideas of labor in the late-1800s and early-1900s, propagating and complicating the racial and cultural moorings of the empire. Using examples from the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, Dr. Lahti will explore how these institutions contested white and indigenous cultures of work, and became a tool for transforming indigenous students into loyal subjects of the US settler state by transforming them into white workers who embodied white material cultures.

Helge Wendt’s chapter will focus on the industrial education system in Spanish America, where specialized training programs were established to educate young men in mechanical production processes. The model of training young boys and men was largely similar to other technical and industrial school systems established in other countries in the 19th century. However, a key element that made it different from the European or American contexts was how it was integrated into agricultural production. Dr. Wendt will study the establishment of specialized educational institutions from different countries of Spanish America, highlighting the connections with the political, economic, and educational contexts of these schools.

Elif Akşit’s chapter will focus on the history of industrial schools in the Ottoman Empire and their subsequent continuation in modern Turkey. Dr. Akşit analysis of industrial education in the late Ottoman empire and modern Turkey suggests that they are part and parcel of efforts resisting colonialism, modernization, and the transformation from an empire to the republic. The first group of industrial schools were very similar to the ragged schools movement in Britain, focusing on the education of orphans and involving them in the production of goods for the army. Dr. Aksit aims to study the development of the Girls Industrial Schools in the late Ottoman Empire and Girls’ Institutes in Turkey and explore the question of what is meant by “Industrial” in the western as well as eastern contexts.

The technical petro-education program at the College of North Atlantic in Qatar is the focus of Danya Al-Saleh’s chapter. She will examine struggles over transferring the national oil industry’s in-house industrial trades education program to a Canadian branch campus in Qatar. The program in question aims to produce enough Qatari men graduates to work as entry level technicians in the industry. However due to racialized labor hierarchies in the Gulf, it has been a challenge to recruit and retain Qatari students. The situation is further made complex by Qatar’s broader development agenda, which emphasizes building an educational system for a knowledge-based post-oil international order. Al-Saleh aims to situate this research within the longer history of capitalism and imperialism shaping oil education programs and racialized labor hierarchies across the Gulf.

Zahra Babar’s chapter will examine the development and delivery of technical training programs and vocational education in Pakistan over the past three decades. Technical and vocational education have a long history in Pakistan, and justified on the basis of bridging the gap between the educated and the uneducated poor in the country. Designed to be delivered to the lower income, rural, and marginalized communities, vocational training delivery was increasingly supported by the large rural support programs during the 1980s-1990s. At that period delivering employable skills for lower income communities was tied to the needs of the local labor market. However, in the 2000s there was a shift in the logic and the design of these programs, as increasingly government efforts in support of vocational training became specifically tied to migration opportunities for unemployed, lower income citizens. In this chapter Babar will aim to explore ways in which the social and physical mobility of the poor has always played a central role in shaping Pakistan’s vocational education goals.

Bronwen Everill’s chapter will focus on the role of Liberians in promoting projects of industrial schooling in Liberia and around West Africa. Black Americans who migrated to Liberia in the nineteenth century helped to establish various educational enterprises aimed at promoting Christian education and agricultural and industrial education amongst different African communities. By the close of the 19th century Liberians were involved in a variety of imperial projects training African workers in other parts of the continent for plantation labor, domestic housework, and for skilled and unskilled industrial labor. She aims to look at ways educational expertise was used to both reinforce and challenge racial hierarchy in the African context. Dr. Everill’s analysis of these programs situates them within transnational imperial collaborations facilitating colonial capitalism’s reach in Africa.

Continuing the theme of African American education, Julia Bates, stated that American sociologists played an eminent role in supporting and promoting the industrial education model used at the Tuskegee and Hampton institutes. While sociologist such as Thomas Jesse Jones, received recognition for their advocacy of this model, W.E.B. Du Bois’s critique of the model was largely ignored in American sociology. Dr. Bates in her chapter will examine this critique of American sociology of race, and highlight how the American sociology of race has been intertwined with and supports this model.

Hossein Ayazi’s chapter also draws on the Liberian case, and how the Booker Washington Institute and its core constituencies were able to merge the promise of Black self-government with the prolongation of plantation production under the control of American multinational corporations. Specifically, in his chapter, Dr. Ayazi looks to Booker Washington Institute materials, U.S.-Liberian correspondence regarding the institute and the Firestone rubber plantation, and social scientific reports that discussed the role of industrial education across Africa. Across these archives, Dr. Ayazi traces the broader recognition of Liberia’s latent capacity for political and economic self-rule, as well as the recasting of Liberian self-rule as a condition of techno-scientific advancement in the realm of agricultural production. In other words, with enough techno-scientific training, it is (Americo-)Liberians would replace the white Americans that ran the vast colonial bureaucracies of multinational plantation corporations, and in doing so, manage their own country, the world’s second Black Republic. Dr. Ayazi proposes that the Booker Washington Institute and broader shifts in international finance, plantation production, and industrial education not only deflected the charge of “colonial slavery” levied against the Firestone in the 1920s and 1930s. By the beginning of the Cold War, the Booker Washington Institute had also modeled the United States’ counterrevolutionary approach to agricultural and rural development across Africa.

Arun Kumar’s chapter focuses on colonial India and Christian missionary schools that promoted and provided industrial education. These missionary schools engineered the concept of work in colonial India, by teaching that work is not just labor and economic activity but also an ethical and religious activity. Industrial schools were the key institutions through which this discourse of manual labor and work was articulated and practiced. Dr. Kumar chose two school in South India, which were run by the American Madura Mission, the American Arcot Mission, and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, as case studies, to address the role of Christian missionaries in building a new discourse of work, worker and labor by studying the history of their industrial schools.

Sarah Steinbock-Pratt’s chapter will study the United States’ efforts at developing industrial education in the Philippines as part of its colonial governance. While the colonial educational officials looked to American schools for black and Indian students as possible models, industrial education was not the initial focus of the schools in the Philippines. The early years of colonial schooling in the islands centered on English language instruction and primary subjects, while a wide-ranging debate was held over the type of education that ought to be provided. At the same time, officials in the US and the Philippines instituted a program to send Filipino students to the United States to study. This program also faced similar questions about whether to provide government scholars with classical or industrial training. Ultimately, like the colonial educational system itself, the program was divided between an attempt to win over and Americanize elite Filipinos, and the perceived imperative to train Filipinos for futures rooted in agricultural development.

In his chapter Dolf-Alexander Neuhaus will study the role of industrial education before and during the colonial period in Korea (1910-1945), with a particular focus on the development of YMCA. The first “Industrial Education Departments” were developed by YMCA and other missionaries in Korea, to educate the students about industrial labor and capitalism. The missionaries used these departments as a convenient tool for instilling Koreans with a Protestant work ethic, whereas for the Koreans these were a means to attain civilization and enlightenment. The Japanese Governor-General also supported similar programs to provide industrial education to the Koreans. Neuhaus proposes to explore the intersection between the missionary efforts for industrial education and colonial education policy in Korea.

Lukas Allemann’s chapter will study industrial education under the Soviet Arctic sphere, and on the industrial education programs the USSR provided to the Arctic’s indigenous communities, namely the Saami people. This chapter will aim to highlight the connection between monoculture and economy, as well as monoculture and dedication. The economy in the north, mostly focused on reindeer hurting. Which meant that industrial schooling, built around a monoculture of education, went hand in hand with industrial reindeer herding. Monoculture in school also meant focusing on linguistic monoculture and the majority culture, meaning here the Russian culture. He expressed that this a has significance across regions, because all circumpolar states did similar things in this respect, and in this respect, there is no Iron Curtain. These industrial schools also highlight the ‘Westernness’ of the Soviet Union, which Dr. Allemann proposes to address.

The discussion was brought to a close by Joshua Frank Cárdenas, whose proposed chapter will focus on the origin and founding of D-Q University in his presentation. He explained that D-Q University is a California-based Chicano and Indian college, founded in response to religious and federal industrial education policies and practices for captive Nations and individuals. For his research he proposes to detail the early origins of industrial education for Americans found at Hampton, Carlisle, Perris Indian, Sherman Indian, Fort Bidwell and Greenville Indian Industrial Institutes or boarding schools. Cárdenas also aims to examine the nature of California Indian and American Indian communities in 1960s and trace the early struggles of Red Power.

The authors received feedback on their abstracts, and engaged in a group discussion on the broader thematic framework for this book project, and discussed how the various chapters are to speak to each other. Between May and August, short follow-up virtual meetings will be held where draft papers will be presented and discussed by the group.

For the roundtable agenda, click here.For the participants’ biographies, click here.For the research initiative, click here.

Participants and Discussants:

Elif Ekin Akşit, Ankara University, TurkeyMaram Al-Qershi, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarDanya Al-Saleh, University of Wisconsin–MadisonLukas Allemann, University of LaplandHossein Ayazi, Williams CollegeZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJulia Bates, Sacred Heart UniversityMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJoshua Frank Cárdenas, California Indian Nations CollegeOliver Charbonneau, University of Glasgow Ahmad Dallal, Georgetown University in QatarBronwen Everill, University of CambridgeArun Kumar, University of NottinghamJanne Laht, University of HelsinkiLaura Mair, University of EdinburghSuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarDolf-Alexander Neuhaus, Free Berlin University Sarah Steinbock-Pratt, University of AlabamaKarine Walther, Georgetown University in QatarElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarHelge Wendt, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG) Berlin

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

CIRS Faculty Fellow Talk: The Amazingly Idiosyncratic History of Passports by Edward Kolla
2021-03-29 18:00 - 19:30
When COVID19 hit, many inveterate travelers like myself were dazed by how quickly something we took for granted had disappeared. Gone, suddenly, was our ability to grab our passport, hop on a plane, and be in a new country—sometimes even without the hassle of getting a visa. But something else we took for granted, back in those halcyon days, was the very need for passports to enjoy international mobility. Though ubiquitous and seemingly all-necessary, passports are something of a historical fluke. While travel documents of all sorts date back to the start of recorded history, the story of how we arrived at these little booklets—which, by the way, are totally uncodified in international law—is quirky, complex, and counter-intuitive.

Edward Kolla | The Amazingly Idiosyncratic History of Passports | March 29, 2021

Extra Q&A | The Amazingly Idiosyncratic History of Passports | April 2021

Speaker: Eddie Kolla has taught history for 10 years at Georgetown University in Qatar. He has also held research fellowships, most recently, at the Institute for Historical Studies at the University of Texas at Austin and the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law in Heidelberg, Germany. His work sits at the intersection of history, international relations, and law and includes Sovereignty, International Law, and the French Revolution (Cambridge, 2017).

Everyday Energy: Approaches to Lived Experience
2021-04-07 20:00 - 21:30
The Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) at Georgetown University in Qatar launched its newly-formed Energy Humanities research initiative with this webinar panel discussion titled “Everyday Energy: Approaches to Lived Experience.” The event featured three area experts in the field of Energy Humanities and was moderated by GU-Q faculty members, Victoria Googasian, Trish Kahle, and Firat Oruc. The Energy Humanities initiative is a new project under the CIRS Environmental Studies thematic cluster and aims to provide new understandings of the influence and impacts of energy in everyday lives and stimulate new conversations in the scholarship.

Speakers:

Dominic Boyer, Founding Director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Research in the Human Sciences, Rice University.

Sara B. Pritchard, Associate Professor in the Department of Science & Technology Studies at Cornell University.

Jennifer Wenzel, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature and of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies at Columbia University.

Moderators:

Victoria Googasian, Assistant Professor at Georgetown University- Qatar.

Trish Kahle, Assistant Professor at Georgetown University- Qatar.

Firat Oruc, Assistant Professor at Georgetown University- Qatar.

Transcript

click here to read

Good evening and welcome to the CIRS panel discussion entitled “Everyday Energy: Approaches Delivered Experience.” My name is Ahmad Dallal, I’m the Dean of the Georgetown University Doha campus. This panel discussion is part of the CIRS, the Center for International and Regional Studies, newly formed research initiative on Energy Humanities, which is being led by three Georgetown University faculty members, professors, Victoria Googasian, assistant professor of American Literature at GUQ. Professor Trish Kahle, assistant professor of history at Georgetown University Qatar, and Professor Firat Oruc, assistant professor of world literature at Georgetown. Building on the previous research and scholarly record of CIRS, the thematic focus on environmental studies continues to address central questions related to climate change and other issues of environmental concern. Today’s Energy Humanities Initiative is a new project under the CIRS Environmental Studies’ thematic cluster that aims to generate new scholarly conversations on the importance of everyday energetic life to the study of energy’s past, present, and future. For today’s discussion, we are honored to have three scholars renowned for their work in the field of energy humanities. Professor Dominic Boyer, professor of anthropology and founding director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Research in the Human Science at Rice University. Professor Sara Pritchard, associate professor in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Cornell University. And Professor Jennifer Wenzel, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature and of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies at Columbia University. I graduated from that department. Just one little remark I was asked to mention that at the bottom of the screen, at the very right, that is an icon, which says CC, which will enable you to have a live transcript if you need to. So you could click on that icon to have a transcription of the lecture. Right now, without further ado, there is a very rich conversation ahead of us. I will hand over to Vicky to start the show, and welcome.

Hi, everyone, and welcome once again on behalf of myself and my co-organizers, Trish and Firat to this kickoff webinar for CIRS’s New Energy Humanities research initiative. I’m also just going to speak very briefly so we can get the show on the road and hand things over to our distinguished panelists. But I did want to just say a few words about the project. Very, very briefly before we get started. So we’ve conceived of this project as the title of the panel and the webinar suggests in response to what we perceived as a need to consider the lived experience of energy. And I want to explain what we mean by that phrase. Though, of course, we’re hoping that our panelists can help us think through it in greater depth as well. So here in the Gulf, I think it’s not surprising that scholarly approaches to energy have often been concerned with the sort of big picture issues of state security, political stability, global economic relations, that arise out of the production and consumption of energy. And this is really the zoomed-out view of energy, as it were. But our goal for this project is to use our position as humanists, as humanities scholars, to add just another layer of nuance and texture to that study of energy by bringing the scale of everyday life, everyday life of individuals and communities into focus. Which is not to say that we’re trying to reject or ignore the other scales at which states or economic systems and energy infrastructure operate. But we hope to connect these big structures that govern the flow of energy in our world to everyday experiences of ordinary people both in this region and beyond it. As you may know, the energy humanities is a rapidly expanding field of research, and we think that humanistic approaches are particularly well suited to answering these kinds of questions about the social and cultural dimensions of energy. We expect this panel to be the first in a series of conversations, so we’re inviting everyone here to keep an eye on the lovely new website that our colleagues at CIRS have put together for us, where you’ll find podcast episodes and other content forthcoming as the project continues to get to gather momentum. But tonight, we’re very pleased to be hosting this trio of experts whose work covers a wide range of fields, topics, geographical regions, all of whom have already made vital contributions to the study of lived experience of energy. And we’re excited to think with them about this topic tonight. So without further ado, I will hand things over to our first panelist, Dominic Boyer. Dr. Boyer, take it away, whenever you’re ready.

Thanks so much, Vicky. And thanks to all the organizers of this event. I think it’s really quite historically important, this initiative that you are that you’re developing. And I just feel humbled and honored to be a part of it. Thank you so much. So my background is in anthropology and especially in historical and political anthropology. And so, part of thinking about everyday energy for me is thinking about how we came to the kind of relationship to energy we have today, which, according to fellow historical anthropologist David Hughes, is one of energy without conscience. We use incredible amounts of energy, especially in the Global North, often without thinking very much about its consequences. So what I’d like to reconstruct in my few minutes here is a very brief glimpse of that bigger history. You see an image here which shows a kind of macrocosmic visualization of the United States energy system. Two things could strike you. One, how huge it is, 100 quadrillion BTUs worth of energy in one year flowing to the United States. And 80 percent of that is still fossil fuels. Only one percent is solar. So, you know, if we had started listening to scientists some 30 years ago, maybe that would be inverted. But the fact that it hasn’t suggests that these historical legacies are very important in terms of setting conditions of possibility for contemporary everyday energy experiences. And so that’s what I like to sort of highlight a little bit today. Now, I think that the history of modern energy, maybe counterintuitively actually begins in the European colonies, in the so-called new world, and particularly in the sugar and coffee plantations. This has been documented through a substantial amount of historical and political anthropology, that have looked at these relationships that, you know, the colonists came to the new world with the ambition to start growing things. And this precious commodity of sugar was one of their first ambitions. Columbus carried sugar cane clippings with him on his very first…his second voyage, rather. And as the conditions proved ecologically ripe for this kind of development in the 16th and 17th century, first the Portuguese and then the British and French created thousands of plantations across the Caribbean with the aim of exporting these precious commodities back to Europe. African slaves were brought in by the millions to power to offer the labor power for these plantations. And they were treated, as David Hughes argues, as a kind of fuel, as an expendable resource. They were literally worked to death in this process. And so for him, our relationship to energy today sort of begins in that lack of concern with human welfare in the plantation system, and with the fact that, as Kathryn Yusoff has put it, Europeans learned how to treat human beings as expendable and extractable energy properties through this experience. Now, sugar itself had a dramatic influence back in Europe. It transformed both middle-class and working-class diets. It helped create the industrial worker who could work longer, faster, harder than before, whose diet might still be poor. But having these stimulants always at the ready really helped. And indeed, to this day, we see the kind of emphasis on stimulants and labor connected to sort of capitalist modernity. So this changed over time, of course, but it changed in part because of the restriction of the slave trade. The abolition movements definitely deserve credit. But above all, it was the uprisings of slaves against the plantation system that were decisive. And in this respect, the Haitian revolution really deserves our attention as a geopolitical event that, in the specific sense, brought to an end France’s new world ambitions, led to the Louisiana Purchase, and the doubling in size of the United States, but also led to an increasing concern among those who operated plantations about what to do with this unruly labor force, and an interest in investing in machine labor as a way of replacing it. So, a lot of the innovations and machine labor that we credit as being associated with the industrial revolution begin to take shape within the plantation system first. Then those ideas come back to Europe. And there’s a wonderful book, a wonderful work of energy humanities by Cara Daggett called “The Birth of Energy,” that explains how in Victorian Britain you get a coming together of steam engine technology, imperial ambitions, new thermodynamic science and Presbyterian moral values that helped to redefine energy, which, up until then had been sort of a sense of dynamic virtue. It gets redefined and specified as being associated with work. Energy as work. And it’s work within a universe that seemed to be prone always to tending towards entropy, towards dissipation, towards waste. So human beings have to organize themselves to work even harder to make something of what the divine has bequeathed them. That leads, of course, to a tremendous investment in civilizational hierarchies and definitions that the Victorians are famous for. All arranged by capacities to use machines and to produce work and energetic racism, as Dagget describes it, that legitimates further imperial expansion and dispossession and that naturalizes fossil fuel use and wage labor as social necessities for human improvement, reinforcing the capitalist obsessions with work and growth. But of course, all of this is known already in the Caribbean. It doesn’t get invented in England. It really gets worked out in the new world. If you look at the old plantation manuals, you see how they already were conceiving of human beings as machines, of plantations, as machines, where they had to manage energy and productivity in very careful ways. Well, to bring this story a little bit closer out of the “sucro-political” into what I call the “carbo-political” era, with the spread of machines throughout Europe, comes an increasing need for the energy density of high carbon fuels. Wood will no longer do, and coal, by the end of the 19th century, becomes the dominant enabling fuel behind a European imperial modernity. And along with it, comes a sort of new regime of production and a new regime of commodities and consumption; what some have called the democracy of things, that suddenly, the “thingly” life around us becomes enriched and people demand and feel entitled to goods that they wouldn’t have had before this era. So the carbo-politics has a kind of dramatic shaping of what we think of as modern life and the affordance and luxuries that it involves. But as Timothy Mitchell tells the tale in his fabulous book, “Carbon Democracy,” there were limits to the sort of evolution of coal. And it really wasn’t about the pollution, which, we all know that burning coal is polluting and unpleasant, but it was less about that dimension of coal use that was problematic than the political, the labor politics of it. It takes a lot of people to mine coal and move it around. And those people have to go underground in dangerous conditions. And they become, they develop a sense of fraternity and identity and they start making demands, demands that we now call maybe, perhaps “social democratic” demands for labor rights and safe labor conditions. And, in fact, a lot of the the labor improvements that occur in the 20th century are owed, according to Mitchell, to the work of coal miners specifically. So he argues that in the post-World War Two redesign of the global economy, there’s a deliberate shift from coal to petroleum. Petroleum requires much less labor. It’s quite flexible in terms of how can be moved around the oceans via shipping and pipelines. And also it has these material properties that petrochemicals can produce plastics. A whole new regime of consumer goods becomes possible. And so the global modernity that typifies where we are now really takes shape in the middle of the 20th century, driven by petro-culture, driven by consumerism and again, cheap goods and rampant energy use without much regard for environmental and social consequences. So, it really just brings us to where we are today. And this is my last slide, hopefully on time, where, you know, the question that all of us are interested in is: what comes post-petro and how will that intersect? Given our topic here today with our everyday expectations, uses, ideologies, understandings of energy. Can we shift away from this model of energy as work? Do we have to shift towards something that Daggett calls “energy as freedom,” liberating energy from work? Do we have to shift our energy sources from the heavy reliance on petroleum and other high-density sources towards solarity? Which is something that a lot of people are talking about. How can that be achieved? What are the cultural forms that will come along with a solar revolution? These are things that I think we’re going to talk about in the discussion to come, so I’ll just stop there. Thank you.

Thanks so much for that history, as you kick us off, and for those questions. And I do think we will come back to you. I just want to remind our attendees that you can post questions at anytime, using Q&A button at the bottom of the screen. And we will have time to get to those questions at the end of tonight’s webinar. So now I will go ahead and hand things off to our second panelist, Sara Pritchard. So, Dr. Pritchard, the floor is yours.

Yes, I think I know how to do this after all this time with Zoom, sorry. This was working a minute ago. Hopefully this is working now. OK. Can you see this? Is this working now? Great. Thank you. So I’m delighted to be here and thank you for the invitation and honor of being part of this launching event. It is an exciting and important initiative. Very briefly, as some of you know, my areas of interest include environmental history, the history of technology, and environmental science studies. So, most broadly, I’m interested in the relationships between, and dynamics among, people, the environment, and technology in the past, but also with an eye to the present and the future. First off, as a historian, I very much appreciate the roundtable’s and thematic project’s interest in everyday energy and lived experience for a number of reasons influenced by social history, labor history, and other subfields. These themes encourage us to think about energy not just from elite perspectives, political, economic, and intellectual elites, but they push us to consider a much wider range of historical and also contemporary actors. This is sometimes called a bottom-up history versus top-down history. These themes also call attention to race, ethnicity, class, gender, religion, and other categories and historical processes such as colonialism, which all can shape experiences with, and ideas about, energy. If we put these very broad concerns in conversation with energy specifically, I think we can consider the experiences and voices of energy workers, users, consumers, mediators, as well as of non-users, those who opt out, but particularly those who are outside dominant energy systems or made outside these systems. Overall, everyday energy and lived experience encourages us to engage with a much wider set of actors, consider the role of agency of these groups. They nuance our understanding beyond simplistic generalizations, and they open up conversations and windows onto contestation and debate. All are really important. Now, as I was reviewing the prompt and trying to collect my thoughts and comments, I have to admit that I kept finding myself sliding back into energy systems and infrastructures and regimes, which in many ways is the opposite of this initiative. So my comments here, and I think there’s synergies with Dominic’s presentation, focus on the intersections of these issues. I want to think a little bit about how energy systems or these higher-level analyses certainly shape and limit, quote-unquote, everyday energy without being either deterministic or outside historical change. But at the same time, how a more social history approach to energy infrastructure and regimes yield important insights about the limits and constraints of these systems. So I want to make five brief points. When we think about technological systems, especially so-called high-tech systems, I think it’s really easy to focus on the technological stuff because systems are by definition large scale and are composed of many constituent parts. So if we think about nuclear reactors to produce energy, we might think about uranium fuel rods, cooling towers, power lines, and so forth. But as historians of technology and others have shown, large-scale systems also depend on workers, not just experts, designers, and engineers, but operators, technicians, and other everyday workers. Often these workers become more visible, or quite visible, during crises, such as the operators who desperately tried to manage the reactors at Fukushima in the hopes of preventing meltdown, which didn’t happen. Or in February of this year, an unusually cold winter storm settled across Texas and much of the American South, and utility operators initially initiated what were intended to be rolling blackouts to prevent a catastrophic failure of the grid. Workers also contend with crises and emergencies and their complex aftermaths, often at considerable risks to themselves. So here we might think of Fukushima’s eighteen thousand cleanup workers. The large point I want to make here is that workers are really essential to high-tech energy systems and, therefore, consumers’ ability to use energy. Workers have particular lived experiences with energy and energy systems as laborers, and consumers and users ultimately rely on energy workers’ knowledge, skill, and labor. The second point I want to make is that, in some parts of the world—and I think we have to be careful about generalizations— energy systems are certain forms of energy and their associate systems have become so, so normal and systematized that they basically become invisible or taken for granted. Electricity is a good example here, say, in Europe and North America. Several scholars have analyzed how energy production and consumption is increasingly separated both spatially and socially. So many of us are fortunate to just be able to flip a switch to turn on electric lights rather than spending days and weeks making candles for winter. But as scholars of infrastructure have argued, infrastructure becomes so normalized, it becomes an invisible, assumed backdrop—until it fails. So the point I want to highlight here is that normal accidents—to borrow the phrase from Perrow—disasters really, so-called disasters, and failure, put everyday dependency on energy and energy systems into sharper relief. However, scholars have also shown how it takes concerted work and effort to normalize and institutionalize energy systems. For instance, Chris Jones has discussed how people had to be taught how to use and burn anthracite coal in the domestic sphere. It wasn’t self-evident. And he has these wonderful multipage manuals teaching servants for wealthy East Coast families basically how you put anthracite coal in stoves. I love this example for a couple of reasons. For one, that it highlights domestic workers and their labor generally, but particularly their labor around energy specifically. Yet another example, electrification was much slower and funkier than confident proclamations by inventors, utilities, and promoters at the time suggest. So we need to look at rhetoric versus reality. And what I want to highlight here is how energy systems and infrastructure are neither inevitable nor permanent. They take work. In my view, one of the most important issues is the uneven or unequal distribution of social and environmental costs, risks, and vulnerabilities associated with energy infrastructure and regimes, both during normal operations and crises. For many marginalized groups, this is a defining feature of energy as lived experience. So to give two examples from colleagues: Andrew Needham has shown how dramatic demographic growth and suburbanization in the US Southwest, where it’s very hot, depended on a lot of energy in part to support centralized air conditioning. Yet the so-called livability of these suburbs relied on coal-fueled electricity. Electricity produced on Diné or Navajo lands And it was these communities who experienced the disproportionate environmental and health effects of coal-fired plants. Or we could look at an example from atomic energy workers, Gabrielle Hecht, who’s looked at uranium mining in Africa and the short-term and long-term hazards nuclear workers faced through exposure, even though they weren’t seen as part of the nuclear age or nuclear world, that at times, this extended into families and communities with radioactive clothing or using scrap metal from mines to make shacks or other buildings. So my take-off point here is I think, frankly, it’s irresponsible to analyze energy systems and energy without attending to social and environmental justice. Quickly, my fifth point: energy systems are obviously dependent on organic and or inorganic energy sources, but these systems are always located in environmental contexts that both shape and are shaped by those systems. And this is encapsulated by the concept of an “envirotech” subfield in the history of technology and environmental history. And we can certainly hear considerable lived experiences of both humans and non-humans in these energy landscapes. Certainly, hydroelectricity is probably one of the most obvious cases here. So I’d like to highlight that this complete separation of environment and technology is an erroneous and even dangerous ideal. So to quickly close as we are now in year two of the pandemic, I want to acknowledge the vital energy of human labor, particularly essential workers and caregivers in these extraordinary times, but also, as Gabrielle Hecht calls it, extraordinary times that have revealed and deepened existing problems and inequalities both nationally and globally. And I look forward to our conversation.

Thanks so much for those remarks and those points that we’ll bear in mind moving forward tonight. So finally, I’d like to hand things over to Jennifer Wenzel, who will close out our panelists’ opening remarks. So, Dr. Wenzel, take it away.

Thank you very much. And I’d like to add my thanks to the organizers. It’s such an honor to participate in this inaugural event. And I’m particularly enthusiastic about the specific focus you’ve chosen for your energy humanities initiative: the theme of everyday energy. To me, the central idea of the energy humanities is that neither climate change nor the various economic and environmental challenges associated with fossil fuels are merely engineering problems. Rather, are political problems, narrative problems, and ultimately problems of the imagination. My own expertise is in narrative, not just literary narratives, but also the implicit unspoken narratives that shape cultural imagining and everyday experience and how we think about, or more importantly, don’t think about, issues like oil and fossil fuels. This is the idea of normalization that Sarah was just talking about. For many people who are fortunate enough to inhabit what the Niger Delta poet Ogaga Ifowodo calls the “chain or ease” enabled by fossil fuels, the primary mode of thinking about energy is not having to think about it. In this fossil-fueled cultural imaginary, oil is at once everywhere and nowhere. Indispensible, yet largely on apprehended, not so much invisible, as unseen. And I borrow this line from my introduction to “Fueling Culture.” I’m bringing my screen up now. My introduction to this book, Fueling Culture, which is a compendium of keywords on the intersections between energy and culture that I coedited with Imre Szeman and Patricia Yaeger, and Dominic has a piece in this collection. One of the key concepts in Energy Humanities is “impasse,” the predicament that Imre Szeman has described as knowing where we stand with regard to environment and energy, but being unable to take action at a scale adequate to the situation. Impasse is a problem for politics. But I’d argue that it’s also connected to esthetics, by which I mean ways of seeing and sensing how we learn to see or not to see. How we learn to regard some things as ugly and other things as beautiful. Think wind turbines. The future might hinge on whether we can convince people that wind turbines are beautiful, solar panels as well. How we learn to regard some things as pleasurable or desirable. These questions of pleasure and desire are central to the question of everyday energy. No matter what we think about oil, every one of us derives some kind of pleasure from the world that fossil fuels have built, including the ways that our own bodies interact with and are shaped by the world around us. It’s not that we love oil itself, which is, after all, kind of smelly and sticky, but that we all have some embodied attachment to the things that oil makes possible. I hear air conditioning is pretty important to a number of the hosts of this event. So for some people, this sense of embodied petro-pleasure comes from the smoothness and sheen of plastic. For me, the smell of my dad’s butane lighter, when I was a kid. I’ve even written an essay on how I love to fly. I think I remember it vaguely, how I love to fly. Of course, it’s not the indignities of post 9/11 commercial air travel that I love, but rather the thrill of exhilaration when the pilot hits the gas and my body is jolted back in the seat. I love the technological sublime of an active airfield, the many kinds of labor that bring a plane from the sky to the gate, and the sea of twinkling blue lights on an airport runway at night. I first described my love of flying for the students in my class on literature and oil. I asked the students to write what I call an “oil inventory,” a creative, open-ended assignment in which they make an inventory. In other words, a list or an accounting of the significance and presence of oil in their lives. Some describe their relationship to oil over the course of a single day. Some wrote a biography of their oil lives so far. I came up with the idea of the oil inventory, when I read this passage from Edward Said’s introduction to Orientalism, where he writes: “The starting point of critical elaboration is the consciousness of what one really is, and is ‘knowing thyself’ as a product of the historical process to date, which is deposited in you an infinity of traces, without leaving an inventory… Therefore it is imperative at the outset to compile such an inventory.” And I love the kind of sedimentary imagery of history depositing these traces in you. So the fundamental gesture of the oil inventory is this active process of knowing oneself in relationship to fossil fuels. Here’s my own academic biography in the form of an oil inventory. So the oil inventory challenges students— and I should say that I wrote this academic bio on a dare from Stephanie LeMenager, another wonderful scholar of energy humanities. So the oil inventory challenges students to acknowledge their love for some part of the world that oil has made—something they would not want to lose. Rather than focusing only on guilt, shame, or fear, which don’t seem a promising way to break through impasse and to lean toward transition. Such negative emotions can lead to a gesture that’s all too easy of pointing out energy hypocracy, whether one’s own or others. As if anyone who drives or flies or eats food comes from a factory gives up the right to wonder and worry about fossil fuels. We are oil subjects who inhabit a society built upon fossil fuels. That’s the big picture the oil inventory invites students to glimpse. But one of the less encouraging lessons that I take from the historical work of scholars like Matt Huber is that the oil inventory was actually invented by the oil industry. And here’s one example of Huber’s argument about advertising campaigns launched by U.S. oil companies dating back to the 1940s that explicitly invite consumers to consider the indispensability of petroleum products in their lives. So I think here we see some of the ideological and imaginary work of normalization. Look, there’s oil in your food. Isn’t that great? Don’t worry about it. And I would say that the same strategy is at work in this recent ad campaign by Exxon Mobil, which is called Energy Lives Here. And I’m going to play an ad from this campaign, which is fortuitously enough called Enabling Everyday Progress. And I’ve Lost. Here it goes. I’m going to go ahead. I’m not totally sure the audio is going to come through. You don’t need to think about the energy that makes our lives possible. Because we do. We’re Exxon Mobile and powering the world responsibly is our job. Because boiling an egg isn’t as simple as just boiling an egg. Life takes energy. Energy and lives here. So ad this offers a perfect example of Huber’s argument that the energy industry in North America creates knowledge and awareness of consumers’ dependence on energy precisely in order to ensure passivity. Right. It’s not that they don’t want us to know about energy. They want us to know that we need it. So notice how the ad invites viewers to forget the revelations offered by the ad’s visual mapping of all that is involved in boiling an egg. So we hear “you don’t need to think about the energy that makes our lives possible because we do.” So the lesson that I draw here is that critical studies of energy in the Energy Humanities must reclaim the oil inventory from the oil industry in order to disrupt the settled habits of mind that surround the energy regimes of the present. Thus, the need for oil inventories of a more complete and complex kind than those that Exxon Mobil are offering. But this task is made harder by the fact that capitalism understands the workings of desire and the imagination better than we would like. Thus, the need for critical investigations of everyday energy. Thank you.

Thank you so much to all of our speakers for those really wonderful opening remarks. Now we’re going to move into a section that will offer some questions and hopefully get a discussion going. Among them, please do feel free to respond directly to each other as well as to the questions. And I’m also going to try and incorporate some of your remarks into the questions as we go. And so the first is to really think about method by trying to and — I’m sorry that my cat just decided that this was the time she was going to come and try and bother me. So we’ll see if she cuts off. But in any case, how your discipline, in particular, understands the concept of lived experience, because I was really struck in your talks by some of the different ideas that came through, the ideas about social revolution, about work, about sensory life. And so I’m just going to offer that as perhaps a starting point to thinking about that, that particular ways that you approached lived experience in your disciplines. Whoever would like to start off.

Well, I guess I could start. I mean, I think that anthropology, really the premise of anthropology, is the study of lived experienced in its many, many complexities. So I would say for us at least, this is very familiar territory. But what makes it unusual — just many thanks to my co-panelists, Sara and Jennifer, for these amazing opening remarks — they showed how many layers there are to thinking about energy. You need to think about the forms of knowledge involved, the forms of desire, the institutions, the infrastructures. So I think that it’s not even, I mean, lived experience captures a lot. And I think as we want to explore it, we have to think about what are the strategies for maybe revealing some of the habits we have that are so ingrained and so under-analyzed in some ways that we don’t even think about it. I do agree with what Jennifer said, that that’s kind of the premise of the Energy Humanities is to take what’s invisible and to sort of flip it over and to try to turn it on its back and look at all that’s there. Is there anything other panelists would like to add on? Well, I was trying to. Oh, look, we’re unmuting at the same time. I think that the kind of the go-to answer for this from the perspective of literary studies — and I should say that I’m a student of narrative.

Right. And so someone who works on poetry might object to my answer. But I would say that I think that the general assumption is that it’s realist fiction that is the genre that is meant to capture whatever it is meant by lived experience, whether psychological realism or social realisms, a narrative that gives the effect of real life. But to echo what Dominic said, I don’t think that it has been the case all the time. I wouldn’t say that it is only in the past decade or so that literary scholars, anthropologists, et cetera, are becoming cognizant of energy. But I do think what Sarah said about crisis, bringing the indispensability of labor and infrastructure into visibility has a corollary effect in literary studies. But I think what has passed for realism may well have included plenty of details that tell us about energy, but we have tended not to notice them. Right. And so I think that even what counts as realism is up for grabs in terms of the extent to which we grapple with the indispensability of energy and the unevenness of energy. My colleague Imre Szeman has a kind of wonderful phrase for talking about this, which is “fictions of surplus,” which he uses to describe both the historical fiction that the surplus of energy that has been made possible by fossil fuels over the past two centuries is anything but an unrepeatable historical anomaly. But the literary aspect of fiction of surplus is that literary fiction has not done anything to challenge that kind of fiction and bring it into visibility. I guess I’ll just out a couple of small things. I think I alluded to this a bit in my comments. And first, as a sidebar, I’m just intrigued and love the synergy’s across our three comments, which were entirely uncoordinated. But it’s amazing how there’s lots of ping-ponging and productive in generative ways. Thank you.

I alluded a little bit to social history really accessing lived experience and in important ways versus top-down history and also hinted at rhetoric versus reality in terms of thinking about what sources that we use, which voices we access and Jennifer’s presentation, talking about ads and idealized representations versus what things look like on the ground for different groups. So I think those are two important points just to draw those out again. But also one of the things that I’ve been thinking about is the “we.” I mean we’ve been using “we,” our actors use “we” and really starting to challenge and pull that apart. And also the political-strategic use of “we” in order to evade politics or keep power in the institutions and groups that already have them. So I think that asking questions about the “we” and generalizations that helps us get lived experience, but precisely looking at lived experience and everyday energy helps us problematize the “we” historically, contemporaneously, ethnographically in terms of policy, all those kinds of things in some really important ways. Yeah, I think this really connects to some of your recent work for all of our panelists, which have really drawn out these key concepts or metaphors. And I think we also saw some new ones tonight with the ideas of impasse, visibility, the idea of the non-user. But some of the ones from your recent work: the concept of solarity, the idea of an endscape, or the concept of extractivism. And I think given what you’ve all just said, it would be interesting to maybe reflect on the utility of these big ideas for organizing these really diverse ranges of lived experience, as well as to sort of think about the way they allow us an entry point into diverse forms of everyday life that we otherwise might not see.

Can I do that annoying political debate thing of answering my panelists, ignoring the question momentarily, and then getting to the question? Yeah. I mean, I think that Sara’s point about the “we” is incredibly important. And I also saw, I think maybe a question from Jeff Insko, which I feel is kind of maybe getting to this as well. And I can say that my own training from graduate school as a scholar of post-colonial literatures, specializing in Anglophone literatures of Africa and South Asia, has really…the way I think about the specialty of my work has changed entirely as I have begun working more on energy humanities. Right. So it’s Nigeria that got me into thinking about oil to begin with. But it has become almost impossible to ignore my own institutional location in North America, which is also the kind of it’s the center of gravity of well, I might get some pushback in this audience. But I tend to think of it as the center of gravity of the fossil fuel industry and also the center of gravity of the energy humanities. And so I think my work has become increasingly contrapuntal between the United States and places where I had been trained in graduate school to think about. Right. So the Mississippi Delta to the to the Niger Delta. And I think that’s all about not necessarily abjuring or disavowing the “we,” but thinking about the different textures of different kinds of we. Right. And another thing that I would say is that I don’t think it’s enough to say North America or the United States. And my thinking in energy humanities has been really shaped by two kinds of locations. One is the classroom. And I am in what now passes from my classroom, right in my home. But one is the classroom. And I think that that is very much the site of thinking about the we of a class and how it connects to these other spaces. And the other is my former institutional location at The University of Michigan, which was about forty-five minutes drive from Detroit. And so I think my students in Michigan had a very different understanding of what it means to think about oil and energy than my students in New York. And I started thinking about energy, you know, in the kind of downturn after the bankruptcy of Detroit. And so I think my students had a sense of a different kind of petro-violence than the petro-violence that I thought I was teaching them about, about the Niger Delta. I will now — sorry Trish, to have ignored your question — I will now take it up. And I would answer just very quickly. And I think that you’ve asked me to talk about extractivism. And the very quick thing that I would say about that is that if anything, I understand myself at this particular moment, as I’m not sure anti-extractivism. — and by that, like, of course, we’re all anti-extractivism — but what I mean by that specifically is suspicious of that category as a category of analysis, because I perceive in it a kind of conceptual creep where it’s it’s becoming a synonym for capitalism writ large. Right. And so losing the texture of what I had understood that word to mean. And here again, I’m cribbing from a piece that I co-wrote with Imre Szeman over the summer. And I think my favorite part of that piece is footnotes six or something like that, which I wrote to claim what had been commons, but would ask whether a dam is extractivist in the same way as a coal mine. And I don’t think that it is, even if we can think about all of the kind of harms and costs that dams inflict on on communities. To me, there’s a value in holding onto a particular kind of materiality in the concept of extractive, which I feel is being how do you say, metaphorized? Turned into a metaphor, in all kinds of directions. But I appreciate the question. Sorry for going on.

Thanks, Jennifer. I guess I could jump in and talk a little bit, speak to the sort of the concepts, in particular solarity as a concept that I think a lot of people are beginning to think with in the energy humanities as a kind of an opposite from petro-culture or something. We’re not quite sure. And, you know, I guess I would tell the parable of one of the early critical theorists in our European intellectual heritage, Karl Marx, who famously never really defined what, you know, a post-capitalist society was supposed to look like communism for him was the negation of the capitalist society of his era. It wasn’t the sort of newly formed, fully formed world that was supposed to follow it. And that’s caused a lot of confusion. And then a lot of people pointed and said, you know, you’re a lazy thinker, an incomplete thinker for this reason. But he was a Hegelian, and Hegelians don’t believe you can really understand things until you’re living in an experientially saturated way through them. So. what I would say about solarity is I don’t think we know what the post-petrol world is going to look like exactly I think what we can do, though, is we can both, on the one hand, think about the values that should inform that world. And we can also think about the kinds of acts of de-systematization of petro-culture that we can all participate in. What I call sabotage. I mean, the acts of sabotage that could be riding a bike instead of, you know, driving a car or flying less or demanding that your political representatives support decarbonization measures. There are a lot of ways you can participate through direct action or indirect action in that process. And I think that as a solarity comes, and we’ve seen this throughout time, many times, again, that something seems impossible to imagine until suddenly it’s there. And then you’re like, oh, of course, we should have known all along that this is what it was. And I think that one of the things I would say, and I’m saying this from a place of Houston, I’m saying it from the beating heart of petro-culture to you — is that the fossil fuel economy will end faster than we think. It’s already decisively on its way out. And in 20 years, we might be amazed to look back and say we didn’t see how fast it was going to end. So solarity is coming in some form or another. But I think to speak to the environmental justice question that was raised in Jeff’s question in the Q&A, that is the key issue: how not to fall into the grooves of the extractivism of the past, how not to build wind parks and solar farms in ways that dispossess people that don’t have. Create meaningful connections to landscapes and communities that prioritize the interests of global capital over the needs of people who live near to these installations. Those are the sorts of habits that we can actually have to work on to unmake so that we don’t end up creating a sort of solarized dystopia going forward. And that’s something that I think is or is a legitimate fear. I guess I’ll comment briefly on the concept that you alluded to Trish in terms of… I had this extraordinary once-in-a-lifetime trip to a small bard in Norway north of the Arctic Circle in January 2019 which seems like a billion years ago now, particularly given travel and pandemic and everything, during Polar Night. So it’s January during Polar Night. And I wrote a piece about the experience of being there and what it was like and thinking about energy and the landscapes of energy north of the Arctic Circle. And so I was playing with the concept of “endscape,” which builds on Dolly Jørgensen’s concept of “endling.” With “endling” being the last the last animal of the species that’s about to go extinct. So I was playing with the idea of endscape, of landscapes that are on the cusp of disappearance or are on their way out. Which, obviously, the Arctic is ground zero for that. And part of the point of the piece was also thinking explicitly and making visible my own implication in that very process at Svalbard. Right. Because I flew a gazillion miles and it took three days to get there and all this kind of stuff, as well as the other people who are part of this conference on darkness. I think I guess what I want to… there are two things I want to say about that that are related is, that “endscape” can be a very privileged category in terms of the futurity of landscape, rather than thinking about how many places are already endscapes or were endscapes 10 years ago or more. Right. And so anxieties about sea-level rise, say, on the coast of the United States versus islands or other parts of the world, which are already experiencing extensive change. And wrestling with the social and economic and political implications of that and so forth. So I haven’t really played with or developed this concept more. But I think what one of the things that’s important to me is to not take for granted that many people, particularly vulnerable people in North America and around around the world, are already living in endscapes, so to speak, and not imagine this is something that’s in the future, whether in your future, or just in the future. I think all of these comments and this sort of first chunk have really underscored something you had said earlier, Sara, right. Which was, you know, getting at this idea that the everyday can really give us strong insights into really profound questions about justice and ensuring justice. And so I want to invite our participants…our attendees, rather, to go ahead and begin sending in questions. I’m going to sort of shift to another round of questions. But we are going to open it to the audience very soon. And that will be great to have a good list of questions to start from. And so now I want to sort of talk explicitly about something that I think has come up in all of the answers, but to really come directly to this problem of futurity. And I think, you know, just taking a little bit of a shift, I was wondering if we could think about even just the idea of lived experience beyond the human right, so theorizing the lived experience as opposed to anthropocentric category, how we might conceive lived experience to include non-human forms of experience as well as human. And so that might be obviously the energy realities of the present as well as future modes of relationality with non-humans. I guess I could jump in on this. It’s a great prompt. Thanks so much Trish.

It reminds me a bit of one of my favorite energy humanities projects, environmental humanities projects that I’ve done in my life, which was working together with collaborators in Iceland and my partner Cymene Howe to create the world’s first memorial for a glacier lost in Iceland to climate change. The first of Iceland’s major glaciers to disappear to climate change. And we had a lot of interesting discussions talking about how do you mourn something that… How do you mourn the death of something that was never properly speaking alive? And how do you blend together sort of the the deep human traditions of thinking about Earth beings and their existence in places? And glaciers in Iceland have meant many different things in different times. And how do you acknowledge that alongside, accommodate it to human ritual and human understandings of death? And I’ll say that that whole process was incredibly, you know, powerful for me and really made me think a lot about how at least in terms of the losses that we’re experiencing, we have to be more present for them and we have to create communities of mourning around the changing world, the damaged planet that we inhabit now. And I actually think that the experience of attending to and really thinking about, say, the loss of a glacier is like something like the loss of a friend or some kin. It’s something that actually, I think has the potential to make us more engaged in the process of making sure that all the glaciers don’t go in the same way. So I do think that attention to the non-human, the anthropocentrism is very deeply set in us, especially in the north, in terms of thinking about, you know, how we relate to the world. But that’s something that we really have to try to disable as we move forward or try to find other ways of being human. I’ll say as an anthropologist, you know, the kind of European modernity that I was discussing in my presentation is pretty much a huge outlier to the rest of human cultures across time in terms of its, you know, its contempt for nature, its contempt for other species, frankly. And I think that’s something that, again, suggests that where we’re going is not simply just tweaking the existing system by putting up some solar panels and wind turbines, but we actually have to engage in a process of civilizational transformation at a more fundamental level. And that’s something that’s frightening. But also, when you think about it, very exciting, because this civilization has a lot of blood in its on its hands, if you will. And I think there’s a chance to make something better. I can jump in. I think there’s a synergy between what you just raised and something that I wanted to bring up kind of as a sidebar. There’s the classic question and history of science and particularly science studies about voice and representation or spokesperson and questions about who speaks for the non-human. Do scientists speak? What does that mean, particularly given that we know the ways in which science and scientists are shaped by cultural, historical, and other kinds of contexts. But that’s kind of a sidebar. What you’re just saying, I think about cultural abnormality of the West. That’s my exaggeration, exaggerated summary of what you just said. I was just thinking about the ways in which this question, which I really appreciate, is already predicated on certain assumptions and places and cultures and contexts. And I’m thinking about the ways in which this question wouldn’t make sense for many indigenous communities. And so what does it mean to be reflective, even about these categories like living, non-living, human, non-human. The question of kin and who are what counts as kin. And certainly there’s been a lot of work in environmental humanities about this, but also some debate between it and digital scholars and environmental humanists in terms of what does it mean to appropriate indigenous notions of kin to describe more complex relationships between the human and non-human and the more than human. So by way of response or engagement with this really important question, I actually just want to encourage us to think about the ways in which it’s already culturally defined in particular ways, and that that of itself, I think is important. Sorry. Yeah, I think I appreciate what Dominic was saying about a sense of loss. And I think that the words that resonate for me in this question are “relationality,” or the word is is “relationality” rather than “experience.” And perhaps, for the moment, I want to locate myself within a kind of European mindset in order to say that I am not confident that I can theorize non-human experience. Right. And I’m thinking partly with Dipesh Chakrabarty, who says that actually we humans can’t experience ourselves as a species. Right. And so relationality is therefore the word that really kind of that resonates for me in terms of understanding our relationship to energy as a multi or understanding relationships to energy as multi-species relationships. And maybe I’ll see if I can share my screen for a literary example that comes at this question in a different way. This is, I think, if I’m not mistaken, this is the very end of Italo Calvino’s story, The Petrol Pump, which is ostensibly a story about pumping gas, like pumping gas during the 1970’s oil shock. The first one in Italy. But as this protagonist is pumping gas, what he is imagining is, as you can read, the day in the future, when “the earth’s crust reabsorbs the cities, this plankton sediment that was humankind will be covered by geological layers of asphalt and cement until in millions of years’ time it thickens into oily deposits, on whose behalf we do not know.” And what I so love about this passage in the story is that it takes the geological fact of fossil fuels as tiny dead creatures, right, fossil fuels as fossilized life, and imagines a future in which humans become fossil fuels for another life form. Right. And so it uses the resources of fiction to imagine what a future human relationship to fuel as fuel might look like on behalf of another species.

Thank you all so much. That was really reminiscent, actually, of my environmental history students working through Bathsheba Demuth’s “Floating Coast,” this year. And just its a really wonderful and provocative discussion to have. So before we move over to audience questions, I’ll just pose one question, bring it all back around and let you give some, I guess, wrap-up comments before we move to the audience questions, which is just to think about really explicitly what role the study of history and culture can play in bringing about a just energy transition. I know we’ve already reflected on this quite a bit, but.

Okay, I can get started here. I can speak really specifically to the risk research that Cymene and I did on wind-power development in southern Mexico, the densest concentration of onshore wind parks anywhere in the world, primarily built upon ancestral indigenous lands of the binnizá and ikojts peoples. And without, you know, getting into the weeds on this too much, just to say that it’s been incredibly impressive in terms of just decarbonizing electricity, it’s been impressive from that standpoint. It’s a terrific development of over two gigawatts of clean electricity. So from that perspective, very impressive. But it’s also been extremely politically contentious, in part because the people who developed these projects had no understanding whatsoever of the specific history of this region, of the indigenous cultures there and of their long relationship to various extractivist projects in the past. So even if you’re only thinking of this from a pragmatic point of view of how can you create clean energy projects that people don’t hate? History and culture have an enormous role to play in this, as we found. And that’s simply, you know, trying to engage these communities in a serious way and understand where they’re coming from would have gone a long way towards creating trust and goodwill. And just to speak to Jennifer’s point about relationality. It’s all about relationality. This is all about trying to be in good relation to other beings, human beings, to human beings, us, to us as a species, to the ecologies that sustain us, and so forth. And I think history and culture are not perfect, but just the commitment to trying to understand, to try to communicate, to try to empathize with peoples and other beings with different histories, I think is really valuable in terms of getting out of the habit in which we’re trying to dominate the world. Right. Extract its resources and use it to feed our machines of productivity and prosperity. Because we’ve seen where that is going to go, and it’s going to go to ecocide and ultimately to the collapse of the civilization. And so it’s all too clear that we’re on that path. So I think that history and culture actually are incredibly important valuable lessons in information and ethics to offer us in that struggle to not allow that future to be foretold. I can go next, I guess. I mean, I’m thinking with my fellow panelists in terms of things that have already been said, and I think that, you know, the kind of classic transition from plantations to petroleum in the U.S. Gulf Coast is, you know, it kind of haunts my understanding of history, of energy transitions. And so what that tells us. And again, I’m stuck with Jeff Insko’s question on my screen. Right. So what that tells us is that the past is not past. Right. And Sara Pritchard has also invoked the really important idea that for so many people, a future of less energy or the costs of the current energy regime is already here. Right. And has been here for a long time. So the past is not past. The future is already here. And so I think I’m leaning actually more to the history than the culture part of the question. I think that the question of how one frames a narrative, how one frames a narrative of history, and how one tells the story of how we got here and who counts in that “we” is crucial to what transition looks like in the future. And so an idea that has stuck with me since I first read it is from the Nigerian writer and public intellectual Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie who says that what is important, or the narrative mode that entrenches injustice is starting the narrative from “secondly.” Right. And what she means by that is you begin the narrative when the violence has already happened and is normalized. Right. And so to refuse a historical narrative that begins from “secondly,” that begins with the violence already baked in, I think by analogy, I think it helps to chart a way toward a future where those modes of violence are not always already assumed. It’s hard to figure out how to add and build on to those great comments. So much has already been said. I think one thing I would add is the way many humanists are attentive to power. This is a super simple point and comment. But sometimes simple matters. Multiple forms of power in different kinds of contexts and different kinds of ways, but understanding how that works historically, culturally, and so forth, then helps us have a richer understanding when we’re debating the contemporary moment. I was kind of twitch about the lessons of history. I mean, yes, there are lessons of history. But then also, you know, I think all historians are trained to twitch at that. But I think if we have a much richer, deeper understanding of these layers and sediments of structures and power and violence and also opportunities and resistance, there are spaces there for thinking both creatively and pragmatically, to kind of link my two co-panelists’ comments.

Well, thank you so much again for talking through these ideas. I have so many more questions that I could ask. But I’m going to turn it now over to my colleague Firat to go ahead and moderate the discussion with our audience questions. Thanks Trish. And thanks to our panelists for the really remarkable reflections that they have provided us. And of course, as a price comes questions. I would like to start with one question I think related to our current moment of the pandemic and also related to one question we had in mind. This is from my Education City colleague Peter Martin. How does or might energy humanities engage or position the notion of well-being and thinking of Dominic’s concept of rebellion, Sara’s evident enjoyment of dog sledding and other experiences of Arctic darkness, Jennifer’s reading fiction, watching films for the planet. What is the value of playfulness and games for the energy humanities? So that’s the fun part in certain ways, right? We could see our interest in lived experiences that turn away from the high seriousness of global energy politics. Is there a political value in that affective shift and make us feel better?

I could start us off here, I mean, I think Jennifer has already talked about the importance of narratives and counter-narratives and creativity and imagination and the ways in which that can all be motivating or constraining. I think some of this affective shift when I was thinking about this question, for me, I think it helps us get out of declensions narratives or nihilistic narratives, even if we — again, asterisk, who’s the “we” here — We are facing daunting circumstances in many ways that this affective shift may provide more motivation or creativity in terms of creative responses to various challenges versus a threat of inaction. I think there’s the line about “if the ship’s sinking, let’s just party as the Titanic goes down.” Right. And the other thing that I was thinking about is actually going back to William Cronon’s “The Trouble with Wilderness” article. He has this line about there’s a problem with seeing all human use as abuse because it doesn’t…it fails to differentiate between different kinds of anthropocentric engagements with the natural world or non-human or more than human world or worlds. And therefore, it becomes a simplistic binary. If we act or change, that’s bad. Untouched wilderness supposedly is good, except that never existed anyway. So I think this more playful register — also, I was thinking about Holly Jean Buck’s idea of the “Charming Anthropocene” — that maybe it provides greater motivation for people rather than feeling overwhelmed, or the scale of issues is fundamentally not changeable or inactionable…unactionable? I don’t know, whatever. Maybe I can pick up on Sara’s last point. Sara, thanks so much. And this idea of sort of feeling trapped in the condition, you know, watching the train in slow motion, you know, collide with the car and not being able to feel like you have any agency to change things. And I do think that goes back to some of the earlier comments that we had about, you know, about can sort of sense of impasse and also the sense of sort of imaginative, you know, failure and where is I rooted? One of my suggestions is that, you know, what we’re up against — and we should realize that we’re up against it — is that petro-culture has filled our — for those of us privileged enough to have an abundance of energy at our disposal to live with this energy without conscience lifestyle — petro-culture has provided us with this rich sense memory archive of all these thrills and indulgences and conveniences and luxuries that petro-culture has given us. So when you talk about a radical break or a shift, immediately, I think people say, but I don’t have memories of this low-carbon future. I don’t I certainly don’t have positive memories, but I don’t have any memories of this low-carbon future. And so thus we tend to kind of retreat back to a sense of well, it must be impossible — or if it’s possible, it’s a dystopia of some kind. And so we fear it. And so it’s sort of easier to imagine apocalypse than the end of petro-culture. Just people said that about capitalism. I think the same goes for petro-culture. But this is why the humanities and especially the arts are so important. — speaking to the artists out there — because the arts have these amazing speculative and performative techniques for creating experiences and ideas and narratives and images that could be associated, that can kind of give us memories of these futures that we need…so desperately need. And I think there’s just you know, I enjoy the work I do with artists, maybe more than any, because I think that this is where you can maybe begin to sort of map out the possibilities for low-carbon pleasures. And honestly, you know, when you begin to think about it, many of the best things in life are low-carbon anyway. If you really begin to think about it, you know, the walks outside in the sun, the intimacies, you know, with your friends and partners and so forth. These are beautiful things that don’t require a lot of high carbon. When you begin to sort of re-rewire your pleasure circuits a little bit in that way, I think it can help a lot to sort of create the sense of possibility. So it’s this again. I don’t think it is one thing. It’s incremental work sort of reorganizing our desires and imagining sort of positive futures that are associated with low-carbon lifestyles. So I think this is the work that has to be done. Yeah, I can definitely build off of that with regard to what Dominic says about, you know, having no memories of low-carbon futures. One of my favorite ideas from Graeme Macdonald is reading 19th-century fiction and doing what he calls chronological backflips to understand what a low-carbon future might look like based on reading, you know, an earlier version of that. And so he reads 19th-century novels for an account of what it means to have to walk everywhere. And it’s a kind of delightful thought experiment. And I’m thinking of a Gayatri Spivak’s description of the work of the humanities as the non-coercive rearrangement of desire. And that’s kind of echoing what Dominic was saying about rewiring desire. And it seems to me that transition is coming. You know, whether we like it or not. And so I think one of the fundamental questions about energy in energy humanities is “what kind of transition do we want?” And so thinking about what a mindful transition to kind of echo the language of well-being, what a just transition would look like it, and how to take incremental steps toward getting there. And so I think that this means a redefinition of what well-being is and what we mean by well-being. What counts as well-being. And I think it would involve those kinds of relationality is that we’ve been talking about, and recognizing that well-being may not be the same as pleasure or what we have thought of as pleasure may be inimical to well-being. So I guess the last thing I would say to try to invoke the question of play is that, maybe it was two…it must have been actually two years ago now I was at an event — I think Dominic must have been there as well — on solarity And what I did in my solarity workshop was, with the help and in the company of others, I, in theory, in actuality, but I in theory made my own solar panel. And I say “in theory,” because it didn’t work. My solar panel didn’t work. Other people’s solar panels did work. And so I think part of what was so wonderful about this experience of making my own solar panel was letting go of the idea that what I do is, some kind of mastery. Right. And kind of leaning into a kind of DIY mode in which I was doing things I didn’t know how to do. Right. And in the sense of play. And I think part of what was powerful to me as I was struggling in frustration to make my solar panel was the idea that the way that solar panels work is that, you know, the electrons are bouncing on these surfaces and they’re incredibly inefficient. Solar panels, they kind of they transform into usable energy only a very small percentage of what’s actually happening with those electrons. And I have kind of held onto that as a metaphor for letting go of the demand for productivity. Right. Letting go of the idea that every electron bouncing in my mind must lead to something. So I think this gets both to the question that Firat raised about play. Where is the place of play? And I think play might be partly about letting go of that Cara Daggett idea of energy that Dominic mentioned that’s all about work. And we’re worrying about waste. Right. And so to think about a way of being that isn’t just about work. And that is about play. And it is about doing things that we don’t know how to do yet. Right.

Thank you so much. We have about five to six minutes left. So in the interest of time, I’ll try to sort of put some of the questions in a thematic cluster. I think in a way they all point out at the unevennesses of lived experiences of energy, especially in the Global South. I think the questions that Petra, Diana, Danya, Jeff, in particular, have been asking center around that question. So to start with Petra’s question, do you agree that an everyday approach helps acknowledge fragmented experiences that are based in different energy regimes that coexist, not just oil, and allows for complexity of historical agency of energy actors, who are never only producers or consumers of energy? Danya Saleh’s question: What do the panelists working in Energy Humanities think about the different green new deals, peoples Green New Deal, Red Deal from the Red Nation, they might they map out ways forward beyond riding bikes and also center reparations to the Global South. Diana’s comment also is in that line in differentiating extractivism — coal versus dam — are we also differentiating petro-violence versus hydro-violence? And finally, I think Jeff’s question, some of it was and in certain ways, but worth asking still, how do we work toward a post-petrol, that is also a just one.

I can start and just be very quick. I’ve actually oh, there it is. I had lost Petra’s question, but I want to answer it by way of a photograph from Ed Kashi. This is in the collection. Curse of the Black Gold: 50 years of Oil in the Niger Delta. And this image is so powerful to me because it is an image of energy simultaneity. Right. So we can understand that these enormous tanks here contain fossil fuels that will be piped elsewhere and not for use in Nigeria. And so we see the kind of muscular labor of these men chopping wood to burn. So we see kind of two energy regimes operating at the same time. And so I think that I’ve lost her question again. But I think that thinking about the unevenness in one place is, a really helpful way of thinking. And about the question of violence, I would say…I think somebody else had asked about dirty-clean fuel and petro-violence versus hydro violence. And I think that the very quick thing I would say about that is that it feels to me, and this might not be right, but it feels to me that there is a tendency toward violence that is inherent in scaling up. Right. So I think many kinds of energy become violent or dirty through this process of scaling up. And I don’t know what to do about that. Right. But I feel like scale is important in thinking about those problems. I could follow on that a little bit. That’s a really interesting point, Jennifer, the last point about the violence of scaling up and I think that there definitely is, this is another one of David Hughes’s arguments as one of the things that the plantation system did was to weave violence into sort of what we would think of as globalization in a very fundamental way so that you couldn’t have that transatlantic capitalism without a whole lot of violence being waged. And so and that’s sort of a legacy that we haven’t really come to terms with a lot of ways in terms of how much it’s fed into globalization more generally. The sense that, you know, the translocal flows are more important than what might happen to people in the communities where resource frontiers. And I think that’s always been an issue. And so a couple of thoughts. I mean, you know, one thought — and this comes out of a German solarity thinkers like Hermann Scheer — is to really sort of move towards hyper-local energy, to really focus on, you know, you use the energy you can make in your community or you can make in your home and that you don’t need the sort of apparatus of sort of long-distance energy systems. In fact, as he saw, like a lot of state violence and was really wrapped up in sort of, you know, managing those long distance flows, like why else is the United States invading the Middle East all the time, if not to guarantee its petro-political, you know, sort of systems? So I think that’s one model. And then there’s another model, which may be more utopian, but I think as we’re thinking about, is are there ways we could move towards more ethical kinds of globalization, more ethical kinds of trans-local relationships? Are they necessarily violent? Can we imagine that there are other models available? And I think that there are some that are out there, you know, that that might exist as alternatives that could be explored. But I think on the whole, you know, it’s probably an issue, as you say, Jennifer, that really has to be thought of as a problem of scale and how we can scale the energy transition in a way that reduces the violence of the previous energy systems. Again, the danger of going last, a lot’s been said, but Dominic, you just used the word ethical. I’m not sure if I have a lot to add in terms of of unevenness, in equality, power, justice, and so forth, because that’s definitely been a thread running through our presentations and the conversations and questions. And so I’m left with the question of how do “we” — again, the problematic “we” — how do we get people to care about ethics and justice and others, whether it’s local, others or just… And also acknowledge the ways in which many of us are already, you know, are implicated in systems that are dependent on unevenness and extraction and violence in order to have energy or convenience or ease of luxury elsewhere.

Thank you so much. Our time is now up. My colleague Danyel Reiche had asked, and I won’t expect you to answer this question, but his question was, what are the issues unique to Qatar and the Gulf when discussing lived everyday energy experiences? I’ll keep this question is an excuse to bring you to Doha when conditions permit. But it is also a question that, as a research group, we are aiming to delve into in detail. Now, I would like to hand it over to Dean Dallal to provide his conclusion or remarks.

Thank you so much for this extremely interesting discussion and the great launch for our project. I hope the audience will join us in future activities and I hope we will, before long, we’ll be able to host you here in Doha. Thank you so much.

Resources

Books

Energy Humanities: An Anthology, edited by Imre Szeman and Dominic Boyer
Energopolitics: Wind and Power in the Anthropocene, by Dominic Boyer
Fueling Culture: 101 Words for Energy and Environment, edited by Imre Szeman, Jennifer Wenzel, and Patricia Yaeger
Confluence: The Nature of Technology and the Remaking of the Rhône, by Sara B. Pritchard
New Natures: Joining Environmental History with Science and Technology Studies, edited by Dolly Jørgensen, Finn Arne Jørgensen, and Sara B. Pritchard
Technology and the Environment in History, by Sara B. Pritchard and Carl A. Zimring
The Disposition of Nature: Environmental Crisis and World Literature, by Jennifer Wenzel
Bulletproof: Afterlives of Anticolonial Prophecy in South Africa and Beyond, by Jennifer Wenzel
Living Oil: Petroleum Culture in the American Century, by Stephanie LeMenager
Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History, by Sidney W. Mintz
A Billion Black Anthropocenes or None, by Kathryn Yusoff
The Birth of Energy: Fossil Fuels, Thermodynamics, and the Politics of Work, by Cara New Daggett
Carbon Democracy: Political Power in the Age of Oil, by Timothy Mitchell
Lifeblood: Oil, Freedom, and the Forces of Capital, by Matthew T. Huber
The Next Catastrophe: Reducing Our Vulnerabilities to Natural, Industrial, and Terrorist Disasters, by Charles Perrow
The Multichannel Retail Handbook, by Chris Jones
Power Lines: Phoenix and the Making of the Modern Southwest, by Andrew Needham
The Work of Invisibility: Radiation Hazards and Occupational Health in South African Uranium Production, by Gabrielle Hecht
The Oil Lamp: Poems, by Ogaga Ifowodo
Orientalism, by Edward W. Said
Curse of The Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta, by Ed Kashi

Articles

Wenzel, Jennifer. “How to read for oil.” Resilience: A Journal of the Environmental Humanities 1, no. 3 (2014): 156-161.
Cronon, William. “The trouble with wilderness: or, getting back to the wrong nature.” Environmental history 1, no. 1 (1996): 7-28.
Buck, Holly Jean. “On the possibilities of a charming Anthropocene.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 105, no. 2 (2015): 369-377.

Films

Not Ok – Cymene Howe and Dominic Boyer

The Impact of Climate Change on Agriculture in South Asia
2021-04-19 12:00 - 13:30
Agriculture is one of the most vulnerable sectors to the effects of climate change. The change in average temperature, rainfall, changes in pests and diseases, variations in the atmospheric Carbon Dioxide (CO2) and ground-level ozone concentrations, as well as changes in sea level can have a direct and negative impact on food production and farming communities. Despite technological advances made in the 20th century, climate change still has a linear and often adverse impact on agricultural productivity. While this is a global phenomenon, South Asia is one of the most susceptible regions to the effects of climate change. Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka together comprise one of the world’s most densely populated regions and are all also highly reliant on agriculture as an economic sector. About 57 percent of South Asia’s landmass is devoted to farming, while nearly 60 percent of its population is engaged in agricultural production in one form or another. Much of this activity is undertaken by vulnerable small landholders, while women also play a significant role. According to Food and Agriculture Organization data, in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Bhutan, more than 60 percent of women work in the agricultural sector. An increasing population, natural resource degradation, and the impact of high rates of poverty means that the region is already contending with food insecurity. This will certainly be amplified to reach critical levels with the anticipated effects of climate change. While direct impacts are associated with the rise in temperatures, indirect impacts include insufficient availability of water, due to decline in annual rainfall and inadequate inputs of water, and changing soil moisture status and pest and disease incidence due to lack of enough fertilizers. The current situation has significantly impacted small-holder rainfed farmers who constitute the majority of farmers in this region and hold low financial and technical capacity to adapt to climate variability and change. The agricultural productivity of the region is in decline, and with fluctuation in crop production and a rise in market prices, the ongoing agrarian crisis is predicted to increase food insecurity and poverty in South Asian countries.

Speakers:

Vaibhav Chaturvedi is a fellow at The Council on Energy, Environment and Water and an economist who leads The Council’s work on Low-Carbon Pathways. His research focuses on energy and climate change mitigation policy issues, especially those impacting India, within integrated assessment modeling framework of the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM)

N.H. Ravindranath is a professor at the Center for Sustainable Technologies at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, India. His research is focused on dimensions of Climate Change: Mitigation Assessment, Carbon Sequestration Modeling, Impact of Climate Change and Vulnerability Assessment in Forest and Agro-ecosystems. He has also worked on Bioenergy, Biofuels and Biomass Production, and Citizen Science.

Moderator: Anatol Lieven, Professor at Georgetown University in Qatar.

The Gospel of Work and Money: Global Histories of Industrial Education Virtual Working Group II
2021-05-25 17:00 - 19:00
On May 25, 2021, the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS) at Georgetown University Qatar held the second virtual working group under its research initiative on The Gospel of Work and Money: Global Histories of Industrial Education. This virtual working group was the first in a series of meetings that will be held between May and August 2021, to present and discuss the chapters contributions for the project. During the May meeting two papers were presented and received feedback and comments from the group.

The first paper titled, “American Sociology’s Promotion of the Industrial Education Model and the Reification of Race,” was presented by Dr. Julia Bates. The paper addresses American sociology’s theoretical promotion of the Industrial Education model. The paper reviews three main sociologists’ use of sociological theory to advocate for the industrial education model. After the first World War, the U.S. Department of Labor worked with a commercial philanthropic institution called the Phelps Stokes Fund to transfer educational policies designed for African Americans to West Africa and South Africa. The US government used and promoted the industrial education model used at Tuskegee and the Hampton institutes for African American education. This model emphasized manual labor, Christian character formation, and political passivity as a form of racial uplift. The model heavily relied upon prominent theories in the sociology of race to propagate this model. Thomas Jesse Jones, who was the educational director of the Phelps Stokes Fund, in particular advocated for the transnational development of the model. W.E.B. Du Bois, a prominent sociologist who was marginalized by the U.S government and American sociology, critiques this model in his works The Crisis and Darkwater. Bates argues that from the works of Jones and Dubois two different sociological conceptions of race emerge. The author will examine the U.S. state’s decision to link African Americans and Africans as similar objects of political intervention and look at Jones’s use of sociology to promote the model’s effect on sociological theories of race.

Dr. Elif Ekin Akşit presented the second paper titled, “Industrial Education in the Late Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey: Gender, Egalitarianism, and Mathematics.” The paper traces the history of industrial schools in the Ottoman Empire and their subsequent continuation in modern Turkey. Dr. Akşit contends that the development of industrial education in the late Ottoman empire and modern Turkey took place within the context of the transformation from an empire to the republic, and adopting policies and practices of the West became the part and parcel of resisting colonialism. The paper discusses the development of the Girls Industrial Schools in the late Ottoman Empire and their importance in the general development of technical/scientific education and its relation to the ideology. The author proposes to study the question of what it meant to be industrial in the East and West, as well as trace the continuation of the industrial schools in the late-20th and early 21st centuries. These key queries will be addressed with the help of the data collected from students’ accounts as well as state documents on these schools. The article primarily focuses on the gendered dimension of the industrial schools because the author argues that their continuation in the Turkish republic made these girls’ schools the main pillar for establishing the revolution on the societal level.

CIRS will convene the next paper workshop for the project in June where three additional paper contributions will be presented and discussed.

For the meeting agenda, click here.For the participants’ biographies, click here.For the research initiative, click here.

Participants and Discussants:

Elif Ekin Akşit, Ankara University, TurkeyMaram Al-Qershi, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarDanya Al-Saleh, University of Wisconsin–MadisonLukas Allemann, University of LaplandHossein Ayazi, Williams CollegeZahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJulia Bates, Sacred Heart UniversityMisba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarJoshua Frank Cárdenas, California Indian Nations CollegeOliver Charbonneau, University of GlasgowBronwen Everill, University of CambridgeArun Kumar, University of NottinghamJanne Laht, University of HelsinkiSuzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarDolf-Alexander Neuhaus, Free Berlin UniversitySarah Steinbock-Pratt, University of AlabamaKarine Walther, Georgetown University in QatarElizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in QatarHelge Wendt, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG) Berlin

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS

The Gospel of Work and Money: Global Histories of Industrial Education Virtual Working Group III
2021-06-08 17:00 - 19:00 | Education City, Al Luqta St, Ar-Rayyan, Doha, Qatar
November 27, 2019

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8:00 pm

On June 8, 2021, the Center for International and Regional Studies convened a third virtual working group under its research initiative on The Gospel of Work and Money: Global Histories of Industrial Education. During this paper workshop two chapter contributions were presented and discussed, which received in-depth feedback from the group.

Dr. Bronwen Everill, presented the first paper titled, ““The Dignity of Labor”: Liberian Industrial Education in West Africa.” The chapter looks at the role of Liberia within West Africa, as a site of educational innovation and the launch of US state-based missionary and educational enterprises. The author explores the close internal relationship between Liberia and Sierra Leonean and the use of education as a way of maintaining Liberian sovereignty. By the end of the 19th century, Liberian engineers were training African workers for plantation labor, domestic housework, and for skilled and unskilled industrial labor in places as far away as German Togo, British Nigeria, and the Belgian Congo. At the start of the 20th century, Liberians had become part of a mobile class of African engineers, missionaries, and educators spreading American values and ideas on the continent. The paper addressed the literature about Liberia and its use of education in their struggle for sovereignty and independence. The author argues that Liberians used whatever means at their disposal to ensure that Liberia was not incorporated into the British or French Empire, by ensuring their effective control over and domination of the indigenous populations of Liberia.

Next Dr. Helge Wendt presented his paper titled, “Industrial-Technological Education in Spanish America during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century.” The paper provides a comparative study of early industrial education schools in five Latin American countries i.e. Chile, Argentina, Mexico, Cuba, and Colombia. These schools of Arts and Trades were opened in the 19th century with the goal of training young men, and later young women, in practical and technical fields of production. The author states that the history of industrial education in these countries can be divided into different initiatives related to higher education, primary education, professional training, and further training. In this comparative study, Wendt wants to understand the school foundations and subsequent reforms in their local, inter-local, national and international contexts. School regulations, teachers and student recruitments play a special role in the analysis of the different developments. Also, connections of the school with the existing school system and the hopes for stimuli for the economic activity in the respective country will be studied.

The third paper workshop for the project is scheduled for the end of June, in which three scholars will present their draft papers and receive commentary.

For the meeting agenda, click here.

For the participants’ biographies, click here.

For the research initiative, click here.

Participants and Discussants:

Maram Al-Qershi, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Danya Al-Saleh, University of Wisconsin–Madison

Hossein Ayazi, Williams College

Zahra Babar, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Julia Bates, Sacred Heart University

Misba Bhatti, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Oliver Charbonneau, University of Glasgow

Bronwen Everill, University of Cambridge

Arun Kumar, University of Nottingham

Suzi Mirgani, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Dolf-Alexander Neuhaus, Free Berlin University

Sarah Steinbock-Pratt, University of Alabama

Karine Walther, Georgetown University in Qatar

Elizabeth Wanucha, CIRS – Georgetown University in Qatar

Helge Wendt, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG) Berlin

Article by Misba Bhatti, Research Analyst at CIRS
