• Sir Tim Lankester on Britain’s Foreign Aid

    Sir Tim Lankester, Chairman of the Council of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical ‎Medicine and Advisor on South East Asia to the consulting firm Oxford Analytica, delivered a ‎CIRS Focused Discussion on “The Politics and Economics of Britain’s Foreign Aid” on October ‎‎8, 2012. The talk was based on his recent book,The Politics…

  • Social Change in Post-Khomeini Iran Working Group I

    On October 20–21, 2012, The Center for International and Regional Studies launched one of its new research initiatives for the 2012–2013 academic year, “Social Change in Post-Khomeini Iran,” through a two day working group held in Doha. Over the course of the two day meeting, international and regional scholars addressed political, economic, and social aspects of…

  • William Beeman Lectures on Iranian-Arabian Biculturalism

    William O. Beeman, Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at the ‎University ‎of ‎Minnesota and President of the Middle East Section of the ‎American ‎Anthropological ‎Association, delivered a CIRS Monthly Dialogue on “The ‎Khalijis: ‎Iranian-Arabian ‎Biculturalism in the Gulf Region”‎ on October 22, 2012. As an ‎introduction‎, ‎Beeman ‎‏gave the audience some background to what…

  • Sheikh Abdullah Bin Mohammed Bin Saud Al Thani on the Digital Generation

    H.E. Sheikh Abdullah Bin Mohammed Bin Saud Al Thani, Chairman of the Board of Directors ‎for Qatar Telecom (Qtel), delivered a CIRS Distinguished Lecture on “Technology and the ‎Digital Generation” on November 7, 2012. ‎ Al Thani began the lecture by giving an overview of Qtel and the changes it has undergone since ‎being restructured in the…

  • Causes and Consequences of Food Insecurity in the Middle East

    In collaboration with partner organizations, Qatar’s National Food Security Program hosted the ‎‎“International Conference on Food Security in Dry Lands” in Doha on November 14th and 15th, ‎‎2012. National, regional, and international institutions participated in the conference and ‎addressed challenges facing dry lands in their pursuit of food security. The conference focused ‎on the three…

  • CIRS and the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs Discuss Climate Change in the Arab World

    Rabi Mohtar founded the Global Engineering Program at Purdue University where he was a ‎Professor of Environmental and Natural Resources Engineering since 1996. His professional ‎activities addressed the important issues of Water – Energy Food nexus and its inter-linkages; ‎more specifically in developing and maintaining the environmental aspects of sustainable ‎development.‎

  • Weak States in the Greater Middle East Working Group I

    On December 8–9, 2012, CIRS convened its first Working Group meeting under the research initiative “Weak States in the Greater Middle East.” Participants employed a multi-disciplinary approach to critically analyze the…