BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Center for International and Regional Studies - ECPv6.16.2//NONSGML v1.0//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu
X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Center for International and Regional Studies
REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H
X-Robots-Tag:noindex
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:Europe/Moscow
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:+0300
TZOFFSETTO:+0400
TZNAME:MSK
DTSTART:20110326T230000
END:STANDARD
END:VTIMEZONE
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Moscow:20121008T080000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/Moscow:20121008T180000
DTSTAMP:20260523T034523
CREATED:20141026T103645Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20210901T132243Z
UID:10000845-1349683200-1349719200@cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu
SUMMARY:Sir Tim Lankester on Britain's Foreign Aid
DESCRIPTION: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 and Economics of Britain’s Foreign ‎Aid: The Pergau Dam Affair (Routledge\, 2012)\, which he described as “a case study of what can ‎go wrong when you do development assistance badly.”‎ \n \n \nGiving a background of the history of British foreign aid\, Lankester said that the program was ‎initiated in the 1960s and was driven by the British government’s belief that it had a moral ‎obligation to its former colonies as well as practical political interests in those countries. In the ‎‎1980s\, Lankester was the Permanent Secretary of the Overseas Development Administration – ‎the ministry responsible for development aid. During his time in the ministry\, “one of the most ‎controversial projects ever funded by British aid” was taking place. This was the establishment of ‎the Pergau Dam and power-generating project on the Malay-Thai border\, which “was the largest ‎funding in the history of British aid\,” Lankester recalled.‎ \n \n \nThe controversial Pergau Dam project was the result of a private agreement between some key ‎members of the Malay and British governments and was based on Britain providing Malaysia ‎with 200 million pounds worth of civil aid in return for sales of 1 billion pounds of defense ‎equipment. Lankester recalled that an agreement based on the offer of British aid in return for ‎arms sales was both unprecedented and against British policy and was thus divisive from the ‎start. To make matters worse\, once the agreement was signed between the two governments\, the ‎powerful contractors and companies assigned to building the project increased their estimates ‎and the total cost for the project almost doubled. ‎ \n \n \nDespite the increasing costs\, and against the advice of British government officials and ‎economists\, the project went ahead with the support of Mrs. Thatcher and a host of others with ‎special interests. Since both the prime ministers of Malaysia and Britain had backed the project\, ‎the other government departments buckled under the pressure and did not offer sufficient ‎opposition to their leaders. Lankester described the situation as being one that suffered from ‎conflicting policy agendas and the “excessive mixing of politics\, business\, and conflicts of ‎interest.” ‎ \n \n \nIn his capacity as Permanent Secretary\, Lankester was tasked with evaluating whether or not the ‎money for the project was being properly and lawfully spent. Although the legal assessment at ‎the time showed that the project was lawful\, the spend for the project was based on taxpayers ‎money and was so inefficient and uneconomic that Lankester felt obliged to formally ‎disassociate himself and the civil service from it. “This\,” he said “is a story of politics and special ‎interests trumping sound development and sound economics.” Had there been more ‎transparency\, it may have been possible for parliament\, the media\, and other interest groups to ‎formally oppose the project that ultimately damaged British-Malay relations at the time. ‎ \n \n \nIn conclusion\, Lankester said that he was curious to know whether the very same project would ‎have been viable today. His ex-post assessment\, in light of increased gas prices over the years\, ‎was that the project would still be an uneconomic one by today’s calculations. As a final thought\, ‎he advised that the Pergau Dam case study provides valuable lessons for governments\, and his ‎advice was that “it is better to be transparent than obscure\,” “don’t say one thing and do ‎another\,” “when things go wrong\, don’t cover up\,” and\, lastly\, “if you make one mistake\, don’t ‎compound it by making another.”‎ \n \n \nSir Tim Lankester is a member of the joint advisory board of the Georgetown University School ‎of Foreign in Qatar. He was UK Executive Director on the boards of the IMF and World Bank\, ‎and later Permanent Secretary of the Overseas Development Administration. He was Director of ‎the School of Oriental and African Studies\, London University\, and from 2001 to 2009 ‎President of Corpus Christi College\, Oxford. He has published articles and book reviews on aid ‎and development. ‎  \n \n \nArticle by Suzi Mirgani\, Editor and Manager for CIRS Publications
URL:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu/event/sir-tim-lankester-britains-foreign-aid/
CATEGORIES:Dialogue Series,Distingushed Lectures,Regional Studies
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2014/10/events_21956_19916_1414681666-1.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Moscow:20121020T080000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/Moscow:20121021T180000
DTSTAMP:20260523T034523
CREATED:20140924T160749Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240314T104716Z
UID:10000799-1350720000-1350842400@cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu
SUMMARY:Social Change in Post-Khomeini Iran Working Group I
DESCRIPTION: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 ongoing domestic transformations within the Islamic Republic. Via a multidisciplinary approach\, the working group offered in-depth analysis of the evolution of Iranian society in the post-Khomeini era\, highlighting contemporary social and cultural trends. \n \n \nWorking group participants debated sources of the Iranian regime’s legitimacy\, its survival strategies\, and how successfully it has penetrated society over the past twenty-three years. The group discussed the role and functions of prominent state institutions\, such as the Velayet e Faqih and bonyads\, along with economic and political elites in contemporary Iran. The Velayet e Faqih has been seen as gaining increasing political power rather than religious influence during the post-Khomeini years. While many grand ayatollahs in Qom have rejected the authority of the Velayet e Faqih\, its institutional strength and capacity extend throughout the Islamic Republic. Acting as parallel institutions to the state\, the bonyads have also flourished and serve as both economic and political sources of state power. By addressing the needs of disadvantaged economic stakeholders\, the bonyads serve to build a core of populist support for the regime. While the bonyads are commonly viewed as inefficient and corrupt\, their distribution of state largesse aids the regime in developing a social base and in spreading its power to marginalized\, rural parts of the country. \n \n \nSome participants posited that both the political and religious legitimacy of the regime are in fact quite narrow within Iran\, with the silent majority of the population rejecting the logic and essence of the system. Participants argued that there has been a social evolution in Iran that belies the ideological discourse often associated with the Islamic Republic. Through clientelism and institutional penetration\, the regime in Iran has developed its capacity; however\, most scholars agreed that Iranian society presents a dichotomy between how people live their lives and what the state wants to impose on its citizens. Some scholars attributed the gradual rise of liberalism within Iranian thought and society in the post-Khatami era to the deficiency of the Iranian state in garnering ideological support. This has also given rise to positive individualism within society\, where religion as a political reference point is on the decline\, and tolerance for the differences of others is a growing trend amongst the youth. Modernizing family dynamics\, gauged through the lower birth rate\, the rising age of marriage\, and decrease in gender inequality perceptions indicate that Iranian society has transformed dramatically in the post-revolutionary years. \n \n \nThe participants also discussed the religious and secular intellectual trends from the pre-revolutionary era to contemporary times\, in terms of religious orthodoxy and heterodoxy\, religious reform and innovation\, and secular critique. Within religious orthodoxy and heterodoxy the trends were marked by transformation from quietist traditional Islam in the pre-revolution era\, to empowered and state-sponsored\, ultra-orthodoxy in present times. Within religious reform and innovation\, the liberal reading of Islam transformed into a radical reform movement as seen with disenchanted reformists in the Green Movement of recent years. Secular critique is viewed to have transmuted from liberal nationalism to liberal secularism. \n \n \nDuring the past twenty years\, Iran has experienced shifts and transformations in its growing economy. The gradual transition from a government-run\, closed economy to a relatively diverse and open economy has led to an economic mindset guided by a nationalism based on technology. The participants discussed the securitization of commercial decisions coupled with techno-based nationalism and how this has had a relatively positive impact on enterprise development in Iran. The business community in Iran is increasingly focused on efficiency\, profitability\, and innovation. Contrary to common negative perceptions of the impact of international sanctions within the country\, the scholars also deliberated the multi-faceted impact of sanctions on business development. Although average Iranians certainly suffer from sanctions\, being cut off from regular import tracks has spurred entrepreneurs to diversify their activities\, and has also led to a greater regionalization of Iranian businesses. \n \n \nIran exhibits a mixed socio-economic picture; it maintains the 10th highest ranking in the Human Development Index of the Middle East\, as well as a middle-income status among developing countries. The lack of deep pockets of poverty and the fact that the state has ensured access to basic needs of food\, electricity\, and water\, have meant that holistic understanding of the conditions of the poor in Iran have been overlooked. Additionally\, the current framing of marginalized youth in the broader region depicts them as disenchanted with social and political life\, drawn to more radical forms of political Islam. These speculative conclusions that the poor are more likely to be radicalized are not backed by empirical evidence. Broader scholarly efforts are needed to examine how urban poor in Iran have responded to poverty and marginalization. In terms of education\, Iran is performing relatively well with declining levels of gender and geographic inequality. However\, the current youth bulge in Iran is similar to that in countries around the region\, where the inability of the labor market to absorb the youth bulge creates visible employment problems for young people exiting the educational system. \n \n \nThe participants also discussed the transformation in terms of demographics\, and how this impacts Iranian society. Lower birth rates and the low male-to-female ratio\, in combination with rising standards of education for women\, have all led to delayed marriages. In the context of women’s status and marriage\, the scholars delved into discussions on legal development in terms of the Islamic Republic’s reinstitution of family law and family courts and their consequential impact on the status of women within society. Some of the family laws\, with particular reference to the divorce laws\, were viewed by the working group members as having the unintended consequence of leading to the individuated subjectivity of women due to their increased litigating role. The continuous modification of marriage laws in Iran was regarded by the discussants as coming from different levels within society. \n \n \nAs a highly literate society\, Iranians have appreciated poetry\, prose\, and non-fiction across the generations\, and have continuously produced literary works against a political backdrop. Regarded as political and social commentary\, the participants discussed post-revolutionary literature\, with particular attention to women writers and the role of gender. In the post-Khomeini era\, Iranian women writers have been on the rise and have been representative of a variety of socio-economic backgrounds. Women writers abroad have also been active actors in Iranian social and political commentary. The diaspora community as a whole\, which is in constant transnational flows between the host and homeland\, has contributed greatly to both the local and international discourse on life in the Islamic Republic. \n \n \n\nRead more about this research initiative	 \n\n \nArticle by Dwaa Osman\, Research Analyst at CIRS
URL:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu/event/social-change-post-khomeini-iran-working-group-i/
CATEGORIES:Focused Discussions,Race & Society,Regional Studies
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2014/09/events_16586_11161_1411574869-1.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Moscow:20121022T080000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/Moscow:20121022T180000
DTSTAMP:20260523T034523
CREATED:20141023T092208Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20210901T132209Z
UID:10000930-1350892800-1350928800@cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu
SUMMARY:William Beeman Lectures on Iranian-Arabian Biculturalism
DESCRIPTION: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 he described as “one of the ‎longest running toponymic ‎battles.” There has been disagreement in the recent historical period ‎over whether the body of water between ‎Iran and the Arabian Peninsula should be ‎called ‎‏‎“the ‎‏Arabian Gulf‎” ‎or the ‎‏‎“‎Persian Gulf‎.”‎ ‎ \n \n \nIn order to resolve this historical contention\, Beeman said that he uses the term ‎‎“‎Khalij” to ‎describe the body of water\, and “Khaliji” to describe the residents of the region. These are terms ‎commonly used in the discourse of the region and are ‎understood in Arabic\, in Persian\, and in ‎some South Asian languages as well. “I want to call into question the nature of the identity of the ‎people who live in this region\, and ‎rather than identifying them either as Persian or Arab\, or ‎calling this body of water the Persian ‎Gulf or the Arabian Gulf\, I want to make a case for these ‎individuals as residents of this region\, ‎whether they are on the Iranian side or on the Arab side ‎independent of an exclusive Arab or ‎Persian identity\,” he said.‎ \n \n \nSuch communities are formed as a result of historical factors\, including migration\, trade\, ‎shifting ‎colonial boundaries\, or as the results of intermarriage or cultural borrowings that occur as ‎a matter of course ‎when populations come into contact. “The Khalij is a rich mélange of cultural ‎differences made up ‎of Arabic\, Persian\, South Asian\, East African\, Portuguese\, French\, and ‎English\,” among others\, Beeman noted. ‎ \n \n \nLinguistically\, the people who live in this region have been comfortable communicating in a ‎number of languages\, and even forming new ones that are a mix of Arabic\, Persian\, and Indian ‎languages. A similar example is Swahili – meaning “coastal” in Arabic – and the mutual influence ‎of Arabic ‎and East African languages on each other as a result of contact and ‎trade across the ‎Gulf of Aden. ‎‎“Many people living on either side of the Khalij are fully ‎bilingual\, and frequently ‎tri- and quad-lingual\,” Beeman said. ‎ \n \n \nThe “geographical impenetrability” that separates the Khalij from the inland regions meant ‎that ‎people on both sides of the water had a closer cultural identity than what they shared with ‎their ‎own inland Arab or Persian communities in terms of cuisine\, dress patterns\, marriage ‎patterns\, religious rituals\, and ‎discourse structures.‎‎‏ ‏Often\, because of the strong marriage and ‎trade ties\, families would be ‎dispersed on both sides of the Khalij and\, to this day\, have strong ‎cross cultural and cross border ties. Before modern air travel\, ‎the ease of maritime travel across ‎the Gulf and the difficulty of inland travel across deserts and ‎mountains meant that “people ‎living on the coast of the Khalij found that it was much easier to ‎communicate with each other ‎than it was to communicate with people who lived inland\,” Beeman said. Boats ‎could carry much ‎heavier loads much more easily than any form of overland transport\, ‎and so the Khalij was an ‎area that thrived both culturally and economically. ‎ \n \n \nIn conclusion\, Beeman said that\, as a result of state and historical processes\, there were several ‎events that had a profound effect on changing the unified nature of Khaliji culture\, including ‎colonial territorial demarcations and competition. He argued that “the early impositions of state ‎structures in the region\, which had been blissfully absent for ‎centuries\, caused an overlay of state ‎identity\, which has served to obscure the basic ‎commonalities between the members of the ‎population of this region.” Other events also contributed to the separation of the Khaliji ‎communities\, including the consolidation of Iran under Reza Shah; the consolidation of Saudi ‎Arabia under Ibn Saud; the departure of the British from the Khalij that left a vacuum to be ‎filled by local ruling families who demarcated their territories accordingly; and\, finally\, the ‎Iranian revolution of 1978-1979 that changed the shape of the Iranian political and cultural ‎landscapes\, and caused a break in the historical alliance between the cross-Gulf communities. ‎ \n \n \nFinally\, the gradual encroachment of modern state structures into the region required a newly ‎‎“imagined” idea of identity that necessarily distinguishes one group or ‎nationality from another. ‎Beeman concluded that the shared culture of “Khaliji” identity belies this imagined separation ‎of ‎nationalities and promotes the idea of a diverse community that is ‎inherently multicultural. ‎‎“This\,” he said\, “is an ‘unimagined’ community; a community in fact\, but not in name\, ‎and not in ‎its social identification.” ‎ \n \n \nWilliam O. Beeman was formerly Professor of Anthropology and Director of ‎Middle ‎East ‎Studies at Brown University. Best known as a Middle East specialist for more than ‎‎30 ‎years\, he ‎has also worked in Central Asia\, the Caucasus\, Japan\, China and South Asia. He ‎has ‎served as ‎consultant to the United States State Department\, the Department of Defense\, ‎the ‎United ‎Nations and the United States Congress. ‎  \n \n \nArticle by Suzi Mirgani\, Manager and Editor for CIRS Publications
URL:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu/event/william-beeman-lectures-iranian-arabian-biculturalism/
CATEGORIES:Dialogue Series,Regional Studies
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://cirs.qatar.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2014/10/events_21821_16651_1414679049-1.jpg
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR