Jonathan Hyslop (Peace and Conflict Studies, Africana and Latin American Studies, Sociology and Anthropology), along with faculty from English, History, ALANA Cultural Center, and the Office of the President, helped organize a celebration of the late Nelson Mandela on December 12th, 2013.
You can watch a recording of the event below:
Peace and Conflict Studies major Jimmy Juarez ’15 was recently interviewed by Timmera Whaley ’15 for a student profile for the Office of Undergraduate Studies. In the interview, Juarez discusses his experiences studying abroad, in class at Colgate, and advice he has for this year’s first-year class.
CLICK TO READ THE FULL INTERVIEW
Information from The University of Wisconsin Press
“Provides a rich discussion of the contemporary Rwandan context, giving voice to people who are largely excluded from public discussions of Rwanda. A much-needed corrective to the cheery presentation of Rwanda in the popular press.”
—Timothy Longman, author of Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda
For 100 days in 1994, genocide engulfed Rwanda. Since then, many in the international community have praised the country’s postgenocide government for its efforts to foster national unity and reconciliation by downplaying ethnic differences and promoting “one Rwanda for all Rwandans.” Examining how ordinary rural Rwandans experience and view these policies, Whispering Truth to Power challenges the conventional wisdom on postgenocide Rwanda.
Susan Thomson finds that many of Rwanda’s poorest citizens distrust the local officials charged with implementing the state program and believe that it ignores the deepest problems of the countryside: lack of land, jobs, and a voice in policies that affect lives and livelihoods. Based on interviews with dozens of Rwandan peasants and government officials, this book reveals how the nation’s disenfranchised poor have been engaging in everyday resistance, cautiously and carefully—“whispering” their truth to the powers that be. This quiet opposition, Thomson argues, suggests that some of the nation’s most celebrated postgenocide policies have failed to garner the grassroots support needed to sustain peace.
On October 7th, Kerry Brinkert, Director, Implementation Support Unit of the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, will be giving a lecture in Persson hall at 7:30pm on “After the Spotlight Dims: Implementing the Global Ban on Land Mines”. Mr. Brinkert is the person who bears responsibility for carrying out the eradication of landmines that is specified in the most widely-supported treaty on this matter, and his organization works with states, international organizations, and NGOs to remove landmines around the world and to assist the victims of landmines. His talk will focus on the challenge of coordinating all of these organizations in their efforts to rid the world of landmines.
In addition to his talk to the larger Colgate University population, Mr. Brinkert will also be holding a lunchtime seminar discussion with a small number of PCON students as part of the Careers in PCON series.
For further information on Mr. Brinkert and his organization, please click on the links below.
http://www.gichd.org/about-gichd/staff-and-organisation-chart/kerry-brinkert/
http://www.apminebanconvention.org/
Peace and Conflict Studies Fifth Annual Schaehrer Lecture will be held on in Love Auditorium, Olin Hall, at 7pm on October 3rd, 2013!
Erica Chenoweth, Why Civil Resistance Works: Unarmed Struggle in the Past and Future
Dr. Chenoweth is co-winner of the 2013 Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order, for her 2011 book co-‐authored with Maria Stephan Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Non-Violent Conflict (Columbia University Press). She is assistant professor at the University of Denver’s Josef Korbel School of International Studies and directs that school’s Program on Terrorism and Insurgency Research. She has been a fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, and the University of California-‐Berkeley’s Institute of International Studies.
In an era where the front lines of battle no longer exist, scholars work to understand the manner in which human conflict occurs. Seemingly gone are the days where the United States or most other nations would need to engage in war against another state. What, then, is the nature of armed conflict now, and how will it evolve in the coming years? This is the question that Peace and Conflict Studies’ Assistant Professor Jacob Mundy and former Post-doctoral Research Fellow Stephanie Fishel sought to answer when they organized the Wars Beyond War workshop, which took place at Colgate in March of 2012.
The workshop participants included Professors Dan Monk, Nancy Ries, and Susan Thomson, all members of Colgate’s Peace and Conflict Studies department. Scholar David Campbell, then holding Colgate’s O’Connor Chair, also participated.
Workshop presenters came to Colgate not only from around the country, but also from around the world, including China, Sweden, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Such topics as international terrorism, civil wars, humanitarian intervention, and unarmed drones were debated and discussed to the educational benefit of all attendees.
Each workshop presenter and participant has written extensively on these topics. Some of these scholar’s contributions to the workshop are now available in one cohesive academic journal, The new issue of Critical Issues on Security, with an introduction by Professor Mundy and an open-access article by Dr. Fishel, features the research presented at the workshop. These articles makes a significant effort to answer some of the most pressing questions as to how scholars and governments should respond to the ever changing sphere of human conflict. This special journal issue, building on the War Beyond Wars workshop workshop, represents yet another example of how Colgate’s Peace and Conflict Studies program is a leader in this rapidly evolving field.
(Note: This story was written by Kevin Costello ’16, a student intern with the Peace and Conflict Studies Program)
One of the most valuable components of the student experience at Colgate is the direct access that undergraduates enjoy to leading experts and thinkers in academia. This is especially important in the complex and often bitterly partisan world of international conflicts. The Peace and Conflict Studies (PCON) program at Colgate has been successful in utilizing this connection to further student understanding about the complications of geopolitics in the context of human conflict.
The most recent example of this connection took place Thursday, September 12, when students packed into the Ho auditorium for a panel on the recent developments in Syria, co-sponsored by the Middle Eastern Studies and Islamic Civilization (MIST) Program and the PCON program. Read more
Professor Jacob Mundy
Professor Jacob Mundy was recently quoted in several media outlets for his expertise in Western Sahara affairs.
Mundy was quoted in the Washington Post title “In Western Sahara, women play large role in forgotten struggle for independence.” He was also interviewed in a related video for the Washington Post, titled “Strife in the Sahara.”
In recent months Mundy’s expertise has been referenced in other publications as well, including the Boston Globe, USA Today, and El Watan (Algiers).
During the fall 2013 semester, Mundy will be instructing the following courses:
Marc Sommers has written one of the only books on youth in post-genocide Rwanda. Sommers is a leading specialist in the field on youth and peace building, with a particular focus on the role of young men in conflict.
Peace and Conflict Studies Assistant Professor Susan Thomson, also a leading specialist in Rwandan studies, was pleased to be able to review this important book. Sommers research will appeal to students working on youth in conflict, post-conflict state building, and forms of structural violence as peace.
Prof. Thomson’s review appeared in the April 2013 issue of the African Studies Review.
http://journals.cambridge.org/repo_A89BtVfh
The following guest editorial was featured on Whiteoliphaunt.com in November 11th, 2012 –
“As Ambassador Gillerman has said many times on our show, ‘Israel lives in a dangerous neighborhood.” — Fox News, 16 November 2012
“As he was asking instructions…a man in his early 20’s came up, stuck the point of a knife against his back and ordered him into the lobby of adjacent building….The youth was…ordered to surrender his money. He explained that the only reason he was there at all was that he had no money…. The man closed his knife and said: “Look, this is a very dangerous neighborhood. You should never come to this part of the city.” Then he instructed him to his destination via the safest route, patted him on the back and sent him on his way.” – New York Times, Metropolitan Diary, Lawrence Van Gelder
The Arab Middle East may have undergone significant political transformations in the period between Israel’s 2008 ‘Cast Lead’ Operation against Gaza and the recent ‘Defensive Pillar’ campaign, but no one in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv appears to think that a review of Israel’s ‘grand strategy’ is warranted. If anything, seasoned observers suggest, the Arab Spring seems to have driven Israelis to assume out of resignation a position which Zionist nationalists like Vladimir Jabotinsky once held with fervor. Writing in 1923, Jabotinsky evocatively described a metaphorical “iron wall” that would protect Zion from the ire of its neighbors; for their part, contemporary Israelis (we are told) can only imagine a future in which they will be perpetually enclosed within a (quasi-literal) Iron Dome. Hence, Ethan Bronner reports: Israelis have concluded that “their dangerous neighborhood is growing still more dangerous…”’ To them “that means not concessions, but being tougher in pursuit of deterrence, and abandoning illusions that a Jewish state will ever be broadly accepted” in the region.
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