*ISA Blog

ASMEA Annual Conference

The third annual conference of the Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA) will be held November 4-6, 2010 at the Key Bridge Marriott in Washington, D.C. ASMEA's 2010 conference will feature:

• Special address by ASMEA Chairman Bernard Lewis
• Banquet luncheon and keynote address by Dr. Les Gelb, president emeritus, Council on Foreign Relations
• Feature presentations by top scholars and official policymakers
• Roundtable discussions on political, cultural and security issues in Africa and the Middle East
• Professional networking reception
• Publishers' displays with the latest academic titles.

ASMEA is a new academic society dedicated to promoting the highest standards of research and teaching in Middle Eastern and African studies, and related fields. It is a response to the mounting interest in these increasingly inter-related fields, and the absence of any single group addressing them in a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary fashion. Please see the Association website for more information.

Call for Nominations: Best Book Award

The award committee sends this reminder that nominations for the annual International Studies Best Book Award are due Thursday, July 1st. The award is conferred for the best book in the field of international studies with a copyright dated the year before the nomination. Individuals, authors, departments, and publishers may submit a nomination. The recipient of the award will receive $500 along with an award plaque and will be automatically nominated for the ISA Book of the Decade Award. Please see the award website for more information.

ISA-West 2010 Proposal Deadline Extended

The ISA-West paper submission has been extended until July 15th! The conference will be held this year at the Westin, Bonaventure in downtown Los Angeles, September 24-25.  More information can be found at isawest.org. In addition to a program focused upon ethics, we have lined up two excellent speakers; on Friday night, September 24, ISA President David Lake will give an address and the Saturday luncheon speaker is Peter W. Singer, director of the 21st Century Defense Initiative and a senior fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institute. This is a great opportunity for graduate students to submit papers to a conference that has always emphasized teaching and mentoring.  Additionally, on the Thursday before the conference, September 23rd, we are offering a Teaching Training Workshop hosted at the University of Southern California.

Eurasia Program Dissertation Workshop

The Eurasia Program of the Social Science Research Council (SSRC), in partnership with Harvard University’s Kathryn W. and Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, invites applications for a three-day interdisciplinary dissertation development workshop for doctoral students on the theme: Globalizing Eurasia? Impacts on the Region and the World. The workshop, to be held 5-7 October 2010, will bring together PhD candidates from across the social science disciplines. The organizers welcome work ranging from interpretive categories (e.g., empire, state, ethnicity, modernity or authoritarianism) to transnational processes (for example, development, trade, migration, health, terrorism, languages or Diasporas). Following a workshop format, the meeting will provide opportunities to discuss ideas and research plans, solicit feedback from fellow dissertators and nationally known resource faculty, and enhance scholarly networks and contacts. For additional details please contact program staff at eurasia@ssrc.org. The application deadline is August 15, 2010.

Workshop: Beyond Rationality

The organizers announce a workshop to be held at the University of Mississippi, July 7-9, 2010, on the theme “Beyond Rationality.” The workshop is co-hosted by our Center for Intelligence and Security Studies and the London School of Economics and Political Science. The first Beyond Rationality workshop, which was held in November 2009, proved to be a rousing success. This second meeting will carry on the theme of the first by examining rationality as it pertains to contemporary problems, such as economic decision-making, the recruitment of jihadists, terrorism, the banking crisis, risk assessment, religion, and conflict.  We have invited a distinguished group of scholars, including Dr. Rom Harre, Dr. Fathali M. Moghaddam, General Robert Schmidle, and  members of the FBI’s Futures Working Group. Because this will be a workshop, you will have an opportunity to interact with presenters in an  atmosphere designed to foster professional networking and lively discussion. Because we want this workshop to be as accessible as possible to junior faculty members and graduate students, we are offering the following:

• No registration fee
• Wine and cheese reception Wednesday evening
• Lunch provided free of charge Thursday and Friday
• Optional banquet Thursday

You can register for the workshop here. If you have any questions, please contact Ms. Melissa Graves at magraves@olemiss.edu.

ISA-Midwest 2010 Call for Papers

The program chair invites proposals for papers, panels, and/or roundtables to be presented at the ISA Midwest Conference. The 2010 ISA Midwest conference will be held in St. Louis, November 4-7 at The Hilton at the Ballpark. The call for papers is available on-line on the conference website. The pre-registration rate is $40 for faculty and $25 for students. The pre-registration deadline is Oct. 16, 2010. Please see the conference website for more information. Paper and panel proposals should be received by August 31, 2010. ISA-Midwest is a regional grouping of international studies scholars created for the purpose of academic collaboration and networking within the region.

CFP: International Graduate Student Conference in Political Science, IR and Public Policy

The conveners announce the Call for Papers for the 6th annual Graduate Conference in Political Science, International Relations and Public Policy in memory of Yitzhak Rabin, to be held at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, between December 15-17 2010. The deadline for receipt of submissions is October 15th, 2010. Please see the conference website for more information.

CFP: Re-engaging the World: The Obama Administration and the Institutions of Global Governance

The Department of Government and Politics at St. John’s University in New York City invites paper proposals for a one-day conference to address the question of whether and how the U.S. is renewing its participation in the institutions of global governance. The conference will be held on St. John’s Manhattan Campus on Murray Street in the New York Financial District. In particular, we seek submissions on six substantial areas of interest:

• U.S. participation in peace and security operations
• U.S. participation in global financial regulation and reform
• U.S. participation in multilateral development assistance
• U.S. participation in international human rights and international law
• The history of U.S. engagement with institutions of global governance
• Critical and theoretical approaches to US engagement with institutions of global governance

We also welcome volunteers for panel moderators and commentators. Please submit paper proposals by Sept. 1, 2010. Submissions or interest in moderating or commenting on a panel should be sent via e-mail to Fred Cocozzelli at cocozzef@stjohns.edu.

CFP: Journal of Strategic Security

The Journal of Strategic Security (JSS), a publication of Henley-Putnam University, announces a call for articles on Strategic Security in the Cyber Age to be featured in our Winter 2010 issue. A wide range of strategic security perspectives from the fields of intelligence studies, political science, international relations, computer science, mathematics, psychology, sociology, anthropology, criminology, history, geography, and demography on this issue will be considered. JSS publishes review articles, original empirical research, and analytic/conceptual works that contribute to a better understanding of security-related threats and ways to prevent or mitigate their impact. Each article should analyze and include implications for policy and practice. Please send all questions and submissions to editor@henley-putnam.edu by September 1, 2010. For more information, please see the journal website.

Conference: Emerging Market Economies of the Balkans and the Caucasus

The University of Delaware announces their first annual “Research Conference on Institutional Transition in the Emerging Market Economies of the Balkans and the Caucasus” to be held in Sofia, Bulgaria on June 30th thru July 1st, 2010. The conference will touch upon many political and economical issues currently being discussed in Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, and various other nations in that region. Topics that will be discussed include but not limited to: the banking sector, agriculture, business, and labor economics to name a few. Presenters include Dr. Iftekhar Hasan, Dr. Tomislav Vukina, Dr. Albert Allen, Dr. Harley Johansen, and many more. Registration is free, the organizers merely ask that people register in advance to provide sense of how many will be attending the conference.