Past Events

Description

Sometimes called “Europe’s last dictatorship,” Belarus has seen massive and unprecedented street protests in the aftermath of its presidential election on August 9. Decrying fraud and harassment, protesters have called for fundamental change to Belarus’s political system, which has undergone little reform since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

In this discussion, Olga Onuch (University of Manchester), Maryia Rohava (University of Oslo) and Lucan Way (University of Toronto) discuss Belarus’s protests and its prospects for change.

Moderator: Seva Gunitsky (University of Toronto)

Description

JHI-UTM Seminar for 2020-2021 on “Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics.”

“Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics” proposed a series of lectures and film screenings featuring scholars and creators of cinema and media in order to investigate how moving image media contribute to formations of race, racism, and racialization from global perspectives. In a time when racist politics and racial capitalism pose increasing physical and psychical dangers to communities across the world, it is critical to examine the histories, theories and role of cinema and media in shaping the geopolitical imagination of the relations between people and nation-states from micro and macro scales.   “Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics” aimed to create a sustaining conversation among junior, senior scholars and film creators across disciplines, institutions and geographical locations.  

Participants’ Bios:

Naoki Sakai teaches in the departments of Comparative Literature and Asian Studies and is a member of the graduate field of History at Cornell University. He has published in a number of languages in the fields of comparative literature, intellectual history, translation studies, the studies of racism and nationalism, and the histories of semiotic and literary multitude – speech, writing, corporeal expressions, calligraphic regimes, and phonographic traditions.   

Takashi Fujitani is the Dr. David Chu Professor and Director in Asia Pacific Studies. His research focuses especially on modern and contemporary Japanese history, East Asian history, Asian American history, and transnational history (primarily U.S./Japan and Asia Pacific). Much of his past and current research has centred on the intersections of nationalism, colonialism, war, memory, racism, ethnicity, and gender, as well as the disciplinary and area studies boundaries that have figured our ways of studying these issues.   

Elizabeth Wijaya works at the intersection of cinema, philosophy, and area studies. She is especially interested in the material and symbolic entanglements between East Asia and Southeast Asia cinema. Her work emphasizes a multimethodological approach, which is attentive to media forms, ethnographic detail, material realities, archival practices, international networks, and interdisciplinary modes of theorization. For 2020-2021, she is the convenor of “Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics,” JHI-UTM Seminar.

Description

Over the last several months, Toronto’s fissures and inequalities have been put on display. Protests against police brutality and anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism have once again highlighted the systemic racism that undergirds many of the city’s key institutions, all while COVID-19 has disproportionately affected racialized residents.

These events have sparked many important conversations about policy gaps, such as the need for more race-based data, and policy solutions, such as calls to defund the police. They have also underlined what Brittany Andrew-Amofah, Alexandra Flynn, and Patricia Wood have called “the democratic deficits in local decision-making” – the fact that, too often, those most affected by policy changes, most dependent on public services, or most vulnerable to abuse and racism, are those least heard when decisions get made.

What changes need to be made to ensure all Torontonians are meaningfully engaged in the City’s decision making? How can the voices of racialized, newcomer, and Indigenous residents be firmly integrated into the City’s governance structures? On September 10, this panel will explore these questions and examine how Toronto can begin to address its divisions and build toward a more inclusive future.

Speakers
Heather Dorries is an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto where she is cross-appointed to the Department of Geography and Planning and Centre for Indigenous Studies. Her research is focused on the relationship between urban planning and settler colonialism, as well as the application of Indigenous knowledge systems in planning contexts. She is currently revising her book manuscript Planning the End of the World: Indigenist Planning Theory and the Art of Refusal, and is co-editor of the collection Settler City Limits: Indigenous Resurgence and Settler Colonial Violence in the Urban Prairie West (University of Manitoba Press 2019).

Anthony Morgan is a lawyer and the Manager of the City of Toronto’s Confronting Anti-Black Racism (CABR) Unit. The CABR Unit is responsible for the implementation of the Toronto Action Plan to Confront Anti-Black Racism. Prior to joining the City, Anthony was an Associate at Falconers LLP, specializing in the areas of civil, constitutional and criminal state accountability litigation. He has a special interest in anti-racist human rights advocacy, particularly in the area of anti-Black racism.

Devika Shah is passionate about building a civic society that is grounded in diversity, equity, social and economic justice, and active democratic engagement. Her interdisciplinary background and experience in the non-profit sector has strengthened her commitment to advancing grassroots, community-led, multi-stakeholder solutions, which she views as the most powerful lever for achieving systems change. Devika is currently Executive Director of Social Planning Toronto and has held past positions with the World Wildlife Fund Canada, Pembina Institute, York University, and KCI Philanthropy.

Patricia Wood is is Professor of Geography at York University and a co-founder of its City Institute. With Alexandra Flynn (Allard School of Law, UBC), she is conducting international comparative research into urban governance, and public consultation about the future of Toronto’s governance structures. She is the author of Citizenship, Activism and the City: the Invisible and the Impossible (Routledge 2017). She also writes an urban affairs column for Spacing.ca.

Moderator:
Brittany Andrew-Amofah is a public policy professional based in Toronto. She is currently the Senior Policy and Research Analyst at the Broadbent Institute, where she is responsible for assisting with setting the research and policy direction of the organization, and managing the Broadbent Institute’s Fellow Program. Prior to joining the Broadbent Institute, Brittany was on the policy team at the Maytree Foundation where her work focused on researching various poverty reduction strategies. She is also a former Program Manager at Harmony Movement, where she delivered diversity, equity and anti-racism training to students, educators and non-profits across Ontario.

Description

The Environmental Governance Lab invites you to the launch of Stefan Renckens’ new book, Private Governance and Public Authority!

At a time of significant concern about the sustainability of the global economy, businesses are eager to display responsible corporate practices. While rulemaking for these practices was once the prerogative of states, businesses and civil society actors are increasingly engaged in creating private rulemaking instruments, such as eco-labeling and certification schemes, to govern corporate behavior. When does a public authority intervene in such private governance and reassert the primacy of public policy? Renckens develops a new theory of public-private regulatory interactions and argues that when and how a public authority intervenes in private governance depends on the economic benefits to domestic producers that such intervention generates and the degree of fragmentation of private governance schemes. Drawing on European Union policymaking on organic agriculture, biofuels, fisheries, and fair trade, he exposes the political-economic conflicts between private and public rule makers and the strategic nature of regulating sustainability in a global economy.

Opening remarks by Margaret Kohn, Professor, and Chair of the Department of Political Science in the University of Toronto at Scarborough

Discussants:

Graeme Auld, Professor, and Director of the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carlton University

Jessica Green, Associate Professor, Political Science and School of the Environment at the University of Toronto

Moderator: Matthew Hoffmann, Professor, Political Science and Co-Director of the Environmental Governance Lab at the University of Toronto

Description

“Transnational Solidarities/Complicities” is the second lecture for the Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics, JHI-UTM Seminar for 2020-2021 co-hosted by the Department of Visual Studies, the Southeast Asia Seminar Series at the Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy and the UTM Collaborative Digital Research Space.   

Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics proposed a series of lectures and film screenings featuring scholars and creators of cinema and media in order to investigate how moving image media contribute to formations of race, racism, and racialization from global perspectives. In a time when racist politics and racial capitalism pose increasing physical and psychical dangers to communities across the world, it is critical to examine the histories, theories and role of cinema and media in shaping the geopolitical imagination of the relations between people and nation-states from micro and macro scales. Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics aimed to create a sustaining conversation among junior, senior scholars and film creators across disciplines, institutions and geographical locations.  

Participants:

Nadine Chan, Assistant Professor of Cultural Studies, Claremont Graduate University

“Asynchronicity and the Time-Lagged Medium: Racializing Space-Time in the Colonial Documentaries of British Malaya.”   

Ryan A. Buyco, Riley Scholar-in-Residence, Asian Studies Program, Colorado College

“Navigating Asian Settler Colonialism: Okinawa-Hawai’i Connections through the Works of Laura Kina and Lee A. Tonouchi.”   

Cheryl Suzack, Associate Professor of English, University of Toronto “Indigenous-Feminist Political Imaginaries in Four Settler-Colonial Countries.”

Jessica Harris, Assistant Professor of History, St John’s University “African-American Women and Love, Italian Style in 20th and 21st Century Media."    

Moderator: Kun Huang, PhD Candidate, Department of Comparative Literature, Cornell University

Description

The Environmental Governance Lab invites you to join the panel discussion in the first pre-symposium webinar on carbon-lock in during COVID
About this Event
Early optimism that the pandemic lockdowns would significantly lower greenhouse gas emissions and disrupt the world’s reliance on fossil energy has started to fade. Our panelists will discuss what impact the pandemic has had on carbon lock-in, what exactly has and has not changed, and whether these changes are likely to endure.

Panelists:

Samantha Gross, Director of Energy Security and Climate Initiative at Brookings
Professor Jonas Nahm, Assistant Professor of Energy, Resources, and Environment at Johns Hopkins University
Professor Piers Forster, Professor of Climate Physics at University of Leeds

Description

Ashley Thompson suggests an engendering of history that bears "the potential to make history, literally and figuratively, insofar as it threatens or promises to upset established notions of the field" (2008:106). This panel took up Thompson’s call to engender history and interrogated dominant conceptions of gender, sexuality, and love in modern Thailand, Lao PDR, and Cambodia. From texts to textiles, classrooms to forests, and wedding photos to state records, the papers focused on particular spaces and materials that vibrated with social and political intensities through the long period of the Cold War in Thailand, Lao PDR, and Cambodia. The panel showed how materiality and spatiality were key aspects that shaped the ideological extremes that manifested in violence and unrest in Southeast Asia, and the panel began its inquiries in the 1950s.  

Alexandra Dalferro – "Weaving Queer Pasts and Futures in Thailand"  

Chairat Polmuk – "Of Eros and the Forest: The Topography of Love in Lao Revolutionary Literature"  Catriona Miller – "Sewing Patterns and Visions of Democracy: Khmer Women Organizing during Decolonization (1948 – 1952)"

Participants’ Bios:

ALEXANDRA DALFERRO is a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology at Cornell University. She is currently writing her dissertation about the politics and practices of sericulture and silk weaving in Surin, Thailand, and she pays particular attention to the sensory and affective dimensions of these processes. Her fieldwork was supported by the Wenner Gren Foundation and the Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad program, and for the 2019-2020 academic year, she was a Mellon Graduate Fellow at the Society for the Humanities at Cornell. Alexandra likes to weave and to sew and to think about how craft and art intersect with daily life.   

CHAIRAT POLMUK teaches Southeast Asian languages and literature, cultural theory, and media studies at the Department of Thai, Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, Thailand. He received a PhD in Asian Literature, Religion, and Culture from Cornell in 2018. His doctoral project titled, “Atmospheric Archives: Post-Cold War Affect and the Buddhist Temporal Imagination in Southeast Asian Literature and Visual Culture,” received the 2018 Lauriston Sharp Prize for best dissertation.   

CATRIONA MILLER is a PhD candidate in the History Department at the University of Wisconsin – Madison. Her dissertation, Gendering the Cambodian State (1900 – 1970) utilizes transnational feminist methods to recast the political history of Cambodia during the transition from a French Protectorate to a neutral Buddhist nation-state. She conducted this research with generous funding from the NSEP Boren Fellowship and Center for Khmer Studies Fellowship.    

ARNIKA FUHRMANN is an interdisciplinary scholar of Southeast Asia, working at the intersections of the region’s aesthetic, religious, and political modernities. She is an associate professor of Asian Studies at Cornell University and the author of Ghostly Desires: Queer Sexuality and Vernacular Buddhism in Contemporary Thai Cinema (Duke University Press, 2016).

Description

*Please RSVP to Grayson Lee at grayson.lee@utoronto.ca to receive the Zoom link*    

On the Margins of Urban South Korea: Core Location as Method and Praxis features a set of ethnographic works from the peripheries of urban, regional, and transnational development in South Korea, and discusses the ways in which places can be studied in an increasingly globalized world. Engaging with the ideas of "core location," a term coined by Baik Young-seo, and "Asia as method," a concept with a century-old intellectual lineage in East Asia, the book explores relational understandings of place as a constellation of local and global forces and processes that interact and contradict with each other in particular ways. Each chapter also explores multiple modes of urban marginality and discusses how understanding them shapes the methods of academic praxis to further social justice causes and decolonialized scholarship. This book is the outcome of several years of interdisciplinary collaborations and dialogues among scholars based in geography, architecture, anthropology, and urban politics.  

On the Margins of Urban South Korea: Core Location as Method and Praxis is available for purchase from the University of Toronto Press. Please use the following promocode: UTPLAUNCH10  

For any inquiries, please email Professor Jesook Song at jesook.song@utoronto.ca

Description

This presentation argued that the global connections and medical culture forged by diasporic WWII medical personnel was central to the survival, growth, and centrality of military medicine in postwar China and Taiwan. Established in post-war Shanghai in 1946 from a military medical complex during World War II, the main military medical institution (National Defense Medical Center NDMC) faced existential threat when its primary source of financial and logistical support from the Chinese diaspora and American aid organizations shriveled up. As the only medical center to move from China to Taiwan in 1949, the NDMC faced an uncertain future on the island. In the mid-1950s, the NDMC’s personnel developed an elaborate Cold War vision of NDMC as a center for training anti-Communist Overseas Chinese students. This vision persuaded the U.S. government to financially support the NDMC in the mid-1950s, enabling the center to become one of the three leading medical colleges on the island today. The center’s philosophy of fusing medical therapy, training, and ideology played a unique role in shaping Taiwan’s exemplary universal health care system, and left an important legacy in its fight against SARS and COVID-19.

WAYNE SOON (PhD Princeton) is an Assistant Professor of History at Vassar College. He researches on how international ideas and practices of medicine, institution-building, and diaspora have shaped Chinese East Asia’s interaction with its people and the world in the twentieth century. His forthcoming book, Global Medicine in China: A Diasporic History (Stanford University Press), tells the global health histories of Chinese East Asia through the lens of diasporic medical personnel. The book argues that the Overseas Chinese were central in introducing new practices of military medicine, blood banking, mobile medicine, and mass medical training to China and Taiwan. Universal care, practical medical education, and mobile medicine are all lasting legacies of this effort on both sides of the Taiwan Straits. Dr. Soon’s published and forthcoming articles can be found in Twentieth Century China, Bulletin of the History of Medicine, American Journal of Chinese Studies, and East Asian Science, Technology and Society: An International Journal.  

SHELLY CHAN is Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is a historian of modern China and the Chinese diaspora and the author of Diaspora’s Homeland: Modern China in the Age of Global Migration. This recent book was published by Duke University Press in 2018 and shortlisted for the International Convention of Asia Scholars (ICAS) Humanities Book Prize. Chan’s new research focuses on the history of “homegoings” involving China, Taiwan, and the diaspora in the Cold War, as well as the historical geography of Nanyang (the South Seas) in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Chan received her Ph.D. from UC Santa Cruz and taught at the University of Victoria (2009-11) and the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2011-20) before returning this year to her Ph.D. alma mater as a faculty member.

Description

From the bestselling author of Paris 1919 comes a provocative view of war as an essential component of humanity and our history. Is peace an aberration?

The instinct to fight may be innate in human nature, but war—organized violence—comes with organized society. War has shaped humanity’s history, its social and political institutions, its values and ideas. Our very language, our public spaces, our private memories, and some of our greatest cultural treasures reflect the glory and the misery of war. War is an uncomfortable and challenging subject not least because it brings out both the vilest and the noblest aspects of humanity.

Margaret MacMillan looks at the ways in which war has influenced human society and how, in turn, changes in political organization, technology, or ideologies have affected how and why we fight. War: How Conflict Shaped Us explores such much-debated and controversial questions as: When did war first start? Does human nature doom us to fight one another? Why has war been described as the most organized of all human activities? Why are warriors almost always men? Is war ever within our control?

Drawing on lessons from wars throughout the past, from classical history to the present day, MacMillan reveals the many faces of war—the way it has determined our past, our future, our views of the world, and our very conception of ourselves.

Margaret MacMillan was educated at the University of Toronto and the University of Oxford. She was a member of Ryerson University’s History Department for 25 years, Provost of Trinity College at the University of Toronto from 2002 to 2007 and Warden of St Antony’s College and Professor of International History, University of Oxford from 2007 to 2017. She is a Professor of History, University of Toronto, the Xerox Foundation Distinguished Scholar at the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS and a Distinguished Fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy.

Description

Following an online screening of Ramona Diaz’s film A Thousand Cuts (2020), please join us for a panel featuring Maria Ressa (Rappler), Jinee Lokaneeta (Drew University), Gina Dent (UCSC), moderated by Neferti Tadiar (Barnard College). A Thousand Cuts focuses on the current effects of Rodrigo Duterte’s infamous “war on drugs” and the shutting down of independent news outlets as well as the arrest, detention, threats and humiliation of journalists, including Maria Ressa. This post-screening panel focuses on policing, state violence, and how the media and ideological landscapes enable populism and authoritarianism across the Philippines, U.S. and India. The discussion also serves as the staging ground for transnational forms of creativity, solidarity, and resistance.

Description

On October 3, 1990 the two Germanys were united again after having been divided for 28 years by barbed wires, landmines, fences and the Berlin Wall.
As we reflect on 30 years of German unity, we are reminded of an era in which a peaceful revolution tore down the Berlin Wall and swept away the repressive East German regime. It was a time that sparked astonishingly rapid progress, as the member states of NATO and the Warsaw Pact engaged in negotiations on peace and security, disarmament, confidence building, and détente.
German unity was made possible through the support of our allies; indeed, it could not have been achieved without those allies’ commitment to multilateralism and cooperation within a rules-based order. An often overlooked aspect of this transformation is the crucial role that Canada played in shoring up international support for a reunited Germany.

Join us for an online event on Friday, 2 October, featuring former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in conversation with Peter Mansbridge and a panel discussion with Senator Ratna Omidvar and political scientist Alexander Reisenbichler. Our distinguished speakers will look back on a time full of hope and promise – and look forward to how Canada and Germany jointly can make a difference in today’s more polarized world.

Participants
• The Right Honourable Brian Mulroney, PC CC QOC, former Prime Minister of Canada
• Peter Mansbridge, OC, former Chief Correspondent, CBC News (Moderator)
• The Honourable Ratna Omidvar, CM Oont, Independent Senator for Ontario
• Alexander Reisenbichler, assistant professor of political science and research coordinator of the Joint Initiative in German and European Studies (JIGES) at the Munk School, University of Toronto
With remarks by
• Michael Sabia, Director, Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy
• Sabine Sparwasser, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Canada

Peter Mansbridge is one of Canada’s most respected and recognizable figures. For five decades, including 30 years as anchor of CBC’s The National, Peter guided Canadians through the political, economic, and cultural events that have shaped the country.
Known for his trademark voice and unflappable on-screen presence, Peter has received over a dozen national awards for broadcast excellence, including a lifetime achievement award from the Academy of Canadian Screen and Television, where his acceptance speech gave a passionate defence of good journalism and the principle it stands for: the truth.
Away from the news desk, he has been recognized by leading universities in the United States, the United Kingdom, and, of course, Canada. He has received 13 honorary doctorates, has been a Fellow at Yale, has lectured at Oxford, and has just finished two terms as Chancellor of Mount Allison University. He is a recipient of the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal and is an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Brian Mulroney became Canada’s eighteenth Prime Minister in 1984, after leading the Progressive Conservative party to the largest victory in Canadian history. Re-elected four years later, he became the first Canadian Prime Minister in 35 years to win successive majority governments.
His tenure as Prime Minister was marked by the introduction of bold new initiatives such as the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the Canada-US Acid Rain Treaty and the Canada-US Arctic Cooperation Agreement, a wave of privatizations, a low inflation policy, historic tax reform, extensive deregulation, and expenditure reduction policies that continue to be the basis of Canada’s impressive economic performance today.
Prime Minister Mulroney served as Co-Chairman of the United Nations World Summit for Children, and his government played leading roles in the campaign against apartheid in South Africa, the creation of Le Sommet de la Francophonie, the Reunification of Germany, and the first Gulf War.
He has been awarded the honor of Companion of the Order of Canada and has received the highest recognition from numerous governments for his leadership in vital matters affecting those nations. He has also been presented with honorary degrees and awards from universities and governments at home and abroad.
Upon resigning, Mr. Mulroney rejoined the Montreal law firm of Norton Rose Fulbright as Senior Partner.

Ratna Omidvar is an internationally recognized voice on migration, diversity and inclusion. In April 2016, Ms. Omidvar was appointed to the Senate of Canada as an independent Senator representing Ontario. As a member of the Senate’s Independent Senators Group, she holds a leadership position as Liaison.
Senator Omidvar is a Councillor on the World Refugee Council, a Director at the Samara Centre for Democracy, and Chair Emerita for the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council.
Senator Omidvar was appointed to the Order of Ontario in 2005 and became a Member of the Order of Canada in 2011, with both honours recognizing her advocacy work on behalf of immigrants and devotion to reducing inequality in Canada. In 2014, Senator Omidvar received the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in recognition of her contribution to the advancement of German-Canadian relations.

Alexander Reisenbichler is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto and research coordinator of the Joint Initiative in German and European Studies (JIGES) at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy. He will be a John F. Kennedy Memorial Fellow at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University in 2021–22. His work explores the politics of housing, financial, and labour markets in advanced economies, with regional specializations in Western Europe and the United States. His current research investigates the political economy of housing capitalism in the United States and Germany from a comparative, historical perspective. His work has appeared in Politics & Society, the Review of International Political Economy, West European Politics, and Foreign Affairs. Prof. Reisenbichler received his doctorate from The George Washington University and undergraduate degree from the University of Leipzig.

Michael Sabia is the Director of the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy at the University of Toronto. From March 2009 to January 2020, he served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ), where he oversaw the organization’s strategic direction and global growth.
Before joining CDPQ, Mr. Sabia held numerous senior positions with BCE, including President and Chief Executive Officer, Executive Vice-President, and Chief Operating Officer as well as Chief Executive Officer of Bell Canada International. From 1993 to 1999, he occupied various roles with Canadian National Railway, including Chief Financial Officer. He spent the preceding decade working as a senior official in the Government of Canada, as the Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet and in senior positions in the Department of Finance.
Mr. Sabia earned a bachelor of arts in economics and politics from the University of Toronto and holds graduate degrees in economics and politics from Yale University.
In April 2020, Mr. Sabia was appointed as Chair of the Board of the Canada Infrastructure Bank. He serves as a member of the Canadian government’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth. He is a trustee of the Foreign Policy Association of New York and a member of the Canada-Mexico Leadership Group and the Asia Business Leaders Advisory Council.
Mr. Sabia was appointed to the board of the Mastercard Foundation in June 2020. He is committed to community involvement and recently co-chaired the capital campaigns of Université de Montréal, Polytechnique Montréal, and HEC Montréal. Mr. Sabia is an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Sabine Sparwasser studied political science with a focus on foreign relations at the Institut d’études politiques in Paris following her studies of German, French, and English literature and linguistics at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz. Before embarking on her diplomatic career, she worked as a freelance journalist for German television and was Research Assistant on European integration to Prof. Joseph Rovan in Paris.
Sabine Sparwasser has been posted to the German EC Representation in Brussels as well as the German Embassies in London and San José. She also served as Consul General in Toronto. At the German Federal Foreign Office headquarters, she held various positions in the press, public relations, and political sections before assuming the role of Deputy Spokesperson. She later served as Director of the Middle East and Maghreb Division and as Head of the Foreign Service Academy. Before coming to Canada, she was Assistant Deputy Minister for Africa, Asia, Latin America, Near and Middle East as well as Germany’s Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Sabine Sparwasser has been Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Canada since 2017. She is married to Gary Soroka, a former Canadian diplomat, and has two children.

Description

Join us for a virtual discussion with Munk School Director, Michael Sabia, in conversation with John Stackhouse, on the release of his new book ‘Planet Canada: How Our Expats Are Shaping The Future.’

A leading thinker on Canada’s place in the world contends that our country’s greatest untapped resource may be the three million Canadians who don’t live here.

Entrepreneurs, educators, humanitarians: an entire province’s worth of Canadian citizens live outside Canada. Some will return, others won’t. But what they all share is the ability, and often the desire, to export Canadian values to a world sorely in need of them. And to act as ambassadors for Canada in industries and societies where diplomatic efforts find little traction. Surely a country with people as diverse as Canada’s ought to plug itself into every corner of the globe. We don’t, and sometimes not even when our expats are eager to help.

Failing to put this desire to work, contends bestselling author and longtime foreign correspondent John Stackhouse, is a grave error for a small country whose voice is getting lost behind developing nations of rapidly increasing influence. The soft power we once boasted is getting softer, but we have an unparalleled resource, if we choose to use it. To ensure Canada’s place in the world, Stackhouse argues in Planet Canada, we need this exceptional province of expats and their special claim on the twenty-first century.

Bio:

As Senior Vice-President in the Office of the CEO at Royal Bank of Canada, John Stackhouse is adviser to the executive leadership team and board of directors on economic, political and social affairs, and a champion for the bank on public policy. Before joining RBC in January 2015, Stackhouse was editor-in-chief of The Globe and Mail, and led the news organization through the launch of a paid website, mobile apps and a historic redesign of the newspaper. He was previously the Globe’s business editor, foreign editor and, for seven years, a foreign correspondent based in New Delhi, India. His reporting won five National Newspaper Awards. He is a senior fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy at the University of Toronto, and the C.D. Howe Institute, and serves on the boards of Saint Elizabeth Health Care and World Literacy Canada.

Description

Taiwan has been a global leader in managing the response to COVID-19. Join us as we welcome the Honorable Audrey Tang, Taiwan’s Digital Minister, to discuss her insights on the role of innovation and digital governance in addressing the global pandemic.

Co-hosted by the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, the Rotman School of Management, the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering, and the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, this conversation will be moderated by Professor Peter Loewen, the Munk School’s Associate Director, Global Engagement, with opening remarks by Professor Joseph Wong, Ralph and Roz Professorship of Innovation at the Munk School and U of T’s Vice President, International.

This virtual event is sponsored by the David Peterson Program in Public Sector Leadership Lecture Series, which welcomes leading policy thinkers and practitioners across the public sector, politics, business, and the media to the University to examine pressing issues. The David Peterson Program in Public Sector Leadership was established through the extraordinary generosity of The Hon. David Peterson, former premier of Ontario, U of T Chancellor Emeritus and Faculty of Law alumnus, and Shelley Peterson.

Description

Join the Centre for the Study of the United States and Professor Alexandra Rahr for a virtual watch party of the Vice Presidential Debate between Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Kamala Harris!

The Centre for the Study of the United States is committed to providing a safe and welcoming environment for all participants at its webinars. As this debate is among the most contentious in recent history, opinions and sentiments may be intense. Please avoid any inappropriate language, harmful or threatening speech, or any other disruptive behaviour during the event. Regretfully, unacceptable conduct may lead to removal from the event and restrictions on participating in future Munk School webinars and events. Excitement, outrage, disappointment and amusement are all absolutely acceptable; rudeness, obscenity, and name calling are not. Please enjoy yourself, but please be civil.

Description

Policymaking is a challenging endeavor under the best of times, as politicians and bureaucrats seek to juggle the need for rapid and innovative interventions on the one hand with democratic accountability on the other. This trade-off, which can lead to conservative, short-term solutions, is exacerbated during periods of heightened uncertainty, moments when the possible outcomes themselves are unknown. This panel examines how policymakers adapt to extremely uncertain events, focusing on innovation, war, and the recent COVID-19 pandemic.

Description

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on municipal finance in Canada. Across the country, increased expenditures and decreased revenues have resulted in large municipal deficits that, under provincial legislation, would need to be balanced in 2021 budgets. Municipalities with transit systems have been particularly hard hit by substantial drops in fare revenues.

The recent announcement of federal and provincial funding for municipalities and transit providers will help address the short-term budget gaps. However, municipalities are predicting continued budget pressures in 2021, particularly if a second wave occurs and the economic recovery progresses slowly.

This panel will examine the continued impact of COVID-19 on municipal finance. How are municipalities preparing for their 2021 budgets? What impacts are they anticipating from COVID-19? What steps are needed at the municipal, provincial, and federal levels to safeguard the fiscal health of municipalities?

This is the first of two IMFG panels exploring the effects of COVID-19 on municipal finance. Details of the second panel will be announced in the coming weeks.

Description

Due to the cancellation of the Second Presidential Debate, the Centre for the Study of the United States is hosting a virtual watch party of Former Vice President Joe Biden’s Town Hall! Join us at 8:00pm to tune into the event with Professor Ryan Hurl.

Host/Moderator:
Nicholas Sammond, Director, Centre for the Study of the United States, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto (Opening Remarks)
Ryan Hurl, Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto

The Centre for the Study of the United States is committed to providing a safe and welcoming environment for all participants at its webinars. Please avoid any inappropriate language, harmful or threatening speech, or any other disruptive behaviour during the event. Regretfully, unacceptable conduct may lead to removal from the event and restrictions on participating in future Munk School webinars and events. Excitement, outrage, disappointment and amusement are all absolutely acceptable; rudeness, obscenity, and name calling are not. Please enjoy yourself, but please be civil.

Description

Just over two months ago, on August 9, Belarus’s Aliaksandr Lukashenka declared victory in presidential elections that were widely decried as unfree and unfair. Since then, protestors have taken to the streets and the regime has begun a widespread crackdown. In the meantime, presidential candidate Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, fearing for her safety, has fled to Lithuania. Massive pro-democracy mobilization continues across Belarus against one of Europe’s last dictatorships.

This panel discussion will be recorded and made available following the event.

Description

The rise of a more assertive China is causing concerns. So is Donald Trump’s policy of “America first” which puts further questions to the liberal world order. The US’s two main liberal partners have been made aware of the fact that multilateralism is no longer a priority for the US that has broken the Iran nuclear deal as well as the Paris climate agreement. Under these circumstances, Japan and EU got their act together and signed several agreements to step up strategic cooperation. This seminar gave a historic perspective on Japan-EU relations and followed the development until today. It also reflected on the role of Canada in connection with this.

Marie Söderberg is the Director of the European Institute of Japanese Studies and an adjunct professor of Stockholm School of Economics. She has a Ph.D. from Stockholm University in 1986.  She has published on Europe-Japan relations, Japanese Influences in Asia, Japan-China, Japan-North Korea and Japan South Korea relations. A central focus of her research is Japanese foreign aid policy. She is the senior editor of the European Institute of Japanese Studies, East Asian Economics and Business Studies, a book series published by Routledge. She is also the Chairperson of EJARN’s (European Japan Advanced Research Network) executive committee.

Description

For JHI-UTM 2020-2021 Seminar Series, Mediating Race, Reimagining Geopolitics presents "Race and Singapore Short Cinema", co-hosted by the Department of Visual Studies, Jackman Humanities Institute, Southeast Asia Seminar Series at the Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, UTM Collaborative Digital Research Space, University of Toronto and Objectifs.  

October 1-23, 2020 | The following film screenings are available for viewing via Objectifs Film Library:  "Dahdi" by Kirsten Tan, "Timeless" by K. Rajagopal, "Last Trip Home" by Han Fengyu, "Not Working Today" by Tan Shijie. Link: https://objectifsfilmlibrary.uscreen.io/categories/mediating-race-reimagining-geopolitics-webinar.

Participants’ Bios:

Kirsten Tan is a New York-based Singaporean filmmaker whose debut feature Pop Aye premiered as the opening night film of Sundance Film Festival 2017 and was awarded a Special Jury Prize for screenwriting. It traveled to 50 film festivals around the world, picking up several accolades along the way. Her shorts have collectively received over ten international awards. She was accorded the Young Artist Award by the NAC Singapore and was nominated as a Singaporean of the Year by The Straits Times.  

Han Fengyu graduated with a diploma in Film, Sound and Video from Ngee Ann Polytechnic in 2014. His graduation short film Last Trip Home premiered at the 67th Cannes Film Festival in the Cinefondation category in 2014. Last Trip Home has also competed at the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, and the Singapore International Film Festival in 2014. It has won ‘The Best Fiction’ film at the 6th Singapore Short Film Awards in 2015.  

As a filmmaker, K.Rajagopal has won the Singapore International Film Festivalʼs Special Jury Prize for 3 consecutive years. I Can’t Sleep Tonight (1995), The Glare (1996) and Absence (1997) have been featured at international festivals around the world. Other works include Brother (1997), The New World (2008) and Timeless (2010), which won Best Cinematography and Best Editing at the Singapore Short Film Awards 2011. His short film was also part of the omnibus film 7 Letters (2015) which had its Asian premiere at the Busan Film Festival in 2015. He directed a segment in the LUCKY 7 film project with other six prominent Singaporean directors. He has also written and directed television films like Maddy, Two Mothers in a HDB Playground and Heartland. He also worked on stage for over ten years. He has collaborated with many notable theatre directors on projects such as Medea, Beauty World and Private Parts. A Yellow Bird is his first feature film and it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2016.  

Shijie Tan studied philosophy before pursuing filmmaking at New York University’s Tisch Asia School. His first school short, For Two, was In Competition for the Short Film Golden Lion at the 66th Venice Film Festival and was acclaimed by the International Film Guide as one of the Top 5 Singapore Films of the year. The Hole won 4 of the 5 awards it was nominated for at the Singapore Short Film Awards that year, including Best Film, Direction and Script. Not Working Today, his third short film, competed at the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival and clinched Best Singapore Short Film at the 25th Singapore International Film Festival. It was also selected as one of fifty significant films in Singapore cinema history, showcased at the Cinematheque Francaise in Paris. His next work, The Lake, part of the omnibus feature Distance, was a cross-territory collaboration between Singapore, China, Taiwan and Thailand. It was selected as the Opening Film of the Golden Horse Film Festival in 2015, the premier festival for Chinese-language cinema. He is currently in development for a feature debut.  

Alfian Sa’at is the Resident Playwright of Wild Rice. His published works include three collections of poetry: ‘One Fierce Hour’, ‘A History of Amnesia’ and ‘The Invisible Manuscript’; a collection of short stories, ‘Corridor’; a collection of flash fiction, ‘Malay Sketches’; three collections of plays as well as the published play ‘Cooling Off Day’. In 2001, Alfian won the Golden Point Award for Poetry as well as the National Arts Council Young Artist Award for Literature. His plays and short stories have been translated into German, Swedish, Danish and Japanese.  

Sophia Siddique holds a PhD from the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts. Her research interests include Singapore cultural studies, representations of trauma and memory in Cambodian, Indonesian, and Thai cinema, and genre (Asian Horror and Global Science Fiction). She has published in the Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, and the Journal of Chinese Cinemas. She co-edited Transnational Horror Cinema: Bodies of Excess and the Global Grotesque (Palgrave Macmillan 2016) with Raphael Raphael. Sophia Siddique is completing two manuscripts: Screening Singapore: Sensuous Citizenship Formations and the National (AUP) and Skin Matters: Horror Films and the Phenomenology of the Monstrous.  

Tan Eng Kiong is Associate Professor of Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies in the Department of English, and Asian and Asian American Studies. He received his Ph.D. in Comparative and World Literature from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is the author of Rethinking Chineseness: Translational Sinophone Identities in the Nanyang Literary World. His essays have also appeared in publications such as Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies, Sun Yat-Sen Journal of Humanities, Journal of Modern Chinese Literature, and Journal of Chinese Cinemas. He is currently working on two separate book projects tentatively titled Queer Homecoming in Sinophone Cultures: Translocal Remapping of Kinship, and Mandarinization and Its Impact on Sinophone Cultural Production: A Transcolonial Comparison of Ethnic China, Singapore and Taiwan.

Description

Join the Centre for the Study of the United States and Professor Ronald Pruessen for a virtual watch party of the Third Presidential Debate between President Trump and Former Vice President Joe Biden!

The Centre for the Study of the United States is committed to providing a safe and welcoming environment for all participants at its webinars. As this debate is among the most contentious in recent history, opinions and sentiments may be intense. Please avoid any inappropriate language, harmful or threatening speech, or any other disruptive behaviour during the event. Regretfully, unacceptable conduct may lead to removal from the event and restrictions on participating in future Munk School webinars and events. Excitement, outrage, disappointment and amusement are all absolutely acceptable; rudeness, obscenity, and name calling are not. Please enjoy yourself, but please be civil.

Description

The rise of populism is a consequence of recent globally spreading economic and political crises and subsequent growing public distrust of technocracy and expert knowledge. Populist politics draws on public anger vis-a-vis growing economic insecurity and the general failure of anti-majoritarian institutions and their expertise to address issues of social justice and equality. However, populists mainly exploit the framework of constitutional democracy without dissolving and replacing it by a different political regime. Their politics thus remains subject of political contestations and opposition challenges in free elections. Nevertheless, some populists seized the opportunity to challenge this constitutional order and transformed into full-scale autocrats by reconstituting their power, such as the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán who staged a coup during the Covid-19 pandemic crisis by eliminating parliament and granting himself power to indefinitely govern by decrees. Because Hungary is a member state of the EU, its legal and political transformation into constitutional autocracy represents a big constitutional question for the Union: “Can a dictatorial regime be a Member State of the EU?” This question needs to be addressed because of the rise of populism in other member states of the EU including countries of Central Europe. Ironically, some of them would not be able to pass the conditionality test if they applied for EU membership today.

Jiří Přibáň is professor of law and Director of the Centre of Law and Society at Cardiff University. He graduated from Charles University in Prague (1989) where he was appointed professor of legal theory, philosophy and sociology in 2002. In 2006, he was appointed professor of law at Cardiff University. He was also visiting professor or scholar at European University Institute in Florence, New York University, UC Berkeley, University of San Francisco, University of Pretoria, The Flemish Academy in Brussels and University of New South Wales, Sydney. Jiří Přibáň has published extensively in the areas of social theory and sociology of law, legal philosophy, constitutional and European comparative law, and theory of human rights. He is an editor of the Journal of Law and Society and a regular contributor to the Czech and international media.

Barbara J. Falk is Professor, Department of Defence Studies at the Canadian Forces College/Royal Military College of Canada, and author of The Dilemmas of Dissidence: Citizen Intellectuals and Philosopher Kings (2003) and Political Trials: Causes and Categories (2008). Her primary research interest is political trials, particularly in the persecution and prosecution of domestic dissent. She is currently writing a book on comparative political trials across the East-West divide during the early Cold War, examining the Rajk, Slánský, Dennis and Rosenberg trials. Prior to her academic career, she worked in the both the private and public sectors in human resources, labour relations and women’s issues. For more information, see: http://www.cfc.forces.gc.ca/136/277-eng.html.

Description

Professor Chapman’s talk examines the Kremlin’s use of nominally-democratic communication strategies to reinforce Russia’s non-democratic regime. Using a detailed case study of the popular “Direct Line with Vladimir Putin” broadcast, she finds that these strategies mitigate information problems and increase regime support—though not without consequences.

Hannah Chapman is the Karen and Adeed Dawisha Assistant Professor of Political Science at Miami University. Her research examines information manipulation and public opinion in Russia and the former Soviet Union.

Description

Drawing from expert and public surveys conducted by Bright Line Watch, a group he co-founded, Nyhan will present new research on the state of American democracy and assess the extent to which the country is suffering from erosion in its performance on key democratic principles and norms.

Speaker:
Brendan Nyhan is a Professor in the Department of Government at Dartmouth College whose research focuses on misperceptions about politics and health care. He has been named an Andrew Carnegie Fellow by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and a Belfer Fellow by the Anti-Defamation League and is a co-founder of Bright Line Watch, a non-partisan group monitoring the state of American democracy, and a contributor to The Upshot at The New York Times. Nyhan received his Ph.D. from Duke University and previously served as Professor of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. He also co-authored All the President’s Spin, a New York Times bestseller, and served as a media critic for Columbia Journalism Review.

Description

Many Canadian municipalities have taken hits to their budgets due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But what has the effect been on municipalities around the world? Have municipalities in different countries fared better than others? What accounts for any differences? What needs to be done to ensure municipalities bounce back?

On October 26, this webinar will explore the above questions through a discussion with experts that have worked in Latin America, Africa, Europe, and North America. This is the second of two events exploring the effects of COVID-19 on municipal finance. For more information on the first event, visit https://archive.munkschool.utoronto.ca/imfg/

Description

Presented by the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences of Canada, the Big Thinking lecture series is committed to bringing big ideas in the humanities and social sciences to new audiences – creating opportunities for researchers to challenge and inspire policy makers, citizens, academics, students and community members on the critical questions of our time.

The next Big Thinking lecture is happening on Tuesday, October 27, 12:00 – 1:00 pm ET. This lecture by Rachel Brickner, moderated by Ito Peng and entitled “Care is on the ballot: Why COVID-19 should push American voters to pay greater attention to the care economy,” will show how the dilemmas about reopening schools offer insights into the importance of taking the care economy seriously this election – and the implications for how Americans provide and receive care if voters do not.

Learn more about the event and register: http://www.ideas-idees.ca/events/big-thinking

Description

Multi-stakeholder partnerships have become an increasingly common form of global governance. Partnerships, usually between international organizations (IOs) or state agencies and such private actors as NGOs, businesses, and academic institutions, have even been promoted as the gold standard of good governance—participatory, innovative, and well-funded. And yet these partnerships often fail to live up to the values that motivated their establishment. In this book, Teresa Kramarz examines this gap between promise and performance by analyzing partnerships in biodiversity conservation initiatives launched by the World Bank.

Description

Recent events in Belarus are a reflection of deep changes transforming the East European space – changes that caught many by surprise, but will undoubtedly have significant regional and global implications and are yet to be understood.

A panel of Belarusian and Canadian experts will explore unfiltered perspectives on what’s happening in the country, what potential scenarios may transpire and what that means for Belarus, Canada and the world in a virtual roundtable.

Dr. Zina J. Gimpelevich is a Professor Emerita at the University of Waterloo, Canada. Born in Minsk, Biełaruś, she came to Canada in 1979. Gimpelevich earned her Ph.D. in Slavic Studies from the University of Ottawa (1987). She worked for the Department of External Affairs and the University of Ottawa, teaching Russian language and culture (1980-1990). Her research interests are Biełarusian and Russian languages, literature, and culture. She has published seven books (the last received award from CAS and Taylor & Francis, 2019), thirteen book chapters, and over eighty articles. Gimpelevich co-authored one textbook and has given over eighty presentations at professional conferences. Zina Gimpelevich has been one of the three founding members of the Canadian Relief Fund for the Children of Chernobyl in Biełaruś (together with its first President, Mme Joanna Survilla [President of the Biełarusian Government in Exile] and Mrs. Paulina Smith-Paškievič). She was the first Vice-president of this national organization. Gimpelevich served as the President of the Canadian Institute of Arts and Sciences (BINiM, Canada 2002-2017) and its Vice-President (2017-2020). ZG served as the President and the Past – President of the Canadian Association of Slavists (CAS, 2008-2014) and was its Honorary President (2017-18). She is also the Honorary life- time member of the Biełarusian Writers’ Union (2017-) and other organizations. Zina Gimpelevich is active in the North American Biełarusian community. One of her dreams is to see her native country follow the example of her adoptive country, Canada, and to become democratic, prosperous, and free.

Valentina Holubeva is a regular active participant in Belarusian protests with a first-hand perspective on what’s happening in the country. She is a former Minsk State Linguistic University instructor and a corporate trainer also serving as Board Member of the Belarusian National Association of Teachers of English and Admin of Teaching English in Belarus Facebook Group. Valentina is a strong Advocate of learner centered learning, technology-driven methods of teaching English and cross-cultural studies. These new approaches in cross-cultural communication and pedagogy shape her vision of democracy-building in Belarus, equality and international cooperation. Having taught pre-service and in-service teachers at Minsk State Linguistic University for twenty years, now Valentina runs international professional development projects for teachers of Belarus in cooperation with Gallery Teaches and the Institute of IT and Business Administration. She has presented at a number of international conferences for teachers, worked as interpreter for international organizations, such as the World Bank, UNESCO, Council of Europe, ICOM and others, which helped her develop a global perspective on the developments in various fields.

Andrei Kazakevich is the Director of the Institute of Political Studies “Palitychnaya sphera” (Political Sphere) in Minsk. His research interests include Belarus’s foreign policy, the development of political institutions and the political history of Belarus and Eastern Europe.
Andrei graduated from the Department of Political Science of the Law Faculty of the Belarusian State University and received a PhD in Political Science in Lithuania (his thesis dealt with the judicial power in the Republic of Belarus). He is Co-founder and Editor-in-Сhief of the “Palitychnaya sphera” and Belarusian Political Science Review journals, Senior Research Fellow at Vytautas Magnus University (Lithuania) and Chairman of the Organizing Committee of the International Congress of Belarusian Studies.

Igor Leshchenya was the first senior diplomat to declare solidarity with protesters in Belarus. Previously the ambassador of Belarus to Slovakia, he was relieved of the post of Ambassador in August 2020.Mr. Leshchenya joined the diplomatic service in 1991 as an Attaché of the Embassy of the USSR. As soon as the Republic of Belarus became independent, Mr. Leshchenya continued his diplomatic career as a Head of Asia and Africa Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus. In 2002, he negotiated with the OSCE on the presence of this organization in Belarus and on December 30, 2002 (on behalf of the government of Belarus) he signed a Memorandum on the OSCE office in Minsk.From 2002 to 2006, Mr. Leshchenya was working as an Assistant to the President of the Republic of Belarus (issues of foreign policy and foreign economic relations). During his very successful diplomatic career, Mr. Leshchenya served his country as an Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Belarus in the Arab Republic of Egypt; the State of Israel; and the Slovak Republic. He also initiated the popular movement “I am a Citizen”.

Description

The Queer Of Color Analysis in Education Research Institute (QOCAERI)’s primary goal is to bring together researchers whose substantive knowledge, theoretical insight, and methodological expertise can be assembled in ways that build upon and reach beyond familiar modes of thinking concerning conundrums or problems related to LGBTQI+ issues in formal, non-formal and informal education. In this 1.5-hour webinar six BIPOC scholars based in the United States who mobilize queer of colour analysis and critique in their work discussed how they are re-imagining and redefining education in times of COVID and anti-Blackness.  

Panel 1 (5:40-6:15pm): Cindy Cruz, Ed Brockenbrough and Roland Coloma considered how trauma, stigma, violence and mourning haunt our everyday lives, including the streets, schools and transnational networks that are the sites of education.  

Panel 2 (6:20-6:55pm): Steve Mobley Jr., Kia Darling Hammond and Vijay Kanagala highlighted how queer of colour communities are forging new ways of thinking and enacting healing, resilience, resistance and thriving in the midst of unprecedent pandemic- and anti-Black racism-related death.  Event organized by CSUS Bissell-Heyd Research Fellow (2019-2020), Prof. Lance McCready.