FSI researchers consider international development from a variety of angles. They analyze ideas such as how public action and good governance are cornerstones of economic prosperity in Mexico and how investments in high school education will improve China’s economy.
They are looking at novel technological interventions to improve rural livelihoods, like the development implications of solar power-generated crop growing in Northern Benin.
FSI academics also assess which political processes yield better access to public services, particularly in developing countries. With a focus on health care, researchers have studied the political incentives to embrace UNICEF’s child survival efforts and how a well-run anti-alcohol policy in Russia affected mortality rates.
FSI’s work on international development also includes training the next generation of leaders through pre- and post-doctoral fellowships as well as the Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program.
Reuben W. Hills Conference Room
World leaders are focused on agricultural supply data, insurance schemes and speculation as they try to quell volatility in global food markets. They should also turn their attention to perhaps the leading cause of price instability: U.S. ethanol policy.
Five years ago, few if any food or energy experts predicted that 40 percent of the U.S. corn crop in 2011 would be devoted to ethanol production. Nor did they imagine: that corn prices would reach all-time highs at $8 per bushel ($275 per metric ton); that July futures prices for corn in Chicago would exceed those for wheat; that the United States would be exporting ethanol to Brazil; or that an Iowa Senator would co-sponsor a bill to reduce corn-based subsidies just prior to the Iowa Caucuses for the 2012 primary season. What has caused these extraordinary circumstances? And what are the economic, political and food-security implications of a revolution in demand that has caught both economists and political leaders unaware?
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations has challenged itself is to become a single integrated community by 2015. The prospect has raised high hopes inside the region. Will they be met? Efforts to build the community have intensified, yet the clock ticks and the deadline looms. Although the result will not match what local enthusiasts of regional unification want to see, but it will likely exceed the expectations of skeptical outsiders. ASEAN is the linchpin of East Asian regionalism, by design and by default. What happens to the Association over the next several years has far-reaching implications for the United States, China, and not least for the states and peoples of Southeast Asia. In his talk, Prof. Pongsudhirak will tease out these dynamics, assess their significance, and explore possible futures beyond 2015.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak heads the Institute of Security and International Studies and teaches international political economy at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. In 2010 he was an FSI-Humanities Center International Visitor at Stanford and, in spring 2011, a visiting professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. He has written many articles, chapters, and books on ASEAN and East Asian affairs, and on Thai politics, political economy, and foreign policy. He has worked for The Nation newspaper (Bangkok), The Economist Intelligence Unit, and Independent Economic Analysis (London). He currently serves on the editorial boards of Asian Politics & Policy, Contemporary Southeast Asia, the Journal of Current Southeast Asian Studies, and South East Asia Research. His degrees are from the London School of Economics (PhD), Johns Hopkins University (School of Advanced International Studies, MA), and the University of California, Santa Barbara (BA).
Daniel and Nancy Okimoto Conference Room
Stanford Humanities Center
424 Santa Teresa St.
Stanford, CA 94305
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is a high-profile expert on contemporary political,
economic, and foreign-policy issues in Thailand today He is also a
prolific author; witness his op ed, "Moving beyond Thaksin," in
the 25 February 2010 Wall Street Journal.
Pongsudhirak is not senior in years, but he is in stature. His
career path has been meteoric since he earned his BA in political science
with distinction at UC-Santa Barbara not long ago. In 2001 he received
the United Kingdom's Best Dissertation Prize for his doctoral thesis at
the London School of Economics on the political economy of Thailand's
1997 economic crisis.
Since 2006 he has held an associate professorship in international
relations at Thailand's premier institution of higher education,
Chulalongkorn University, while simultaneously heading the Institute of
Security and International Studies, the country's leading think tank on
foreign affairs.
His many publications include: "After the Red Uprising," Far East
Economic Review, May 2009; "Why Thais Are Angry," The New York
Times, 18 April 2009; "Thailand Since the Coup," Journal of
Democracy, October-December 2008; and "Thaksin: Competitive
Authoritarian and Flawed Dissident," in Dissident Democrats: The
Challenge of Democratic Leadership in Asia, ed. John Kane et al.
(2008). He has written on bilateral free-trade areas in Asia,
co-authored a book on Thailand's trade policy, and is admired by
Southeast Asianist historians for having insightfully revisited, in a
2007 essay, the sensitive matter of Thailand's role during World War
II.
He was a Salzburg Global Seminar Faculty Member in June 2009, Japan
Foundation's Cultural Leader in 2008, and a Visiting Research Fellow at
the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (Singapore) in 2005. For
ten years, in tandem with his academic career, he worked as an analyst
for The Economist's Intelligence Unit.
This event is co-sponsored by the Program on Social Entrepreneurship at CDDRL together with the Clayman Institute for Gender Research, the Program in Ethics in Society, and the Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society.
Award-winning documentarian and Stanford alumna Abigail Disney will talk about her latest project, PBS mini-series Women, War & Peace — the most comprehensive global media initiative ever mounted on the roles of women in peace and conflict, an area she calls the ignored "second front of war."
Disney is a filmmaker, philanthropist, and scholar. She holds degrees from Yale, Stanford, and Columbia. Her work in philanthropy, women's engagement and leadership, and conflict resolution has been recognized through the Epic Award from the White House project, the Changing Landscape for Women Award from the Center for the Advancement of Women, and the prestigious International Advocate for Peace (IAP) Award from the Cardozo Law School's Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution.
Watch the premiere episode of Women, War & Peace, "I Came to Testify," at 11pm on October 11th, 2011 on KQED. Then join the conversation with Abigail Disney at Stanford the following day at 7pm on October 12th, 2011.
When the Balkans exploded into war in the 1990s, reports that tens of thousands of women were being systematically raped as a tactic of ethnic cleansing captured the international spotlight. "I Came to Testify" is the moving story of how a group of 16 women who had been imprisoned by Serb-led forces broke history's great silence — and stepped forward to take the witness stand in an international court of law.
This event is free and open to all. However, tickets are required. To get tickets, click here.
Cemex Auditorium, Zambrano Hall
Knight Management Center (free underground parking available)
Stanford, CA 94305, USA
The Program on Human Rights Collaboratory Series is an interdisciplinary investigation of human rights in the humanities. It is funded under the Stanford Presidential Fund for Innovation in International Studies as the third in a sequence of pursuing peace and security, improving governance and advancing well-being.
Pheng Cheah is professor of rhetoric at the University of California at Berkeley. He is the author of Inhuman Conditions: On Cosmopolitanism and Human Rights (Harvard University Press, 2006) and Spectral Nationality: Passages of Freedom from Kant to Postcolonial Literatures of Liberation (Columbia University Press, 2003), and the co-editor of several book collections, including Derrida and the Time of the Political (Duke University Press, 2009), Grounds of Comparison: Around the Work of Benedict Anderson (Routledge, 2003) and Cosmopolitics - Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (University of Minnesota Press, 1998). He is currently completing a book on theories of the world and world literature from the postcolonial South in an era of global financialization. Also in progress is a book on globalization and world cinema from the three Chinas, focusing on the films of Jia Zhangke, Tsai Ming-liang and Fruit Chan.
Building 500, Seminar Room
Stanford Archaeology Center
Center on Food Security and the Environment
Encina Hall East E400
Stanford, CA 94305-6055
Chris Fedor is a research assistant in the Center on Food Security and the Environment. He received his BS/MS in Earth Systems from Stanford in 2011, with a focus on environmental geography and land use modeling.
While a student, Chris worked two years as a teaching assistant for Roz Naylor’s and Wally Falcon’s World Food Economy course. Almost all of his other previous endeavors seemed to have circulated around food as well. Those range from a summer spent with a hand held camera in Norway eating whale steaks and producing a movie about modern arctic whaling, to assisting CIMMYT in attempts to measure maize yields via remote sensing data in the Yaqui Valley of Mexico. He prefers burritos.
The Liberation Technology Seminar Series is set for an exciting fall quarter. Held on Thursdays from 4.30 to 6 pm at Wallenberg Theater, this 1-unit seminar course is co-taught by CDDRL director Larry Diamond and Professor of Computer Science Terry Winograd. Hosted by the Program on Liberation Technology (LibTech) at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, this seminar series features guest speakers who introduce students to cutting-edge theoretical and practical applications of new technologies.
Beginning on October 6, the seminar series will kick off with Andrew McLaughlin an expert on internet regulation who served in the Obama administration and worked with Google’s policy division. The quarter will continue featuring new research, innovative Lib Tech products and stimulating debate on the impact technology has on ‘liberation’.
When protestors waged a revolution across the Arab world in January, they did not set out to make life interesting at Stanford. Whether they intended to or not they have achieved just that. We are now mired in the debate on the impact of technology in revolutions that has become more interesting since the Arab Spring. Ramesh Srinivasan Assistant Professor in Design and Media/Information Studies at UCLA, will speak to this debate based on his recent field work in Egypt on October 20. Evgeny Morozov a visiting scholar for the Program on Liberation Technology will revisit the debate at the end of the quarter based on his new work. For those who have heard him caution against the use of technology before the Arab Spring, it may be an interesting time to revisit Morozov's arguments on December 1.
At the core of this debate is the idea that technology is ever-evolving. Some are creating systems to give governments greater control, while others seek to protect the activists. New ideas and products are changing this landscape every day. To take an example, at a recent hack-a-thon in San Francisco there was a suggestion to encrypt sensitive messages in a Beyonce song. If that works out, you may be able to swing a leg and send a message at least until a technology comes up to trace your steps. We could not have a LibTech seminar series without taking a look at such innovations.
Sam Gregory and Bryan Nunez from Witness will give a taste of this evolving drama through their work on the use of videos for human rights. They will offer ideas to harness its power without exposing the activists to its dangers on October 27.
The Fall series will also feature Joshua Stern, executive director of Envaya, speaking to their ultra fast blogs that are making inroads among African NGOs on October 13. Paul Kim of Stanford University will discuss his experiments with delivering education through mobile phones. For those who enjoy the 'hands on experience,' word is that Paul Kim will bring his mobile phones for us to play with on November 3! On December 8, Jeff Klingner of Benetech will give a presentation on databases that help track human rights abuses.
One of the season’s highlights is a panel of students who participated in the innovative class taught by Joshua Cohen and Terry Winograd at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (d.school). On November 17, four teams will present their new ICT designs to mitigate water problems and other issues in the slums of Kibera, Kenya. For those who wish to get a taste of this much sought after course, this talk will prove invaluable.
For those interested in registering for the course it is available on Explore Courses as CS 546: Seminar on Liberation Technologies and POLISCI 337S. We encourage others to attend who are interested in the topics, speakers, or liberation technology in general.
To view the complete Liberation Technology Seminar Schedule, please click here.
The Program on Arab Reform and Democracy (ARD) at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, together with the Safadi Foundation USA (SFUSA) and the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) announced the winners of the first annual Safadi-Stanford Initiative for Policy Innovation (SSIPI). The title of Safadi Scholar of the Year has been awarded to Katarina Uherova Hasbani, an energy policy expert at the American University of Science and Technology in Beirut, Lebanon. The title of first runner up has been awarded to Miriam Allam, an economist for the Middle East North Africa Governance Program at the Regulatory Policy Division, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
SSIPI was established to promote new scholarship and analysis on Lebanon. “SSIPI represents the link between the academic and policy worlds that Stanford's Program on Arab Reform and Democracy aims to nurture,” said Dr. Lina Khatib, who leads the ARD program at CDDRL. "The research by Hasbani and Allam addresses some of the core challenges impacting governance in Lebanon and the rest of the region. Hasbani’s paper on the reform of the electricity sector and Allam’s discussion on public consultation are both strategic areas vital to linking citizens and institution building,” said Lara Alameh, Executive Director of Safadi Foundation USA.
Hasbani will begin her four-week residency at CDDRL with the ARD program on October 1 where she will participate in seminars, engage with leading faculty and benefit from the scholarly resources at Stanford. During that time she will produce a publishable paper based on her research, which will then be presented at a policy conference in Washington, DC on December 6, 2011.
"It is an incredible opportunity to receive the support of SSIPI for my research on consensus-based electricity sector reform as a vital element for Lebanon's future economic and social development," said Hasbani.