2017 - 2018
Demography, Fertility, and Sustainability
Karl Hofmann, Population Services International
Retired U.S. ambassador and SIA advisory board member Karl Hofmann is President and Chief Executive Officer of Population Services International, a Washington-based global health organization. Mr. Hofmann is former U.S. Ambassador to Togo and Executive Secretary of the State Department. He also served on President Clinton’s National Security Council staff.
Dealing with North Korea
Evans Revere, Albright Stonebridge Group
Evans J.R. Revere will speak about current policy challenges in North Korea as part of the Penn State School of International Affairs’ spring colloquium. Revere is senior director with the Albright Stonebridge Group, providing strategic advice to clients with a specific focus on Korea, China and Japan. Fluent in Chinese, Korean and Japanese, Revere retired from the Foreign Service in 2007 after a distinguished career as one of the U.S. Department of State’s top Asia experts. He has extensive experience in negotiations with North Korea.
Why People Rebel – Greed versus Grievance
Greg Kruczek, Virginia Tech
Kruczek graduated from Penn State in 2005 with a B.A. in Political Science and B.S. in Professional Golf Management. During time as an undergraduate, spent time in Cairo, Egypt and Beirut, Lebanon studying Arabic and each state’s political culture. In Fall 2006 completed intensive Arabic program at the Monterey Institute of International Studies in Monterey, CA. Worked as Research Assistant at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies (Arlington, VA) from 2006-2007. In 2007 served as Information Officer at Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies. After a brief stint in Beirut in late-2007, returned to Penn State for his Masters, graduating from the School of International Affairs in 2009. Master’s paper dealt with confessional politics in Lebanon. From 2010-2012 was a lead researcher in Penn State’s College of Information Science and Technology on the counter-insurgency component of a Multi-University Research Initiative sponsored by the U.S. Army Research Lab. In 2011 joined the faculty of Susquehanna University as an instructor in the Department of Political Science, teaching classes on world politics and comparative domestic politics. In January 2013 began pursuing Ph.D in Government and International Affairs at Virginia Tech’s Washington, D.C. campus under the guidance of Dr. Ariel Ahram. His dissertation topic concerns the Christian response to the Arab Spring.
Intelligence and National Security
Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Former Chief of Staff to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell
Doing Development Right
Greg Gottleib, Tufts University
The Media
Steve Mufson, The Washington Post
Global Commons
Leif Trana, Economic Minister with the Norwegian Embassy
Leif Trana, Minister Counsellor for Economic Affairs at the Embassy of Norway will present “Managing the Global Commons: Norway’s Interests in the Arctic” as part of the Penn State School of International Affairs’ spring colloquium. The Arctic is Norway’s top policy issue.
Before joining the Embassy of Norway in August 2014, Trana serviced as the director of the section for organizational development in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Oslo. In this position, he focused on how to align the resources used at various embassies with Norwegian interests in the corresponding country or organization. Before that, he was deputy director int eh same section. He spent five years working on World Trade Organization matters focusing on the agricultural and the National Agri-Marketing Association negotiations in the Doha Development Agenda. Trana is a career foreign-service officer who has served in Riyadh and Washington. He received his M.A. in economics from the University of Oslo.
Nation Building
Peter Van Buren, author and 24-year veteran of the State Department
Peter Van Buren is a retired 24-year veteran of the U.S. Department of State. He spent a year in Iraq as a State Department Foreign Service Officer serving as Team Leader for two Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs). Now in Washington, he writes about Iraq and the Middle East at his blog, We Meant Well. His first book, We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People, was published in 2011, and his latest book, Ghosts of Tom Joad: A Story of the #99Percent, has just been published.
Peace in the Middle East
Dr. Husam Zomlot, Palestinian Ambassador to the United States
Climate Change
Dr. Richard Alley, Penn State
Dr. Richard Alley, Evan Pugh Professor in the Penn State Department of Geosciences at the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, will speak about climate change at the Penn State School of International Affairs’ spring colloquium.
Alley has authored more than 170 refereed scientific publications about the relationships between Earth’s cryosphere and global climate change. Alley testified about climate change before the U.S. House Committee on Science and Technology in 2007 and 2010. His 2007 testimony was due to his role as a lead author of “Chapter 4: Observations: Changes in Snow, Ice and Frozen Ground” for the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He has participated in the joint United Nations World Meteorological Organization panel since 1992, having been a contributing author to both the second and third IPCC assessment reports.
Terrorism
Dr. James Piazza, Penn State
Dr. Piazza is Professor of Political Science. His research focuses on terrorism and political violence. Specific interests include: socioeconomic roots of terrorism; regime-type, human rights, repression and terrorism; state failure and terrorism; religion, ideology and terrorist organizations and behavior; ethnic minorities and terrorism; the global narcotics trade and terrorism; natural resources and conflict; right-wing extremism in the United States; public opinion and counterterrorism. His work has been published in the American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, Comparative Political Studies, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Public Choice, Journal of Peace Research, Political Psychology, Conflict Management and Peace Science, Political Research Quarterly, Foreign Policy Analysis, International Interactions, Defence and Peace Economics, Southern Economic Journal, Security Studies, Terrorism and Political Violence and Studies in Conflict and Terrorism.
Echoes of 20th Century Fascism in Modern Politics and Culture
Bringing together faculty and graduate students from both the Political Science and History departments, “Echoes of 20th Century Fascism” provides a platform to discuss varying perspectives on a complex and pertinent topic: the history of Fascist thought in the United States and globally and how this relates to the current political climate. This event seeks to bring together faculty and students – university-wide as well as the general public to discuss the importance of using history to understand recent events.
New Media in India: From Fad to Fundamental?
Dr. Sunetra Sen Narayan, Indian Institute of Mass Communication
Dr. Shalini Narayanan, Independent Communications Consultant
New media is shaping the public discourse in India today. What are the implications of this for the world’s largest democracy? And for development? Who is getting left out of the new media equation? Given the sheer numbers and diversity of India, how do we go about regulating it? This study aims to map the changing contours of India’s fascinating new mediascape.
ISIS, Jihad, and Islamic Law
Dr. Mohammad Khalil, Michigan State University
How does ISIS attempt to justify its acts of terrorism? In this lecture, Mohammad Khalil (associate professor of Religious Studies, adjunct professor of Law, and Director of the Muslim Studies Program at Michigan State University) discusses some of the traditional rules of armed jihad according to Islamic law, shows how the leadership of ISIS attempts to present their acts of terrorism as being in line with those rules, and examines mainstream Muslim scholarly responses to ISIS.
2014 - 2015
School of International Affairs Lectures
Nation-building and why it’s so hard to do
Peter Van Buren, Policy Expert, Middle East Policy Council
North Korea
Evans Revere, Senior Advisor of Albright Stonebridge Group
(Re)imagined Communities: Christians and the Search for a Place and Identity in the Post-Arab Spring Middle East
Greg Kruczek, PhD. student, Virginia Tech
Demography, Fertility, Sustainability: How Global Population Trends Shape Your Future
Karl Hofmann, President & CEO Population Service International
Development Work in Developing Countries
Fawad Sultani, Penn State alumnus and current Program Implementation Coordinator for the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan
Contemporary Afghan Politics
Fawad Sultani, Penn State alumnus and current Program Implementation Coordinator for the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan
Development: The Third “D” of National Security
Rachel Sayre, Senior Advisor for USAID
Strategic Intelligence
Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Former Chief of Staff to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell
Poverty and the Academy: ‘How We Know Poverty’ is What Causes Poverty
Lakshman Yapa, Penn State
Guns vs. Butter in American Politics
Ryan Crotty, Fellow and Deputy Director for Defense Budget Analysis, Center for Strategic and International Studies
The Arctic – A Region for the Future?
Leif Trana, Minister Counsellor for Economic Affairs, Embassy of Norway
Root Causes of Terrorism
James Piazza, Penn State
Religious Freedom: A Global and Historical Exploration
Roger Finke, Penn State
A Few Thoughts on Sustainability
Richard Alley, Penn State
2013 - 2014
School of International Affairs Lectures
Globalization and International Science Cooperation
Cathleen Campbell, President and Chief Executive Officer of CRDF Global
Additional Resources
China-Constitution-Politics
Tong Zhiwei, East China Univ. of Political Science and Law
This conference considered issues of Chinese constitutional law and politics and consider the current movement of government and popular sentiment. Featured Speakers include Professor Zhiwei Tong, one of China’s most well known public intellectuals and a Professor at the East China University of Political Science and Law. Anyone interested in current developments in Chinese politics, law and culture will find the proceedings of interest.
Links to the video recording follow. The recording can be accessed in one of three ways. One is of the entire conference proceedings. The second is of the morning session; the third is of the afternoon session. For ease fo reference, the Conference announcement and Conference Program are also provided.
- Entire Conference
- AM Session (featuring Tong Zhiwei’s paper presentation)
- PM Session (featurung Larry Catá Backer’s paper presentation)
This lecture was sponsored by the School of International Affairs, the Center for Global Studies, the Center for Democratic Deliberation, the Rock Ethics Institute, and the Coalition for Peace and Ethics.
Global Penn State Conference
The University Office of Global Programs hosted its first annual Global Penn State conference on September 26-27, 2013, to bring colleagues together from across the commonwealth to share best practices in developing the Global Penn State.
- Part 1: Introduction by Vice Provost Adewumi and Provost Jones
- Part 2: Keynote by Stanley Katz, Princeton University
- Part 3: Panel on Building a Global Campus
- Part 4: Panel on Building a Global College, College of Agricultural Sciences
- Part 5: “Methodological Issues in Implementing and Internationalized Curriculum – Five Approaches to Internationalization” Larry Cata Backer, Penn State Law
2012 - 2013
Additional Resources
Extraterritoriality and the Construction of International Governance Frameworks for Business and Human Rights
Nabih Haddad, School of International Affairs, Penn State
Over the last decade, two international institutions — the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) — have crafted frameworks for the governance of the human rights impacts of international business activities. In both cases, the focus has been on creating international standards above national law. Yet, both systems also provide a space for the assertion of national law beyond the territorial limits of states, at least under certain circumstances. But the assertion of extraterritorial power has been controversial for a century or more.
Fostering Student Global Engagement through Academic Advising A professional development seminar for academic advisers at Penn State
During fall 2012, the Division of Undergraduate Studies hosted “Fostering Student Global Engagement through Academic Advising,” a scholarly professional development seminar on the importance of academic advising in cultivating a global perspective in undergraduate students. Sessions focused on understanding globalization in an educational context, engaging students in global issues, introducing the range of global opportunities—curricular and co-curricular—available at the University, and informing the pedagogy of advising for global engagement.
The Division of Undergraduate Studies and Penn State World Campus partnered with WPSU to live stream the event, which was made possible in part through a grant from the Bringing Theory to Practice Project in cooperation with the Association of American Colleges and Universities. Generous support for the seminar additionally came from Penn State’s Center for Global Studies and the World Campus.
Program
Session 1
Video recording
Slides
- Understanding Globalization and Promoting Student Global Engagement (Keynote): Robert Crane, Ph.D., Alliance for Education Science, Engineering, and Development in Africa
Session 2
Video recording
Slides
Julianna Chaszar, Ph.D., College of the Liberal Arts
Nimisha Thakur, M.Arch, University Office of Global Programs
Session 3
Video recording
Slides
Sophia McClennen, Ph.D., Center for Global Studies
Susannah Barsom, Ph.D., Center for Sustainability
Session 4
Video recording
Slides
Elena Galinova, Ph.D.; Marie Lindhorst, Ph.D.; and Marion Schwartz, Ph.D., all from the Division of Undergraduate Studies
This discussion, moderated by Dr. John Kelmelis, looked at the impact and the implications of the disasters in Japan from a variety of perspectives. Panelists included Dr. Charles Ammon, Dr. Gregory Smits, Dr. Arthur Motta, and Dr. Yumiko Watanabe. To view the webcast of Disasters in Japan, you may need to download Microsoft SilverLight Player.
The Future is Global Education: A Panel Discussion
Leaders in various international initiatives at Penn State will discuss the possibilities and challenges that globalizing trends present to faculty and students in institutions of higher education, and to offer creative ways that the PSU community can address them. Ultimately our goal is to consider how PSU can lead the future of global education.
- Educating Global Citizens, Powerpoint by Leila Bradaschia, College of Education
- Global Education in Agricultural Sciences, Powerpoint by Ketja Lingenfelter, Study Abroad Coordinator
Expanding Sustainability: Rights, Global Economics, and Human Transformation
A Public Talk with Chilean Environmental Economist, Diplomat and Spiritual Teacher Alfredo Sfeir-Younis.
The video presentation is available in five parts:
- Part 1 of 5 — Alfredo Sfeir-Younis’s Sustainability Lecture at Penn State
- Part 2 of 5 — Alfredo Sfeir-Younis’s Sustainability Lecture at Penn State
- Part 3 of 5 — Alfredo Sfeir-Younis’s Sustainability Lecture at Penn State
- Part 4 of 5 — Alfredo Sfeir-Younis’s Sustainability Lecture at Penn State
- Part 5 of 5 — Alfredo Sfeir-Younis’s Sustainability Lecture at Penn State
The Q&A session following the presentation is available in three parts: