Global Studies Seminar Series
During 2012 the Globalism Research Centre continued its Global Studies Seminar Series, a program of free public seminars exploring key issues and debates in the field of global studies. Our aim is to provide an intellectually challenging but accessible and collegial environment for discussion and debate around central themes in globalisation.
Global Languages and Linguistic Sustainability in the ‘Asian Century’
Panel Members: Michael Singh, Lynne Li, and John Hajek
Thursday 15 March: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
Prime Minister Gillard announced, in September 2011, that the Australian Government had commissioned a White Paper on Australia in the Asian Century for consideration by Cabinet in the first half of 2012. In providing a national blueprint for Australia at a time of transformative economic growth in Asia, this White Paper is expected to help the Australian Government, and the people of Australia, navigate the ‘Asian Century’. Language education is a key part of this challenge because the effective teaching and learning of global languages is commonly understood as essential for the cultural, economic and intellectual life of any society. Moreover, and in terms of Australian National Interest, greater language diversity and capacity could result in a significant deepening of our engagement with Asia, not just in the areas of economy and security, but in science and technology collaboration, clean energy, education and so forth. The panel members will together address issues involving linguistic diversity and sustainability in a national sense, Australia, as well as the challenges and opportunities that Australia’s language education will face over the coming decades
Subjects of Security: Foreign Policy, War on Terror and the Constitution of Social Order
Thursday 12 April: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
This paper offers a theoretical framework for understanding how foreign policy affects its own domestic sphere. Inverting the traditional analysis of foreign relations, it will be argued that there is a significant impact from external foreign policy on 'domestic' individual subjectivity and social order. As such, this framework demonstrates how the subjectivity of citizens are shaped by notions of security stemming from the pervasion of norms and stereotypes of foreign policy that rebound onto domestic politics. Furthermore, notions of security derived from foreign policy inform how liberty is perceived and what it means to be free, in so doing assuming a vital part of the constitution of social order. The presentation will conclude by arguing that the war on terror heralded a distinct shift on the operation of foreign policy, one that continues to inform the construction of new security policies such as critical infrastructure protection and cyber security.
Seminar Podcast
Security and Development: Assessing the Policy and Practice of the Nexus in a Global Context
Thursday 10 May: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
The idea that security and development are inter-dependent and mutually reinforcing informs the mainstream donor approach towards the reconstruction of 'conflict-affected' countries. The security-development nexus theory argues that because conflict and violence impede countries’ development prospects, it is imperative to create a secure domestic environment first through a policy emphasis on the adoption of institutional reforms. This policy consensus, however, does not align with the empirical evidence on the ground. Despite improvements in public security conditions, the anticipated development objectives have yet to follow in 'conflict-affected' societies such as Sierra Leone, Timor-Leste and the Solomon Islands. This paper addresses why this gap between the policy and practice of security-development nexus occurs. It does so by examining the underlying assumptions of the nexus theory and how it actually correlates to the realities in the 'field'. It argues that more attention needs to be given to the views of aid recipient populations about security and development and the nature of the relationship between the two, as well as their identification of other factors that are likely to impact on development outcomes.
Current and Future Trends in Globalization Research
Roundtable Discussion with Manfred B. Steger, Paul Battersby, Chris Hudson
Thursday 21 June: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
During the last two decades, Global Studies has emerged worldwide as a new transdisciplinary field of academic inquiry in the context of and in response to globalization. Responding to strong interest by students and academics, Global Studies programs and departments have sprung up in hundreds of universities around the world. The rise of Global Studies has facilitated the ongoing movement of globalization research from the margins of academic inquiry into the mainstream. The participants of this roundtable will not only introduce and discuss cutting-edge trends in globalization but also suggest ways in which interested RMIT staff might link their work to these trends—with an eye toward achieving concrete outcomes such as externally funded research projects and high-level publications.
A State Reliant on Pornography: Japan in the Twenty-first Century
Thursday 16 August: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
It will be argued in this presentation that Japan's child pornography problems occur within the context of a state that permits the organisation of women and girls for pornography consumption in order to bolster its political viability. The economic malaise that has beset Japan since the 1990s has caused the increasing destabilisation of its male workforce, but this threat to the state remains placated as long as the sexual 'comfort' on offer to Japanese men continues to progress in its diversity and extremity. The Japanese government attracts international criticism for failing to act against child pornography, but continues to legally allow the individual possession of child pornography, and does not regulate the production of manga images of child sexual abuse. Other research shows that globalisation has elevated Japanese men's technological and financial advantage over women in the region, and this has facilitated their overseas sex tourism and demand for foreign trafficked women. This paper will additionally account for their commercial sexual victimisation of Japanese women and girls.
Seminar Podcast
Presidential Succession in Crisis: Charisma and Mortality in Venezuela
Dr Raul Sanchez Urribarri, Lecturer, Legal Studies, School of Social Sciences, La Trobe University
Thursday 13 September: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
What role do constitutional rules play in solving multiple questions regarding succession, especially in the context of regimes with charismatic, personalistic leaders? What would happen if a president is ill, and may no longer fulfill her duties? These are important questions for developing democracies, as recently demonstrated in the case of the diagnosis and treatment of cancer of Venezuela's president Hugo Chávez, who is standing for reelection on October 7, 2012. In this work, I discuss the constitutional regulation of presidential disability in comparative perspective in Latin America. I evaluate alternative explanations that might account for its use and implementation (or lack thereof) in the Venezuelan case, and provide a brief comparison to the discussions surrounding the diagnosis and treatment of former President Fernando Lugo in Paraguay.
Raul Sanchez Urribarri is a Lecturer in Legal Studies at the School of Social Sciences, La Trobe University. His work lies at the crossroads between Law and Politics, with an emphasis on judicial politics in comparative perspective. His teaching interests include Law and Development, Comparative Politics, Judicial Politics, and Research Methods. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science (University of South Carolina), an LL.M. (Cambridge University) and a Law degree (Universidad Catolica Andres Bello). His work has been published in Law and Social Inquiry, The Journal of Politics, and edited volumes. He is currently writing a book on judicial politicization in developing democracies, with a focus on Venezuela, Paraguay and Costa Rica.
Seminar Podcast
Reframing Analysis of Voluntourism in International Development
Thursday 11 October: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
The presentation will consider current representations of voluntourism in international development. In particular, an argument will be made that distinguishes between analyses that is restricted to the merits and legitimacy of voluntourism and those analyses that attempt to explain its presence in International Development in the first instance. Instead of considering the effectiveness or legitimacy of voluntourists as participants or practitioners in development settings, this reframing considers voluntourism as an inevitable phenomenon of consumerist societies which expect that anything can be bought and sold, including good intentions. Moreover, the paper will draw out the implications for development NGOs, training and education in international development as well as the role of enterprise and regulation.
Entanglements of Custom and Modernity: Land and Power in Papua New Guinea and Timor-Leste
Victoria Stead
Thursday 15 November: 12:30-2 pm
Research Lounge, RMIT Building 28, Level 5
Across the Pacific, modernising processes of globalisation, state and nation-building are being brought into encounter with customary ways of being, knowing and belonging. This presentation explores these dynamics within two countries, Papua New Guinea and Timor-Leste, through the lens of changing forms of connection to land. Drawing together theoretical inquiry with multi-sited ethnographic research, it argues that the entanglement of modern and customary forms of connection to land destabilises structures of power, in ways that create multiple possibilities for their reconfiguration. On the one hand, the autonomy of local communities diminishes as power and decision-making capacity shifts to the sites and apparatuses of the state and of globalizing capital. The entanglement of custom and modernity, however, also create possibilities for the creative rearticulation of customary connection to land. A metaphor of entanglement provides a basis for theorising this dynamic and contested landscape. Entanglement speaks to the intertwining of ontologically distinct forms of social relations, in ways which cut across the boundaries of delimited social groups (nations, clans, or communities), rather than being synonymous with them. Entanglements are held to be dynamic but also ambivalent sites, writ through with hierarchical relationships of power.