果冻传媒

CSGR and PAIS would like to welcome Toni Haastrup, who will be starting as a Research Fellow working on GR:EEN on 1^st June.

Toni recently completed her doctoral degree at the University of Edinburgh, where she was a Tutor and Research Assistant. Prior to Edinburgh, she was a Junior Researcher at the Human Sciences Research Council in South Africa. Her current research focuses on the intersection between security and development in EU external relations and the EU?s role in international affairs. Toni is particularly interested in the interregional cooperation especially EU-Africa relations, and has published on EU-Africa security cooperation'.

Toni is very excited to be working on GR:EEN and at 果冻传媒, PAIS in general and looks forward to meeting colleagues in June. 

The PaIS undergraduate handbook has been updated. The key changes are:

* Clarification of the responsibility of students to regularly check for updates to the undergraduate handbook (page 2).

* Inclusion of material on policies and procedures concerning harassment and complaints (pages 14-15).

* Clarification on the procedure for applying for an extension, and changes to the use of medical evidence for extension requests (page 32-3). This informs students that PaIS reserves the right to check the validity of any medical evidence provided in support of an extension with the provider of that evidence.

* Information about the move to a 3,000 word limit for assessed essays from the 2011/12 academic year (page 30). This change does not apply to students entering their final year in 2011/12. Students entering their final year remain on the 5,000 word limit

* Inclusion of information about forthcoming changes to the weighting system for core PaIS degrees (Politics, Politics and International Studies). This applies only to students entering PaIS at the start of the 2011/12 academic year (page 47). 

The handbook can be downloaded from the usual place: http://bit.ly/djnRie

On the basis of a seminar paper he delivered in the Business School earlier in the year, first year PhD student Justin Brown has been invited to participate in a very high-profile 'Audience with...' event with the Knowledge and Innovation Network at Lloyd’s Registry in early June . 'Audience with...' event. The format will primarily be Q&A with opportunities for discussion. Patricia Eng from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Hugh O'Neill, Associate Director of Marketing at Jones Lang LaSalle, will also be on the panel.

Justin will talk about the work he has done with on “accelerated learning”. GPR Dehler is a management consultancy with offices in London, Sydney and San Diego. Justin is also undertaking a double doctorate at the 果冻传媒 and l’Université libre de Bruxelles, focusing on learning and innovation in the international monetary system. Justin also specialises in managing change and talent management.

The 'Audience with...' event will take place on 7 June 2011. More details can be found on the .

Dr Ted Svensson, who finished his PAIS Phd last year, has won the Lord Bryce Prize for Best Dissertation in International Relations/Comparative Studies for 2010.

The judges said :

This dissertation provides a theoretically rich and empirically informed examination of the complex processes that shaped the production of national independence and citizenship in India and Pakistan. By judiciously deploying critical social theory and skilfully interpreting extensive archival material, it is able to map the mythologies of state formation in political theory and the formation of state mythologies during the independence and partition processes on the sub-continent. The analysis of dynamics such as communal violence, diaspora networks, internal migration, class antagonisms, religious affiliation, and caste marginalisation reveal the ways that dominant mythologies shape the very limits of political possibility and representation within any nation-state. In doing so, this dissertation engages with vital questions about power, identity, authority, and authenticity in the mutually constitutive development of political structures and political identities. Moreover, at a time when the potential for dramatic constitutional change and socio-political transformation is once again emerging globally, one of the key implications of this study is to remind us of how any period of political transition produces opportunities and foreclosures, certainties and uncertainties, traditions and novelties, and practices of memorialisation and wilful forgetting. All are deployed in order to discipline the ambiguities of ‘foundational’ moments in politics, lest the radical contingency of constitutions, national identities, and the forms of authority they enable be revealed.

Congratulations, Ted!

Dear All,

I am delighted to be able to inform you that the has recently conferred the title of Academician upon Wyn Grant.

This is, of course, recognition of Wyn's highly distinguished scholarship and contribution to the Politics discipline, and especially through the .

I am sure you will join me in congratulating Wyn on this very prestigious achievement.

Chris

Christopher W. Hughes
Professor of International Politics and Japanese Studies
Head of Department, Politics and International Studies