Themes

David Orr

Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics, Oberlin College

Designing Resilience in a Black Swan World

Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Anita Tuvin Schlechter Auditorium, 7:00 p.m.

Black Swan events are those with low or unknown probability, but high, long-lived and often global impacts. Orr will discuss how we should design communities, regions, and nations to improve resilience and prosperity in the context of such events, with a focus on the Oberlin Project and the National Sustainable Communities Coalition.

The event is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and the Office of the President, and co-sponsored by the Center for Sustainability Education and the Department of Environmental Studies. It is also part of The Clarke Forum’s Leadership in a Age of Uncertainty Series and the faculty seminar series titled, Living in a World of Limits.

Biography (provided by the speaker)

David Orr the Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics and senior adviser to the president at Oberlin College. He is the author of seven books, including Down to the Wire: Confronting Climate Collapse (Oxford, 2009) and co-editor of three others. He has authored nearly 200 articles, reviews, book chapters, and professional publications. In Read more

Human Dimensions of Natural Resource Extraction – Panel Discussion

Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

Panelists:

Peter Bechtel ’81 – Andorinha Azul Ambiental
Tim Kelsey, Penn State University
Veronica Coptis, Center for Coalfield Justice
Erika Staaf, PennEnvironment
Moderated by Julie Vastine, ALLARM

Natural resource extraction has been at the heart of economic growth and, for that reason, remains a source of considerable political and economic controversy. Both Pennsylvania and Mozambique are currently experiencing a boom in natural gas exploration while they yet confront the economic, social, and environmental consequences of previous forms of resource extraction. The panel will discuss and compare the two locations, identify commonalities, and see what lessons have been learned.

This event is part of the faculty seminar series titled, Living in a World of Limits and is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the Center for Global Study and Engagement, Center for Sustainability Education, Career Center, Department of Religion, Office of Institutional and Diversity Initiatives, Department of International Business and Management, Health Studies, Department of Environmental Studies, Community Studies Center, Department of Africana Studies and ALLARM.

Biographies

Peter Bechtel, an ’81 Dickinson graduate, worked with the World Wildlife Fund in Mozambique on Read more

Peter Bechtel ’81 and Ruth Mkhwanazi-Bechtel

Peter Bechtel ’81, director, Andorinha Azul Ambiental, a company specializing in sustainable development
Ruth Mkhwanazi-Bechtel, program director, Vanderbilt University’s Friends in Global Health in Mozambique

Sustainable Development in Mozambique

Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

For many years, Mozambique has been near the bottom of the UN Human Development Index, but recent discoveries of gas, coal, and mineral deposits have created opportunities for rapid economic development. While the government places some importance on sustainability, there are ongoing problems related to transparency, top-down decision-making, urbanization and climate change.

The event is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the Center for Global Study and Engagement, Center for Sustainability Education, Career Center, Department of Religion, Office of Institutional and Diversity Initiatives, Department of International Business and Management, Health Studies, Department of Environmental Studies, Community Studies Center and the Departments of Africana Studies, International Studies, Earth Sciences and Economics.

This event is also part of The Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series and the faculty seminar series titled, Living in a World of Limits.

Biographies

Peter Bechtel ’81, a graduate of Dickinson College, traveled to Africa with the US Peace Read more

Michael Shellenberger

President, The Breakthrough Institute

Love Your Monsters: Why Technology Will Save the World

Tuesday, January 29, 2013 *
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

Environmental expert Michael Shellenberger will describe why technology is the key to dealing with the world’s toughest environmental problems from climate change to rainforest destruction and species extinction.

The event is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the Center for Sustainability Education and the Department of Environmental Studies. It is also part of The Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series and the faculty seminar series titled, Living in a World of Limits.

Biography (provided by the speaker)

Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus are leading global thinkers on energy, climate, security, human development, and politics. Their 2007 book Break Through was called “prescient” by Time and “the most important thing to happen to environmentalism since Silent Spring” by Wired. Their 2004 essay, “The Death of Environmentalism,” was featured on the front page of the Sunday New York Times, sparked a national debate, and inspired a generation of young environmentalists. They also co-authored the 2011 book titled “Love Your Monsters: Postenvironmentalism and the Anthropocene.”

Over the years, the two Read more

Ara Wilson

Associate Professor of Women’s Studies and Cultural Anthropology, Duke University

The Erotic Life of Globalization

Friday, November 30, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 4:30 p.m.

This talk provides a new direction for thinking about sexuality at the transnational level. It focuses on the infrastructures of globalization, highlights the effects of intensified transnational links in the post-Cold-War period, and argues that transformations of sovereignty, labor, knowledge, and space provide the conditions for key forms of sexuality.

This event is sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by Women’s and Gender Studies.

Biography (provided by the speaker)

Ara Wilson is an associate professor of women’s studies and cultural anthropology at Duke University, where she directed the program in the study of sexualities for six years. Trained as an anthropologist, her research combines political economy, culture theory, and post-colonial, queer, and feminist frameworks to understand the operations of sexuality and gender within global capitalist modernity. She has conducted long term research on Bangkok published in The Intimate Economies of Bangkok: Tomboys, Tycoons, and Avon Ladies in the Global City (UC Press 2004) and on transnational feminist and queer politics.

Video of the Program

Associate Professor of Political Science, George Washington University

The Arab Uprisings

Thursday, November 8, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.
Book Sale/Signing to Follow

Lynch sheds light on the unfinished Middle East revolutions that have so far brought down the governments of Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya, and offers a framework for understanding the deeper changes still emerging from a region thoroughly and forever altered.

This event is jointly sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Penn State Dickinson School of Law and School of International Affairs and co-sponsored by the Constance and Rose Ganoe Memorial Fund for Inspirational Teaching courtesy of Professor Russell Bova and the Department of Middle East Studies. It is also part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

Biography(provided by the speaker)

Marc Lynch (@abuaardvark) is associate professor of political science at George Washington University, where he is the director of the Institute for Middle East Studies and the Project on Middle East Political Science. He is also a nonresident senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security and edits the Middle East Channel for ForeignPolicy.com. He has written several books including The Arab Uprising: The Unfinished Read more

Anne Fausto-Sterling

Professor of Biology and Gender Studies, Brown University

From Babies to Gender Identity

Thursday, November 15 (Rescheduled from October 30 due to inclement weather)
Anita Tuvin Schlechter Auditorium, 7:00 p.m.

How are we to understand the processes by which bodily differentiation, behavioral differentiation and gendered knowledge intertwine to produce male and female, masculine and feminine? Read more

This event is sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the Women’s Center, Institutional and Diversity Initiatives, Women’s and Gender Studies and the Departments of Anthropology, Psychology, American Studies and Sociology.

Biography (provided by the speaker)

Dr. Anne Fausto-Sterling is a leading expert in biology and gender development and has achieved recognition for works that challenge entrenched scientific beliefs while engaging with the general public. Using a groundbreaking new approach to understanding gender differences, Dr. Anne Fausto-Sterling is shifting old assumptions about how humans develop particular traits. Dynamic systems theory permits one to understand how cultural difference becomes bodily difference. By applying a dynamic systems approach to the study of human development, Dr. Fausto-Sterling’s work exposes the flawed premise of the nature versus nurture debate.

Radio Interview for WDCV, Dickinson College

Leadership Under Pressure

Monday, October 22, 2012
Katz Hall, Penn State Dickinson School of Law, 7:00 p.m.
Link to Live Webcast

General Dubik, The General Omar N. Bradley Chair in Strategic Leadership, will discuss the strategic mistakes made in Iraq; the myths that are partly responsible for these mistakes; the transformation that turned Iraq from a strategic failure to a strategic opportunity; and how the U.S. should incorporate its experience in Iraq in addressing current ongoing events in the Middle East and North Africa.

This event is jointly sponsored by Dickinson College, Penn State University Dickinson School of Law and School of International Affairs, and the U.S. Army War College. It is also part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

The Omar Bradley Chair is a joint initiative among the United States Army War College, Dickinson College and Penn State University Dickinson School of Law and School of International Affairs. Its objective is to advance the study of strategic leadership and enhance civilian-military dialogue by offering distinguished individuals the opportunity to contribute to the educational and research activities of the partner institutions. Previous chair-holders include former director of national intelligence and retired United States Navy Read more

Richard Matthew

Founding Director of the Center for Unconventional Security Affairs & Professor of International and Environmental Politics, UC at Irvine

Natural Resources, Conflict and Peacebuilding

Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

Based on fieldwork in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, this presentation examines the complex and evolving relationships among natural resources, violent conflict and peacebuilding.

This event is jointly sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Penn State Dickinson School of Law and School of International Affairs and is part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

Biography (provided by the speaker)
Richard A. Matthew (BA McGill; PhD Princeton) is a professor in the Schools of Social Ecology and Social Science at the University of California at Irvine, and founding director of the Center for Unconventional Security Affairs (www.cusa.uci.edu). He is also a senior fellow at the International Institute for Sustainable Development in Geneva; a senior fellow at the Munk School for International Affairs at the University of Toronto; a senior member of the UNEP Expert Group on Environment, Conflict and Peacebuilding; and a member of the World Conservation Union’s Commission on Environmental, Economic and Social Policy. He has carried Read more

Cheng Li

Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Thornton China Center, Brookings

China’s Leadership Transition & the Bo Xilai Case

Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

Just as the Chinese Community Party elite is trying to smooth the way for the transfer of power to a new generation of Chinese leaders, one of its rising stars, Bo Xilai, has been ousted as party chief of Chongqing and his wife is charged with the murder of a British businessman. What are the implications of this unfolding crisis for China’s decision-making process, economic policies, social stability, and foreign relations? More information

The event is jointly sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Penn State Dickinson School of Law and School of International Affairs and co-sponsored by the Department of East Asian Studies. It is also part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

Biography (provided by the speaker)

Cheng LI is the director of research and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s John L. Thornton China Center. Dr. Li currently also serves as a director of the National Committee on US-China Relations, a member of the Academic Advisory Team of the Congressional U.S.-China Working Group, Read more

Pat Genovese

Head Lacrosse Coach, William Smith College

Title IX: Conception, Progression, Direction

Monday, September 24, 2012
Anita Tuvin Schlechter Auditorium, 7:00 p.m.

In 1972, Congress enacted Title IX, which prohibited sexual discrimination in any education program or activity that received federal financial assistance. Coach Genovese will explore the origin of Title IX; the advances and setbacks that have occurred in athletics since its enactment; and where it will take us in the future.

This event is sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the Department of Athletics, Office of Institutional and Diversity Initiatives, and the Women’s Center. It is also part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

Pat Genovese’s Biography Read more

Heather Love

Professor of English, University of Pennsylvania

Gay Marriage and Its Others

Thursday, September 13, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

This lecture considers the fate of the spinster in the era of gay marriage. Through a reading of the 2006 film Notes on a Scandal, Love argues that, while monogamous gay and lesbian couples have achieved unprecedented levels of social acceptability, those who are alone or whose intimacies are unconventional are more stigmatized than ever. Read more

The event is sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by Women’s and Gender Studies.

Biography
Heather Love is the R. Jean Brownlee Term Associate Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, where she teaches interests include gender studies and queer theory, the literature and culture of modernity, affect studies, film and visual culture, psychoanalysis, race and ethnicity, sociology and literature, disability studies, and critical theory. She is the author of Feeling Backward: Loss and the Politics of Queer History (Harvard, 2007), the editor of a special issue of GLQ on the scholarship and legacy of Gayle Rubin (“Rethinking Sex”), and the co-editor of a special issue of New Literary History (“Is There Life after Identity Politics?”). She has recent Read more

Harry Brod

Professor of Philosophy and Humanities, University of Northern Iowa

Asking for It: The Ethics & Erotics of Sexual Consent

Thursday, August 30, 2012
Anita Tuvin Schlechter Auditorium, 7:30 p.m.

In a nonthreatening, non-hectoring discussion that ranges from the meanings of “yes” and “no,” to the indeterminacy of silence. to the way alcohol affects our ethical responsibilities, Brod challenges young people to envision a model of sexual interaction that is most erotic precisely when it is most thoughtful and empathetic.

This event is sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and co-sponsored by the Milton B. Asbell Center for Jewish Life and Women’s and Gender Studies.

Harry Brod’s Web site

Co-Chair of the Kitchen Table Patriots

The Tea Party

Thursday, April 19, 2012 (originally scheduled for March 1)
Althouse Hall, Room 106, 5:00 p.m.
Reception to Follow

Puig will address the nature of the Tea Party and the impact that it has had in the early Republican primaries and the role she anticipates it will play in the 2012 presidential election.

This event was initiated by The Clarke Forum Student Project Managers and is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues. It is also part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

Ana Puig’s Biography

Video of Program

Professor of Music, New York University

Acoustemology & the “War on Terror”

Tuesday, April 17, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

Based on interviews with released detainees at Guantanamo and elsewhere, this lecture analyzes the ways that regimes of sound and silence were used to attack the subjectivities of prisoners detained in U.S.-run prison facilities during the so-called “global war on terror.” More information.

The event is co-sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and the Department of Music.

Biography (provided by the speaker)
Suzanne G. Cusick is a professor of music at New York University. Her writing on music in relation to gender, sexuality and cultural history has appeared in such journals as the Journal of the American Musicological Society, Early Music, Musical Quarterly, Repercussions, Perspectives of New Music, Early Modern Women, TRANS, and the Journal of the Society for American Music. Her monograph “Francesca Caccini at the Medici Court” will be published by the University of Chicago Press in 2009. She is currently working on a book about the uses of sound and silence in U.S.-run detention camps in the so-called “global war on terror.”

Video of the

Dean of the School of Business, George Washington University

China’s Capitalism: A Model For U.S.?

Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

One of the great ironies of our time is this: today, the largest Communist society in the world is also the world’s most dynamic and business-friendly capitalist economy. To examine this seemingly paradoxical circumstance, this lecture will analyze the economic reforms that have been sweeping across China for over three decades. As we view the changes in China through the prism of media representations, political rhetoric, and the many other distortions that have shaped perceptions of the reform process in China, the picture is murky at best. We will examine the changes that have actually occurred in China and the forces that have brought about this process of change. As it turns out, China’s course of building a market economy can teach the world’s capitalist powers a great deal about healthy market economies.

This event was initiated by The Clarke Forum Student Project Managers and is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, the Department of Political Science and Department of International Business and Management. It is also part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership Read more

Eisenhower National Security Series

A Visit by U.S. Army War College Eisenhower Fellows

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

The Eisenhower program is an academic outreach designed to encourage dialogue on national security and other public policy issues between students at the U.S. Army War College and students/faculty at academic institutions. The fellows will be visiting classes and participating in events throughout the day.

Each year a few students at the U.S. Army War College participate in the Eisenhower National Security Series and travel outside Carlisle Barracks to engage in discussions with other students, academics, and the public about national security issues and the employment of military assets.

* This program is part of the Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series and is co-sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Penn State University Dickinson School of Law, School of International Affairs and the Churchill Fund.

Schedule of Programs:

9 – 10:30 a.m. – Open Class Visit

Ethics and International Security
Captain Stephen C. Krotow, U.S. Navy and Lt. Col. Curtis Mason, U.S. Marine Corps to visit Professor Bova’s class.
Denny Hall, Room 211

Noon – 1:30 p.m. – Lunch Panel Discussion

The Arab Spring
Panelists: Eisenhower National Security Series Fellows, with Prof. Read more

Daniel Drezner

Professor of International Politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University

International Politics and Zombies

Thursday, March 22, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.

Addressing timely issues with analytical bite, Drezner looks at how well-known theories from international relations might be applied to a war with zombies. He boldly lurches into the breach and “stress tests” the ways that different approaches to world politics would explain policy responses to the living dead. Drezner examines the most prominent international relations theories–including realism, liberalism, constructivism, and neoconservatism –and decomposes their predictions. Exploring the plots of popular zombie films, songs, and books, Theories of International Politics and Zombies predicts realistic scenarios for the political stage in the face of a zombie threat and considers how valid–or how rotten–such scenarios might be.

This event is jointly sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Penn State Dickinson School of Law and the School of International Affairs.

Biography (provided by the speaker)
Daniel W. Drezner is professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, a senior editor at The National Interest, and a contributing editor at Foreign Policy. Prior to Fletcher, he Read more

Thom Shanker and Eric Schmitt

Pentagon Correspondents, The New York Times and Co-authors of Counterstrike

Counterstrike

Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Stern Center, Great Room, 7:00 p.m.
A book signing will follow.

Schmitt and Shanker explore the Pentagon’s secretive and revolutionary new strategy to fight the war on terrorism. This new strategy will have game-changing effects in the Middle East and in the United States.

This event is jointly sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Penn State Dickinson School of Law, the School of International Affairs and Betty R. ’58 and Dan Churchill.

Biographies (provided by the speakers)
Eric Schmitt is a senior writer for The New York Times who covers domestic and internationalism terrorism issues. For nearly 20 years, he has covered military and national security affairs for the newspaper. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, he has made ten reporting trips to Iraq and five trips to Afghanistan to cover American military operations there. In the past year, he has also reported on counter-terrorism operations in Pakistan, Mali and Southeast Asia.

Previously, Mr. Schmitt reported on demographic and national immigration issues for The Times and covered Congress for five years. During that time, he one of newspaper’s main reporters assigned to the 2000 Read more

Michael Granoff

Head of Oil Independence Policies, Better Place

The End of the Oil Monopoly

Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Anita Tuvin Schlechter Auditorium, 6:30 p.m.

For 100 years, virtually all of global transport has been the domain of a single, depleting, polluting commodity to the detriment of the global economy, security and environment. But the trend is beginning to change in 2012 as the convergence of technology and creative business modeling has led to the creation of a less expensive and more convenient alternative to gasoline-driven automobiles. Pioneered in Israel, Denmark and Australia, this radical new approach has the potential to turn two giant industries upside down.

This event is sponsored by The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues and The Milton B. Asbell Center for Jewish Life and is part of The Clarke Forum’s Leadership in an Age of Uncertainty Series.

Biography (provided by the speaker)
Michael Granoff has been head of oil independence policies for Better Place since its founding in 2007. In that capacity, he helps stakeholders of all types calibrate policies consistent with the Better Place approach to ending the corrosive effect of oil dependence on economy, environment and security. Stakeholders with which Granoff works include governments on every Read more