IPSA RC 41 - Geopolitics

BISA was established in 1975, making it one of the longest established subject associations in the discipline of International Studies; ISA is the largest such association in the world. For only the second time in their history they will be holding a joint conference. This will bring together scholars from across the world, at all career stages, in probably the largest International Studies conference ever held in Europe.

Call for papers

Contemporary international relations is shaped by a series of global challenges. These include the financial crisis, political revolution in the Middle East, rising powers from the Global South, concerns over terrorism and the projection of Western military power. Alliances are being reconfigured, institutions are evolving and security is being articulated in new ways.

In addressing these issues, International Studies is characterised by diversity. We invite papers and panels which explore this diversity, particularly in relation to how competing approaches define and understand contemporary global challenges, and how those competing approaches have led to quite different proposals for responding to those challenges.

We welcome proposals for panels which consist of a diverse grouping of scholars from various countries and regions, from different career stages and which represent both genders. Joint submissions from ISA Sections and BISA working groups are warmly encouraged.

Location The conference will be held at two hotels on the Royal Mile, the mediaeval heart of Edinburgh with the Castle at one end and Holyrood the other, and in the historic Scotsman hotel overlooking Princes Street Gardens and the Scott Memorial. Edinburgh is a UNESCO city of culture, home to the International Festival and Fringe. The conference will be held at the same time as the Edinburgh International Film Festival and the Royal Highland Show.

Deadlines for proposals Panels, papers and roundtables: proposals by 1st September 2011 Submit proposals via the bisa website conference pages, here or copy and paste this link into your web browser http://www.bisa.ac.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=203&catid=35&Itemid=63

Contacts Please check the BISA conference pages (link above) for advice before emailing any of the following contacts

Joint Programme Chairs - Prof Colin McInnes (BISA) and Prof Karen Rasler (ISA) email: bisa-isa2012@isanet.org. (For enquiries about panels, papers and roundtable and conference programme generally)

Conference Organiser - Gail Birkett (BISA) email: bisa-conference@aber.ac.uk (For more general conference enquiries about venues, hotels, travel etc)

Co-sponsored by the Graduate School of Geography at Clark University and the journal Human Geography, the 18th Annual Conference on Critical Geography seeks to bring critical geographers together to engage with a world in crisis. Historically, crises have been viewed as moments of political opportunity; as points in time where hegemonic contradictions are revealed and contested. This conference views crisis as an entry point into questions of how critical geographers can construct a responsive, radical politics. If the point of critical social theory is not only to understand but to change, we seek to question what notions of change, politics, and action underlie contemporary critical and radical geographies.

The conference will begin on Friday, November 4th, 2011. The opening evening will feature a keynote address by Neil Smith, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Geography and Director of the Center for Place, Culture, and Politics at the CUNY Graduate Center.

The program on Saturday, November 5th will consist of paper sessions, panels, and round table discussions. Saturday evening will feature a keynote panel addressing the theme of the conference. Sunday, November 6th will include additional sessions.

We invite you to submit abstracts or proposals for paper sessions, panels, roundtable discussions, or sessions with alternative formats by the deadline of August 15, 2011. Abstracts or proposals should be 250 words in length, and we ask that you include contact information and any titles or affiliations you would like placed in the program. We are especially interested in participants organizing their own sessions. If you are interested in organizing a session, please let us know in advance and you can then issue your own CFP through the appropriate mailing lists. Papers submitted individually will be reviewed by the program committee after August 15, and will be accepted for committee-organized sessions as space allows. Please send your abstract or proposal to criticalgeography@clarku.edu.

Further information on the conference, including accommodations, paper sessions, and the conference synopsis will be available at the conference web site, www.criticalgeography.org. Please feel free to email any further questions to the conference planning committee at criticalgeography@clarku.edu

The Association of American Geographers invites scholars, researchers, and students to begin making plans to attend its 2012 Annual Meeting in New York for the very latest in research and applications in geography, sustainability, and GIScience. The conference will be held from February 24 to February 28 at the Hilton New York. The AAG Annual Meeting is an interdisciplinary forum open to anyone with an interest in geography and related disciplines. All scholars, researchers, and students are welcome to submit abstracts for papers and presentations beginning May 15. The deadline for submitting abstracts is September 28, 2011. Details on the call for papers will be published in the June issue of the AAG Newsletter and at www.aag.org/annualmeeting/call_for_papers. The four-day conference is expected to host more than 7,000 geographers from more than 60 countries and feature over 4,000 scientific presentations, posters, workshops, and field trips by leading scholars and researchers. Sessions will be organized around topics and special themes such as political geography, natural hazards, cartography, geography education, climate change, human geography, GIScience and technologies, physical geography, planning and international development, and social justice. Special events will include special guest speakers, a reception for international attendees, World Geography Bowl, awards luncheon, and an exhibition hall showcasing recent publications and new geographic technologies. Geographers and graduating students seeking new career opportunities can participate in career development sessions and the Jobs in Geography Center, a career fair highlighting numerous job opening in all fields of geography. Attendees also will have several options to explore the rich cultural and physical geography of New York and the surrounding region through informative field trips and excursions. Visit www.aag.org/annualmeeting on May 15 to register for the meeting and submit a paper.

The main objective of the conference is to discuss the state of research in the field of territorial identity, the impact of globalization on its evolution in different geographical and geopolitical conditions, the relation between the problem of identity with other directions of geographical studies, their practical importance in the understanding of current shifts in social and political processes in the world and in state-building in different countries. The conference is sponsored by the IGU Commission on Political Geography, National Committee of Geographers of Ukraine, Institute of Geography of The National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Tavrian G.I. Vernadsky National University

Ukraine

A 2-day workshop organised by the Politics-State-Space and Lived and Material Cultures Research Clusters

This workshop seeks to open up a conversation concerning the interplay between subjectivity, spatiality and materiality as constitutive features of the geopolitical. In response to recent calls for a critical geopolitics that challenges the centrality of Western elite practices and representations, the workshop aims to conceptualize how political subjectivity and materiality intersect in and through geopolitical space and asks what this might mean for the way in which the geopolitical is performed.

The workshop draws inspiration from a range of contemporary geographical approaches: recent feminist scholarship on the embodiment of political subjects, research on transnational citizenship and subaltern geopolitics on the value of theorising the geopolitical from the margins; and recent work on the geographies of materiality and affect and the roles they play in shaping contemporary geopolitical orderings. By considering these approaches together, the workshop aims to work toward a reconceptualisation of the everyday enactments of the geopolitical. The workshop is furthermore concerned with questions of methodology, namely with the methods available for tracing the material through the geopolitical.

We are now inviting submissions of abstracts for papers in a variety of formats, including 10-minute position papers and 20-minute research papers on these themes. Participants might, for instance, explore how recent critiques of scale inform critical geopolitical thought (Marston 2000, 2004, Marston et al 2005, Jones et al 2007, Law 2004, Gibson-Graham 2002), or the material assemblage of contemporary geopolitical orders (Ong and Collier 2005, Bennett 2010).

We are particularly keen to encourage submissions by postgraduate researchers and have a small number of postgraduate bursaries available to assist with travel expenses. Please let us know, if you are interested in applying for one of these.

Confirmed Participants: Professor Audrey Kobayashi (Queen's University, Canada) Dr. Merje Kuus (University of British Columbia, Canada) Professor Lynn Staeheli (Durham University, United Kingdom) Professor Joe Painter (Durham University, United Kingdom) Dr. Martin Müller (University of St. Gallen, Switzerland)

Participants not intending to give papers are also welcome to register.

Deadline: 15 April 2011

Please submit your abstract to: Kathrin Hörschelmann (kathrin.horschelmann@durham.ac.uk); Matthew Kearns (m.b.kearnes@durham.ac.uk), or Andrew Baldwin (w.a.baldwin@durham.ac.uk)

This year the Political Geography and Sexuality and Space Specialty Groups are co-sponsoring a pre-conference on the University of Washington Tacoma campus immediately prior to the start of the Association of American Geographers conference in Seattle. We have extended the submission deadline for this pre-conference for one more week. The new deadline is March 8, 2011. We have some great papers and panels thus far. We welcome additional paper and panel proposals on a wide range of topics related to political geography, sexuality and space, and/or the overlaps and interconnections between the two. Participation is not limited to specialty group members. To submit a paper or session proposal, please send a title, abstract, and complete author/organizer contact information ! to Larry Knopp (knoppl@uw.edu) or Mark Pendras (pendras@uw.edu) no later than March 8, 2011.

The pre-conference will begin midday on Sunday, April 10 and will feature a Keynote Address by Dr. Lynn Staeheli, Professor of Geography at Durham University in the United Kingdom. The conference will continue through Monday, April 11. Additional registration details, including fee and fee payment details, are available at http://www.tacoma.uw.edu/events/pgs.

The University of Washington Tacoma campus is located in downtown Tacoma’s vibrant and beautifully renovated museum district. Accommodations within walking distance include the Courtyard by Marriott (http://www.marriott.com/hotels/hotel-information/travel/seatd-courtyard-tacoma-downtown/) and the Hotel Murano (http://www.hotelmuranotacoma.com/). The Best Western Tacoma Dome (http://www.bestwesternwashington.com/hotels/best-western-tacoma-dome-hotel/) is a very short (2-3 minute) free tram ride away. All three of! fer room rates that are considerably cheaper than hotel rates ! in downtown Seattle (including AAG conference rates). In addition, downtown Seattle and Tacoma are accessible to one another via commuter train and express busses from early morning until late evening. The trip takes less than an hour.

Special thanks to the two specialty groups, UW-Tacoma administration, and the UW-Tacoma Office of Advancement, for their support of this pre-conference. Thanks also to the local organizing committee comprised of geographers and fellow-travelers in the Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences and Urban Studies programs at UW-Tacoma and the Department of Geography at UW-Seattle.

Description: The student paper competitions are open to all students who have written and presented a research paper on a topic in political geography. Guidelines are as follows:

1. The competition is open to all students, however a student may not receive a Student Paper Competition award more than once during her/his tenure as a student. See also 8a below.

2. The entries must be research papers and not complete theses or dissertations. Papers must not be longer than 15 pages plus bibliography.

3. Entries must be on a topic in political geography.

4. Paper entries must have been presented at a professional meeting during the period beginning with the first day of the previous AAG Annual Meeting and concluding with the last day of the next AAG Annual Meeting.

5. Hard or digital copies of papers must be submitted to all three members of the PGSG's Student Paper Award Committee by the deadline announced in the PGSG newsletter.

6. Submissions will normally be divided into Masters and Ph.D. student divisions.

7. Submissions will be judged on their written clarity, methodological and theoretical soundness, and their contributions to research in political geography.

8. All monetary prizes are awarded at the discretion of the Student Paper Award Committee. Awards will normally include:

A. A regional student-paper award: for a paper presented at a Regional AAG meeting; award will be $100 for the top paper(MA or Ph.D. level, only one award); a student may not win both student paper awards;

B. Doctoral Student Award ($100 + reimbursement of next year’s AAG Annual Meeting student registration fee),

C. Master's Student Award ($100 + reimbursement of next year’s AAG Annual Meeting student registration fee),

D. up to three Honorable Mention awards (reimbursement of next year’s AAG Annual Meeting student registration fee).

9. The results of the Student Paper Award competitions will be announced to the winner just prior to the annual AAG meeting in Las Vegas and the awardees (including any Honorable Mention awardees) will be invited to attend the annual AAG Awards Luncheon at the expense of the PGSG. The awards will be formally announced at the PGSG business meeting in Las Vegas Payment will take place shortly thereafter. The awardees' names and paper titles will be forwarded to the AAG for publication in the AAG Newsletter.

10. Any questions pertaining to eligibility will be resolved by the Student Paper Award Committee.

Deadline is on March 15, 2011

Submissions should be sent to committee chair Darren Purcell (dpurcell@ou.edu), or other members of the committee ( Helga Leitner - eqj6139@umn.edu>, Katrinka Somdahl-Sands - somdahka@gmail.com.)

The Argentine Commission on the Outer Limit of the Continental Shelf (COPLA) is very pleased to invite you to the International Workshop “Seabed and Subsoil: the Continental Shelf and the Area”, to be held in Buenos Aires from October 5^th to 7^th , 2011.

This Workshop aims at providing a forum for discussion in order to exchange points of view and information on technical and legal matters related to the seabed and subsoil. National and foreign experts from different States and organizations involved in geological, geophysical, hydrographic, legal and economic issues related to the outer limit of the continental shelf and the exploitation and conservation of the resources of the seabed and subsoil are invited to participate in this Workshop.

The following general topics will be address:

· The Outer Limit of the Continental Shelf: Sharing Experiences and New Developments

· The Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf: its Work and current Workload

· Resources of the Seabed and Subsoil

· The Role of the International Seabed Authority and its Challenges for the Future

Should you be interested in submitting a paper or a poster, please send your proposal by e-mail to copla@mrecic.gov.ar <mailto:copla@mrecic.gov.ar> before February 28^th 2011, so that it may be evaluated by the Organizing Committee. Please, bear in mind that only a limited number of presentations will be accepted, so the refusal of a presentation does not prejudice about its academic quality.

Vacancies are limited. Further information on the Seminar will be provided by March 2011.

Dear Colleagues:
As newly confirmed Chair of The International Political Science Association’s Research Committee RC-41 (Geopolitics), I am writing not only to introduce myself but to address each of you associated with this Committee in some capacity in the past, whether as a formal member or participant in one of its sponsored workshops. 
Pledged to help build upon the longstanding efforts by Professor Robert Lieber almost single-handedly at sustaining the activities of IPSA’s RC-41, I want begin by expressing our sincere individual and collective thanks to him. 
Looking to the future, clearly, there are many ideas for prospective activities within this domain of Geopolitics – and I certainly welcome any and all suggestions. Beyond generating ideas, however, I am asking each of you to renew your personal commitment and involvement in RC-41.
If we are to revitalize RC-41 and to undertake any new programs it seems to me that the most pressing need at the moment is to deepen the ranks of our membership though a determined, energetic recruitment campaign. I therefore urge you to approach known colleagues, overseas research collaborators and advanced graduate students who might have a professional interest in registering as members of RC-41. Please provide them with my E-Mail address (aklieman@gmail.com), and ask they write me directly with their particulars.
If each of us undertakes this fairly simple step and stimulates even 5-10 people to commit we stand to multiply our membership by several fold. For this purpose, I am attaching a brief description of RC-41’s terms of reference.

I look forward to hearing from you in response to my letter. Also, to working with you more closely in the future, and to meeting you personally. 

Sincerely, 
Professor Aharon Klieman