Coming up at the Mershon Center
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Sold out! Video will be posted.
Glenn Carle
Interrogation, the Law, and Ethics: When to Say No
Noon, Mershon Center for International Security Studies, 1501 Neil Ave.
 Glenn Carle served 23 years in the Clandestine Service of the Central Intelligence Agency, working in a number of overseas posts on four continents and in Washington, D.C. Carle has worked on terrorism issues at various times since the mid-1980s. He has worked extensively on Balkan, Central American, and European political, security, and economic issues.
His last position was as Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Transnational Threats, on the National Intelligence Council, where his office was responsible for strategic analysis of terrorism, international organized crime, and narcotics issues. He is author of The Interrogator: An Education (Nation Books, 2011). Read more and register
Friday-Saturday, January 27-28, 2012
Somalia at the Crossroads: Foreign Intervention, Humanitarian Crisis and Aspirations for Statehood
Hagerty Hall, 1775 College Road; Denney Hall, 164 W. 17th Ave.
Co-sponsored by SomaliCAN
This two-day conference will bring together some of the brightest minds in Somali affairs with the aim of deepening public discourse and understanding of the complex situation in Somalia and developing strong, pragmatic, and principled policy recommendations for, post-transition political development in Somalia. Issues discussed include the national roadmap, piracy, humanitarian crisis, frontline state military interventions, diaspora remittance challenges and community development issues. Read more and register
Friday, February 3, 2012
Jennifer Merolla and Elizabeth Zechmeister
Terrorist Threat and Democratic Public Opinion
3:30 p.m., Mershon Center for International Security Studies, 1501 Neil Ave.
  Jennifer Merolla is associate professor of politics and policy at Claremont Graduate University. Her research focuses on how the political environment shapes the political behavior of individuals. Elizabeth Zechmeister is associate professor of political science and associate director of the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) at Vanderbilt University. Her work includes studies of voting, ideology, political parties, representation, charisma, and crisis. Merolla and Zechmeister are authors of Democracy at Risk: How Terrorist Threats Affect the Public (University of Chicago, 2009). The book examines how worry about terrorism alters individual attitudes toward others in society, their evaluations of political leaders, and their foreign policy preferences. Read more and register
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Han Park
Kim Jong Un in North Korea: Implications for the Region and Beyond
Noon, Mershon Center for International Security Studies, 1501 Neil Ave.
 Han Park is University Professor of Public and International Affairs and Director of the Center for the Study of Global Issues at University of Georgia. Park is recognized as a leading expert on domestic and foreign affairs surrounding the Korean peninsula. He has provided briefings to several foreign ministers, and has also acted as a consultant to former U.S. President Jimmy Carter during visits to Pyongyang in 1994 and 2010. In addition, Park was instrumental in the release of American journalists from North Korea in 2009. He is author of Human Needs and Political Development (Schenkman, 1984) and North Korea: The Politics of Unconventional Wisdom (Rienner, 2002). Read more and register
Other events
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Aaron Wolf
Healing the Enlightenment Rift: Rationality, Spirituality, and Shared Waters
3:30 p.m., Cartoon Room 1, Ohio Union, 1739 N. High St.
Sponsored by the Department of Geography
While press reports of international waters often focus on conflict, what has been more encouraging is that, throughout the world, water also induces cooperation, even in particularly hostile basins. This begs the question, why do countries that share a basin cooperate on water, even when they will not cooperate over other issues? Perhaps the answer lies not in the world of rationality, but rather in the spiritual, ethical, and moral dimensions of water conflict resolution. Aaron Wolf, Department of Geosciences, Oregon State University, will discuss the current understanding of water conflict and cooperation, then document the geography of the "Enlightenment Rift" – the process by which the global West/North separated out the worlds of rationality from spirituality – and the impact of this rift on ideas related to natural resources management. He will discuss the current clash of worldviews, and describe how the two worldviews might be interwoven within the framework of more effective water conflict management. Read more (pdf).
Friday, January 27, 2012
Taste of OSU
5-9 p.m., Ohio Union, 1739 N. High St.
Sponsored by Office of International Affairs
The Office of International Affairs, along with more than 30 Ohio State student organizations and the University Residences and Dining Services chefs, are coming together to prepare an evening of international food, exhibits and cultural performances for the campus community at the 2012 Taste of OSU. The event is free and open to all Ohio State students, faculty, staff, alumni, family and friends. Tickets to purchase small samplings of international foods cost $1 each (Cash and BuckID only). The student organizations will prepare foods with an international flavor that are characteristic of their home countries. The evening will be highlighted by international foods, cultural exhibits and performances presented by the student organizations.
Previous events available for viewing
Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee meets with the conference's graduate staff after his welcoming address to the Islam and Rationality conference on November 10. 2011; from left, Heather Sweetser, Clint Hackenburg, Joanna Bell, Allen Tuazon, conference convener Georges Tamer, David Bond, President E. Gordon Gee, Zachariah Carper, and Ryan Schaffner.
Gee opens conference on Islam and Rationality
Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee welcomed participants to a conference on Islam and Rationality: The Impact of al-Ghazālī, held November 10-12, 2011, at the Mershon Center for International Security Studies. Organized by Georges Tamer, M.S. Sofia Chair of Arabic Studies, the conference examined the influence of Abu Hāmid al-Ghazālī (1058-1111), a central figure in the history of Islamic theology, jurisprudence, philosophy and Sufism. You can watch a streaming video of the keynote address by Eric Ormsby of the Institute of Ismaili Studies, London, on "The Comedy of Reason: Strategies of Humor in al-Ghazālī."
Full Archive
Visit the Event Recordings page for the full list of streaming videos from previous events sponsored by the Mershon Center. Note: Streaming videos recorded before Fall 2010 require RealPlayer. If you do not have RealPlayer, you can download it free.
Mershon News
Mershon Center research grant deadline January 27
Each year, the Mershon Center for International Security Studies holds a competition for Ohio State faculty and students to apply for research grant funds. Grants may be used for a variety of purposes including travel, research, seminars, conferences, interviews, experiments, workshops and more.
Applications must be for projects related to one of our focus areas within the study of national security in a global context: use of force and diplomacy; ideas, identities, and decisional processes that affect security; and institutions that manage violent conflict. We are also interested in projects related to Ohio State’s global gateways in China, India, and Brazil, as well as policy issues in biosecurity and cybersecurity.
For more information, including an application form and instructions, please see http://mershoncenter.osu.edu/grants/grants/grants.htm. The deadline is January 27, 2012.
Wendt named top scholar in international relations
 In a survey of faculty at more than 1,400 colleges and universities worldwide, Alexander Wendt was named as having the most influence in the field of international relations over the past 20 years. Wendt is Ralph D. Mershon Professor of International Security.
The survey was part of the Teaching, Research, and International Policy (TRIP) Project done by the Theory and Practice of International Relations at the College of William and Mary. This is the project's fourth survey since 2004.
Wendt was also named for producing the best work in the field of international relations over the past 20 years, and third for producing the most interesting scholarship over the past five years.
Wendt is author of Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge, 1999), widely cited for bringing social constructivist theory to the field of international relations. His book argues that international politics is determined not primarily by material concerns such as wealth and power, but by states' perceptions of each other as rivals, enemies, and friends. Social Theory of International Politics was named Best Book of the Decade by the International Studies Association in 2006 and has been translated into 10 languages.
Wendt is also co-editor, with Duncan Snidal, of International Theory: A Journal of International Politics, Law and Philosophy. His recent publications include New Systems Theories of World Politics (Palgrave, 2009), edited with Mathias Albert and Lars-Erik Cederman. Based on a 2005 Mershon Center conference, the book uses a number of systems theoretical approaches to analyze the structure and dynamics of the international system. Wendt’s contribution, "Flatland: Quantum Mind and the International System," compares the international system to a hologram.
 The survey also named John Mueller as among scholars doing the most interesting research in international relations over the past five years. During that time, Mueller has published Terror, Security, and Money: Balancing the Risks, Costs, and Benefits of Homeland Security (Oxford, 2011), Atomic Obsession: Nuclear Alarmism from Hiroshima to Al-Qaeda (Oxford, 2010), and Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them (Free Press, 2006).
Other scholars named in the survey include Michael Doyle, Daniel Drezner, James Fearon, Robert Jervis, Peter Katzenstein, John Mearsheimer, Joseph Nye, and Ann Tickner, all of whom have spoken at the Mershon Center, as well as Furniss Award Winner Stephen Walt.
Tamer wins prestigious Marie Curie Fellowship
 Georges Tamer, M.S. Sofia Chair in Arabic Studies in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures, was awarded a 24-month Marie Curie Fellowship from the German Gerda Henkel Foundation. The fellowship is aimed at supporting outstanding scholars.
Tamer won for his project "The Concept of Time in the Koran," which builds on a project he began with a grant from the Mershon Center. In this project, Tamer found that many of the images used in the Koran to describe time have their roots in ancient Greece and late antiquity.
The fellowship is co-financed by the European Commission under the EU’s Seventh Framework Programme for Research. One objective is to increase networking between researchers in the historical humanities at the international level, including researchers in religious, cultural and political sciences under the special program Islam: the Modern Nation State and Transnational Movements.
Tamer’s research deals with various subjects of Arabic and Islamic literature and culture. His particular interests are the Koran and the Arabic literature in the context of Late Antiquity, classical Arabic poetry, medieval Arabic philosophy as well as its reception in modern political philosophy. His other areas of expertise include Islamic thought and Christian- and Judeo-Arabic literature.
Tamer organized two recent conferences at the Mershon Center, Islam and Rationality: The Impact of al-Ghazālī, held in November 2011, and Migration, Religion, and Germany, with Barbara Becker-Cantarino, held in April 2011.
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