Workshop on Islam and Secularism in Contemporary Turkey
This workshop is sponsored by the Mediterranean Studies Program, and co-sponsored by the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law, the Europe Center, and the Stanford Humanities Center
Stanford faculty, students, scholars and staff are welcome to attend. To RSVP, please contact medstudies@stanford.edu.
WORKSHOP SCHEDULE:
November 15th
10:30 am – Noon: Conceptual Explorations
Haldun Gulalp (Department Political Science, Yildiz Technical University)
“Rethinking Islam and Secularization in Turkey: A Durkheimian Perspective”
Ahmet Kuru (Department of Political Science, San Diego State University)
“Islamism, Secularism, and Democracy in Turkey”
2:00 pm- 3:30 pm: Managing the Difference
Aykan Erdemir (Department of Sociology, Middle East Technical University)
“Faith-based Activism for Secularism: The Transformation of Alevi Collective Action Repertoire in Turkey”
Murat Somer (Department of International Relations, Koc University; Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, Princeton University)
“Islamic-Conservative and Pro-Secular Values and the Management of Ethnic Diversity and Conflict”
4:00 pm - 5:30 pm: Claiming Secularism
Umit Kurt (Department of History, Clark University)
“Military’s Perceptions of Islam and Secularism in Contemporary Turkey”
Kabir Tambar (Department of Religion, University of Vermont)
“Staging Alevi Pasts in Secular Time”
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November 16th
10: 30 am- Noon: Turkey’s “Islamists” and “Secularists” Abroad
Betul Balkan (Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Northeastern University)
“Opinions of Turkish Immigrants in Houston About Secularism and Islam in Turkey”
Zeynep Atalay (Department of Sociology, University of Maryland-College Park; The Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Stanford University)
“From the Neighborhood to Umma: Global Networks of Muslim Civil Society in Turkey”
2:00 pm – 3:30 pm: Contextualizing the Turkish Case
Hootan Shambayati (Division of Public Affairs, Florida Gulf Coast University)
“Controlled Democratization, Moderate Islam, and Radical Secularism: Lessons from Turkey and their Implications for the Middle East”
Nora Fisher-Onar (Department of Politics and International Relations, Bahcesehir University; Centre for International Studies, University of Oxford)
“Vision or Cacophony?: Mixing Liberal-Democratic, Religious-Conservative, Power Political, and Ottomanist Metaphors in Contemporary Turkey”
4:00 pm- 5:30 pm: Concluding Session
Riva Kastoryano (Center for International Studies and Research, Sciences Politique)
Larry Diamond (Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law, Stanford University)
Stanford Humanities Center, Board Room
History and Responsibility: Hebrew Literature and 1948
The Europe Center announces the international conference, “History and Responsibility: Hebrew Literature and 1948” which will take place at Stanford University on June 13-14, 2011. The aim of this conference is to consider some six decades of literary reflection on the 1948 Middle Eastern war, an event that resulted with the establishment of Israel on the one hand, and with the birth of the Palestinian refugee problem, the Nakba on the other hand.
In recent decades there has been extensive discussion of 1948 in historiography. Many novels, films, journals, exhibitions, anthologies and political essays of recent years also display a keen interest in revisiting 1948. It is our wish to address this context from the perspective of literary studies, and to do so with a strong emphasis on maintaining a theoretical, comparative dimension, i.e. raise questions that result from recent theoretical debates on historical representation, postcolonial discourse, literature and philosophy, literature and ethics, and so forth.
The conference thus wishes to discuss different forms of literary engagement with the past (poetry, drama and prose); the literary relation to ethical and political questions surrounding 1948; changes in the literary dealing with 1948 from the late 1940s to the present; as well as public debates surrounding the literary engagement with 1948.
This conference is sponsored by The Europe Center, with co-sponsors The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, the School of Humanities and Sciences, The Taube Center for Jewish Studies, the Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages, The Department of Comparative Literature at Stanford University, the Center for Ethics and Society, along with The Hebrew University, Jerusalem.
A full conference schedule can be found here.
Stanford Humanities Center
Beginning September 1, 2010, FSI launches The Europe Center
Fall 2010 marks the launch of The Europe Center (formerly the Forum on Contemporary Europe/FCE), housed jointly within the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and the Division of International, Comparative and Area Studies (ICA). The Europe Center will continue to serve as Stanford's main center for research on European affairs, trans-Atlantic relations, and the role of Europe and the United States in addressing today's most pressing global economic, political, and security issues.
The Europe Center is dedicated to new thinking about Europe and the global context of trans-Atlantic relations in the new millennium. The increasingly complex challenges facing Europe and its global relations—including labor migrations, strains on welfare economies, local identities, globalized cultures, expansion and integration, and threats of terrorism—coupled with Europe’s recent struggle to ratify a single constitution, underline the challenges that Europe and the United States share, and the need to bring Stanford’s finest multidisciplinary research into practical policy dialogue with an engaged public.
Europe Center Director Amir Eshel (German Studies, Comparative Literature), outlines the importance of the new center in FSI's forthcoming 2010 Annual Report: “As the United States and Europe face new challenges in the international arena, they share lasting economic and political interests as well as a set of values that is crucial for the future of a prosperous, free humanity. In the next decade, the peaceful ascendance of new powers will depend on the stability of the trans-Atlantic alliance and its commitment to solving conflicts such as those that destabilize the Middle East or impede efforts to combat hunger and poverty in Africa.”
Founded in 1997, first as the European Forum, and now as a full research center, The Europe Center gathers Stanford’s most distinguished Europeanists across all disciplines, encourages them to speak on our most pressing issues, and brings them into policy dialogue with public leaders.
Alternatives to Partition: New Visions for Israel/Palestine
The logic of partitioning the land has dominated the various attempts to settle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Several developments in the last few years cast serious doubts regarding the feasibility of partition. This talk seeks to critically explore alternatives to partition in the case of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. More specifically, it seeks to examine feasible, reasonable, and fairly just alternatives to partition that would secure the national and individual rights, interests and identities of Arabs and Jews alike.
Bashir Bashir is a research fellow at The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and a Civic Education and Leadership Fellow at Maxwell School of Citizenship at Syracuse University. He holds a Ph.D. and Master’s degree in Political Theory from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a Bachelor’s degree in Politics, Sociology and Anthropology from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has taught Political Theory at the London School of Economics, Queen's University, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His primary research interests are democratic theories of inclusion, multiculturalism, civic education, conflict resolution and the politics of reconciliation, historical injustices, Palestinian nationalism, and Israeli politics. Among Bashir's publications is: Will Kymlicka and Bashir Bashir (eds.), The Politics of Reconciliation in Multicultural Societies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
CISAC Conference Room
Debating History, Democracy, Development, and Education in Conflicted Societies
The Forum on Contemporary Europe (FCE) at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) has launched a multi-year collaborative project with research institutes in Europe and the Greater Middle East. First partners include the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute.
Heinz Gaertner
Berggasse 7
A-1090 Vienna
Austria
Prof. Heinz Gärtner is academic director (since 2013) at the Austrian Institute for International Affairs (oiip) in Vienna, Austria and senior scientist at the University of Vienna. He is Lecturer at the National Defense Academy and at the Diplomatic Academy in Vienna. He was a Fulbright Fellow at the World Policy Institute as well as the Visiting Austrian Chair at Stanford University in 2001-2002. In 2008 he held again a Fulbright Professorship at the Freeman Spogli Institute (FSI). In 2012 he was Visiting Professor at the FSI. Heinz Gärtner was visiting Professor at St. Hugh's College, Oxford (1992), and at the Institute for International Relations, Vancouver, Canada (1993), and at the University of Erlangen (Germany) (1994/95). He lectures often at other American, European, and Asian universities and research institutes. Heinz Gärtner has received international recognition for his work on European, international security, and arms control. He is also a frequent commentator on European and Austrian television, radio, and print media, including CNN Europe and the BBC. He also acts as a Special Adviser to the Austrian Ministry of Defense. He was academic member of the Austrian delegation of the Wassenaar arms export control arrangement in the framework of the Austrian presidency (2005). He supervised several large projects on NATO, and comprehensive security, and arms control. Heinz Gärtner received the Bruno Kreisky (legendary former Austrian Chancellor) Award for most outstanding Political Books: “Models of European Security“ (1998). Gärtner holds several international, and European, and Austrian academic memberships.
Heinz Gärtner is the author of numerous academic articles and books.
Some of his books are:
- Die neue Rolle der USA und Europa (America’s New Role and Europe), (lit-Verlag: Münster), 2012.
- Obama and the Bomb: The Vision of a World free of Nuclear Weapons (ed.), (Peter Lang publisher: Frankfurt-New York- Vienna; 2011).
- USA – Weltmacht auf neuen Wegen: Die Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik Barack Obamas, (America - World Power breaks New Ground), third updated edition, (lit-Verlag: Münster), 2010.
- Internationale Sicherheit - Definitionen von A-Z (International Security - Definitions from A-Z), second revised and extended edition, (Nomos: Baden-Baden), 2008.
- European Security and Transatlantic Relations after September 11 and the Iraq War, editor together with Ian Cuthbertson, (Palgrave-MacMillan: Houndmills), 2005.
- Small States and Alliances, editor together with Erich Reiter, (Springer: Berlin) 2001, 300 pages.
- Europe’s New Security Challenges, editor together with Adrian Hyde-Price and Erich Reiter, (Lynne Rinner: Boulder/London) 2001, 470 pages.
Heinz Gärtner also is editor of the books series “International Security” (Publisher: Peter Lang).
Some of his recent academic articles are:
- Deterrence and Disarmament, Europe’s World online, 26 02 2012.
- The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) and Libya,” Europe’s World online, 02 07 2011.
- A Nuclear-Weapon Zone in the Middle East, Europe’s World online, 24 05 2011.
- A year of Amano's leadership in IAEA, Bulletin of American Atomic Scientists, December, 2011.
- Non-proliferation & Engagement: Iran & North Korea should not let the opportunity slip by, Defense & Security Analysis, Volume 26 edition 3, September 2010.
- Towards a Theory of Arms Export Control, International Politics, Vol. 47, 1, January 2010, 125–143.
Elizabeth B. Bernhardt-Kamil
30-110
Stanford, California 94305-2015
Elizabeth B. Bernhardt (Ph.D., University of Minnesota) is the John Roberts Hale Director of the Language Center and Professor of German Studies at Stanford University. She has spoken and written on second-language reading, teacher education, and policy and planning for foreign- and second-language programs. At the 2014 Annual Convention of the Modern Language Association (MLA), Dr. Bernhardt was presented with the 2014 Distinguished Service to the Profession Award, from the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages (ADFL). Her book, Reading Development in a Second Language (1991), earned her the MLA’s Mildenburger prize as well as the Edward Fry Award from the National Reading Conference as an outstanding contribution to literacy research. Professor Bernhardt’s latest book, Understanding Advanced Second Language Reading, (2011) has appeared with Routledge. UNESCO has recently published her pamphlet on teaching second-languages and her work is appearing in the Encyclopedia of Diversity in Education; Debating Issues in American Education; and in theInternational Encyclopedia of Education. She has published in the Modern Language Journal, Applied Linguistics, the ADFL Bulletin, Foreign Language Annals, and Reading Research Quarterly.
Francis Fukuyama
Encina Hall, C148
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305
Francis Fukuyama is the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), and a faculty member of FSI's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). He is also Director of Stanford's Ford Dorsey Master's in International Policy, and a professor (by courtesy) of Political Science.
Dr. Fukuyama has written widely on issues in development and international politics. His 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man, has appeared in over twenty foreign editions. His book In the Realm of the Last Man: A Memoir will be published in fall 2026.
Francis Fukuyama received his B.A. from Cornell University in classics, and his Ph.D. from Harvard in Political Science. He was a member of the Political Science Department of the RAND Corporation, and of the Policy Planning Staff of the US Department of State. From 1996-2000 he was Omer L. and Nancy Hirst Professor of Public Policy at the School of Public Policy at George Mason University, and from 2001-2010 he was Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University. He served as a member of the President’s Council on Bioethics from 2001-2004. He is editor-in-chief of American Purpose, an online journal.
Dr. Fukuyama holds honorary doctorates from Connecticut College, Doane College, Doshisha University (Japan), Kansai University (Japan), Aarhus University (Denmark), the Pardee Rand Graduate School, and Adam Mickiewicz University (Poland). He is a non-resident fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Rand Corporation, the Board of Trustees of Freedom House, and the Board of the Volcker Alliance. He is a fellow of the National Academy for Public Administration, a member of the American Political Science Association, and of the Council on Foreign Relations. He is married to Laura Holmgren and has three children.
(October 2025)
Global Populisms
New Forum on Contemporary Europe research project on History, Memory and Reconciliation
In spring 2009, the Forum on Contemporary Europe (FCE) and the Division on Languages, Civilizations and Literatures (DLCL) delivered the first part of its multi-year research and public policy program on Contemporary History and the Future of Memory. The program explored how communities that have undergone deep and violent political transformations try to confront their past.
Despite vast geographical, cultural and situational differences, the search for post-conflict justice and reconciliation has become a global phenomenon, resulting in many institutional and expressive responses. Some of these are literary and aesthetic explorations about guilt, commemoration and memorialization deployed for reconciliation and reinvention. Others, especially in communities where victims and perpetrators live in close proximity, have led to trials, truth commissions, lustration, and institutional reform. This series illuminates these various approaches, seeking to foster new thinking and new strategies for communities seeking to move beyond atrocity.
Part 1: Contemporary History and the Future of Memory
In 2008-2009, this multi-year project on “History and Memory” at FCE and DLCL was launched with two high profile conference and speaker series: “Contemporary History and the Future of Memory” and “Austria and Central Europe Since 1989.” For the first series on Contemporary History, the Forum, along with four co-sponsors (the Division of Literatures, Civilizations, and Languages, principal co-sponsor; the department of English; The Center for African Studies; Modern Thought and Literature; the Stanford Humanities Center), hosted internationally distinguished senior scholars to deliver lectures, student workshops, and the final symposium with Stanford faculty respondents.
Part 2: History, Memory and Reconciliation
In 2009-2010, we launch part 2 of this project by adding “Reconciliation” to our mission. We are pleased to welcome the Human Rights Program at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law as co-sponsor of this series. This series will examine scholarly and institutional efforts to create new national narratives that walk the fine line between before and after, memory and truth, compensation and reconciliation, justice and peace. Some work examines communities ravaged by colonialism and the great harm that colonial and post-colonial economic and social disparities cause. The extent of external intervention creates discontinuities and dislocation, making it harder for people to claim an historical narrative that feels fully authentic. Another response is to set up truth-seeking institutions such as truth commissions. Historical examples of truth commissions in South Africa, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Morocco inform more current initiatives in Canada, Cambodia, Colombia, Kenya, and the United States. While this range of economic, social, political and legal modalities all seek to explain difficult pasts to present communities, it is not yet clear which approach yields greater truth, friendship, reconciliation and community healing. The FCE series “History, Memory, and Reconciliation” will explore these issues.
The series will have its first event in February 2010. Multiple international scholars are invited. Publications, speaker details, and pod and video casts will be accessible via the new FSI/FCE, DLCL, and Human Rights Program websites.
Series coordinators:
- Elisabeth Mudimbe-Boyi
- Helen Stacy
- Saikat Majumdar
- Roland Hsu