Stanford University

Questions of integration: social, political, and economic incorporation of New Europe in a globalized world

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Roland Hsu
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During 2007–2008 the forum on contemporary Europe launched the second phase of its comprehensive, multi-year analysis of Europe and the EU’s global relations in the context of an expanding European Union. What began last year with analysis of political membership this year added a focus on implications of expanded membership in key areas, including social integration of immigrant communities. Forum researchers and invited scholars addressed questions central to understanding the process of European integration and areas of concern it raises. During the fall of 2007, in seminars, keynote speeches, and international conferences, Forum researchers addressed such questions as:

  • What explains the electoral results of populist parties, with their nationalist and anti-immigrant platforms, gaining where they had previously remained marginal (Switzerland) and declining where they had regularly held influence (France)?
  • How should OSCE member states and election monitors respond to the denial of visas for monitoring Russia’s parliamentary elections?
  • What is inflaming renewed outbursts of violence in multiple urban centers? Do the riots reveal urban youth segregated by race? Compelled by fundamentalism? Or disaffected with the promised EU economic mobility?
  • Do instances of violence against ethnicminorities reveal a return to a pre-modern xenophobia or an old behavior used to express a new rejection of EU integration?
  • Will laws protecting historical memory, such as the Spanish act to rebury victims of Fascist forces and German and Austrian laws criminalizing holocaust denial, resolve or inflame neo-fascist parties?
  • What stance can the EU take in regard to Turkey’s article 301 criminalizing historical comments as denigrating the heritage of the Turkish state?
  • Does EU membership mollify or magnify cultural tensions behind separatist movements in cases such as Flanders, Catalonia, Corsica, Basque homelands, and, potentially, Kurdish regions of Turkey?

Highlights of the following fall 2007 events illustrate forum research on these vital questions.

INTERNATIONAL CONVERENCE ON ETHNICITY IN TODAY'S EUROPE

The forum joined with the Stanford Humanities Center to organize an international conference on “Ethnicity in Today’s Europe.” Amir Eshel, director of the forum, opened the conference with remarks on the growth of immigrant communities, and their increasingly widespread origins, as well as implications for security and integration. The Stanford faculty organizing committee identified and attracted the top scholars on the subject from both sides of the Atlantic, including professors Saskia Sassen (sociology, Columbia), Alec Hargreaves (French, Florida State), Leslie Adelson (German studies, Cornell), Kader Konuk (Germanic languages and literatures, Michigan), Rogers Brubaker, (sociology, UCLA), Carole Fink (history, Ohio State), Salvador Cardus Ros (sociology, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), and Bassam Tibi (international relations, University of Gottingen). Panels were moderated by Stanford faculty: Helen Stacy (law school), J.P. Daughton (history), Joshua Cohen (political science, philosophy, FSI), Pavle Levi (art), and Josef Joffe (FSI).

Panelists and a large, engaged public audience convened for a screening of the award-winning film Fortress Europe and a discussion with the film-maker Zelimir Zilnik. The conference-related Presidential Lecture by Partha Chatterjee (political science, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta; anthropology, Columbia), brought a capacity audience to open the conference with a study of the historical foundations of inter-ethnic relations in post-colonial Europe. The forum’s assistant director, Roland Hsu, has invited participants to contribute to a volume he will edit and introduce on Ethnicity in Today’s Europe to be published in 2008.

FSI INTERNATIONAL CONFERNCE: FCE PANEL ON EUROPE - A CHANGING CONTINENT?

The forum invited three leading figures on EU policy to speak on the FCE panel at the FSI international conference. Engaging the theme of power and prosperity, Wolfgang Münchau, writer for the Financial Times; Monica Macovei, former justice minister, Romania; and Mark Leonard, executive director of the European Council on Foreign Relations and Open Society [Soros] Foundation, spoke on the challenge of interpreting recent EU electoral, juridical, economic, and social reforms. This panel examined economic growth in the newest member states in the East, the challenge of political and social integration in the West, and countervailing pressures for consolidating post-communist governments and transparency reforms. The European Union’s expansion to 27 member nations promises a vast Euro-zone and a stronger trans-Atlantic partner. Questions from the audience engaged the panel on what level of confidence should be placed in this promise. The dilemma over Kosovo, pending Serbian EU accession, the expansion eastward to include societies bordering former Soviet republics, the question of Turkey’s membership, as well as tightening labor markets and welfare budgets in Western Europe, led the panel and audience to anticipate with cautious optimism the potency of EU integration and foreign policy initiatives.

AN EVENING WITH ORHAN PAMUK

Forum-affiliated faculty brought such questions to a special lunch with Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk; and then joined an overflow audience event at Memorial Auditorium titled An Evening with Orhan Pamuk. The forum co-sponsored the visit by Pamuk, along with Mediterranean Studies, the Office of the Provost, and the FSI S.T. Lee lecture series.

Research and public programs on these subjects will continue at the forum in the following selected events:

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON THE TRAFFICKING OF WOMEN POST-COMMUNIST EUROPE

Designed by forum acting director Katherine Jolluck, this international conference will examine the trafficking of women for sexual slavery, a trade that has rapidly expanded since the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the USSR. The conference will bring together scholars, policy experts, and NGO analysts to discuss the issue from economic, legal, and human rights perspectives. Special attention will be devoted to strategies to combat the problem and address the needs of victimized females. Madeline Rees, head of Women’s Rights and Gender Unit, U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, former U.N. high commissioner for human rights in Bosnia, has been invited to give the keynote speech.

JAN ELIASSON: THE FUTURE OF DARFUR

The forum has invited Jan Eliasson, former Swedish foreign minister and current U.N. special envoy to Darfur, to speak on his work on behalf of the international community and the EU-African Union mission to bring peace and humanitarian relief to Darfur and its neighboring states.

KOSOVO: PROSPECTS FOLLOWING THE DECEMBER 2007 U.N. STUTS TALKS

The forum has invited multiple affiliated centers including the Center for Russian, Eastern European, and Eurasian Studies, the Department of History, and the Stanford Law School to co-sponsor a panel discussion following the December 2007 U.N.-EU deadline for status talks. Elez Biberaj, director of the Eurasia division at VOA, and Obrad Kesic, formerly at IREX and also former advisor to Yugoslav President Panic, will speak on prospects for the status of Kosovo and the efficacy of potential EU membership to mediate Kosovo-Serbian relations.

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Austria and Central Europe Since 1989: Legacies and Future Prospects

This conference on Austria and Central Europe Since 1989: Legacies and Future Prospects is the third in the series of biannual international conferences to study the political and cultural landscape of Austria and Central Europe since 1945. Our previous conferences focused on Central Europe during the period of the post-war up to 1989. This year’s conference gathers leading scholars and public figures to discuss the exciting developments of our contemporary era and to offer comments on future prospects for the region.

The conference panels will offer multi-disciplinary views of Central Europe today. Addressing topics from the area stretching from the Baltic to the Balkans, speakers will focus on Austria as well as Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland, and the counties of former Yugoslavia. Presentations will explore political, economic, social, and cultural facets of the region’s larger dynamic. Among the milestone changes during this period which will be highlighted will be Austria’s (and other Central European countries’) ascendance to the European Union, the disintegration and reconfiguration of Balkan nations, the collapse of the Soviet Bloc, and the great mobility of goods and labor through the region and new forms of social and cultural interaction.

The two-day conference will be held at Stanford University on March 5 and 6, 2009. The conference panels will be conducted in workshop format. Papers will be pre-circulated to facilitate round table discussion among participants. Faculty, students, and the interested public are encouraged to attend.

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Austria in the Postwar World

The Puzzle of Slovenia and Estonia in the Post-Communist Era: How Deliberated Nationalism Explains Reform and Consensus-Driven Transition

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Praised by international organizations, Slovenia and Estonia constitute the most successful post-communist economies. These two states are likewise success stories when it comes to democratic consolidation and state-building. Slovenia has opted for gradual market reforms guided by social justice while Estonia quickly reformed its Soviet economy into one of the most liberal in the world. Still, I argue that their roots of success coincide. Crucial opportunities of civil initiatives were never repressed in Slovenia and Estonia during the Communist period as in several other Yugoslav and Soviet republics. Distinct national identities continued to form and re-form during these decades and became deliberated rather than repressed, later strengthening reform capacities in decisive areas. In Estonia, national identities were further emphasized by ethically dubious processes that locked large Russian-speaking minorities out of citizenship.

Li Bennich-Björkman is Johan Skytte professor in political science at University of Uppsala, Sweden. She has published on the organisation of creativity, Organising Innovative Research, (Elsevier/Pergamon Press, 1997), on educational policies, integration and political culture. A dominant theme in her present research on Eastern Europe and post-Soviet States has been how historical and cultural legacies relate to the divergent post-communist trajectories. A particular focus has been on the three Baltic States. Within this framework, Ukraine has been included. Recent research activities have concerned the impact of the European Union on elite values and political culture in Ukraine, Bulgaria and Romania. Her latest publication is a monograph published with Palgrave/Macmillan, Political Culture under Institutional Pressure. How Institutions Transform Early Socialization, (2007), dealing mainly with the Estonian Diaspora. Articles have appeared in the Journal of Baltic Studies (2006), East European Politics and Societies (2007) and Nationalities Papers (2007) as well as Higher Education Quarterly (2007). Comparative state-building in Estonia and Latvia was addressed in a recently published volume on Building Democracy East of the Elbe (Routledge/Sage:2006).

Daniel and Nancy Okimoto Conference Room

Li Bennich-Bjorkman Johan Skytte Professor of Elocution and Political Science Speaker Uppsala University
Seminars

The Transatlantic Link: Repairing EU-USA Relations

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As President 1999-2007, Dr. Vike-Freiberga has been instrumental in achieving Latvia's membership in the European Union and NATO. She is active in international politics, was named Special Envoy to the Secretary General on United Nations reform and was official candidate for UN Secretary General in 2006.

Born 1937 in Riga, Latvia, Vaira Vike and her family fled the country in 1945 to escape the Soviet occupation and became refugees in Germany and Morocco. After arriving in Canada in 1954, she obtained a B.A. and M.A. from the University of Toronto and her Ph.D. in experimental psychology in 1965 from McGill University in Montreal. She speaks Latvian, English, French, German and Spanish.

Dr. Vike-Freiberga has been Professor of psychology at the University of Montreal, president of various Canadian professional and scholarly associations, incl. Académie I of the Royal Society of Canada, Vice-Chairman, Science Council of Canada, Chair, Human Factors Panel, NATO Science Program. She is member of the Council of Women World Leaders.

She has published ten books and numerous articles, essays and book chapters in addition to her extensive speaking engagements. Dr. Vike-Freiberga has received many highest Orders of Merit, medals and awards including the 2005 Hannah Arendt Prize for political thought for her advocacy of social issues, moral values, European historical dialogue and democracy, and the 2006 Walter-Hallstein Prize for discourse on the identity and future of the EU.

Since July 1960, Dr. Vike-Freiberga has been married to Imants Freibergs, Professor of Informatics at the University of Quebec in Montreal and since 2001 President of the Latvian Information and Communication Technologies Association.

This seminar is jointly sponsored by the Forum on Contemporary Europe and the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies.

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Dr. Vaira Vike-Freiberga President (former), Latvia Speaker
Seminars

Petrostate: Putin, Power and the New Russia

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In the aftermath of the financial collapse of August 1998, it looked as if Russia's day as a superpower had come and gone. That it should recover and reassert itself after less than a decade is nothing short of an economic and political miracle.
 
Marshall Goldman incorporated extensive research, including several interviews with Vladimir Putin, in his new revealing book that chronicles Russia's dramatic reemergence on the world stage, illuminating the key reason for its rebirth: the use of its ever-expanding energy wealth to reassert its traditional great power ambitions. Goldman traces how this has come to be, and how Russia is using its oil-based power as a lever in world politics. Goldman provides an informative overview of oil in Russia, traces Vladimir Putin's determined effort to reign in the upstart oil oligarchs who had risen to power in the post-Soviet era, and describes Putin's efforts to renationalize and refashion Russia's industries into state companies and his vaunted "national champions" corporations like Gazprom, largely owned by the state, who do the bidding of the state. Goldman shows how Russia paid off its international debt and has gone on to accumulate the world's third largest holdings of foreign currency reserves--all by becoming the world's largest producer of petroleum and the world's second largest exporter. Today, Vladimir Putin and his cohort have stabilized the Russian economy and recentralized power in Moscow, and fossil fuels (oil and natural gas) have made it all possible.
 
The story of oil and gas in Russia is a tale of discovery, intrigue, corruption, wealth, misguidance, greed, patronage, nepotism, and power. Marshall Goldman tells this story with panache, as only one of the world's leading authorities on Russia could.

About the Speaker
Marshall I. Goldman is the Kathryn W. Davis Professor of Soviet Economics Emeritus at Wellesley College and until he retired, the Associate Director of the Davis Center for Russian Studies at Harvard University. He earned a B.S. in economics from the WhartonSchool of the University of Pennsylvania (1952), and an M.A. and Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University, as well as an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 1985. He has also been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Dr. Goldman’s publications include The Piratization of the Russian Economy, (Routledge April 2003), Lost Opportunity: Why Economic Reforms in Russia Have Not Worked (W.W. Norton, 1994), What Went Wrong with Perestroika: The Rise and Fall of Mikhail Gorbachev (W.W. Norton, 1991), Gorbachev’s Challenge: Economic Reform in the Age of High Technology (1987), The USSR in Crisis: The Failure of an Economic Model (1983), The Enigma of Soviet Petroleum: Half Empty or Half Full? ((1980), Détente and Dollars: Doing Business with the Soviets (1975), The Spoils of Progress: Environmental Pollution in the Soviet Union (1972), and Ecology and Economics: Controlling Pollution in the 70’s (1972). Dr. Goldman has published widely in Foreign Affairs, Atlantic Monthly, Boston Globe, Harvard Business Review, New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times. He is a frequent guest on CNN and “Good Morning America” and has appeared on “NewsHour”, “Crossfire”, “Face the Nation”, “The Today Show”, “Nightline”, and NPR.

Dr. Goldman’s latest book, to be published by Oxford University Press in April, 2008, is Petrostate: Putin, Power and the New Russia.

This seminar is jointly sponsored by the Forum on Contemporary Europe and the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies.

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Marshall Goldman Professor Emeritus of Soviet Economics Speaker Wellesley College
Seminars
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