INTS-Sponsored Speakers and Events
2024 Speakers & Events
Advice on a Career in Diplomacy
Paul Berg, (Retired Sr. US Foreign Service Officer), 17 October 2024
Evening with retired Senior U.S. Foreign Service Officer Paul Berg as he discusses his life and career as a diplomat as well as those of colleagues in the Foreign Service. He shares the elements of a successful (and unsuccessful) overseas posting in addition to the challenges of serving in one’s own capitol and the temperament and traits that diplomats should possess. Mr. Berg has served in U.S. Embassies and Consulates in 11 countries in many regions of the world, as well as the State Department in Washington DC, over a 35-year career.
Tibet in the Contemporary World: An Open Discussion
Tenzin Dorjee (Professor at California State University, Fullerton) and Amy Homes-Tagchungdarpa (Professor at Occidental College), 22 April 2024
Tibet is often misrepresented as an imagined space, a paradisical Shangri La inhabited by monks, or as a popular tourist space in contemporary China. These Western and Chinese imagining do not acknowledge Tibetan agency or the complexity of claims to Tibetan sovereignty.
The event features Tibetan scholar of communication studies Professor Tenzin Dorjee (California State University, Fullerton) and Tibetan and Himalayan cultural studies Professor Amy Holmes-Tagchungdarpa (Occidental College) as speakers. They come together to discuss Tibet as a real and lived space, specifically focusing on the complex political, cultural, and economic factors at play in Tibet’s future.
Narratives of Mass Atrocity: Victims and Perpetrators in the Aftermath
Sarah Federman (Associate Professor at the University of San Diego’s Kroc School of Peace Studies) and Ronald Niezen (Professor at the University of San Diego), 12 April 2024
This talk addresses the aftermath of mass conflict and the difficulty of accountability and justice mechanisms premised on clear roles. Individuals can assume—and be assigned—multiple roles throughout a conflict: perpetrators can be victims, and vice versa; heroes can be reassessed as complicit and compromised. Long-term positive peace requires understanding the narrative dynamics within and between groups, demonstrating the blurring of victim-perpetrator boundaries, and acknowledging their overlapping roles. This project grew out of a workshop at Harvard University with senior genocide scholars whose research focuses on different regions of the world.
Sarah Federman, an Associate Professor of Conflict Resolution at the University of San Diego’s Kroc School of Peace Studies, studies the intersection of business and mass atrocity. She is the author of the award-winning Transformative Negotiation: Strategies for Everyday Change and Equitable Futures (University of California Press, 2023) and the award-winning Last Train to Auschwitz: The French National Railways and the Journey to Accountability (University of Wisconsin 2021). Federman is also a frequent instructor at the Department of State and their Foreign Service Institute where she trains future diplomats.
Ronald Niezen is Professor of Practice in Sociology at the University of San Diego and an Associate Member of the Faculty of Law at McGill University. He completed a doctoral degree in Social Anthropology at Cambridge, for which he spent ten months living and travelling in northern Mali. His first job after the PhD was with the Cree Board of Health and Social services of James Bay, following which he spent many years working with Indigenous organizations based in northern Canada. He was for many years a professor in the Department of Anthropology and Faculty of Law at McGill University and also held positions as a professor of anthropology and of social studies at Harvard University.
Faculty Career Talk Hour for INTS
Lisa MacLeod, Shane Barter (Professors at Soka University of America), 09 April 2024
Faculty from the INTS concentration share valuable insights on how students can best navigate and utilize their Soka education to be successful after graduation, common mistakes that Soka students make, as well as potential careers from an academic perspective and examples of the diverse career paths alumni have pursued.
Professor Shane Barter (PhD UBC 2011) is a distinguished Professor of Comparative Politics in International Studies at Soka University of America. He has worked in various fields, including for Southeast Asian human rights groups, the Carter Center, the European Union, and the Canadian government. At SUA, he has served as Director of the Pacific Basin Research Center, International Studies, and the Learning Cluster Program.
Professor Lisa MacLeod is an esteemed Associate Professor of International Studies at SUA. She has a rich academic background and extensive teaching experience in International Relations and Human Rights. Professor MacLeod’s research interests are in Security Council Politics, UN Peace Operations, and International Organizations, and she has also served as the Co-Director of REHR and of the International Studies Concentration at Soka.
2023 Speakers & Events
Support for Secession: Evidence from Scotland
Kevin Gatter (PhD candidate at the University of California, Los Angeles), 20 November 2023
Secessionist movements – those seeking make a region independent from another country – have taken root in regions around the world. What motivates individuals to support secession? Using mixed methods, I examine this question in relation to the Scottish independence movement. Drawing on public opinion models, I highlight secessionist rhetoric gathered during interviews conducted with pro-secession elites during fieldwork to get a sense of the types of secession-related arguments to which voters are exposed. I use survey data from the Scottish Referendum Study to identify the profile of typical supporters and opponents of Scottish independence. Finally, I link Scotland comparatively to other secessionist movements in Europe, namely in Wales and Catalonia. During the presentation, I will walk students through the steps of research design, requesting their input in designing a methodological framework to assess my research question. Through this, students will learn not only about the dynamics supporting secessionism and the Scottish context, but also about mixed-method research design.
Kevin Gatter is a PhD candidate in political science at UCLA. His research interests include territorial politics, nationalism, secessionism, and decolonization. Kevin has conducted fieldwork in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Republika Srpska), Catalonia, Montenegro, Northern Ireland, Puerto Rico, Quebec, Scotland, Wales. Kevin holds BA and MA degrees in international studies from American University.
Why Now? The 2023 Israel-Gaza War: Significance for the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and the Middle East
Fatima Rahman, PhD (Soka University of America), 02 November 2023
The outbreak of war in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories is one of the most significant events in the enduring, century-old Israeli Palestinian Conflict.
Dr. Rahman shares her insight and assesses the implications of the unfolding events for the conflict and the Middle East.
Lessons Learned from a Career in Diplomacy
Paul Berg, (Retired Sr. US Foreign Service Officer), 24 October 2023
Retired Senior U.S. Foreign Service Officer Paul Berg shares what he has learned about diplomacy, intercultural communications, and the distinct cognitive worlds that countries live in from his 35-year career as a U.S. diplomat. Mr. Berg has served in U.S. Embassies and Consulates in 11 countries in many regions, as well as the State Department in Washington DC, and shares his perspective as an American representative abroad and as a global citizen. He also deals with some of the widespread myths about foreign policy and international relations and provides advice on how students can prepare for a career in diplomacy.
State Adoption of Islamic Doctrine and Women’s Economic Rights
Fatima Rahman, PhD (Soka University of America), 14 March 2023
Islam provides counteracting rules on women’s economic rights. While the Quran explicitly allows women to seek employment and maintain full control of their income, Sharia prescribes gendered norms, in which men are primarily breadwinners and women homemakers. Similarly, while Sharia does not explicitly stop women from working outside of the home, it recognizes potential spousal disapproval. Unlike other areas in which Islamic doctrine’s effect on gender equality is predictable, its impact on women’s economic rights is ambiguous. Using cross-national data from 1990-2014, Dr. Rahman examines the effect of state-adopted Islamic doctrine on women’s economic rights in the population of Muslim-majority states.
Brazilian Capoeira and the Black Atlantic
Bruno Andrade (Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles), 07 March 2023
Capoeira is sometimes called martial art and sometimes a dance. It is also a musical tradition deeply rooted in the African diaspora. Professor Bruno Andrade will explain capoeira’s meaning in the Black Atlantic and its importance to Brazil.
Following a short lecture, participants may get on their feet and learn the “jinga,” one of the basic steps of capoeira. Unique musical instruments, like the berimbau, will also be on display.
Bruno Andrade has two PhDs, one in Postcolonialisms and Global Citizenship from the University of Coimbra in Portugal and another in Law from the Federal University of Bahia in Brazil. Dr. Andrade is a visiting instructor at UCLA. He is on leave form his faculty position at the Brazilian federal university UNILAB, which serves students in from the former Portuguese colonies in Africa and Asia. After many years of practice, Dr. Andrade has attained the level of professor in Capoeira Angola.
International Journalism, Cybermedia, and American Media on China: An Informal Chat
Tom Plate (Journalist), 21 February 2023
Veteran American journalist Tom Plate shares his experiences reporting from and on Southeast Asia and China. A former editor at the Los Angeles Times and contributor to the South China Morning Post, Mr. Plate has interviewed several Asian leaders as part of the Giants of Asia book series. In this talk, Mr. Plate will share his experience in conducting interviews, reporting on Asia to American audiences, the changing nature of journalism in the internet age, and perspectives on relations with China.
2022 Speakers & Events
Human Rights Day 2022 Event, “Arts as Activism”
United Nations Association of The United States of America (OC Chapter), 10 December 2022
Orange County humanitarian organizations and visual & performing artists come together for a day of art, advocacy, and action. The event includes special presentations about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the works of art gifted to the United Nations by member states, as well as a special appearance by the internationally renowned activist artist of INTERCULTURAL, Sheinina Lolita Raj.
The Umbrella Movement and Martin Luther King – a filmmaker’s reflection
Evans Chan (Director of Raise the Umbrellas), 02 December 2022
The Umbrella Movement, Hong Kong’s 79-day democratic Occupy demonstration in 2014, followed the Arab Spring and a global movement spearheaded by Occupy Wall Street. But it originated as a campaign called “Occupy Central with Love and Peace,” as initiated by three Chinese Christians in Hong Kong – two university professors and a pastor. One crucial document that inspired Benny Tai, law professor and conceiver of Occupy Central, is Martin Luther King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” (1963). Before Occupy Central’s mutation into the student-driven Umbrella Movement, the campaign used the King essay as the foundation for an outstanding civic educational initiative with a global lineage that ran from Thoreau, Gandhi, via Martin Luther King to Hong Kong. Uniquely, the Hong Kong Occupy campaign had incorporated the strategizing of Gene Sharp and implemented, in 2013, Deliberative Polling gatherings as developed by Stanford University’s Center for Deliberative Democracy. Evans Chan, New York-based film critic and director of the acclaimed documentaries “Raise the Umbrellas” (2016) and “We Have Boots” (2020), revisits this incubating stage of the Umbrella Movement, while offering personal testimony and analysis about the continuing relevance of King’s legacy in the US, Hong Kong, and the world today.
His 2016 film Raise the Umbrellas (www.raisetheumbrellas.com), which explores the 79-day Occupy/Umbrella Revolution, was banned repeatedly in Hong Kong. Its sequel, We Have Boots, which covered post-Umbrella Movement Hong Kong through the political unrest of 2019, was premiered at the Rotterdam International Film Festival in 2020. Both films can no longer be screened in Hong Kong.
Evans Yiu Shing Chan (www.evanschan.com) is a New York and Hong Kong-based critic, librettist and an independent filmmaker of more than a dozen fiction and documentary films, which have been screened at the Berlin, London, Moscow, Vancouver, AFI-Docs, and Taiwan Golden Horse film festivals, among others. His directorial debut To Liv(e) (1991) was listed by Time Out as one of the 100 Greatest Hong Kong Films. He was the librettist for the opera, Datong: The Chinese Utopia, which is based on his Datong: The Great Society, named Movie of the Year by Southern Metropolitan Daily in 2011. A critical anthology about his work, Postcolonalism, Diaspora, and Alternative Histories: The Cinema of Evans Chan was published by the HKU Press in 2015. Chan’s latest films include Love and Death in Montmartre, which was premiered at the Hamburg International Queer Film Festival in 2019 as a Best Film nominee.
Is Democracy at Stake? Brazil’s Electoral Battles
Ambassador Todd Chapman, (Former U.S. Ambassador to Brazil 2020-2021) and Professor Paulo Nogueira Batista, Jr., (Former Brazilian Executive Director at the IMF), 03 November 2022
Presented by The World Affairs Council of Orange County in Partnership with Soka University of America’s International Studies Concentration & The Center for Race, Ethnicity, and Human Rights.
Left vs. Right in Brazil. Former president Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva vs. incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro. Can Brazil’s 33-year-old democracy contain the clash of these populist titans, a proliferation of threats, and digital misinformation? What will the country’s new (or renewed) government mean for a divided Brazilian society? Will we see a change in U.S.-Brazil relations? Such electoral battles and polarization are hardly Brazil’s alone.
Academic Highlights
Israel, Gaza, Palestine Webinar - “Envisioning a Future for Palestinians and Israelis.”
24 November 2024
Join us for a Soka University of America Office of Academic Affairs Webinar. The attacks by Hamas on October 7, 2023, and the subsequent Israeli invasion of Gaza have resulted in more than 40,000 Palestinian deaths, the relocation of approximately 60,000 Israelis, and the dislocation of more than one million Lebanese. Fundamental questions of rights and justice remain unresolved, and negotiations have failed to produce a ceasefire, encouraging nonstate actors’ entry. What began as a local conflict now threatens to engulf the entire region. This webinar will consider possible futures for Israelis and Palestinians alike.
Panelists:
Farid Abdel-Nour, Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University where he helped found the Center for Islamic and Arabic Studies
Samer Abdelrazzak, Head of Diplomatic and International Relations (Fatah Shadow Leadership) and Chair, Jerusalem Development Fund
Gershon Baskin, Israeli columnist, social and political activist, and founder of IPCRI, a jointly run Israeli and Palestinian think tank
Lisa MacLeod, Associate Professor of International Relations, Soka University. Expertise in United Nations Peace Operations, Human Rights, International Security.
Moderator:
Michael Weiner, Professor of East Asian History and International Studies, and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs at Soka University of America.
Panel Event: Exploring Indigenous Food Systems for a Sustainable Future
Chika Esiobu (Soka University of America), Moderators: Mareva Dijoux 2026 and Rushak Gohar 2027, 25 April 2024
The Sustainability Educators and the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion host an event in celebration of Earth Week. The event covers environmental justice, food security, indigenous knowledge, and the power of youth in fostering change through a panel discussion. The event explores Indigenous Food Systems for a Sustainable Future.
PBRC Faculty Fellow Research Lecture by Dr. Shane Barter
Shane Barter (Soka University of America), 28 March 2023
“Territorial Autonomy & Indigenous Self-Government: A Global Perspective ”
Although less heralded than waves of democratization, the world has seen a sustained shift towards decentralization, devolving power to subnational governments. Part of this trend involves the rise of territorial autonomy, providing special forms of self-government to territorially concentrated minorities. A compromise between independence and incorporation, autonomy is integral to managing separatism and protecting minority cultures. Meanwhile, there exists a parallel rise of Indigenous self-government, with Indigenous peoples seeking greater control over resources, land, revenue, law, and cultural affairs. Surprisingly, these trends and accompanying scholarship have carried on largely in isolation. What can these parallel trends teach each other? In what ways are territorial autonomy and Indigenous self-government distinctive, and in what ways might they overlap?