International Civic Engagement

Social Capital Conferences, Publications and Grad Schools

From Fabio Sabatini of Social Capital Gateway:

Dear All,
this is to let you know about some interesting news on social capital and related topics.
 
Conferences:
 
- The program of the Social Capital Foundation Malta Conference that will take place in Bugibba, Malta, on 19-22 September 2008 is now available:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-malta2008.html#program
 
Please note that the deadline is still open and will end on 31 July 2008.
 
- The conference "The Third Sector and Sustainable Social Change: Frontiers for Research" will take place in Barcelona, Spain, on 9-12 July 2008. The program is now available at the address:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-barcelona2008c.html

- The workshop of the Social Movements Research Network will take place in Trento, Italy, on 10-11 October 2008. The deadline for abstract submission is 5 July 2008:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-trento2008.html

- The conference "Citizen Participation and Democratic Engagement" will be held in Bristol, UK, on 27-28 October 2008. The deadline for submitting an abstract is 31 july 2008:
 
http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-bristol2008.html

Forum
 
- The Social Enterprise World Forum will take place in Edinburgh, Scotland, on 2-5 September 2008. Please follow the link for further details:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-edinburgh2008.html

Books
 
- Eric M. Uslaner (2008), Corruption, Inequality and the Rule of Law, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-news.htm#ric

- Flash Eurobarometer Survey "What Does European Citizenship Means to Europeans?", Flash Eurobarometer Survey No. 213:

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-news.htm#eurob

Grad schools
 
- PhD Course on "Approaching Organisations", organised by the Roskilde University, the Danish Institute for International Studiesand the Aarhus University. The course will be held in Jyllinge, Denmark, from 8 to 10 December 2008:
 
http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-postgraduate.html#phdorgan

- The Summer School on Social Inequalities in Contemporary Societies" will take place in Trento, Italy, from 31 August to 6 September 2008:
 
http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/eng-postgraduate.html#summertrento

- PhD Programme in Economics at the University of Milan, Italy. The deadline for submitting an application is 30 July 2008 (the call for applications is only in Italian):
 
http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/ita-postgraduate.html#bandounimi

- PhD Programme in Economics at the University of Turin, Italy. The deadline for submitting an application is 18 July 2008 (the call for applications is only in Italian):

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/ita-postgraduate.html#bandounito

Papers
 
If you want to receive a weekly notification reporting new papers on social capital related topics, you can subscribe to the Nep-Soc (New Economics Papers on Social Norms & Social Capital) newsletter I edit within the RePEc project:
 
http://lists.repec.org/mailman/listinfo/nep-soc

 
Thank you for your attention.
Best regards,
Fabio Sabatini

Suzanne Morse on City Managers, Mayors and Civic Engagement

Suzanne Morse posted the following entry today on Smart Communities:

Today begins the fiscal year for many of our states and municipalities. It is also the time when the budgets in place will likely be less than last year. After multiple quarters of decline, services are being cut left and right. As I tell audiences, if you are waiting for relief from Washington, DC, you have got a long wait. But in many things painful, this is a learning opportunity. What you cry? This is a time like no other to get citizens involved in the reality of local politics. I am not talking about a focus group to set priorities for local spending. I am talking about ways to inform and involve the public on the issues at hand. If there will be less for social services--say so--and ask for help. If parks and recreation are to be affected--say so--and ask for help. People are not stupid. They know that gas prices are affecting everything from food delivery to municipal services. This is an opportunity to change business as usual. More people have to step up to meet the needs. Methods of delivery have to change. This is time to remake the community where we live. Will the economy come back? It always has. What will be different this time is that we will be better prepared, have closed the gaps, and will engage the community in ways not seen before. Actually not a bad trade-off if we can pull it off. Check out this free information from Public Agenda to get started.

Local governments seem to be warming up to the benefits of civic engagement, as evidenced by this August 2007 National League of Cities City Practice Brief.

Fourth CRESC Annual Conference on Citizenship and Culture (2-5 September 2008)

From H-CITIZENSHIP:

ESRC Centre for Research on Socio-Cultural Change Annual Conference 2008
2-5 September 2008, St Hugh’s College, Oxford

Cultural Citizenship

Plenary speakers: Mieke Bal, Nina Glick Schiller, Engin Isin, Ghassan Hage, Barbara Kirshenblatt Gimblett, Michael Keith, Scott Lash, Mary Poovey, Nick Stevenson

This fourth CRESC Annual Conference on Citizenship and Culture seeks to explore the inter-relationships between citizenship and culture and their contemporary social, cultural and political significance in a number of different contexts.

About 230 papers have been structured in some 60 sessions addressing the following themes:

·         Cities and Citizenship
·         Politics and Citizenship
·         Citizenship and the Cultural Sector
·         Science, Technology, Biology and Citizenship
·         Europe and the Citizen
·         The Relationships between Religious and Secular Concepts of Citizenship
·         Transnationalism and Cosmopolitanism
·         The Media and Citizenship
·         Colonialism and Post-colonialism
·         Sexual Citizenship
·         Race, Ethnicity, Indigeneity and Citizenship

The conference starts with a Plenary Session and a Film screening on Tuesday 2nd September 2008 at 06.30pm and will finish around 16.00 on Friday the 5th of September 2007. The academic programme is available online at: http://www.cresc.ac.uk/events/conference2008/programme.html

Registration details are available from http://www.cresc.ac.uk/events/conference2008/registration.html.

Early registration deadline is 31st of July 2008

For more information please contact Bussie Awosanya or Josine Opmeer at CRESC@manchester.ac.uk

Princeton University Seeks Senior Program Coordinator for Pace Center

The Pace Center, Princeton's center for civic engagement, is hiring a senior program coordinator. 

Applicants should visit http://jobs.princeton.edu to learn more and to submit an application.

Applications will be accepted until July 21, 2008.

 
Senior Program Coordinator
Pace Center, Princeton University

Position Summary

The mission of the Pace Center, Princeton's center for civic engagement, is to integrate civic engagement with the teaching and learning mission of Princeton University.  Pace helps all members of the extended Princeton community to identify and address issues of public concern through engaged scholarship, active citizenship, and effective public leadership for the purpose of building stronger communities and societies throughout the world. The Pace Center's work is directly aimed at Princeton's unofficial motto: "in the nation's service, and in the service of all nations."  For more information about the Pace Center, visit http://pace.princeton.edu

The Pace Center connects constituents with high-quality opportunities to effectively address civic problems through course work, independent research, volunteer activity, extracurricular projects, internships, fellowships, or professional opportunities. Our constituency includes all segments of Princeton's population - undergraduates, graduate students, faculty, staff, and alumni.

The Senior Program Coordinator works with undergraduate and graduate students to develop and coordinate civic engagement programs that emphasize student leadership, engaged learning, and community development.  This position reports to the Coordinator for Civic Engagement Learning.  The Senior Program Coordinator works with colleagues across campus and the community to develop and sustain high-quality programs that build student leadership capacity and advance civic engagement.  The incumbent is responsible for administrative oversight of these programs, including budget, compliance, and logistics.

Key Responsibilities:

1. Advise and lead students in managing Breakout Princeton civic engagement break trips; oversee training for trip leaders and participants; mentor leaders; provide administrative oversight.

2. Advise the Pace Council for Civic Values student group; oversee annual and one-time campus civic engagement programs.

3. Develop and maintain community- and capacity-building programs in cooperation with residential colleges, eating clubs, Grad College, and undergraduate and graduate student government. Functions include organization, outreach, publicity, evaluation, and assessment.

4. Work with students and student organizations to create new civic engagement programs and to improve existing programs (including implementing assessments & trainings).

5. Collaborate on programs such as Community Action and educational outreach programs (including planning, training, and evaluation).

6. Advise and train student leaders; nurture student social entrepreneurship.

7. Work with the Director and Center staff to promote civic engagement at Princeton, to strengthen civic engagement projects, and to develop new initiatives.

8. As a spokesperson for Pace, educate campus and community partners about civic engagement.

9. Monitor and share information about new developments and best practices in civic engagement at other universities and professional associations.

Essential qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree
• At least 2 years of experience in organizing, advocacy, service, or political work.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills and attention to detail
• Ability to work with diverse groups and individuals who have diverse characteristics
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively, and to manage several simultaneous projects with overlapping deadlines
• Excellent interpersonal skills with a high degree of professionalism and initiative

Neal Peirce on 'Metropolitics'

In his June 29, 2008 weekly Washington Post Writers Group syndicated column, Neal Peirce writes:

The time may be ripe for a new metropolitics, a radical new “deal” between the federal government and America’s metropolitan regions.

Metros -- the increasingly urbanized regions that make up the “citistates” of our time -- are the center of action in today’s America.  The biggest 100 alone account for 65 percent of our national population and 75 percent of our economic activity.  They have become the country’s wellsprings of innovation, investors, higher learning, advanced research, and profitable businesses.

If the metros succeed, America succeeds-- and if they fall short, the nation may too.

[snip]

The thought’s close to revolutionary -- the federal government attacking critical national goals not by ignoring our citistates, or dictating to them, but by empowering them.

Because today, it’s fair to say, official Washington is largely adrift and unfocused in how it deals with states and localities. Either it’s mired in congressional earmarks or a stale “we know best” grant-in-aid approach.  Hundreds of disparate, unconnected programs are administered in “silo” fashion by such federal departments as Transportation, Energy, Commerce and Housing and Urban Development.

Some of this made sense a generation ago, when Washington attracted more top talent and our metro regions were barely coalescing.  But devolution of federal powers, begun under President Nixon, has changed the landscape.  Today the concentration of skills has shifted out to the metro centers and their multiple partnerships of governments, corporations and universities.

Just check our top economic clusters: Global finance in New York. Life sciences in Boston. Advanced manufacturing in Minneapolis.  Logistics in Louisville.  Photonics in Rochester.  Energy in Houston.  Banking in Charlotte. Advanced technology in Silicon Valley and Seattle.

If the United States is to compete globally, maintain its standard of living in a challenging 21st century, it has to keep adding new creative clusters and strengthening the ones already formed.  Such countries as Japan, Germany and Korea are ahead of us in such smart moves.

World Trade Indicators 2008 – Benchmarking Policy and Performance

From the World Bank:

A new database and ranking tool unveiled last week by the World Bank shows that in 2007 most developing countries continued to improve trade policies supporting greater integration. Data in the World Trade Indicators 2008 – Benchmarking Policy and Performance, produced by the World Bank Institute, also show that, over the past decade, countries with lower barriers tended to have stronger, more consistent trade and export performance.

2008 Abe Fellowship

[Courtesy of H-Citizenship]

Abe Fellowship
Deadline: September 1, 2008
http://fellowships.ssrc.org/abe

The Social Science Research Council (SSRC), the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership (CGP), and the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) announce the annual Abe Fellowship competition. The Abe Fellowship is designed to encourage international multidisciplinary research on topics of pressing global concern. The Abe Fellowship Program seeks to foster the development of a new generation of researchers who are interested in policy-relevant topics of long-range importance and who are willing to become key members of a bilateral and global research network built around such topics.

The Abe Fellowship Research Agenda Applicants are invited to submit proposals for research in the social sciences and related fields relevant to any one or combination of the following three themes:

1) Traditional and Non-Traditional Approaches to Security and Diplomacy - Topic areas include transnational terrorism, internal ethnic and religious strife, infectious diseases, food safety, climate change, and non-proliferation, as well as the role of cultural initiatives in peace building.

2) Global and Regional Economic Issues - Topic areas include regional and bilateral trade arrangements, globalization and the mitigation of its adverse consequences, sustainable urbanization, and environmental degradation.

3) Role of Civil Society - Topic areas include demographic change, immigration, the role of NPOs and NGOs as champions of the public interest, social enterprise, and corporate social responsibility.

Research projects should be policy relevant, contemporary, and comparative or transnational.

Fellowship Terms

Terms of the fellowship are flexible and are designed to meet the needs of Japanese and American researchers at different stages in their careers. The program provides Abe Fellows with a minimum of 3 and maximum of 12 months of full-time support over a 24 month period.

Part-time residence abroad in the United States or Japan is required.

Eligibility

• This competition is open to citizens of the United States and Japan as well as to nationals of other countries who can demonstrate strong and serious long-term affiliations with research communities in Japan or the United States.
• Applicants must hold a Ph.D. or the terminal degree in their field, or equivalent professional experience. Applications from researchers in professions other than academia are encouraged.

Contact Details

For further information and to apply, go to:
http://fellowships.ssrc.org/abe

Contact SSRC staff at abe@ssrc.org

Paul Light on "Can't-Do Government"

[Courtesy of The Partnership's Daily Pipeline]

Paul Light opines in the Washington Post about the many management challenges facing the next POTUS.  He writes:

[T]he next president will appoint almost 3,000 political executives. Not only will these appointees dilute transparency between the top and bottom of government, but each must go through a brutish approval process that will vitiate the chain of command. The 60 pages of clearance forms have never been more complex or difficult to complete — one set has to be filled out using a typewriter. Hillary Rodham Clinton might have promised to be ready on Day One, but she would have been lucky if her appointees were in place by March of Year Two.

The president will also oversee a federal work force that is increasingly frustrated and demoralized — with good reason. Asked to do more with less, it is close to doing everything with almost nothing. Federal employees do not get the resources necessary to do their jobs; they rate their leadership as barely competent at best (and getting worse) and give their hiring and disciplinary processes failing marks. Turnover is up at all levels; customer service ratings are down.

The next president will also be responsible for recruiting thousands of new employees. However, many of the most talented young Americans consider the federal government a career of last resort. They understandably wonder whether government service would give them a chance to make a difference and acquire the skills they need in an unforgiving economy. They are not saying "show us the money" but "show us the work." And federal work has not been showing well lately.

Facebook Passes MySpace With Global Boost

From the Washington Post:

Facebook may have started to win the global popularity contest over the rival social network site MySpace, judging from some recent figures.

Last month, Facebook had 123.9 million unique visitors and 50.6 billion page views worldwide, according to the research firm ComScore. MySpace, meanwhile, had 114.6 million unique visitors and 45.4 billion page views. According to the Reston, Va., research firm, this is the first time Facebook has edged past MySpace in those measures.

Call for Papers - OMNES: Journal of Migration and Society

Sookmyung Institute for Multicultural Studies invites manuscripts for the inaugural issue of OMNES: Journal of Migration and Society to be published biannually from 2009.  OMNES welcomes submissions from academics and professionals in the fields of the humanities, social sciences, business, arts and education.  The scope of the journal covers themes such as the global movement of people, human security related to migration, multicultural societies, identity, nationalism, citizenship, ethnicity, diversity, social conflict and cohesion, and relevant topics.  Deadline for submission is November 30th, 2008.  If you wish to submit a manuscript, please send us the title or a one-paragraph outline.  For more information, please send an email to omnes@sm.ac.kr.

Sookmyung Institute for Multicultural Studies, Sookmyung University, Yongsan-Ku, Seoul 140-742, Korea