[URBANTH-L]CFP: Graduate Conference on Activism and the State of Neo-liberalism (Budapest)

[Angela Jancius]

CALL FOR PAPERS

Graduate Conference on
Activism and the State of Neo- liberalism
22-23 June 2007 in Budapest, Hungary

Abstract Deadline: 31 March  2007

The Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology of Central European 
University is pleased to announce its First Graduate Student Conference that 
will take place in Budapest on 22-23 June 2007. The conference aims at 
bringing together graduate students, scholars, and activists who are 
committed to understanding forms of neo-liberal governance and capitalist 
states as well as the concrete mechanisms of resistance to and contestation 
of neo-liberal imperatives. We invite abstracts that address related 
theoretical concerns, discuss empirically based research, or present the 
particular experiences of activists. Our goal is to bring together 
participants of a variety of disciplines and geographical loci.


Our key speakers include:
Dr Gavin Smith (University of Toronto), who will talk on "Organic ideology 
and political economy: Modes of resistance and modes of rule".

Dr Paul Stubbs (The Institute of Economics, Zagreb), who will talk on uneven 
neo-liberalisms and the present problems and possibilities for various kinds 
of activism.

Submitted abstracts shall address one of the topics of the panels:

PANEL DISCRIPTIONS


1. Panel: States of Neo-liberalism

The panel seeks to discuss the complex and often ambiguous processes 
connected to the transformations that states are going through due to 
neo-liberal reforms of the last decades. The 'retreat' of the nation-state 
from economic and social regulations has been accompanied on the one hand by 
the increasing prominence of supranational organizations like the IMF or 
World Bank, and on the other by increased opportunities for sub- national 
groups or organizations. At the same time, the state itself is undergoing 
important transformations, inviting further analysis of how practices of 
neo-liberal governmentality are relayed through clearly identifiable state 
policies and apparatuses.

This panel invites contributions focusing on:
the new types of relations between state actors and non- state actors such 
as social movements, NGOs, international organizations, and the business 
sector;
the novel practices of the neo-liberal state such as re- scaling, devolved 
sovereignty, and the new forms of spatiality and their cultural-ideological 
representations.


2. Panel: Of markets and transnational movements

This panel invites papers that examine the concrete links between civic 
activism and donors, charity organizations and other funding bodies. The 
focus of the panel is on the specific cases of distribution and/or 
competition for money in the framework of the marketization of civil society 
and the paradoxes of cooperation between civic movements and trans/national 
sponsoring agencies.

The panel encourages the submission of abstracts related to the following 
themes:
civil society initiative, fund raising, accountability;
allocation of aid, conditionality of financial support, transnational donors 
and European Union initiatives.


3. Panel: Fighting subalterities

Though subalterity seems a position from which the most urgent criticisms of 
the global neo-liberal regime and its transfiguration onto local politics 
can be launched, it is also a condition that people usually seek to 
overcome. This panel seeks to explore the complex processes involved in 
simultaneously organizing as a subaltern group and overcoming subalternity, 
i.e., of 'fighting subalternities'. In particular we hope to look at how the 
internal dynamics of organized subaltern (indigenous, Roma, dalit..) 
movements have been affected by neo-liberal rule.

The panel calls for papers that look at:
the divisive pressures of neo-liberalism on leaders and constituencies of 
subaltern social movements;
the difficult connection between lived subaltern experiences and their 
public, political representations.


HOW TO APPLY

Applicants from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds are encouraged to 
submit an abstract (not more than 300 words) and a short cv to the following 
e-mail address:

Activism_vs_Neoliberalism at yahoo.com (cc: to oustinova- 
stjepanovic_galina at phd.ceu.hu).

Please state clearly if you are interested in presenting your paper within a 
specific panel. If not, your paper will be allocated to one of the panels 
upon our discretion. Completed applications should be submitted 
electronically no later than 31 March 31 2007. Applicants will be notified 
about the results by 15 April. Presentations should not be longer than 15-20 
minutes. A written outline of the presentation should be submitted two weeks 
before the conference. For any further questions, please contact us at 
Activism_vs_Neoliberalism at yahoo.com (cc: to sphstl01 at phd.ceu.hu).

Visa
Those requiring support to obtain a visa to Hungary, please contact us 
mentioning your passport details.

Funding
Limited funding to cover travel costs and accommodation is available. 
However, we encourage participants to also try to find travel support at 
their home institutions.


- - -
Dept. of Sociology, St. Anne's building,
NUI Maynooth, Co. Kildare
Tel. (+353-1) 708 3985
http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/toolsforchange/