On April 7-10, 2005, IREX, in collaboration with the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars’ Kennan Institute (WWC) [20], hosted the 2005 Asia Regional Policy Symposium at the Chesapeake Beach Hotel in Chesapeake Beach, MD. The symposium, sponsored by the US Department of State Title VIII Program and the WWC, provided senior and junior scholars, as well as members from the policy community, with the opportunity to discuss a variety of political, economic, historical, and cultural topics related to the larger region of Asia. Countries in this region include Afghanistan, China, India, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, South Korea, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
Symposium participants included 10 junior scholars, five senior scholars, as well as members of IREX and WWC staff. Junior scholars were awarded grants through a national competition to present research papers at this three-day symposium based on their demonstrated commitment to continued study, research, and work on and with the countries of the larger region of Asia. The event provided them with the opportunity receive feedback from participating senior scholars and engage in US policy development discussions.
Junior scholar presentations represented a diversity of fields and perspectives, including education, religion, history, economics, and gender issues. Topics included “Development and Ideological Struggle in the Kyrgyz Republic,” “Direct versus Indirect Pressures for Human Rights Accountability: Lessons from Uzbekistan,” and “Gender Policy in Central Asia at Crossroads: Integrating International Obligations with Renascent Islamic Orientations.”
The five senior scholar participants in the symposium were:
Gary Bertsch, director of the Center for International Trade and Security and university professor of Public and International Affairs at University of Georgia.
Herbert Ellison,professor of Russian History and International Studies at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies and the History Department at the University of Washington. He is also founding director of Eurasia Policy Studies at The National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR).
Roger Kangas, professor of Central Asian Studies at George C. Marshall European Center for Strategic Studies.
W. Kendall Myers, special advisor for analyst training and senior analyst for Europe at the US Department of State's Bureau of Intelligence and Research and adjunct professor of European Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS).
Gil Rozman, professor of Sociology at Princeton University.
For more information on symposium participants, please view Senior Scholars Biographies [21].
The three-day event commenced with a dinner at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for scholars in Washington, DC, on April 7, 2005. IREX President Mark Pomar gave welcoming remarks and spoke briefly about the importance of Title VIII programs. The dinner provided scholars with the opportunity to network and socialize with one another prior to departing that evening for the hotel to begin two full days of sessions and presentations.
All sessions took place on April 8th and 9th. During this time, junior scholars presented their research in a sequence based on the nature of their topics. Each scholar was also paired up with one of the senior scholars who served as a moderator for discussions following each of the 20 minute presentations.
Sessions included:
- “Development and Ideological Struggle in the Kyrgyz Republic”
-
“Direct versus Indirect Pressures for Human Rights Accountability:
Lessons from Uzbekistan” -
“Regional Migration Policies, Freedom of Movement, and Citizenship in the
Russian Federation” -
“The Information Revolution Effect: Re-aligning Hierarchies of Knowledge
and Understanding” - “Xinjiang as Part of the Central Asian Region”
- “The Political Economy of Transitional Societies: An Analysis of Democracy and Inequality in Post-Communist Central Asia”
- “Making Modern Muslims: Markets and the Meaning of 'A Good Education' in Pakistan"
- “Gender Policy in Central Asia at Crossroads: Integrating International Obligations with Renascent Islamic Orientations”
- “Global Memories, Local Accounts: Regional Trade Networks in Ladakh (North India), 1920-47”
- “Common Property Management and Economic Development in Asia”
In order to ensure that there a wide range of perspectives and fields were represented at the Symposium, Senior Scholar Herbert Ellison led a general discussion on Asian regionalism, and Senior Scholar Gary Bertsch gave a short presentation on “Geopolitics: Security and Energy in Asia.”
For more information about the symposium, please view Agenda & Presentation Summaries [22].