2008 Regional Symposium Grants: Frozen Conflicts and Unrecognized States in Southeast Europe and Eurasia
April 14, 2008
OVERVIEW
On April 9 – 11, 2008, IREX, in collaboration with the Kennan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (WWC), hosted its Eighth Annual Regional Policy Symposium at the Herrington Harbour Inn in Rose Haven, MD. The Symposium provided senior and junior scholars, as well as members from the policy community, with the opportunity to come together to examine and discuss timely topics related to the frozen conflicts and unrecognized states in Southeast Europe and Eurasia from multi-disciplinary approaches. Topics included: security and military cooperation; economic trends; environment and safety; human rights; cross-border ethnic issues; trade development; legal reform; and foreign relations. Research focus areas included: Abkhazia; Kosovo; Nagorno-Karabakh; Republika Srpska; South Ossetia; and Transnistria.
Symposium participants included ten junior scholars, five senior scholars, and members of IREX and WWC staff. Junior scholars were invited to apply for grants to present research papers at the two-day symposium, receive feedback from participating senior scholars and colleagues, and engage in US policy discussions. Junior scholars were chosen based upon a national competition in which they were required to demonstrate a commitment to continued study, research, and work on the region.
SYMPOSIUM PARTICIPANTS
The five senior scholar participants included:
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Ambassador Carey Cavanaugh
Director of the Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce, University of Kentucky -
Valerie Bunce
Professor of International Studies and Government, Cornell University -
Paula Garb
Co-director of the Center for Citizen Peace-building, University of California - Irvine -
Stephen Jones
Professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies, Mount Holyoke College -
Charles King
Professor of International Affairs and Government and the Ion Ratiu Professor of Romanian Studies, Georgetown University -
The ten junior scholar participants included:
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Lyndon Allin
Juris Doctor Candidate, Law Center, Georgetown University -
Rebecca Chamberlain-Creanga
Doctoral Candidate, Department of Anthropology, London School of Economics and Political Science -
Stacy Closson
Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Center for Security Studies, Swiss Federal Institute for Technology -
Fred Cocozzelli
Instructor, Department of Government and Politics, St. John's University -
Jesse Driscoll
Doctoral Candidate, Department of Political Science, Stanford University -
Julie George
Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, Queens College, City University of New York -
Krista Goff
Doctoral Student, History Department, University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI -
Angela Kachuyevski
Assistant Director, International Peace and Conflict Resolution Program, Arcadia University -
Valery Perry
Deputy Director, Department of Education, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe - Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina -
Elton Skendaj
Doctoral Student, Department of Comparative Politics, Cornell University
EVENT SUMMARY
The event commenced with a dinner at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC, on April 9, 2008. IREX President Mark Pomar and Kennan Institute Director Blair Ruble gave welcoming remarks and were followed by a keynote address by Ambassador William H. Hill, Former Head of the OSCE Mission to Moldova and Current Faculty Member at the National War College. The dinner provided scholars with the opportunity to network with one another prior to departing that evening for the hotel to begin two full days of presentations and peer reviews of research.
Over the course of the two day event, each junior scholar delivered a 20 minute presentation on their research followed by 40 minutes of discussion which was led and moderated by one of the five senior scholars at the event.
Presentation topics included:
Identity and Industrial Change on a Contested Borderland, Moldova and Secessionist Transnistria
How Life Goes On: A 'Nationally' Representative Household Survey Demystifies Life in Abkhazia
Passport Power: Documents, Citizenship and Russian Leverage in Abkhazia
Warming Relations in Georgia: Legitimizing Trade between the Government and Secessionist Territories
Thawing the Frozen Conflicts? How Regime Change has Affected Eurasia's Unrecognized States
Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and Frozen Conflicts: Human Rights and Politics in Azerbaijan
Seeking Solutions in Transnistria: Looking Beyond Russia to the Challenges of 'Undoing'
Social Policy and Reconstruction in Post-Conflict Kosovo
Weak State Institutions in Kosovo: Accountability Deficits of International and Local Administration
BRIEFING
On April 14, 2008, the symposium senior scholars delivered a briefing at the US Department of State on the results of the symposium. In addition to providing an overview of the research currently being conducted in the region, they discussed the areas in need of additional research, and presented recommendations for the policy-making community.
