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SUMMARY:Graduate Conference: The Roots of Global Civil Society - Speaker t
 o be confirmed
DTSTART:20091001T230000Z
DTEND:20091001T230000Z
UID:TALK17192@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Su Lin Lewis
DESCRIPTION:_Please note this is not a talk but a graduate conference.  We
  are currently updating the website - this note will be moved to the confe
 rence list_\n\n*The Roots of Global Civil Society\nFrom the Rise of the Pr
 ess to the Fall of the Wall*\n\nThe concept of global civil society has ga
 ined currency in recent years among social scientists and public policy pr
 actitioners. However\, it is often seen as a contemporary phenomenon – a
  by-product of the wellspring of popular sentiment leading to the collapse
  of the Berlin Wall\, or of the increasingly integrated global system whic
 h emerged in its wake.\n\nYet\, the roots of global civil society – like
  those of globalisation itself – may be traced far further back. Ordinar
 y citizens and subjects have long pursued social and political aims throug
 h organisations which spanned states and empires and crossed borders – a
 nd were often explicitly ecumenical in purpose. From Buenos Aires to Beiru
 t\, Paris to Penang\, growing numbers of civil society institutions – cu
 ltural clubs\, philosophical and learned societies\, charitable organisati
 ons and reformist leagues – emerged throughout the nineteenth century. T
 heir members increasingly thought globally\, using the printing press and 
 the telegraph to exchange ideas\, and to put their claims before the world
 . By the early 1900s\, women’s rights activists and socialists\, anarchi
 sts and Marxists\, radical nationalists and religious revivalists had all 
 created movements which ran across\, and sometimes undercut\, borders. Ind
 eed\, the twentieth century witnessed not only successive reforms to inter
 national society\, but also the growing prominence of organisations which 
 sought to mobilise citizens for a global purpose – from the peace league
 s of the 1920s and 1930s to the anti-globalisation movements of the 1990s.
 \n\nCan we locate the roots of ‘global civil society’ in such events? 
 How did historical actors understand the ecumenical dimensions of their ac
 tivities at various locations and points in time? How were these notions a
 rticulated in their writings and pronouncements? And how were they embodie
 d in the associations they created\, and the friendships and alliances the
 y contracted? How might we\, in turn\, define and use the concept of ‘gl
 obal civil society’?\nThe Cambridge World History Workshop invites schol
 ars working across a broad range of time periods and geographical areas to
  help answer such questions around the theme of ‘global civil society’
 .\n \nPossible topics might include\, but are not limited to:\n- The conce
 pt of global civil society\, and its utility as a category of world-histor
 ical analysis\n- Religious and secular conceptions of civic virtue in a gl
 obal context\n- Cosmopolitan / Trans-national models of association and ar
 ticulation\n- Interwar globalism and the anti-colonial moment\n- Trade uni
 ons\, NGOs\, and the post-1945 consensus from below\n- Global Civil Societ
 y from the 1960s\n\nThe conference will be held 2-3 October 2009 at the Un
 iversity of Cambridge. Please check the website for further details: http:
 //www.worldhist.group.cam.ac.uk.\nWe particularly welcome applications fro
 m graduate students and early-career academics.  \n\nPlease send a 250 wor
 d abstract\, including name\, contact details\, and institutional affiliat
 ion as a .doc attachment to the conference organisers:\nSu Lin Lewis sll53
 @cam.ac.uk\nAndrew Arsan aka25@cam.ac.uk\nAnne-Isabelle Richard aigcfr2@ca
 m.ac.uk\n\nThe deadline for applications is 10th May 2009.
LOCATION:Undecided
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