Subcribe
26 May, 2011
Legitimacy and Civil Society
| Date: | Thursday, 26th May |
| Time: | 1:15pm - 2:30 pm (EST) |
| Venue: | Conference Room 6, |
The relationship between the United Nations and its partners in the private sector and civil society involves accommodating diverse parties with competing values and priorities, and potentially contradictory notions of legitimacy. This session examines the challenges of legitimacy, focusing on key questions of the processes and politics of accountability, from the perspective of the UN's relations with various non-state actors. These include, but are not limited to, local groups that interact with UN field operations, partner groups that provide funding or operational expertise, activist NGOs that seek to influence the UN, and countless other groups and individuals with a stake in UN operations.
The seminar is part of the UNU Legitimacy Series, which provides a platform for critical discussions with academics and public intellectuals about issues of legitimacy as they arise in various aspects of the work of the United Nations.
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Chairs:
- Jean-Marc Coicaud, Director, United Nations University Office in New York.
- Ian Hurd, Associate Professor at Northwestern
University and visiting fellow at the Niehaus Center on Globalization
and Governance at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International
Affairs, Princeton University
Speakers:
- Valerie Sperling, Associate Professor of Political Science, Clark University
- Roland Rich, Executive Head, United Nations Democracy Fund (UNDEF); Officer-in-Charge, United Nations Office for Partnerships (UNOP)
Speakers' Profiles:
Valerie Sperling is Associate Professor of Political Science at Clark University (Worcester, MA). She is the author of Altered States: The Globalization of Accountability (Cambridge University Press, 2009), and Organizing Women in Contemporary Russia (Cambridge University Press, 1999), and the editor of Building the Russian State (Westview, 2000). Her research on the Russian women's movement, as well as militarism and patriotism in Russia, has been published in various journals and edited volumes. At Clark, Sperling teaches courses on globalization and democracy, revolutions and political violence, mass killing and genocide under communism, Russian politics, and gender politics.
Roland Rich is Executive Head of the United Nations Democracy Fund (UNDEF), a United Nations General Trust Fund, which supports democratization around the world, focusing on projects that strengthen the voice of civil society, promote human rights, and encourage the participation of all groups in democratic processes. He is concurrently Officer-in-Charge of the United Nations Office for Partnerships (UNOP), a gateway for corporate and philanthropic partnership opportunities with the UN family. Prior to UNDEF, Mr. Rich was at the Centre for Defence and Strategic Studies of the Australian Defence College, teaching and mentoring colonel-level officers. In 2005, Mr. Rich was a research Fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington DC. Between 1998 and 2005, Mr. Rich was the Director of the Centre for Democratic Institutions at the Australian National University, Australia's democracy promotion institute for the Asia-Pacific region. Mr. Rich joined the Australian foreign service in 1975 and had postings in Paris, Rangoon, Manila and, from 1994-1997, as Australian Ambassador to Laos. He has also served as Legal Advisor and Assistant Secretary for International Organisations in the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Mr. Rich holds a Ph.D from the Australian National University and a law degree from the University of Sydney. He has contributed to The Journal of Democracy, Agenda - A Journal of Policy Analysis and Reform, Global Governance, and The Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies. In 2004, together with Edward Newman, he edited The UN Role in Promoting Democracy, examining areas of comparative advantage the UN had in this field. His most recent book is Pacific Asia in Quest of Democracy (2007), which surveys the current state of democratic consolidation among the countries along Asia's Pacific Rim.
Ian Hurd is Associate Professor of Political Science at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois and a visiting fellow at the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University. He has written widely on international organizations and international law, including the books International Organizations: Politics, Law, Practice (2011) and After Anarchy: Legitimacy and Power in the UN Security Council (2007) which won prizes from the International Studies Association and the Policy Sciences Society. His articles and essays have appeared in International Organization, Foreign Affairs, Global Governance and other journals. His current research is on the interaction between international law and international politics, with a focus on laws on war, torture, and humanitarian intervention.
Jean-Marc Coicaud is the Director of the United Nations University (UNU) Office at the United Nations Headquarters (New York). He was Senior Academic Officer and Director of Studies at the UNU Headquarters (Tokyo) from 1996 to 2003. From 1992 to 1996, he served in the Executive Office of the United Nations Secretary-General as a speechwriter for Dr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali. A former fellow at Harvard University (Center for International Affairs, Department of Philosophy and Harvard Law School, from 1986 to 1992), Coicaud has held appointments such as Cultural Attaché with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Legislative Aide with the European Parliament (Financial Committee). He has also been a Visiting Professor at the École Normale Supérieure-Ulm in Paris and has taught at the New School for Social Research (New York). In addition, he has been a Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace (Washington, D.C.), a Global Research Fellow at New York University School of Law and a Visiting Scholar at the School of Public Policy and Management of Tsinghua University (Beijing). Coicaud holds a Ph.D. in Political Science-Law from the Sorbonne and a Doctorat d'État in philosophy from the Institut d'Études Politiques of Paris. Jean-Marc Coicaud has published 14 books in the fields of comparative politics, political and legal theory, international relations and international law. They are available in English, French, Japanese, Chinese, Spanish and Arabic, and include the following single-authored books: L'introuvable démocratie autoritaire (L'Harmattan, 1996), Légitimité et Politique (Presses Universitaires de France, 1997), Politics and Legitimacy: A Contribution to the Study of Political Right and Political Responsibility (Cambridge University Press, 2002), Beyond the National Interest (United States Institute of Peace Press, 2007), Kokuren no Genkai/Kokuren no Mirai (Future of the UN/Limits of the UN - Fujiwara Shoten, 2007), Mai Xiang Guo Ji Fa Zhi (Towards the International Rule of Law - Sanlian Shudian, 2008). His latest book, co-edited with Hilary Charlesworth, is Fault Lines of International Legitimacy (Cambridge University Press, 2009).
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