The talk, Value Struggles: Waste Work and Urban Ecology in Delhi, will be on Tuesday, Oct. 8, with coffee beginning at 10:30am, followed by the lecture at 11.30am, at 519 Kaneff Tower, Keele campus. YCAR will also host a roundtable with Gidwani later in the day for graduate students, from 3 to 5pm, at 857 Kaneff Tower.

Vinay Gidwani

Gidwani, who studies the layering of labour processes and ecologies in agrarian and urban settings, describes waste as the flip side of value, the antithesis of capitalist value. Waste is the byproduct of surplus accumulation.

鈥淚 suggest that by tracing the dialectic of value and waste[鈥we gain insight into how capital always draws its economic vitality and moral sanction from programs to domesticate and eradicate waste,鈥� says Gidwani.

Waste confounds capitalism鈥檚 attempts to discipline and contain life within the domain of utility and accumulation. Contemporary urban transformations in cities like Delhi, India, around the management of municipal solid waste, for instance, should be properly construed as the latest salvo in a long history of value struggles.

Gidwani is also an adjunct professor at the Graduate Center of the City University of New 91亚色 and is editor of Antipode, the leading journal of radical geography. He is currently involved in The Afterlives of Waste, a project that examines the spatial histories, political uses and contemporary global political economy of waste as both commodity detritus and social excess. His most recent book is Capital, Interrupted: Agrarian Development and the Politics of Work in India (University of Minnesota Press, 2008).

The post YCAR's 2013 Asia Lecture looks at value and waste in capitalist society appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The first conversation, 鈥淭he Future of Public Sector Collective Bargaining,鈥� will take place Wednesday, Oct. 26, from 12:30 to 2pm, 2003 Osgoode Hall Law School, Ignat Kaneff Building, Keele campus.

Left: Steven Barrett

of Sack, Goldblatt Mitchell LLP, (LLB 鈥�94) of the School of Management at Ryerson University and of McGill University will discuss the issue of collective bargaining, a topic on many聽Canadians' minds right now.

Barrett, managing partner of the firm since 2006, practises in the areas of labour law, the聽Charter of Rights and聽constitutional litigation, as well as public interest litigation. An alumnus of Osgoode Hall Law School, Bartkiw鈥檚 research interests include industrial relations, labour and employment law, labour policy, public policy and political economy. Hebdon, a professor in the Desautels Faculty of Management, worked for the Ontario Public Service Employees Union for 24 years and his research interests include public sector labor relations and restructuring, collective bargaining, dispute resolution and industrial conflict.

Right: Timothy Bartkiw

The second conversation will feature , a professor of economic security at the University of Bath, talking about his new book, The Precariat: The New Dangerous Class (Bloomsbury Academic). The event will take place Tuesday, Nov. 15, from 12:30 to 2:30pm, at 2003 Osgoode Hall Law School, Ignat Kaneff Building, Keele campus.

Left: Robert Hebdon

鈥�91亚色 had traditionally been the go to place for media and government policymakers for pressing and hot labour issues of the day, as well as long-term labour-relations issues,鈥� says social science Professor Carla Lipsig-Mumm茅 of 91亚色鈥檚 Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies (LA&PS) and co-convener of the series with law Professor Sara Slinn. 鈥淥ne of the reasons for this kind of a speaker series is to bring that role back to 91亚色 as the leading university in research and community-based action-research in labour relations and get people talking about labour issues both internally and externally.鈥�

Standing, a former research director of the International Labour Organization and an internationally acclaimed scholar, will argue that the long-term work-based precarisation of increasing numbers of people worldwide is leading to the crystallization of a new class. The volatility and political potential of this new class is just starting to be recognized, he says. Neoliberal policies and institutional changes have produced a huge and growing number of people with sufficiently common experiences to be called an emerging class. This conversation is co-organized with 91亚色 Professor Peer Zumbansen and the Comparative Research in Law & Political Economy Network.

Right: Guy Standing

There will be six conversations throughout the academic year, featuring nationally and internationally influential speakers from Canada, the United States, the European Union, international organizations and 91亚色.聽

These conversations will foster more internal dialogue with students and academics, as well as law and social science collaborative research at 91亚色, and will help bring people external to the University into the dialogue, said Lipsig-Mumm茅. It will allow collaboration with labour and labour law practitioners that will benefit students, researcher and the wider public.

A will allow those conversations to continue and deepen long after the panel discussions are finished. More disciplines than ever are now concerned with labour issues, which makes this speakers series highly relevant, she says.

As Slinn of 91亚色鈥檚 Osgoode Hall Law School points out, 鈥�91亚色 has a lot of expertise and interest in labour and employment issues. This speaker series takes advantage of expertise and provides a nexus for a multi-dimensional discussion on timely and important issues.鈥�

Right: Sara Slinn and Carla Lipsig-Mumm茅

The conversations will encompass a variety of different viewpoints and ideologies regarding the topic at hand and will include union leaders, academics, lawyers and academics. 鈥淭hey are meant to be fulsome conversations. We hope the panels will be enlightening and interesting and will examine crucial questions at the heart of each topic,鈥� says Slinn. 鈥淭here aren鈥檛 many spaces in existence for those kinds of conversations anywhere right now.鈥�

The Conversations on Work and Labour Speakers' Series is a joint project of Osgoode Hall Law School and LA&PS. A number of departments, programs and associations are also sponsoring the conversations.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post New speaker series hits hot labour relations buttons appeared first on Research & Innovation.

This intensive -funded international workshop will take place Thursday, May 26 to Saturday, May 28 in the Research Tower on the聽Keele campus.

The event is by invitation only and not open to the public. However, detailed information, including聽the full list of presentations and abstracts can be聽viewed by visiting the New Constitutionalism and World Order website.聽Following聽the events, the website will be used to provide publication and other information.

Right: Stephen Gill

The workshop will be one component of the International Political Economy and Ecology Graduate Summer School, hosted by 91亚色 graduate programs in political science, geography and environmental studies, that has been taking place since May 16.

Some of the speakers at the workshop will include:

• Richard Falk, the Albert G. Millbank Professor Emeritus of International Law & Politics at Princeton University and a Visiting Distinguished Research Professor聽in Global & International Studies聽at the University of California, Santa Barbara
• 91亚色 political science Professor , a current Trudeau Fellow
• sociology, social and cultural analysis Professor Neil Brenner of New 91亚色
• Tim DiMuzio, a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre of Excellence in Global Governance Research at the University of Helsinki
• current Trudeau Fellow Janine Brodie, Canada Research Chair in Political Economy & Social Governance at the University of Alberta.

Each presentation will be followed by a Q聽& A where the workshop participants can engage with the presenters.

New constitutionalism refers to the complex of politico-juridical and constitutional frameworks, regulations and rights that have emerged as key mechanisms of global governance to regulate political economy, society and ecology in the era of neo-liberal capitalism.

Some of the questions the participants and聽students will discuss include: What are the main transformations occurring in governance arrangements for the global political economy? What legitimacy concerns are raised by new constitutionalism in the context of the deepest crisis of global capitalism since the 1930s? Is there evidence of the emergence of, or conceptualization of, alternative forms of constitutionalism and world order?

Substantial evidence, says Gill, suggests that new constitutionalism is a key feature of the present world economic order, exemplified in organizations such as the , and in the emergence of independent central banks, each of which have been largely premised on neo-liberal development models. These developments have coincided with the global expansion of capitalism and the extension of private property rights and a proliferation in private governance mechanisms.

However, the recent deep crisis of accumulation has called into question the legitimacy and sustainability of these arrangements, prompting critical reflection on alternative forms of constitutionalism and global governance and questions concerning the potential shape of the emerging world order.

Republished courtesy of YFile 鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post Graduate students to engage with lawyers, political economists and theorists at SSHRC-funded workshop appeared first on Research & Innovation.

"I'm optimistic about the explosion that's happened in Wisconsin," says Leo Panitch, a political science professor at 91亚色 [Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies]. "For the first time in a long time, the Canadian left is looking south, rather than the other way."

But he's loath to make too many claims for a new dawn rising: "The craziness and mindlessness of so much of what is going on in the American right may 鈥� and I'm very cautious about this 鈥� it may lead to the same kind of sensibilities that produced a radical new left in the sixties."

Says Panitch, "It's much more complicated now. It's not easy to organize these days when you don't have masses of workers brought together in a big factory and they aren't living in the same part of the city. A lot of people now who are exploited and poorly paid are working in funky areas like producing software or advertising."

Two years ago, he wrote a piece for Foreign Policy magazine titled 鈥淭horoughly Modern Marx鈥� about how the post-crash world might possibly (though by no means inevitably) see a rebirth in radical thinking. That, of course, has not happened 鈥� in fact, the political left has suffered setbacks and since 2008, centre-right parties have gained power in Europe.

Panitch is the Canada Research Chair in Comparative Political Economy and a Distinguished Research Professor of Political Science.

Posted by Elizabeth Monier-Williams, research communications officer, with files courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin

The post Professor and CRC Leo Panitch on renewed interest in Karl Marx appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The panel, hosted by 91亚色鈥檚 (CCGES) and co-sponsored by the International Business Program of the Schulich School of Business, will feature Scott聽Paradise, VP marketing & business development, Magna International; Jim Stanford, economist for the Canadian Auto Workers Union and 91亚色 political science Professor Greg Chin, author of and member of the 91亚色 Centre for Asian Research.

Left: The Hyundai automobile assembly line

Panellists will focus on the state of the world鈥檚 automotive and light truck manufacturers in the wake of the global financial crisis: In the United States and Canada, governments stepped in to become majority owners of General Motors, while management of Chrysler was assumed by Italian-based automaker Fiat. In Europe, governments provided incentives to keep consumer demand up and the largest German car company, Volkswagen, began producing vehicles in North America for the first time since the 1970s. Mexico continues to increase its lead over Canada in terms of vehicle production. The same period saw China grow into the world鈥檚 largest auto market, with sales of 18 million vehicles, an increase of 32 per cent over 2009. The panel will explore these and other developments, and their ramifications for the global auto manufacturing sector.

Organized by CCGES affiliates Professor Roger Keil, director of 91亚色鈥檚 City Institute and Professor Emeritus of 91亚色鈥檚 Schulich School of Business, the series aims to shed light on major shifts in the auto industry and society鈥檚 relationship to it.

, director of CCGES, noted that the centre is well-positioned to look at this important theme from a variety of angles. 鈥淭he importance of the automotive industry to the economies of the industrialized world can鈥檛 be overestimated, but it鈥檚 clearly a mistake to view this sector and its prospects in a monolithic way. The panel will consider the situation in a variety of regions and jurisdictions so that a useful overview of the current situation and future prospects emerges,鈥� he said.

The event will run from 4:30 to 6:30pm on the seventh floor of the 91亚色 Research Tower, Keele campus.

A full report on the first panel in the series is available . Panels are open to the public. Attendees are asked to register in advance at ccges@yorku.ca. For more information, visit the website or phone ext. 40003.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin

The post Panel examines impact of financial crisis on auto industry January 24 appeared first on Research & Innovation.

One of several Guyanese faculty at 91亚色, Prof. Grant played an important role in fostering links between Guyana and the University. In 1996, Prof. Grant was one of several faculty members to host Guyanese President Cheddi Jagan during聽his official visit to Canada.

Prof. Grant was cross appointed to the Departments of聽Political Science and Social Science. He taught in both areas聽for more than 30 years. He was also affiliated with聽91亚色's Centre for Research on Latin America聽& the Caribbean. Dedicated to his students, Prof. Grant was described as an inspiring聽mentor and friend.

He leaves behind his wife Gwen and聽three children, their spouses and six grandchildren. Visitation will take place today at the聽Highland Funeral Home, 3280 Sheppard Ave. E., from 2 to 4pm and聽from 7 to 9pm. Funeral services will聽be held on Saturday at 12pm at St. Paul's L'Amoreaux Church, 3333 Finch Ave. E. Interment is at Highland Memory Gardens, 33 Memory Gardens Lane.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post 91亚色 remembers Professor Emeritus Rudy Grant, specialist in African political economy appeared first on Research & Innovation.

This is only the second year the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships have been awarded.

鈥淲e are delighted with the results of the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships competition and the opportunity that this represents for four of 91亚色's outstanding doctoral candidates,鈥� says Douglas Peers (left), dean of the Faculty of Graduate Studies. "In addition to exhibiting remarkable potential as young scholars, the success of these students is a testament to 91亚色's interdisciplinary strengths in areas such as environmental studies and women's studies. The Vanier Scholarships' emphasis on bringing the most promising international students to Canada to study has allowed 91亚色 to attract three students with great potential."

The winners from 91亚色 are: Tania Hernandez Cervantes of Mexico, who is studying agricultural economics; Yasin Kaya of Turkey, who is studying聽political economy; women鈥檚 studies student Healy Thompson of the United States; and history student James D.J. Trepanier of Canada. Each will receive $50,000 per year for up to three years to pursue research that will lead to the growth of the global knowledge base.

Hernandez Cervantes will research alternatives against the global takeover of organic agriculture in Mexico and Canada looking at agro-ecological innovation, rural livelihoods and alternative production, distribution and consumption. Yasin is interested in researching globalization in jeans in a multi-sited ethnography of global economic processes. Thompson will research the protection of vulnerable women looking at northern paternalism and women's sexual and reproductive rights. Trepanier will study scouting and the two solitudes, investigating youth, religion and nationalism in French and English Canada from 1908 to 1970.

This year, 174 scholarships were awarded to doctoral students from Canada and around the world recognized as leaders in their fields of research and in their communities. The Vanier scholars were selected for their exceptional leadership skills and their high standard of scholarly achievement in graduate studies in the social sciences and humanities, natural sciences and engineering, and health.

The scholarships are administered by Canada's three federal granting agencies: the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council of Canada聽and the Social Sciences & Humanities Research Council of Canada. The goal is to build world-class research capacity by recruiting top-tier doctoral students, both nationally and internationally, who will positively contribute to our economic, social and research-based growth for a prosperous future.

For more information, visit the Web site.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post Four 91亚色 students win Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships appeared first on Research & Innovation.

Gill is聽at the University of Helsinki in Finland as the institution鈥檚 inaugural Jane & Aatos Erkko Visiting Professor in Studies on Contemporary Society. As part of his role with the Finnish university, Gill has organized an international conference titled The Helsinki Discussions, which will examine critical perspectives in global governance.

Left: Stephen Gill

"This one-day landmark event brings to Helsinki some of the world鈥檚 leading critical thinkers on global political economy, law and international relations," says Gill. "They will address the challenges of achieving sustainable and democratic governance in the 21st century."

Gill has asked the international contingent of thinkers and theorists to聽develop a dual perspective on the nature and future of global governance.

First, they will consider global governance as the practices associated with enduring forms of international rule beyond the purview of individual nations 鈥� that is, as it has been normally understood in politics and diplomacy since ancient times. In this sense, global governance involves consideration of the main mechanisms that have emerged to stabilize, modify and legitimate the global status quo, such as the G8 or the G20. Consequently, global governance is mainly evaluated from the perspective of the most powerful states and economic interests. Global governance today involves devising durable methods, mechanisms and institutions 鈥� including those of peace and war 鈥� to help sustain an international order that is premised on the primacy of capitalism and the world market as the key governing forces of world politics.

Second, participants will also develop critical perspectives on global governance 鈥� involving not only a demystification of the power relations between leaders and led, but also an assessment of the potential for changes in those relations. Conference participants will analyze global governance not just from the vantage point of dominant power, but from the perspectives of subaltern forces. Participants will question the necessity, desirability and sustainability of existing institutional arrangements in light of global economic, social and ecological crises and challenges.

Joining Gill in The Helsinki Discussions聽are some of the world's most聽distinguished thinkers and theorists. They are:

• 91亚色 political economy Professor聽.聽A聽Trudeau Fellow (2009-2012), Bakker is聽a visiting Fellow at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies and a consultant on gender and human security issues to the United Nations (UN).
• Author and University of Warwick Professor Upendra Baxi, who teaches law in development and was previously a professor of law at the University of Dehli in India and its former聽vice-chancellor.
• University of Cape Town Professor Emeritus of Medicine, Dr. 厂辞濒辞尘辞苍听叠别苍补迟补谤, now a professor in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto and聽 a聽founding member of the Academy of Science of South Africa. He is聽an elected foreign member of the United States National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine and a foreign honorary member of the American Academy of Arts聽& Sciences.
• University of Victoria international relations and international law Professor Claire Cutler, a researcher聽interested in advancing critical theory in international relations and developing a radical political economy critique of both public and private international law.
• Hilal Elver, a聽Distinguished Visiting Professor in global & international studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She was founding legal adviser to the Turkish government鈥檚 ministry of environment and general director of women鈥檚 status in the prime minister's office. In 1994, Elver was聽appointed聽chair in environmental diplomacy by the UN Environment Program聽at the Mediterranean Academy of Diplomatic Studies in Malta.
• Richard Falk is the Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law and Practice聽at Princeton University and Visiting Distinguished Professor in global & international studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
• Adam Harmes, a professor of聽political science at the University of Western Ontario whose work deals with聽global political economy, global finance and global governance. His current research examines the competition between neo-liberalism and social democracy over multi-level governance in federal, regional and global contexts.
• Political science Professor Mustapha Kamal Pasha is the chair of the聽Department of Politics & International Relations at the University of Aberdeen, UK. Previously, he taught at the School of International Service, American University in Washington, DC (1993-2005).
• 91亚色 political science Professor , whose聽current research examines the political economy of inequality and difference in world affairs from the perspective of Gramscian political theory.
• University of Helsinki world politics Professor Teivo Teivainen, director of the聽Program on Democracy聽& Global Transformation at the San Marcos University in Lima, Peru. As a representative of Network Institute for Global Democratization, he is a founding member of the International Council of the World Social Forum.

The conference speakers will address a variety of contested political issues including such noteworthy topics as聽the legitimacy of global institutions; social justice, taxation and redistribution; privatized security governance; gender, race and equitable development; environmental issues and climate change; global health; the rights of subordinated peoples in an era of globalization; Islamic conceptions of justice and leadership; corporate social responsibility and public-private partnerships; and various mechanisms of regulation in finance, the workplace and in trade and investment.

The event has been organized under the auspices and sponsorship of the Jane聽& Aatos Erkko Chair on the Study of Contemporary Society at the聽Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies, University of Helsinki. Other sponsors are the聽Social Science & Humanities Research Council of Canada;聽the Finnish Institute of International Affairs; and the University of Helsinki's Office of the Rector, the Centre of Excellence in Foundations of European Law聽& Polity, the Centre of Excellence in Global Governance Research and the Faculty of Law.

For more on The Helsinki Discussions, visit the Web site.

About Stephen Gill

Gill is the inaugural Erkko Visiting Professor聽in Studies on Contemporary Society at the聽Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies and a Distinguished Research Professor of Communication, Culture and Political Science at 91亚色.聽His publications include The Global Political Economy (with David Law, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988); American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission (Cambridge University Press,1991); Gramsci, Historical Materialism and International Relations (Cambridge University Press,聽1993); Globalization, Democratization and Multilateralism (UN University Press & Palgrave Macmillan, 1997); Innovation and Transformation in International Studies (co-editor, Cambridge University Press 1997); Power, Production and Social Reproduction: Human In/security in the Global Political Economy (co-editor with Isabella Bakker, Palgrave Macmillan, 2004) and Power and Resistance in the New World Order (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003 & 2008).

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post 91亚色 prof behind today's prestigious Helsinki Discussions on global governance appeared first on Research & Innovation.

The conference, to be held Oct. 29 to 31 at 91亚色, will have a dual theme: to investigate the global financial crisis and to use the crisis to probe alternative theoretical frameworks in political economy.

Recent events have given political economists plenty to talk about: the bursting of the real estate 鈥渂ubble鈥�, the bailout of Wall Street, the collapse of global exports and more. Not only were most theorists unable to foresee the crisis and adequately explain its particularities and implications, they continue to employ concepts and categories that have long-since been challenged.

The conference organizers believe there is great need for new ideas, concepts and analyses, and welcome both panels and individual papers. Abstracts of no more than 250 words should be sent to casp.york@gmail.com by June 30.

Visit the for further information.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

The post Call for Papers: Crisis of Capital, Crisis of Theory conference to be held in late October appeared first on Research & Innovation.