CFP: Social policy and regimes of social welfare in Africa (Fribourg 14.09.2014)

International workshop organized by Daniel Künzler and Michael Nollert at the Division of Sociology, Social Policy and Social Work at the University of Fribourg on behalf of the Swiss Society for African Studies and the Swiss Sociological Association (Research Committee Economic Sociology).

There is a vast amount of scientific literature on social welfare in developed countries. In addition to research on individual strategies (micro level) and collective actors in specific policy fields (meso level), there is substantial research on welfare states (macro level). However, social welfare is not only provided by states but also by markets, households and non-governmental organizations. The description and analysis of these welfare mixes is frequently based on typologies, the most well-known being the differentiation between social democratic, conservative and liberal welfare regimes
(Esping-Andersen 1990, 1999). Research not only focuses on different social policies, welfare mixes and their outcomes such as reduction of poverty or inequality, but also on path-dependent developments and the variance of welfare regimes.

For other contexts, especially in the Global South where social policy is less pervasive, these concepts proved inspiring, but not directly transferable. In recent years, researchers increasingly began to empirically research other contexts and develop theoretical concepts for them. To underline the different position of states in the welfare mixes, typologies of welfare regimes were developed. Examples include the liberal-informal welfare state in Latin America, the productivist welfare regime and the emerging productivist welfare states, both in East Asia (Wood and Gough 2006). In this perspective, African countries are examples of the residual category, the insecurity regimes.

The Fribourg workshop seeks to provide a more nuanced and contextualized picture of the welfare mix in African countries based on the most recent typologies. Key note speakers will not only focus on these typologies, but also on (pre-)colonial legacies and its relations to welfare mixes. Additionally, two forums will host paper presentations that focus on social policy and regimes of social welfare in Africa. The organizers especially invite papers that use macro level conceptual frameworks to analyze cases of welfare mixes and explain their emergence or their outcomes. Additionally, papers can focus on regional and global influences on the welfare mix (e.g., processes of pressure and/or learning from international organizations or regional integration). The organizers furthermore look for paper proposals that further our conceptual and methodological understanding of regimes of social welfare in Africa. Comparative papers are strongly encouraged.

Call for papers:
Paper proposals of approx. 200 characters should be submitted to the contact address before 31 December 2013 and additionally include name
and institutional affiliation of the author(s). The organizers will support travel and accommodation for invited presenters.

Contact address:
Workshop “Social policy and regimes of social welfare in Africa” Daniel Künzler University of Fribourg, Division of Sociology, Social Policy and Social Work
Route des Bonnesfontaines 11
CH-1700 Fribourg
Mail: daniel.kuenzler@unifr.ch<http://www.zasb.unibas.ch/?id=>
Phone +41 26 300 83 86, fax +41 26 300 96 63

Appel à communications colloque Mouvements étudiants en Afrique

Appel à communications ci-joint pour un colloque « Mouvements étudiants en Afrique francophone, des indépendances à nos jours » qui aura lieu à Paris du 3 au 5 juillet 2014.

MvtsetudiantsAppelcom

FSS – Appel 2014

La Fondation pour les sciences sociales lance, pour la 2e année consécutive, 12 bourses d’articles.
Thème 2014 : « Ville et logement : dynamiques des inégalités spatiales et politiques publiques ».

D’un montant de 2500 euros, chaque bourse ira à l’auteur d’un article inédit sur cette question, publié dans une revue scientifique fin 2014 et présentée à un plus large public à la 2e Journée des sciences sociales (novembre 2014), dans le même style que la 1re Journée, prévue le 14  novembre 2013 (voir pièce jointe).

Sélection des 12 lauréats : sur projet par le conseil scientifique de la Fondation. Juristes, économistes, sociologues, urbanistes, géographes, historiens, quelle que soit votre discipline, vous êtes concernés !

Conditions à réunir : avoir moins de 50 ans et avoir soutenu sa thèse depuis au moins un an au 31 octobre 2013 [attention : ce dernier critère a été élargi depuis l’appel précédent].

Précisions et formulaire de candidature : pièces jointes.
Réponses à l’adresse contact@fondation-sciences-sociales.org

DATE-LIMITE DE DÉPÔT DES RÉPONSES : 31 octobre 2013, à minuit
Sélection : novembre 2013
Réunion des lauréats : janvier 2014

Call for Applications – The ICD « Experience Africa » Initiative (Forthcoming Events & Programs: November, 2013 – February, 2014)

– Call for Applications –

The ICD Experience Africa Initiative

Forthcoming Events & Programs: International Conferences, Academic Curriculum, Young Leaders´ Forums & Professional Training Courses

(November, 2013 – February, 2014)

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

We are pleased to announce and bring to your attention our forthcoming academic international conferences, to be hosted by the ICD in partnership with other leading organizations. The information attached below provides further details on the programs offered at these events. We would be extremely grateful if this announcement could also be shared with other interested parties by forwarding the information provided below.

If you do not wish to receive emails from the ICD in the future, please send us an email to info@culturaldiplomacy.org indicating this.

To view the complete ICD Calendar of Events for 2013, please click here.

Llamado a articulos revista Territorios No 30

Landscape Management Post-doc opportunity in Copenhagen, Denmark (deadline 15 November 2013)

Please direct inquiries to tobias.plieninger@life.ku.dk.

Postdoc in Landscape Management

The Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management, Faculty of Science, University of Copenhagen invites applications for a position as Post Doc in Landscape Management from January 2014 or as soon as possible thereafter. The position is limited to three years. The position is anchored in the research group Spatial Change and Planning, which is an interdisciplinary group dealing with landscapes and urban areas in a planning and management context.

The position´s duties will primarily include research, including obligations with regard to publication/scientific communication within Landscape Management. To a limited extent this may also include performance of other duties. The research activities will primarily be linked to the EU-FP7 projects AGFORWARD (« Agroforestry that advances rural development ») and HERCULES (« Sustainable futures for Europe´s heritage in cultural landscapes »).

The overall objective of AGFORWARD is to increase the understanding of traditional and novel agroforestry systems in Europe and to identify, develop and demonstrate innovations to improve the ecosystem service benefits and viability of agroforestry systems in Europe. HERCULES will synthesize existing knowledge on the drivers, patterns, and outcomes of persistence and change in cultural landscapes, close knowledge gaps regarding the dynamics and values of cultural landscapes and generate tools for landscape observation and modeling.

The successful applicant will carry out systematic reviews and meta-analyses, perform ecosystem services assessments and analyses of landscape change, and participate in inter- and transdisciplinary project activities. Tasks will further include project management and collaboration with project partners.

Further information on the Department is linked at http://ign.ku.dk/english . Inquiries about the position can be made to associate professor Tobias Plieninger on tel. (+45) 353 36782 or e-mail tobias.plieninger@life.ku.dk

The University wishes our staff to reflect the diversity of society and thus welcomes applications from all qualified candidates regardless of personal background.

Qualifications – selection criteria
Applicants must have an academic degree within landscape related sciences (e.g. geography, landscape ecology, forestry). Substantial knowledge on European landscapes and land uses and familiarity with landscape research is required. The fields of qualifications listed below are considered decisive in the evaluation of the applicants, and the successful candidate should have a track record in one or more of these fields:
Multifunctional land use, agroforestry systems
Ecosystem services assessment
GIS / database applications for the analysis of landscape change
Meta-analysis and systematic review techniques
Experience in project management (ideally in international projects), interdisciplinary cooperation, teaching at university level, and scholarly publishing
Documented scientific qualifications such as a Ph.D. or equivalent in relation to one or more of the above subject areas

The candidate is also required to be enterprising and to possess good interpersonal skills. He/she must be able to work in a large project environment with many partners and work with sharp deadlines.

Terms of employment
The position is covered by the Memorandum on Job Structure for Academic Staff.

Terms of appointment and payment accord to the agreement between the Ministry of Finance and The Danish Confederation of Professional Associations on Academics in the State.

The starting salary is currently up to DKK 402,046 including annual supplement (+ pension up to DKK 68,750). Negotiation for salary supplement is possible.

The application, in English, must be submitted electronically by clicking APPLY ONLINE below.

Please include
Cover letter
Curriculum vitae
Diplomas
Research plan – description of current and future research plans
Complete publication list
A maximum of 3 relevant scientific works which the applicant wishes to be included in the assessment
Documentation for additional research qualifications
Contact details for three potential referees

The deadline for applications is 15 November 2013.

Interviews are scheduled to take place during December 2013.

Apply online: https://ssl1.peoplexs.com/Peoplexs22/CandidatesPortalNoLogin/ApplicationForm.cfm?PortalID=3789&VacatureID=612238
The University of Copenhagen actively influences current and future generations through excellent research, education and co-operation. UCPH is one of the highest ranked universities in Europe and is Denmark´s oldest university, founded in 1479. Today, the University has 37,000 students and 9,000 employees affiliated across six faculties: humanities, law, natural sciences, social sciences, health sciences and theology. www.ku.dk/english/.

Journal of Ethnobiology Call for Papers (deadline December 1, 2013)

CALL FOR PAPERS
Fire Ecology and Ethnobiology
Special issue of the journal of Ethnobiology

Anthropologists have been studying fire’s evolutionary and cultural significance for more than 100 years.  For several decades ethnobiologists have addressed the ways and reasons people use fire to manage resources and the effects of anthropogenic fires on resources.  Attention to fire ecology has blossomed during the previous decade within anthropology as well as in other academic disciplines and in applied fields (e.g., land management).  The burgeoning interest in fire ecology coincides with explosive growth in climate change science.  Now is a strategic time for ethnobiologists to discuss the ways our work converges with fire ecology and climate change science.

The aim of this special issue is to discuss the social, ecological, and meteorological processes that ensue when fire encounters biological organisms.  Anthropogenic and spontaneous fires link to multi-scale, multi-species processes ranging from the biographies of individual organisms, to fluxes in biological communities, and to population-level dynamics.  Contributors to this special issue will explore the ways human knowledge and behavior intersects with the biological processes that cause or are caused by fire. Theoretically, contributors will seek to explain the relationships between fire ecology and human ecology in ways that are relevant for climate policy and cultural diversity.

Authors are encouraged to reflect on such questions as: Do anthropogenic fires in small-scale communities contribute to global warming and climate change, or are their impacts minimal relative to the contributions of high-volume consumers in industrialized and post-industrialized societies? What are the consequences of fire suppression for traditional societies? What ethical issues do anthropologists consider when issues of self-determination and human rights confront issues of carbon emissions and deforestation? Does traditional peoples’ right to burn their own landscapes conflict with the conservation agenda of and conserving biodiversity and addressing human-induced global warming? How do people use and understand fire in local ecological settings?

Extended abstracts (600 words) will be accepted until December 1, 2013. Please include a prospective title and a short bio-note about yourself. All submissions should be in English. The editors will review the abstracts and invite submission of full-length papers (5,000 – 10,000 words) for peer-review. An invitation to submit a full-length paper is not a guarantee that the paper will be accepted, and all articles will undergo a peer-review process. Deadline for the submission of full-length papers: May 1, 2014.
To submit your abstract, or for any further queries regarding this special issue, please contact the issue editors directly: FowlerCT@wofford.edu or welch@ensp.fiocruz.br.

Kristina Tiedje, PhD
Maître de conférences en anthropologie (Assoc. Professor of anthropology)
Faculté de Sociologie et d’Anthropologie
Université Lumière Lyon 2, France
Email: kristina@ktiedje.com, kristina.tiedje@univ-lyon2.fr, tiedje.kristina@mayo.edu

Website: www.ktiedje.com

Researcher, Centre de Recherche et d’Etudes Anthropologiques (CREA) http://recherche.univ-lyon2.fr/crea/
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Affiliated Researcher, Creative Solutions to Sustainability, Ceres 21 (www.ceres21.org)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Secretary, International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature & Culture (www.religionandnature.com/society)
Editorial Board Member, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature & Culture
Editorial Team, Curare Journal of Medical Anthropology (http://www.agem-ethnomedizin.de/index.php/curare.html)

Call for papers: African capitalismsalumni, “Future Africa” (11.-14 Juni, Bayreuth)

Call for papers: African capitalisms /(Thomas Bierschenk, Mainz)/

Panel no. 31 at the Conference of the African Studies Association of Germany/VAD, 11.-14 Juni, Bayreuth “Future Africa”; */http://www.vad-ev.de/bayreuth2014/callforpapers//*

For some time the concept of capitalism has experienced a remarkable renaissance as well in public debate as in the social sciences. With respect to Africa, however, the term of capitalism is mostly used in the sense of a non-relationship or of an external, usually negatively connoted, force. As usual, investors and businessmen are well ahead of academics in this respect: for them the « African lions » constitute one of the last frontiers of capitalism. In contrast, in African Studies, capitalist actors such as entrepreneurs or institutions such as banks and stock markets are under-researched, and the question of indigenous African capitalisms seems to have been settled, in the negative sense, since the end of the Kenya debate.

However, the concept of capitalism cannot be reduced to economic actors and economic institutions alone. Capitalisms are also cultural forms which, as we know since Max Weber, correspond to a certain « spirit ». Religious orientations (such as in Pentecostalism or in Islam) have been studied from this perspective. One might also ask whether the new spirit of network capitalism à la Boltanski, based on mobility, disponibility, creativity, pluri-competence and virtuosity in the use of new media corresponds perhaps particularly well with local cultural practices in Africa.

The panel will thus try to explore the historical and social conditions of capitalism in Africa in the 21st Century will be performed. Historical as well as contemporary perspectives, empirical as well as and conceptual ones, from all fields of African studies are solicited. Contributions which connect economic to cultural developments are particularly welcome. Other possible keywords are: the movement of African goods (such as cotton) and people in global capitalism; rentier capitalism; African middle classes; capitalist consumer culture without capitalist production relations; neoliberalism; etc. The panel sees itself primarily as an exploratory exercise which aims to find out whether the concept of capitalism can be a structuring perspective in today’s African Studies.

Papers (in English, French or German) are welcome until the 17th of November 2013. Please send your abstracts to biersche@uni-mainz.de <mailto:biersche@uni-mainz.de> and to the conference organizers under vad.bayreuth2014@gmail.com.
Afrikanische Kapitalismen

Call for abstracts – Indiana University Bloomington African Studies Symposium (November 30, 2013.)

4th Annual Graduate Students in African Studies Symposium
Indiana University, Bloomington

African Innovation :  Ideas Shaping Africa and the World
Saturday, March 1, 2014

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Clapperton Mavhunga, Associate Professor of Science, Technology, and Society, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Indiana University Graduate Students in African Studies (GSAS) invite proposals for our annual symposium that explore innovations, broadly defined.

How have Africans driven change through inventions, designs, experiments, technologies, ideas, artworks, stories, or skills? What ideas or methods (from within or outside the African continent) have shaped African lives?

Though “innovation” is often conflated with technological novelty, we seek to understand the diverse ways that ingenuity and creativity are manifested in African contexts and beyond—perhaps ways that are unnoticed or unorthodox. Whether generated by individuals, communities, or institutions, whether past or present, new ideas that respond to particular African contexts can have far-reaching social, cultural, and political effects.

Papers might consider, but are by no means limited to, the following areas:
– Visual and performing arts, literature Philosophy
– Religious movements Fashion, popular culture
– Political systems Media and communication
– Entrepreneurship Science, mathematics
– Invented or appropriated technologies Healthcare and medicine
– Agricultural methods New identities, the invention of traditions

We welcome proposals from current graduate students in any discipline. The symposium is open to investigations of any topic, time period, person or place considered in this light. By encompassing diverse perspectives from many areas of scholarship, this symposium aims to create a fruitful dialogue around concepts of creativity and change.

Presentations will be limited to 20 minutes. Please submit abstracts of no more than 300 words to iu.gsas.symposium [at] gmail [dot] com. The deadline for consideration of abstracts is November 30, 2013.

CFP: Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Feministes (Deadline: December 1, 2013)

CALL FOR PAPERS/APPEL À COMMUNICATIONS
WOMEN’S AND GENDER STUDIES ET RECHERCHES FÉMINISTES

DATE: May 25-27, 2014
(Coordinators Meeting May 24, 2014)
LOCATION: Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario

WGSRF is now seeking proposals, in either French or English, for its annual conference, held in conjunction with the Congress of the CFHSS/FCSH. Submissions for panels, roundtables, workshops, papers, and other presentation formats can be made by groups or individuals, and as joint sessions with other associations. The conference committee encourages you to make use of your networks to organize panels (with moderators) for submission. Please identify the specific theme to which you are submitting your proposal.

The overall theme for this year’s Congress, “Borders without Boundaries,” clearly connects to a number of issues and topics recognizable to WGSRF. We invite abstracts that address the following specialized themes that challenge and problematize “borders” and “boundaries” in numerous ways, in addition to submissions that address topics outside of these themes.

Theme 1: “Borders without Boundaries”? How do feminist and other critical inter/disciplinary approaches, languages, and bodies of scholarship take up the themes of, and complex and multiple relationships between, borders and boundaries? How do they explore borders and boundaries as material, as affective, as stable, as fluid, as rigid, as porous, as repressive, as productive? Where are borders and boundaries located, maintained, and challenged—in space/place, across time, through and on bodies? How do individuals and communities create, defy, live within/without borders and boundaries of all kinds? What are the consequences of troubling the multiple meanings attached to borders and boundaries? And how do other connecting words—such as with, and, through, in, of—complicate and extend understandings of borders and boundaries?
Participants may explore these and related questions through any number of possible topics and approaches, including: space and virtuality; the urban and the rural; home and community; the private and the public; the local, the national, the transnational; nation (building) and citizenship(s); migrations and movements; terror, fear, anxiety; pain and pleasure; work and play; the body; representation; war…. We are interested in proposals: that consider topics through intersectional categories and analyses; that engage scholarly, pedagogical, activist, and cultural productions; and that investigate, interpret, intervene in, and illuminate the complexities that emerge when borders and boundaries are at stake.

Theme 2: “Women’s and Gender Studies: Borders with/out Boundaries”? This theme welcomes proposals that take the field of Women’s and Gender Studies as their site of inquiry and work to further conversations about the field, its pedagogies, practices, and curricula, its institutional force, and its status as a social, academic, political, imaginary, textual, virtual, affective, creative community. How does WGS negotiate borders (and/with/without/in/through) boundaries in its relationship with the university more generally—with other intellectual fields and organizations of knowledges, with the institution and its current pressures/restructurings/funding crises, with a larger climate increasingly suspicious of liberal arts education? How do we continue to energize the field’s various epistemological commitments (to gendering, queering, indigenizing, decolonizing, inter/transnationalizing, and globalizing) in the face of these multiple and contradictory pressures?

Theme 3: Open Call: We also welcome proposals outside of the above two themes that explore Women’s and Gender Studies knowledge work in all its diverse articulations.

HOW TO SUBMIT:
We encourage presentations in a variety of formats, including panels, workshops, roundtables, papers, poster sessions, film and video screenings, performance art pieces, exhibits, and cultural events. If you are proposing a non-traditional presentation, please include a brief write up on any necessary audiovisual, technical, logistical, or room size and location considerations.

The Conference Proposal Form (Word document) can be found on the WGSRF website – www.wgsrf.com – under the ‘annual conference’ tab at the top. All submissions must include a clear, concise and well-argued 250 – 300-word abstract for individual papers and panel topics. Panel submissions must also include short (100 – 150 word) abstracts of the individual papers, and all submissions should indicate the theme for which the proposal is to be considered.

While welcoming individual paper proposals, WGSRF encourages submissions of panel proposals (with a maximum of 3 presenters), to ensure thematic consistency across papers in a given session. Cohesiveness will be a primary criterion in the panel selection process.

Round table presentations may have up to 5 members and workshops may have as few as 2 or as many as 4 facilitators. Proposals for performances and art installations will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, for feasibility.

All sessions are typically scheduled to be 75 minutes in length; if you are proposing a workshop or non-traditional format, please indicate your expected time and other needs. All proposals will be anonymously reviewed.

**Individual presenters and all members of panels/roundtables must be current members of WGSRF to submit an abstract. For more information, see the membership tab at www.wgsrf.com.

Send proposals, by email only, in Word or RTF, to: WGSRF.Conference.2014@gmail.com.
Deadline: December 1, 2013. No late proposals will be accepted.