Three scholars at the Univerisity of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies have won visiting fellowships for the 2009-10 academic year for research on Middle East conflict, economic sanctions and political reconciliation. They will spend the year in Washington, D.C., and Virginia.
Asher Kaufman, assistant professor of history, received a Woodrow Wilson Center fellowship for his project “Contested Frontiers: Conflict and Potential Resolution in the Syria, Lebanon, Israel Tri-Border Region.” He joins 23 other Woodrow Wilson fellows from the United States, Australia, Bulgaria, Canada, Denmark, Israel, the United Kingdom and Uzbekistan.
George A. Lopez, the Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., Professor of Peace Studies, was awarded a Jennings Randolph Senior Fellowship from the United States Institute of Peace. He is writing a book titled “Can Sanctions Be Saved?” for which he plans to interview 150 treasury personnel, United Nations officials, bankers and others in the private and public sectors.
Daniel Philpott, associate professor of political science, received a visiting fellowship from the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia. The grant will support the completion of his monograph, “Just and Unjust Peace: An Ethic of Political Reconciliation,” which confronts the challenges faced by societies overcoming a past of war, dictatorship and human rights violations.
“During a period of global financial tumult, ongoing border disputes and civil wars, and nuclear proliferation and terrorism, research into the causes and consequences of deadly conflict is essential to the prevention of war and the peaceful reconstruction of war-torn societies,” said Scott Appleby, John M. Regan, Jr., Director of the Kroc Institute.
“Prestigious fellowships such as the ones awarded to these three peace studies scholars—a historian of the Middle East, a political scientist and security and human rights expert and a leading theorist of the ethics of international relations—speak eloquently to the fact that addressing the world’s problems requires multiple lenses of analyses and the contributions of several academic disciplines.”
The Kroc Institute is a leading center for the study of violent conflict and strategies for sustainable peace. More information is available at www.kroc.nd.edu.