----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Matthew Paterson" <[log in to unmask]>


Dear all

Essex University in the UK (one of the country's foremost political science
depts) has an annual political theory conference. This year's is on
'capitalism and ecology'. The flyer and cfp is attached.

Cheers
Mat

-- 
Matthew Paterson
École d'études politiques, Université d'Ottawa
Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5
tel: +1 613 562-5800 x1716

Web site:
http://www.socialsciences.uottawa.ca/pol/eng/profdetails.asp?ID=123
And http://matpaterson.wordpress.com/
Co-editor, Global Environmental Politics http://www.mitpressjournals.org/gep
Latest books "Climate capitalism: global warming and the transformation of
the global economy" (with Peter Newell)
http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=0521194857
And "Cultural Political Economy" (edited, with Jacqueline Best)
http://www.routledgepolitics.com/books/Cultural-Political-Economy-isbn978041
5489324

----------------------------------------------------------
10th ESSEX CONFERENCE IN
CRITICAL POLITICAL THEORY

THEORY IN THE FACE OF GLOBAL CHALLENGES:
CAPITALISM & ECOLOGY, COMMUNITY & CITIZENSHIP

Call for Papers

Dates: 16-18 June 2010
Location: University of Essex, Colchester, UK
Call for Papers Deadline: 30 April 2010
Website:http://www.essex.ac.uk/idaworld/10th_Essex_Conference_in_Critical_Political_Theory.html
All Inquiries to: [log in to unmask]

Keynote Speakers
ROMAND Coles is Professor of Community, Culture & Environment at Northern 
Arizona University.
DIANA Coole is Professor of Political & Social Theory at Birkbeck, University of 
London.
STEPHEN K. White is James Hart Professor of Politics at the University of 
Virginia.

Other Confirmed Speakers Include
JANE Bennett, The Johns Hopkins University (USA)
WILLIAM E. Connolly, The Johns Hopkins University (USA)
ERNESTO Laclau is Emiritus Professor of Political Theory at the University of 
Essex.
FRANCISO Panizza, London School of Economics and Political Science (UK)

Organizing Committee at the University of Essex
JASON Glynos, Department of Government, University of Essex
DAVID Howarth, Centre for Theoretical Studies, University of Essex
ALETTA J. Norval, Centre for Theoretical Studies, University of Essex
JONATHAN Dean, Department of Government, University of Essex
KHAIRIL Ahmad, PhD Candidate, Department of Government, University of Essex
GRAHAM Walker, PhD Candidate, Department of Government, University of Essex

Methodology Workshops Organizing Committee
GRAHAM Walker, PhD Candidate, Department of Government, University of Essex

The Conference Theme: Theory in the Face of Global Challenges: Capitalism & 
Ecology, Community & Citizenship


FEW doubt, today, that we face a series of connected global challenges: the 
dangers of climate change and environmental degradation; a crisis of 
international finance and global capitalism; an ever-increasing logic of 
minoritization, which threatens to fragment communities and societies; greater 
social and economic inequalities, both nationally and globally; the 
intensification of various forms of religious belief, including fundamentalism, 
alongside a growing secularization of communities and societies; and a palpable 
disillusionment with politics and politicians.

THEORISTS and scholars in the humanities, social sciences, and the natural 
sciences also face new challenges: insistent demands to show the ‘relevance’ of 
their research for the ‘real world’; diminishing resources and institutional 
support; a growing marginalization from mainstream and corporately subsidized 
research. Universities and colleges are being compelled to show that their 
research has a ‘direct impact’ on the economy, public policy, or society in 
order to secure funding and research grants.

‘THEORY in the Face of Global Challenges: Capitalism & Ecology, Community & 
Citizenship’ takes up the challenge of rethinking different aspects of global 
capitalism, religion, the place of minorities, and the environment. It will also 
problematize and explore the role of theory in the academy and in relation to 
the pressing issues we confront.

HOW do we problematize and critically explain these new phenomena? What are the 
limits and potentials of contemporary political and ethical theory in addressing 
these new issues? What is the relationship between community, citizenship, and 
democracy? What kind of ethos needs to be cultivated in the face of these new 
challenges, and how can it be brought about? Must ecology be sacrificed on the 
altar of rebuilding the global capitalist system, or is an eco-egalitarian 
alternative possible? In what ways can various fundamentalisms be challenged and 
engaged with in the name of a democratic politics that is not itself 
fundamentalist in character? What is the relationship between cultural theory, 
radical materialism and various sorts of naturalism? What are the prospects and 
limits of pluralizing pluralism? Ought we to restrict agency to humans, or does 
it extend to the material and non-human world more generally? What is the 
relationship between nature and culture? How can cultural theory respond to 
recent developments in science? How do these broad sets of issues and questions 
get addressed in specific contexts and policy arenas? And what theoretical 
languages and methods are best able to respond to these changes and trends?

THESE are just some of the tasks of critical political theory today. Our invited 
speakers shall deliver keynote addresses to the conference that will shape the 
discussions with their distinctive voices and perspectives. Each of the speakers 
will address one or more of the themes announced in the title.

ROMAND Coles is Professor and Director of the Programme in Community, Culture & 
Environment at Northern Arizona University. He works at the intersections 
between radical democratic theory, continental philosophy, and grassroots 
democratic activism. During his two decades at Duke University he co-founded and 
co-directed an interdisciplinary project called Dialogical Ethics and Critical 
Cosmopolitanism, as well as The Third Reconstruction Institute, which cultivated 
collaborations between scholars and grassroots organizers across the 
South-Eastern United States. He currently directs the Programme for Community, 
Culture, and Environment at Northern Arizona University where he writes, teaches 
and organizes politically on issues pertaining to building grassroots democracy 
in schools, developing a green economy, crafting public spaces, immigration 
rights, urban agriculture, and the engaged pedagogy movement in higher 
education. His writings include: Self/Power/Other: Political Theory and 
Dialogical Ethics; Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of 
Caritas; Beyond Gated Politics: Reflections Toward the Possibility of Democracy; 
and (with Stanley Hauerwas) Christianity, Democracy, and the Radical Ordinary: 
Conversations Between a Radical Democrat and a Christian. Romand’s address will 
explore possibilities for radical democratic transformation toward a green 
political economy, focusing on vital micro-relational dynamics among humans and 
the nonhuman that nurture revolutionary enthusiasms, hopeful visions of 
possibility, and networks of political power necessary for constructing 
alternatives to ecocidal global capitalism. His discussion will make connections 
between grassroots community organizing initiatives in which he is involved, 
theories of mimesis and mirror neurons, and broadening experiments in 
alternative political economy.

DIANA Coole is Professor of Political and Social Theory at Birkbeck, University 
of London. Her many books and articles include Women in Political Theory: From 
Ancient Misogyny to Contemporary Feminism, 2nd Edition (Hemel Hempstead, 
Harvester-Wheatsheaf & Colorado, Lynne Rienner, 1993); Negativity and Politics: 
Dionysus and Dialectics from Kant to Poststructuralism (London & New York, 
Routledge, 2000); Merleau-Ponty and Modern Politics after Anti-Humanism (Rowman 
and Littlefield, 2007); Materialism and Subjectivity (Duke University Press, 
2007). Her address will focus on the discursive and ethical framing of question 
the population question for developed countries. Her concerns thus engage the 
intersection between capitalism and the environment, whilst raising significant 
controversies about immigration, community and new forms of citizenship. Drawing 
on her extensive knowledge of modern political and social theory, and 
contemporary continental political philosophy, she will also explore the role of 
theory and theorists in addressing these issues and their policy implications.

STEPHEN K. White is James Hart Professor of Politics at the University of 
Virginia. His books include The Recent Work of Jurgen Habermas (Cambridge 
University Press, 1988) and Political Theory and Postmodernism (Cambridge 
University Press, 1991); Edmund Burke: Modernity, Politics and Aesthetics (Sage, 
1994). He has also edited volumes entitled Lifeworld and Politics: Between 
Modernity and Postmodernity (University of Notre Dame Press, 1989) and the 
Cambridge Companion to Habermas (Cambridge University Press, 1995). His 
contribution to the forthcoming conference arises from his most recent book - 
The Ethos of a Late-Modern Citizen – where he contends that the global 
challenges facing Western democracies require a systematic re-examination and 
re-articulation of the role of citizens and citizenship. His approach does not 
deny, in the name of tradition, the force of what is new, nor does he imagine 
that we can adequately confront change by simply rejecting the traditions of 
modern Western political thought. Instead, he offers an incisive interpretation 
of our late-modern ethical-political condition and explains how a distinctive 
“ethos” or spirit of citizenship might constitute part of an exemplary response. 
This ethos requires reworking basic figures of the modern political imagination, 
including our conception of the self, citizenship, and democratic politics.


***

THE TENTH CONFERENCE IN CRITICAL POLITICAL THEORY at the University of Essex 
provides a space to address and engage with these issues. The conference has 
achieved a renowned reputation for the quality of the papers presented and the 
large number of international participants. Previous guest speakers have 
included Bill Connolly, Michael Hardt, Wendy Brown, Judith Squires, Quentin 
Skinner, Joan Copjec, James Tully, Jane Bennett, Fred Dallmayr, Bonnie Honig, 
David Owen, David Campbell, Simon Critchley, Ernesto Laclau, and Chantal Mouffe, 
amongst others. This year the conference will be hosted by the IDAWorld, Centre 
for Theoretical Studies, and the Department of Government at the University of 
Essex.

THE conference provides an important opportunity to engage with the contemporary 
challenges and possibilities of social and political theory and to exchange 
views on ongoing research. We welcome papers from all scholars, including 
postdoctoral researchers, postgraduates and early career scholars from a wide 
variety of backgrounds in the field of social and political theory. But as is 
customary with the Essex conference, the themes are in part shaped by the 
thought and writings of our invited guests, and this year is no exception. We 
are delighted to host Professors Romand Coles, Diana Coole, Ernesto Laclau & 
Stephen White.




Broad Themes Include
* Rethinking Community and Citizenship
* Critical Political Economy
* Discourse & the Media
* Politics of Immanence and Transcendence
* Ecology and Capitalism
* Politics and Technology
* Latin American Politics
* Universalism and Particularism
* Democracy and Representation
* Capitalism, Multiculturalism, Globalization
* Identity Politics and Mobilization
* Subjectivity and Psychoanalysis
* Religion, Faith and Pluralism
* Discourse and Affect
* Fundamentalisms
* New Ecologies
* Philosophies of Nature
* Discourse, Governance & Public Policy
* Culture and Political Economy
* The Politics of Space, Time and Territoriality
* Reworking Identity/Difference


Proposals for Papers, Panels and Roundtables
The conference organizers welcome proposals for individual papers; full panels 
(with papers); and roundtables (focused on discussion of a common theme rather 
than the formal presentation of papers). Paper, panel, and roundtable proposals 
(short abstracts) should be sent to [log in to unmask] no later than 30th April, 
2010. Inquiries may also be sent to that address. Decisions on proposals will be 
made on a rolling basis. Inquiries may also be sent to that address. Final 
papers will be posted on the conference website.

Methodology Workshops
Some of the sessions will be devoted to methodological workshops. The 90-minute 
workshop sessions feature specialists in different aspects of critical and 
poststructuralist political analysis. The workshop sessions take the form of a 
“master-class”, with senior researchers meeting a small number of early career 
researchers using a particular methodological strategy or technique. The focus 
will be on questions raised by researchers, and their research will be treated 
as case studies to generate and engage a set of methodological questions.
The workshops aim at creating a setting where early career researchers can 
benefit from interaction with experts in their field. The sessions will be 
facilitated by fellow early career researchers, and the discussants will be 
established and renowned names in the field of interpretative political 
analysis, such as Jason Glynos, David Howarth and Aletta Norval. The sessions 
are fully incorporated into the regular conference program, and the sessions are 
open to all conference participants.
In order to take part in a workshop session, early career researchers invited to 
present their work in one of these will be asked to introduce their research 
project in a 2-3 page summary, pointing to the particular difficulties or 
methodological questions that arise from their research that they would like to 
explore in the workshop. Please note it clearly in your inquiry if you wish to 
be considered for inclusion in a Methodology Workshop. The deadline for 
inquiries is 30 April 2010. For additional questions, please do not hesitate to 
contact the chair of the Methodology Workshop Advisory Board 
([log in to unmask]) marking your inquiry clearly for attention: Graham Walker.
Conference Fees*

Conference fees for Staff: £140
Conference fees for Early Career Researchers: £80

*Conference fees include coffee/tea, 3 lunch vouchers and the conference dinner 
(excluding wine) on Thursday night.
Note: Those not wishing to attend the conference dinner may subtract £30 from 
the conference fee.

Conference Site
The University of Essex is located in the ancient market town of Colchester and 
near the picturesque village of Wivenhoe in Northeast Essex. It is about 45 
minutes from London by rail, 30 minutes from London’s Stansted Airport by cab or 
about an hour by bus. The conference programme will offer opportunities to enjoy 
the traditional villages and countryside in this scenic part of England. More 
information about accommodation, costs, and venue is available on the website.