International Climate Change and Vulnerability Conference organized by UPEACE

On 13-14 February  UPEACE convened an international climate change and vulnerability conference in The Hague, Netherlands that focused on climate adaptation for small island states and low lying communities.  The event, held at the Peace Palace, brought together almost 150 participants from more than 30 countries for two days of discussion about how to build social and technical capacity to adapt to the challenges of climate change in coming decades.  The conference’s venue in the Netherlands provided an opportunity for participants working in vulnerable developing countries to learn from the long history of Dutch efforts to live below sea level, one of many challenges to developing states if current climate change induced environmental changes continue.  A stimulating day of site visits to the Dutch delta works preceded the 2-day meeting.  Participants also learned from the progressive Dutch efforts to energize citizens to take proactive measures to mitigate and adapt to climate change.  Coming barely two weeks after the release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Fourth Assessment summary for policy makers, UPEACE’s conference capped several months of activities in the Netherlands to educate and raise public awareness about the challenges being faced by climate change. 

Notable participants who addressed the conference included Jan Pronk, former Dutch Minister of the Development Cooperation, former Minister of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment, and most recently, former UN Special Representative to Sudan.  Pronk gave a stirring, emotional call to action on climate change.  As well, Mr. Pieter van Geel, the out-going Dutch State Secretary for Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment, and H.E. Enele Sosene Sopoaga, Tuvaluan Ambassador to the UN and Vice Chair of the Alliance of Small Island States addressed the assembled audience.

A consistent theme during the conference was that the time to act on climate change has arrived – that further studies are not needed for adaptation measures to begin in many island states and low-lying communities.  Heading this call, various sessions explored how measures to adapt to climate change could be integrated into higher education, community development projects and planning, government policy, etc.  In addition to galvanizing a network of experts working around the world on climate change adaptation among island and low-lying states, UPEACE hopes that this conference will be the first step in efforts to work with other partners on adaptation projects, particularly in terms of building capacity for adaptation among higher education and training institutes around the world.  UPEACE is committed to working with interested partners such as the University Consortium of Small Island States, the Commonwealth Secretariat, the Cooperative Programme on Water and Climate, UNESCO-IHE, and others.

Currently, a conference report outlining the findings of the meeting is being finalized.  This report will soon be sent to participants and placed on UPEACE’s conference website, www.upeace.org/climate.  As well, UPEACE will soon place summaries of all the conference sessions, and the text of all the presentations onto its website, along with a short film about the event. 

UPEACE would like to thank all the participants and contributing agencies to the success of the conference - the Dutch National Postcode Lottery, the Netherlands Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning, and the Environment, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Cooperative Programme on Water and Climate, the Commonwealth Secretariat, the Mayor and Municipality of The Hague, the Province of Zeeland, and the Fred Foundation - for financial and planning support that helped to create a very successful and enriching event.

The very active involvement of Dominic Stucker, Alana Paul, Catherine Garcia, Elizabeth Hogan, and Douglas Williamson, (five UPEACE alumni) during the conference was noted by all participants.

****************************************************************

University for Peace Model United Nations Conference 2007 held at UPEACE

With around 100 participants, 50 of them coming from academic institutions in Costa Rica and the U.S.A., UPMUNC 07 took place on 22-24 February at the UPEACE Campus. 

During this year's event, important aspects of the Darfur conflict were analyzed under the procedures that the United Nations follows in its Security Council.

On Thursday 22 February, Mr. Jose Pires, Resident Representative for Latin America and the Caribbean of the International Organization for Migration, delivered the key note speech, which was followed by a Diplomatic reception. The next two days students engaged in several discussions in their assigned roles. On Saturday an official ceremony closed the activity with certificates given to the participants.

This is the fifth consecutive year that UPEACE carries out this activity with successful results and experiences from their participants and organizers.

****************************************************************
UPEACE’s  short courses

Short Course on Gender and Conflict: Human Rights and Transitional Justice

 9-13 April 2007, Mbodiène, Sénégal

Deadline for Letter of Application: 8 March 2007

Organisers: FAS and UPEACE

This short course will bring together practitioners, researchers, people working with Regional and International Institutions and NGO’s for a five-day workshop and will provide participants with the opportunity of improving their skills on gender and peacebuilding.
The approach will be interactive and participatory in order to bring participants to share experiences, knowledge and to create a network for addressing gender issues on a peace agenda.

The aims of this workshop are:
- To present and discuss specific aspects of gender and conflict management and transformation
- To clarify terms, definitions and key concepts of human rights and transitional justice
- To examine the gender dimension in transitional justice and violations of human rights during conflict and its transformation
- To empower women as actors of change
- To examine the use of video and materials facilitators trainers
- To share experiences and lessons learned
For more information, please click here >>
Participant Information Sheet, click here >>
Pour le Français, cliquez ici >>

The Practice of Human Rights Protection in the Field

28 May – 5 June 2007, UPEACE Campus, Costa Rica

The aim of this course is to provide participants with an in-depth practical understanding of human rights protection in a field setting. Participants will acquire a solid grounding in the key skills that underpin human rights protection, which will enhance their effectiveness as human rights professionals working with IGOs, NGOs and national human rights institutions. This course does not aim to teach international human rights law or examine the international system for the protection and promotion of human rights. Rather, the focus of this course is on the practical aspects of human rights fieldwork. For more information, please click here.

************************************************
Visiting professor

Dr. Saleem H. Ali,
University of Vermont and Brown University, USA


ESP 6030 - Indigenous Sovereignty, Environment and Development Conflicts



Saleem H. Ali is an Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Vermont (with joint appointment at the School of Natural Resources) and on the adjunct faculty of the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University. He is currently involved in various research projects focusing on the causes of environmental conflicts between indigenous communities and mining companies and has authored a new book, Mining, the Environment and Indigenous Development Conflicts (published by the University of Arizona Press, fall 2003). Dr. Ali has worked as an environmental health and safety professional at General Electric (based at GE headquarters in Fairfield, CT, and at silicone resin manufacturing sites in New York). He has served as a consultant for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Health Canada as an Associate at the Boston-based consulting firm Industrial Economics Inc. Teaching experience includes courses on environmental planning, conflict resolution, industrial ecology, research methods and technical writing. Professor Ali received his doctorate in Environmental Planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), an M.E.S. in environmental law and policy from Yale University , and his Bachelors in Chemistry from Tufts University (summa cum laude).

***********************************************


**********************************************

Professor Mahmoud Hamid successfully presents his PhD thesis in Environmental Scarcity, Hydropolitics and the Nile: Population Concentration, Water Scarcity, and the Changing Domestic and Foreign Politics of the Sudan

By Prof. Mahmoud Hamid
Department of Environment, Peace and Security

My Ph.D. research is informed by recent debates on hydropolitics of international rivers, especially the due attention they paid to sub-regional and domestic water disputes along these rivers as the major cause of international tensions. Realising that such disputes are indeed important for understanding the dynamics of international river basins, my Ph.D. research explores the domestic water demands in the Sudan by investigating the social effects of environmental scarcity. The latter are manifest in a condition of chronic food insecurity, the consequent population displacement, disruption of institutions and social relations, and the often ultimate consequence of population concentration along river banks. In so doing, the research explores hydropolitical dynamics at two levels. Firstly, at the domestic level, it looks at the changing relationship between the Nile banks (i.e. the riverain zone) on the one hand and their surroundings (i.e. the non-riverain zone) in the Sudan on the other hand. Secondly, it investigates the change of Sudan’s attitude towards its Nile co-riparian states, namely the two major contestants over Nile waters, i.e. Egypt and Ethiopia. It investigates the extent to which Sudan’s recent change of attitude is a consequence of the domestic dynamics it is experiencing. 

Unlike arguments appealing to population increase as the cause of water scarcity, as predominates hydropolitical analyses, my Ph.D. study exhaustively presented the view that the water scarcity currently experienced at the domestic level in the Sudan is caused by environmental scarcity, precisely in causing the population of regions away from the Nile banks to concentrate along the banks of this river, namely in the arid and semi-arid downstream riverain zone. More precisely, water scarcity in the Sudan is caused by structural inequality in powers between groups of actors and regions initiated and reinforced through administrative, legal, and spatial regulations and economic development policies, particularly in stimulating large-scale resource capture and, therefore, causing ecological marginalisation. Water scarcity is largely caused by the way power is being played out—how the geopolitical importance of the Nile is conceived, how political alliances are formed in association with modern irrigation, and how agricultural lobbies influence the issues of land use, distribution, and conservation. An antecedent condition resides in Egypt’s haunting pre-1820 fear, which invoked its invasion of Sudan and had great influence on shaping power relations in the Sudan. I elaborately showed that the Nile water was at the core of the process of generating structural inequality associated with processes of coercive annexation of regions in a centralised political system with the Nile Valley becoming dominant over all other regions in the Sudan.

************************************************************

UPEACE New Staff 

Aileen Toohey, Doctor of Philosophy (Anthropology), Australian National University, Bachelor of Arts, University of Sydney, Bachelor of Commerce, University of Melbourne.

Assistant Professor, International Peace Studies – Manila Project Dual Campus, Department of Peace and Conflict Studies

Before joining UPEACE, Aileen worked as Senior Policy Officer, Blueprint for the Bush Project Team, Department of Communities, Queensland Government; Guest Lecturer & Tutor, School of Behavioural, Social Sciences and the Sciences and the Humanities, University of Ballarat; Fellow, Department of Sociology, National University of Singapore; Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Ateneo de Manila University.

Balazs Kovacs – Master of Arts in International Peace Studies, UPEACE, Doctor of Law (J.D.) Eötvös Loránd University of Sciences, Faculty of Law and Political Science.

Instructor, International Peace Studies – Manila Project Dual Campus, Department of Peace and Conflict Studies

Balazs’s last appointments were as Programme Officer at Freedom House Europe;  Legal Affairs Consultant – Municipality, 9th District, Budapest, Civil Servant - Ministry of Justice, Instructor - FEB’93 Foundation

************************************************************

Alumni Advocacy Project at the United Nations

UPEACE/US and UPEACE are co-sponsoring an initiative to send UPEACE alumni to the United Nations in New York on 17-29 June. The objective is to assemble an advocacy team of 6 - 8 UPEACE alumni to lobby UN Permanent Missions, foundations and NGOs in New York. Given the relationship between UPEACE and the United Nations, raising UPEACE’s profile and carrying on activities with the UN is a natural fit. More specifically, the lobbying session will be held with the aim of: (1) establishing, on a long-term basis, permanent scholarships to earn an MA at the UPEACE headquarters campus; (2) raising the profile of UPEACE at the United Nations and other relevant organizations; and (3) potentially creating opportunities for UPEACE students and alumni to do internships and find employment in the UN system or in NGOs. If you are interested in participating click here to download an application. Applications are due Wednesday, 18 April.

The UPEACE alumni advocacy project at the United Nations is first and foremost a unique and exciting opportunity to support the University for Peace and the cause of higher education for peace. The hope is to ensure through this project that other students from around the world are afforded the same chances to come to the UPEACE campus in Costa Rica and study systemic approaches to peace-building, peace-making, and peace-educating in existing UPEACE masters programs. The project will also involve many opportunities for educational enrichment and networking. Meetings with high level officials from the United Nations and the surrounding NGO community will be arranged for the alumni participants and media coverage is expected throughout.

For more information about the project including eligibility requirements and application details please visit the UPEACE/US website or request more information by emailing Nick Martin at unadvocacy@upeaceus.org. Additional details will follow in subsequent newsflashes. Click here to download an application.

************************************************************

News from our Alumni

University for Peace Alumni Coordination Team (UPACT)

Nicolas C. Martin
Co-Director UPEACE/US
Peace Education ‘06

With nearly three hundred graduates from over 60 countries, UPEACE is blessed to have one of the most globally diverse and inter-connected group of alumni in the world. Over the course of the past year there have been lots of conversations about the possibilities for this network and it has become clear in many of these exchanges that we have yet to realize the full potential of this impressive body. What also has become clear is that we do not lack the human resources necessary to recognize this potential. What we lack is an effective and simple mechanism for alumni to get involved.

As a result, several of us in Washington D.C. (Sabrina Sideris, Jamie Hess, Rebecca Harned, Beatrice Kirkbright, April Stanley, Dana Perry, Jessica Morey, Stephanie Gliege and Nick Martin) got together and offered a proposal to the administration at UPEACE last month to allow us to form the University for Peace Alumni Coordination Team (UPACT) to coordinate the global alumni outreach as we begin to look towards forming an alumni association.  Washington was chosen simply because there are around 35 alums here, many of whom able to meet on a regular basis, and because UPEACE/US has agreed to manage the initiative.  The hope however is to make this a global project by developing other regional hubs as soon as possible and with the help of alumni from around world.

At the moment we are in the process of revamping the alumni website with the help of UPEACE staff to include job postings, professional resources, photo/video galleries, an alumni newsletter, upcoming events and projects, and an interactive country-by-country map/database of UPEACE alumni activity. Beginning next month we will be launching a global contact campaign in an effort to get in touch with as many UPEACE alumni as possible. The hope is to compile accurate information regarding alumni whereabouts, professional endeavours, and any exciting stories they may wish to share. We have also received funding and are currently accepting applications for our first alumni initiative: a two-week advocacy project from June 17th to June 29th at the United Nations Headquarters to help set up scholarships for future UPEACE students and raise the profile of UPEACE in formal UN channels. More information is available in the article included in this Newsflash and on the UPEACE/US website.

Thank you to those alums who have agreed to help thus far.  However, we still welcome and need the support from more of you in order to achieve our goals.  In particular we are looking for class officers from each programme, country representatives, and task force members for the website, the newsletter, and the job database.  If you would like to get involved or would like more information about what these responsibilities entail then contact me (Nick Martin) at nmartin@upeaceus.org. Otherwise stay tuned for more details.

**************************************************************