Podcasts about europeanization

Was migration to Germany a blessing or a curse? The main argument of this book is that the Greek state conceived labor migration as a traineeship into Europeanization with its shiny varnish of progress. Jumping on a fully packed train to West Germany meant leaving the past behind. However, the tensed Cold War realities left no space for illusions; specters of the Nazi past and the Greek Civil War still haunted them all.  Adopting a transnational approach, The Greek Gastarbeiter in the Federal Republic of Germany (1960–1974) (de Gruyter, 2024) retargets attention to the sending state by exploring how the Greek Gastarbeiter's welfare was intrinsically connected with their homeland through its exercise of long-distance nationalism. Apart from its fresh take in postwar migration, the book also addresses methodological challenges in creative ways. The narrative alternates between the macro- and the micro-level, including subnational and transnational actors and integrating a diverse set of primary sources and voices. Avoiding the trap of exceptionalism, it contextualizes the Greek case in the Mediterranean and Southeast European experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Was migration to Germany a blessing or a curse? The main argument of this book is that the Greek state conceived labor migration as a traineeship into Europeanization with its shiny varnish of progress. Jumping on a fully packed train to West Germany meant leaving the past behind. However, the tensed Cold War realities left no space for illusions; specters of the Nazi past and the Greek Civil War still haunted them all.  Adopting a transnational approach, The Greek Gastarbeiter in the Federal Republic of Germany (1960–1974) (de Gruyter, 2024) retargets attention to the sending state by exploring how the Greek Gastarbeiter's welfare was intrinsically connected with their homeland through its exercise of long-distance nationalism. Apart from its fresh take in postwar migration, the book also addresses methodological challenges in creative ways. The narrative alternates between the macro- and the micro-level, including subnational and transnational actors and integrating a diverse set of primary sources and voices. Avoiding the trap of exceptionalism, it contextualizes the Greek case in the Mediterranean and Southeast European experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Was migration to Germany a blessing or a curse? The main argument of this book is that the Greek state conceived labor migration as a traineeship into Europeanization with its shiny varnish of progress. Jumping on a fully packed train to West Germany meant leaving the past behind. However, the tensed Cold War realities left no space for illusions; specters of the Nazi past and the Greek Civil War still haunted them all.  Adopting a transnational approach, The Greek Gastarbeiter in the Federal Republic of Germany (1960–1974) (de Gruyter, 2024) retargets attention to the sending state by exploring how the Greek Gastarbeiter's welfare was intrinsically connected with their homeland through its exercise of long-distance nationalism. Apart from its fresh take in postwar migration, the book also addresses methodological challenges in creative ways. The narrative alternates between the macro- and the micro-level, including subnational and transnational actors and integrating a diverse set of primary sources and voices. Avoiding the trap of exceptionalism, it contextualizes the Greek case in the Mediterranean and Southeast European experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/german-studies

Was migration to Germany a blessing or a curse? The main argument of this book is that the Greek state conceived labor migration as a traineeship into Europeanization with its shiny varnish of progress. Jumping on a fully packed train to West Germany meant leaving the past behind. However, the tensed Cold War realities left no space for illusions; specters of the Nazi past and the Greek Civil War still haunted them all.  Adopting a transnational approach, The Greek Gastarbeiter in the Federal Republic of Germany (1960–1974) (de Gruyter, 2024) retargets attention to the sending state by exploring how the Greek Gastarbeiter's welfare was intrinsically connected with their homeland through its exercise of long-distance nationalism. Apart from its fresh take in postwar migration, the book also addresses methodological challenges in creative ways. The narrative alternates between the macro- and the micro-level, including subnational and transnational actors and integrating a diverse set of primary sources and voices. Avoiding the trap of exceptionalism, it contextualizes the Greek case in the Mediterranean and Southeast European experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/eastern-european-studies

Was migration to Germany a blessing or a curse? The main argument of this book is that the Greek state conceived labor migration as a traineeship into Europeanization with its shiny varnish of progress. Jumping on a fully packed train to West Germany meant leaving the past behind. However, the tensed Cold War realities left no space for illusions; specters of the Nazi past and the Greek Civil War still haunted them all.  Adopting a transnational approach, The Greek Gastarbeiter in the Federal Republic of Germany (1960–1974) (de Gruyter, 2024) retargets attention to the sending state by exploring how the Greek Gastarbeiter's welfare was intrinsically connected with their homeland through its exercise of long-distance nationalism. Apart from its fresh take in postwar migration, the book also addresses methodological challenges in creative ways. The narrative alternates between the macro- and the micro-level, including subnational and transnational actors and integrating a diverse set of primary sources and voices. Avoiding the trap of exceptionalism, it contextualizes the Greek case in the Mediterranean and Southeast European experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Quelle influence l'Union européenne a-t-elle sur ses États membres ? Dans cet épisode, Maxime Forest, chercheur, enseignant à Sciences Po, revient sur le concept d'européanisation et l'évolution des politiques d'égalité en Europe. Il explique comment le clivage Est-Ouest autour des questions d'identité et d'égalité s'est transformé en un clivage pan-européen.--Lire la transcription écrite de l'épisode.--

Joining us today is Dr. Jon Mitchell, a Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Sussex. Dr. Mitchell is an expert in religious anthropology and researches questions of identity and political alignment in various regions… Dr. Mitchell's primary research site is Malta, an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. Here, he conducted his doctoral research during the 1990s – a time of rapid social and political transformation. Most recently, he has been researching the places and processes of belief while exploring the social, political, and economic significance of Maltese football.  Click play to find out: The difference between biblical archaeology and the anthropology of religion.  The effects of Europeanization on the island of Malta.  Why immigrants tend to cluster in specific industries.  The ways that pilgrimage sites impact surrounding economies. You can learn about Dr. Mitchell and his work here! Take advantage of a 5% discount on Ekster accessories by using the code FINDINGGENIUS. Enhance your style and functionality with premium accessories. Visit bit.ly/3uiVX9R to explore latest collection. Episode also available on Apple Podcasts: http://apple.co/30PvU9C

Dimitri and Khalid continue their multi-episode journey into the actually existing history of the geographic region known for millennia as Palestine, and the actually existing people who inhabited it under (mostly) uninterrupted Ottoman rule from 1516 to 1918. Part 6: Ottoman Palestine Before The Deluge, 1900-1913 Herzl's roundabout assimilationism and building a new Europe for Jews in the middle east, parallels to the Young Turk quest towards Europeanization, lighting your torch with someone else's flame… Swirling precursors to World War 1, the expanding economic and military relationship between Imperial Germany and the Ottomans, the Damascus-Medina-Hejaz Railway line, British fears about German-Ottoman friendship, the German military mission to Istanbul, grooming the future Young Turks, simmering Arab-Ottoman tensions, government surveys of the Palestinian population, and dracular parallels between Herzl and the 17th c. Ottoman Jewish false messiah Shabbatai Zevi. For access to premium episodes, the full SJ back catalog, show notes, and the Grotto of Truth Discord, subscribe to the Al-Wara' Frequency at patreon.com/subliminaljihad.

Joining us today is Dr. Jon Mitchell, a Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Sussex. Dr. Mitchell is an expert in religious anthropology and researches questions of identity and political alignment in various regions… Dr. Mitchell's primary research site is Malta, an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. Here, he conducted his doctoral research during the 1990s – a time of rapid social and political transformation. Most recently, he has been researching the places and processes of belief while exploring the social, political, and economic significance of Maltese football.  Click play to find out: The difference between biblical archaeology and the anthropology of religion.  The effects of Europeanization on the island of Malta.  Why immigrants tend to cluster in specific industries.  The ways that pilgrimage sites impact surrounding economies. You can learn about Dr. Mitchell and his work here! Take advantage of a 5% discount on Ekster accessories by using the code FINDINGGENIUS. Enhance your style and functionality with premium accessories. Visit bit.ly/3uiVX9R to explore latest collection. Episode also available on Apple Podcasts: http://apple.co/30PvU9C

Noah Smith and Erik Torenberg continue their analysis of the Israel-Gaza war, against the backdrop of shifting geopolitical power, increasing conflicts, and the end of Pax Americana. They also discuss why Noah expects a China-Taiwan conflict, and the possibility of WWIII. Daffy is offering Econ 102 listeners a free $25 for the charity of their choice when they join: https://www.daffy.org/econ102 -- Sponsors: GIVEWELL | DAFFY | NETSUITE  Have you ever wondered where your donation could have the most impact? GiveWell has now spent over 15 years researching charitable organizations and only directs funding to the highest impact opportunities they've found in global health and poverty alleviation. Make informed decisions about high-impact giving. If you've never donated through GiveWell before, you can have your donation matched up to $100 before the end of the year, or as long as matching funds last. To claim your match, go to givewell.org and pick “Podcast” and enter Econ 102 at checkout.  Daffy is the most modern and accessible donor-advised fund, making it easier to put money aside for charity. You can make your tax-deductible contributions all at once or set aside a little each week or month. And you don't just have to donate cash, you can easily contribute stocks, ETFs, or crypto. Plus, you never have to track receipts from your donations again. It's free to get started and Econ 102 listeners get $25 towards the charity of their choice. Daffy is offering Econ 102 listeners a free $25 for the charity of their choice when they join Daffy https://www.daffy.org/econ102  NetSuite has 25 years of providing financial software for all your business needs. More than 36,000 businesses have already upgraded to NetSuite by Oracle, gaining visibility and control over their financials, inventory, HR, eCommerce, and more. If you're looking for an ERP platform head to NetSuite http://netsuite.com/102 and download your own customized KPI checklist. -- RECOMMENDED PODCAST:  Every week investor and writer of the popular newsletter The Diff, Byrne Hobart, and co-host Erik Torenberg discuss today's major inflection points in technology, business, and markets – and help listeners build a diversified portfolio of trends and ideas for the future. Subscribe to “The Riff” with Byrne Hobart and Erik Torenberg: https://link.chtbl.com/theriff RECOMMENDED PODCAST: LIVE PLAYERS Join host Samo Burja and Erik Torenberg as they analyze the mindsets of today's most intriguing business leaders, investors, and innovators through the lens of their bold actions and contrarian worldviews. You'll come away with a deeper understanding of the development of technology, business, political power, culture and more. LIsten and subscribe everywhere you get your podcasts: https://link.chtbl.com/liveplayers. -- Econ 102 is a part of the Turpentine podcast network. To learn more: www.turpentine.co -- TIMESTAMPS: (00:00) Episode Preview (01:50) Commentary on the Israel-Hamas war (03:41) The idea that wars end (07:34) The US has lost its unipolar moment (09:12) Should Israel double Gaza's GDP to prevent violence? (15:05) Rich and aggressive?  (19:50) Sponsors: Daffy and NetSuite (22:02) Collapse of Pax Americana means countries feel safer declaring war (22:59) Hotspots for conflict: Azerbaijan and Armenia, Serbia and Kosovo (25:52) If China attacks Taiwan, what happens (29:32) How should international companies get ready? (31:12) Auditing supply chain (33:50) Recap of the tension between Taiwan and China (35:14) Strategic Ambiguity (38:11) Other key players in the Taiwan-China conflict (47:10) The Europeanization of the Ukraine war (50:17) We have nukes in Germany (51:03) Comparing Obama/Trump/Biden policies (53:37) What we're actually doing vs the illusion of what we're doing with Iran (54:26) How should the government get ready?

This series of podcast-interviews gives researchers from all over Europe a voice. We exchange views from different countries, talk about background specifics, and try to give an honest assessment of the state of the EU. In this episode we learn from António Raimundo about the specific situation in Portugal, the fact that in contrast to other European countries populism does not play a major role in Portugal, about the way the European integration is viewed in Portugal, and about the way the role of the so-called “smaller countries” within in the EU is evolving. António Raimundo is a Research Fellow at the Research Centre in Political Science of University of Minho. He holds a PhD in International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a Masters in European Politics from the Université Libre de Bruxelles. Recently he completed a postdoc on the Europeanization of Portuguese foreign policy and was part of the European research project “EU Foreign Policy Facing New Realities”. He has been Guest Lecturer in several Portuguese universities and has contributed to the “Yearbook of European Integration” of the Institut für Europäische Politik (IEP) as national expert on Portugal. His research has covered topics such as European integration, Europeanization, Portugal's European and foreign policy, Brexit and EU-Africa relations. Among other outlets, he has published in the Journal of European Integration, Journal of Contemporary European Studies and European Politics and Society. Notes: When debating the EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy, António at one point talks about "moving towards unanimity“, when he actually meant moving towards majority voting. The book António Raimundo mentioned is the Oxford Handbook of Portuguese Politics: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-portuguese-politics-9780192855404?cc=de&lang=en& Moderation: Felix Heidenreich (IZKT) A project produced in cooperation with the Public Library of Stuttgart and Stiftung Geißstraße Stuttgart.

In this conversation with assistant editor Lorena Drakula, Vjosa Musliu discusses her book Europeanization and State Building as Everyday Practices. Performing Europe in the Western Balkans (Routledge, 2021). The conversation critically examines mechanisms of Europeanization, discourses surrounding international interventions, and the processes of EU enlargement to the Western Balkans.

Omar Sadr talks to Bengi Gumrukcu on democratic backsliding, populism, Islamism in Turkey. Bengi Gumrukcu is lecturer of political science at Rutgers University. She studies various aspects of social movements, political parties, far right, violence and Europeanization and Euroscepticism, mainly focusing on the case of Turkey. Suggested readings: Bengi Gumrukcu. "Populist discourse, (counter-) mobilizations and democratic backsliding in Turkey”, Turkish Studies, 2022 Bengi Gumrukcu. "Forming Pre-Electoral Coalitions in Competitive Authoritarian Contexts: The Case of the 2018 Parliamentary Elections in Turkey,” Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern, 2022. Sebnem Gumuscu. Democracy or Authoritarianism Islamist Governments in Turkey, Egypt, and Tunisia. Cambridge University Press Hanspeter Kriesi. "Revisiting the Populist Challenge", Politologicky Casopis/ Czech Journal of Political Science. 2018. Connect with us! Google, Apple, Spotify, Anchor Twitter: @negotiateideas & @OmarSadr Email: negotiatingidea@gmail.com

Guests featured in this EpisodeGábor Tóka, Senior Research Fellow in the Vera and Donald Blinken Open Society Archives in Budapest.  A sociologist by training, he has published more than 60 articles on electoral behaviour, public opinion, political parties and democratic consolidation in edited volumes, political science and sociology journals. He is also the author of Post-Communist Party Systems: Competition, Representation, and Inter-Party Cooperation (Cambridge University Press, 1999), and has co-edited The Europeanization of National Polities (Oxford University Press, 2012). GLOSSARYWhat is Fidesz, the Hungarian political party ?(00:1:20 or p.1. in the transcript) Fidesz, by name of Federation of Young Democrats–Hungarian Civic Alliance, is a centre-right Hungarian political party. Fidesz (the Federation of Young Democrats) was founded in 1988 as an anticommunist party that promoted the development of a market economy and European integration.  Initially, membership was restricted to those age 35 and younger, though this restriction was eliminated in 1993. In 1995 the party appended the name Hungarian Civic Party to its shortened form (altered to Hungarian Civic Alliance in 2003). Fidesz had its first notable success in 1990, when candidates associated with a coalition of which Fidesz was a member won mayoralties in a number of cities. In elections to the National Assembly, Fidesz won 22 seats. In 1997 members of a Christian Democratic group that had dissolved joined Fidesz in the National Assembly, enabling the joint group to form the largest bloc. The following year Fidesz became the single largest party in the National Assembly. After some eight years of Socialist rule, Fidesz, capitalizing on Hungary's ongoing economic problems after the country's economic collapse in 2008, swept back into power in the parliamentary elections of April 2010, winning more than two-thirds of the seats. Fidesz and its junior electoral coalition partner, the Christian Democratic People's Party, repeated that feat in 2014 and again in 2018 and 2022, with Orbán returning as prime minister each time. Source:  What is The Visegrad Group? (00:22:12 or p.5 in the transcript) The Visegrad Group (V4) is an informal regional format of cooperation between the four Central European countries: Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary, which are not only linked by neighbourhood and similar geopolitical situation but above all by common history, traditions, culture, and values.The idea behind the Group was to intensify cooperation in building democratic state structures and free market economies and, in the long term, to participate in the process of European integration. The date of its creation is 15 February 1991, when the Presidents of Poland and Czechoslovakia, Lech Wałęsa and Václav Havel, and Prime Minister of Hungary József Antall signed a joint declaration on the objectives and conditions of cooperation in the Hungarian town of Visegrad.Since 2004, all V4 countries have been members of the European Union, and the Visegrad Group provides a forum for exchanging experiences and working out common positions on issues relevant to the future of the region and the EU.In addition to European issues, V4 cooperation focuses primarily on matters concerning Central Europe, exchange of information, and cooperation in culture, science, education and youth exchanges. Priority areas include expanding transport infrastructure and strengthening energy security in the region. Source:  Democracy in Question? is brought to you by:• Central European University: CEU• The Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy in Geneva: AHCD• The Podcast Company: Novel Follow us on social media!• Central European University: @CEU• Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy in Geneva: @AHDCentreSubscribe to the show. If you enjoyed what you listened to, you can support us by leaving a review and sharing our podcast in your networks! 

Dr. Megan Brown discusses how post-independence Algeria remained a part of a pan-European project, as it existed in a legal limbo following its independence. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gary: Today’s special episode is an interview with Dr. Megan Brown. Brown received her Ph.D. from City University of New York, and she currently teaches modern French history at Swarthmore College. The following interview discusses her new book, The Seventh Member State: Algeria, France and the European Community, published by Harvard University Press. The book […]

In this conversation with RevDem editor Ferenc Laczó regarding contemporary Turkey, Dimitar Bechev discusses how the Justice and Development Party has evolved into a personality cult; how Erdogan pro-active, remilitarized foreign policy has probably reached its limits; how leverage now goes both ways in EU-Turkey relations while Europeanization may also mean a turn to xenophobia; as well as the promising signs of democratic health and political competition.

Writer, researcher, and Chairperson of the Institute for Global Analytics, Rumena Filipova joins host Am Johal to discuss her latest book, Constructing the Limits of Europe: Identity and Foreign Policy in Poland, Bulgaria, and Russia since 1989. Rumena speaks to how dominant conceptions of national identity have shaped the foreign policy behaviour of the Balkan states, Hungary and Russia. She explores the internal politics of European Union member states, the competing regional forces of Europeanization and their impact on traditions of national identity. Am and Rumena discuss the rise of right-wing populism worldwide and how climate change could exacerbate existing geopolitical tensions. This episode also highlights the way national identities can be in flux, and how activists and local community organizers are reasserting liberal democratic norms and their rights through protest. Full episode details: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/158-rumena-filipova.html Read the transcript: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/transcripts/158-rumena-filipova.html Resources: — Institute for Global Analytics: https://globalanalytics-bg.org/ — Constructing the Limits of Europe Identity and Foreign Policy in Poland, Bulgaria, and Russia since 1989: https://cup.columbia.edu/book/constructing-the-limits-of-europe/9783838216492 — Episode 21: Do we really know what democracy is? — with Astra Taylor: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/21-astra-taylor.html — Episode 129: Fascism, Fanaticism and Neoliberalism — with Alberto Toscano: https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast/episodes/129-alberto-toscano.html — Europe and right-wing nationalism: A country-by-country guide: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36130006 — Serbia halts China-owned mine over environmental breaches: https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/serbia-halts-china-owned-mine-over-environmental-breaches-2021-04-14/ Bio: Dr. Rumena Filipova studied Political Science and International Relations at Cambridge and Oxford and she is Chairperson and Co-Founder of the Institute for Global Analytics. Rumena's main research interests focus on the politics and international relations of Central and Eastern Europe, with a particular reference to questions of identity, media and disinformation, and the authoritarian influence exercised by Russia and China in the region. Constructing the Limits of Europe: Identity and Foreign Policy in Poland, Bulgaria, and Russia since 1989, is Rumena's latest book and will be published in April, 2022.

Find out more on our website: https://bit.ly/3swoC8l For many observers, the European Union is mired in a deep crisis. Between sluggish growth; political turmoil following a decade of austerity politics; Brexit; and the rise of Asian influence, the EU is seen as a declining power on the world stage. Columbia Law professor Anu Bradford argues the opposite in her important new book The Brussels Effect: the EU remains an influential superpower that shapes the world in its image. By promulgating regulations that shape the international business environment, elevating standards worldwide, and leading to a notable Europeanization of many important aspects of global commerce, the EU has managed to shape policy in areas such as data privacy, consumer health and safety, environmental protection, antitrust, and online hate speech. And in contrast to how superpowers wield their global influence, the Brussels Effect - a phrase first coined by Bradford in 2012- absolves the EU from playing a direct role in imposing standards, as market forces alone are often sufficient as multinational companies voluntarily extend the EU rule to govern their global operations. In this webinar, Bradford will explain how the EU has acquired such power, why multinational companies use EU standards as global standards, and why the EU's role as the world's regulator is likely to outlive its gradual economic decline, extending the EU's influence long into the future. Speaker: A leading scholar on the EU's regulatory power and a sought-after commentator on the European Union and Brexit, Anu Bradford coined the term the Brussels Effect to describe the European Union's outsize influence on global markets. Most recently, she is the author of The Brussels Effect: How the European Union Rules the World , named one of the best books of 2020 by the Foreign Affairs. Bradford is also an expert in international trade law and antitrust law. She spearheads the Comparative Competition Law Project, which has built a comprehensive global data set of antitrust laws and enforcement across time and jurisdictions. The project, a joint effort between the Law School and the University of Chicago Law School, covers more than a century of regulation in over 100 countries and has been the basis for Bradford's recent empirical research on the antitrust regimes used to regulate markets. Before joining the Law School faculty in 2012, Bradford was an assistant professor at the University of Chicago Law School. She also practiced EU and antitrust law in Brussels and has served as an adviser on economic policy in the Parliament of Finland and as an expert assistant at the European Parliament. The World Economic Forum named her Young Global Leader '10. At the Law School, Bradford is the director of the European Legal Studies Center, which trains students for leadership roles in European law, public affairs, and the global economy. She is also a Senior Scholar at Columbia Business School's Jerome A. Chazen Institute for Global Business and a nonresident scholar at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Join Harry and Philip as they continue their analysis of dictatorship! This week, we turn to midcentury Portugal to apply the "stationary bandit" theory from our last Bird's Eye. Was António de Oliveira Salazar, the autocratic ruler of Portugal from 1932 to 1968, an example of the stationary bandit? How well does Olson's theory hold up in a historical study of dictatorship? Listen and find out! -- https://www.spectacles.news/insight-normalcy-an-inadequate-solution-in-a-changing-world/#/portal/ (Visit our website and subscribe to our newsletter!)https://www.spectacles.news/birds-eye-the-bandit-in-portugal/ (To comment on this episode, click here!)https://spectacles-insight.captivate.fm/listen (To listen to written articles from Spectacles read aloud, click here!)https://twitter.com/SpectaclesMedia (Follow us on Twitter!)-- Further Reading"Dictatorship, Democracy, and Development," by Mancur Olson, in The American Political Science Review. Property Without Rights, by Michael Albertus. The Revolution Within the Revolution, by Nancy Bermeo. Development of the Portuguese Economy: A Case of Europeanization, by David Corkill. The Portuguese Revolution: State and Class in the Transition to Democracy, by Ronald H. Chilcote. "Salazar's Ministerial Elite, 1932-1968," by Paul H. Lewis in The Journal of Politics. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Salazar/EtmJAwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Oliveira%20Salazar&pg=PA88&printsec=frontcover&bsq=Oliveira%20Salazar (Salazar: A Political Biography), by Filipe Ribeiro De Meneses. Wikipedia pages for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ant%C3%B3nio_de_Oliveira_Salazar (António de Oliveira Salazar), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estado_Novo_(Portugal) (Estado Novo (Portugal)), and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnation_Revolution (Carnation Revolution). -- Table of Contents00:00 - Intro & Housekeeping 00:32 - The common human longing for enlightened dictatorship 01:41 - Today's subject: Salazar 02:21 - Recap 05:50 - A brief bio of Salazar 09:40 - How was Olson right? 14:40 - What did he miss? 25:41 - The feasibility of autocracy in a globalized world 29:57 - Don't be deceived by the appeals of dictatorship 33:20 - Signing off

Jovana Babović’s Metropolitan Belgrade: Culture and Class in Interwar Yugoslavia (University of Pittsburgh Press) examines the ways in which middle-class Belgraders negotiated metropolitan modernity in the interwar era. Defying the historiographical conventions of its field, the book unearths leisure activities that captured the attention of Belgrade urbanites in the 1920s and 1930s. The capital of the newly unified Yugoslavia, Belgrade was gradually integrated into transnational entertainment networks, as jazz, film, and cabaret streamed into the city from abroad. Belgrade’s middle-class residents consumed foreign popular culture as a symbol of their participation in European metropolitan modernity. The pleasures they derived from entertainment, however, stood at odds with their civic duty of promoting highbrow culture and nurturing the Serbian nation within the Yugoslav state. Ultimately, middle-class Belgraders learned to reconcile their leisure indulgences by defining them as bourgeois refinement. As they endowed foreign entertainment with higher cultural value, they edged out domestic performers and their lower-class patrons from urban life. Metropolitan Belgrade tells the story of how the Europeanization of the city’s middle class led to spatial segregation, cultural stratification, and the destruction of the Yugoslav entertainment industry. Jovana Babović is an Assistant Professor of History at SUNY Geneseo and a historian of urban life and popular culture in twentieth-century Eastern Europe. Vladislav Lilić is a doctoral candidate in Modern European History at Vanderbilt University. His research focuses on the place and persistence of quasi-sovereignty in late Ottoman and post-Ottoman Southeastern Europe. Vladislav’s other fields of interest include the socio-legal history of empire, global history of statehood, and the history of international thought. You can reach him at vladislav.lilic@vanderbilt.edu. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jovana Babović’s Metropolitan Belgrade: Culture and Class in Interwar Yugoslavia (University of Pittsburgh Press) examines the ways in which middle-class Belgraders negotiated metropolitan modernity in the interwar era. Defying the historiographical conventions of its field, the book unearths leisure activities that captured the attention of Belgrade urbanites in the 1920s and 1930s. The capital of the newly unified Yugoslavia, Belgrade was gradually integrated into transnational entertainment networks, as jazz, film, and cabaret streamed into the city from abroad. Belgrade’s middle-class residents consumed foreign popular culture as a symbol of their participation in European metropolitan modernity. The pleasures they derived from entertainment, however, stood at odds with their civic duty of promoting highbrow culture and nurturing the Serbian nation within the Yugoslav state. Ultimately, middle-class Belgraders learned to reconcile their leisure indulgences by defining them as bourgeois refinement. As they endowed foreign entertainment with higher cultural value, they edged out domestic performers and their lower-class patrons from urban life. Metropolitan Belgrade tells the story of how the Europeanization of the city’s middle class led to spatial segregation, cultural stratification, and the destruction of the Yugoslav entertainment industry. Jovana Babović is an Assistant Professor of History at SUNY Geneseo and a historian of urban life and popular culture in twentieth-century Eastern Europe. Vladislav Lilić is a doctoral candidate in Modern European History at Vanderbilt University. His research focuses on the place and persistence of quasi-sovereignty in late Ottoman and post-Ottoman Southeastern Europe. Vladislav’s other fields of interest include the socio-legal history of empire, global history of statehood, and the history of international thought. You can reach him at vladislav.lilic@vanderbilt.edu. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jovana Babović’s Metropolitan Belgrade: Culture and Class in Interwar Yugoslavia (University of Pittsburgh Press) examines the ways in which middle-class Belgraders negotiated metropolitan modernity in the interwar era. Defying the historiographical conventions of its field, the book unearths leisure activities that captured the attention of Belgrade urbanites in the 1920s and 1930s. The capital of the newly unified Yugoslavia, Belgrade was gradually integrated into transnational entertainment networks, as jazz, film, and cabaret streamed into the city from abroad. Belgrade’s middle-class residents consumed foreign popular culture as a symbol of their participation in European metropolitan modernity. The pleasures they derived from entertainment, however, stood at odds with their civic duty of promoting highbrow culture and nurturing the Serbian nation within the Yugoslav state. Ultimately, middle-class Belgraders learned to reconcile their leisure indulgences by defining them as bourgeois refinement. As they endowed foreign entertainment with higher cultural value, they edged out domestic performers and their lower-class patrons from urban life. Metropolitan Belgrade tells the story of how the Europeanization of the city’s middle class led to spatial segregation, cultural stratification, and the destruction of the Yugoslav entertainment industry. Jovana Babović is an Assistant Professor of History at SUNY Geneseo and a historian of urban life and popular culture in twentieth-century Eastern Europe. Vladislav Lilić is a doctoral candidate in Modern European History at Vanderbilt University. His research focuses on the place and persistence of quasi-sovereignty in late Ottoman and post-Ottoman Southeastern Europe. Vladislav’s other fields of interest include the socio-legal history of empire, global history of statehood, and the history of international thought. You can reach him at vladislav.lilic@vanderbilt.edu. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jovana Babović’s Metropolitan Belgrade: Culture and Class in Interwar Yugoslavia (University of Pittsburgh Press) examines the ways in which middle-class Belgraders negotiated metropolitan modernity in the interwar era. Defying the historiographical conventions of its field, the book unearths leisure activities that captured the attention of Belgrade urbanites in the 1920s and 1930s. The capital of the newly unified Yugoslavia, Belgrade was gradually integrated into transnational entertainment networks, as jazz, film, and cabaret streamed into the city from abroad. Belgrade’s middle-class residents consumed foreign popular culture as a symbol of their participation in European metropolitan modernity. The pleasures they derived from entertainment, however, stood at odds with their civic duty of promoting highbrow culture and nurturing the Serbian nation within the Yugoslav state. Ultimately, middle-class Belgraders learned to reconcile their leisure indulgences by defining them as bourgeois refinement. As they endowed foreign entertainment with higher cultural value, they edged out domestic performers and their lower-class patrons from urban life. Metropolitan Belgrade tells the story of how the Europeanization of the city’s middle class led to spatial segregation, cultural stratification, and the destruction of the Yugoslav entertainment industry. Jovana Babović is an Assistant Professor of History at SUNY Geneseo and a historian of urban life and popular culture in twentieth-century Eastern Europe. Vladislav Lilić is a doctoral candidate in Modern European History at Vanderbilt University. His research focuses on the place and persistence of quasi-sovereignty in late Ottoman and post-Ottoman Southeastern Europe. Vladislav’s other fields of interest include the socio-legal history of empire, global history of statehood, and the history of international thought. You can reach him at vladislav.lilic@vanderbilt.edu. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do we feel about the ultra rich? And what is going on right now with spices? [27:25] This week, Joey, Jess, and Aaron talk about microschools, income inequality, "unfairness," the different kinds of cinnamon, "elevating comfort foods", and spicing up your life. They don't talk about how Bill Gates actually was pretty darn close guessing the price of floss. references Microschooling in a tweet Vice: Bill Gates estimates the market price of groceries (Corrections Department: the Totino's pizza rolls were $8.98) California Estates YouTube The latest $6M from Ross and Blau An Abigail Disney interview DashMarts Vox: Cancelling Goya, explained Yun Hai Taiwanese Pantry Check out spices from Diaspora Co. Extraneous reads on the Europeanization of international foods: the gentrification of Asian cuisine, food gentrification and Anthony Bourdain, "ethnic food", and most recently, Priya Krishna and Yewande Komolafe on whitewashing in recipe writing

Trevor clears up the misconception about the "Europeanization of the Council of Nicea in 325 AD" as claimed by Dr. Umar Johnson. Check out the episode to learn what really happened at the Council of Nicea; why the meeting was called and what was accomplished.Please feel free to donate towards our efforts of expanding the podcast:CashApp: $tbthosea46PayPal: paypal.me/tbthosea46 Find us on social media at:IG @tbthosea46FB: facebook.com/tbthosea46Twitter: @tbthosea46

Ever go backpacking through Europe? In Backpack Ambassadors: How Youth Travel Integrated Europe (University of Chicago Press, 2017), Richard Ivan Jobs traces the postwar cultural history of the making of Europe through the stories and perspectives of the young people who moved across the continent’s borders. A history of European integration from the end of the Second World War to the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht, the book emphasizes the roles that young people played in postwar recovery and reconciliation efforts, their participation in Europeanization, the upheavals of 1968, and the ways that young people’s movements were circumscribed by the Cold War and transformed by its end. Backpack Ambassadors examines the emergence of a “community of practice” defined by young people themselves, a community complicated by gender, class, race, and other differences. While youth are the key agents in this history, the book also considers the policies, programs, and regulations of the states that sought to encourage and manage the movement of young travelers across Europe in various ways. Transnational in subject and method, the chapters of the book draw on multiple archives and sources from several countries, including interviews with former backpackers and the experiences of the author himself. Absorbing in its myriad stories and compelling in its analysis, Backpack Ambassadors is a must-read for anyone interested in research and writing that connects culture and politics while pushing past the limits of national history. Highly readable and human in its approach, the book is also a fantastic resource for those teaching European integration at the undergraduate or graduate levels. Roxanne Panchasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. Her current research focuses on the representation of nuclear weapons and testing in France and its empire since 1945. She lives and reads in Vancouver, Canada. If you have a recent title to suggest for the podcast, please send an email to: panchasi@sfu.ca. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever go backpacking through Europe? In Backpack Ambassadors: How Youth Travel Integrated Europe (University of Chicago Press, 2017), Richard Ivan Jobs traces the postwar cultural history of the making of Europe through the stories and perspectives of the young people who moved across the continent's borders. A history of European integration from the end of the Second World War to the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht, the book emphasizes the roles that young people played in postwar recovery and reconciliation efforts, their participation in Europeanization, the upheavals of 1968, and the ways that young people's movements were circumscribed by the Cold War and transformed by its end. Backpack Ambassadors examines the emergence of a “community of practice” defined by young people themselves, a community complicated by gender, class, race, and other differences. While youth are the key agents in this history, the book also considers the policies, programs, and regulations of the states that sought to encourage and manage the movement of young travelers across Europe in various ways. Transnational in subject and method, the chapters of the book draw on multiple archives and sources from several countries, including interviews with former backpackers and the experiences of the author himself. Absorbing in its myriad stories and compelling in its analysis, Backpack Ambassadors is a must-read for anyone interested in research and writing that connects culture and politics while pushing past the limits of national history. Highly readable and human in its approach, the book is also a fantastic resource for those teaching European integration at the undergraduate or graduate levels. Roxanne Panchasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. Her current research focuses on the representation of nuclear weapons and testing in France and its empire since 1945. She lives and reads in Vancouver, Canada. If you have a recent title to suggest for the podcast, please send an email to: panchasi@sfu.ca. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever go backpacking through Europe? In Backpack Ambassadors: How Youth Travel Integrated Europe (University of Chicago Press, 2017), Richard Ivan Jobs traces the postwar cultural history of the making of Europe through the stories and perspectives of the young people who moved across the continent’s borders. A history of European integration from the end of the Second World War to the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht, the book emphasizes the roles that young people played in postwar recovery and reconciliation efforts, their participation in Europeanization, the upheavals of 1968, and the ways that young people’s movements were circumscribed by the Cold War and transformed by its end. Backpack Ambassadors examines the emergence of a “community of practice” defined by young people themselves, a community complicated by gender, class, race, and other differences. While youth are the key agents in this history, the book also considers the policies, programs, and regulations of the states that sought to encourage and manage the movement of young travelers across Europe in various ways. Transnational in subject and method, the chapters of the book draw on multiple archives and sources from several countries, including interviews with former backpackers and the experiences of the author himself. Absorbing in its myriad stories and compelling in its analysis, Backpack Ambassadors is a must-read for anyone interested in research and writing that connects culture and politics while pushing past the limits of national history. Highly readable and human in its approach, the book is also a fantastic resource for those teaching European integration at the undergraduate or graduate levels. Roxanne Panchasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. Her current research focuses on the representation of nuclear weapons and testing in France and its empire since 1945. She lives and reads in Vancouver, Canada. If you have a recent title to suggest for the podcast, please send an email to: panchasi@sfu.ca. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever go backpacking through Europe? In Backpack Ambassadors: How Youth Travel Integrated Europe (University of Chicago Press, 2017), Richard Ivan Jobs traces the postwar cultural history of the making of Europe through the stories and perspectives of the young people who moved across the continent’s borders. A history of European integration from the end of the Second World War to the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht, the book emphasizes the roles that young people played in postwar recovery and reconciliation efforts, their participation in Europeanization, the upheavals of 1968, and the ways that young people’s movements were circumscribed by the Cold War and transformed by its end. Backpack Ambassadors examines the emergence of a “community of practice” defined by young people themselves, a community complicated by gender, class, race, and other differences. While youth are the key agents in this history, the book also considers the policies, programs, and regulations of the states that sought to encourage and manage the movement of young travelers across Europe in various ways. Transnational in subject and method, the chapters of the book draw on multiple archives and sources from several countries, including interviews with former backpackers and the experiences of the author himself. Absorbing in its myriad stories and compelling in its analysis, Backpack Ambassadors is a must-read for anyone interested in research and writing that connects culture and politics while pushing past the limits of national history. Highly readable and human in its approach, the book is also a fantastic resource for those teaching European integration at the undergraduate or graduate levels. Roxanne Panchasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. Her current research focuses on the representation of nuclear weapons and testing in France and its empire since 1945. She lives and reads in Vancouver, Canada. If you have a recent title to suggest for the podcast, please send an email to: panchasi@sfu.ca. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever go backpacking through Europe? In Backpack Ambassadors: How Youth Travel Integrated Europe (University of Chicago Press, 2017), Richard Ivan Jobs traces the postwar cultural history of the making of Europe through the stories and perspectives of the young people who moved across the continent’s borders. A history of European integration from the end of the Second World War to the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht, the book emphasizes the roles that young people played in postwar recovery and reconciliation efforts, their participation in Europeanization, the upheavals of 1968, and the ways that young people’s movements were circumscribed by the Cold War and transformed by its end. Backpack Ambassadors examines the emergence of a “community of practice” defined by young people themselves, a community complicated by gender, class, race, and other differences. While youth are the key agents in this history, the book also considers the policies, programs, and regulations of the states that sought to encourage and manage the movement of young travelers across Europe in various ways. Transnational in subject and method, the chapters of the book draw on multiple archives and sources from several countries, including interviews with former backpackers and the experiences of the author himself. Absorbing in its myriad stories and compelling in its analysis, Backpack Ambassadors is a must-read for anyone interested in research and writing that connects culture and politics while pushing past the limits of national history. Highly readable and human in its approach, the book is also a fantastic resource for those teaching European integration at the undergraduate or graduate levels. Roxanne Panchasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. Her current research focuses on the representation of nuclear weapons and testing in France and its empire since 1945. She lives and reads in Vancouver, Canada. If you have a recent title to suggest for the podcast, please send an email to: panchasi@sfu.ca. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever go backpacking through Europe? In Backpack Ambassadors: How Youth Travel Integrated Europe (University of Chicago Press, 2017), Richard Ivan Jobs traces the postwar cultural history of the making of Europe through the stories and perspectives of the young people who moved across the continent’s borders. A history of European integration from the end of the Second World War to the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht, the book emphasizes the roles that young people played in postwar recovery and reconciliation efforts, their participation in Europeanization, the upheavals of 1968, and the ways that young people’s movements were circumscribed by the Cold War and transformed by its end. Backpack Ambassadors examines the emergence of a “community of practice” defined by young people themselves, a community complicated by gender, class, race, and other differences. While youth are the key agents in this history, the book also considers the policies, programs, and regulations of the states that sought to encourage and manage the movement of young travelers across Europe in various ways. Transnational in subject and method, the chapters of the book draw on multiple archives and sources from several countries, including interviews with former backpackers and the experiences of the author himself. Absorbing in its myriad stories and compelling in its analysis, Backpack Ambassadors is a must-read for anyone interested in research and writing that connects culture and politics while pushing past the limits of national history. Highly readable and human in its approach, the book is also a fantastic resource for those teaching European integration at the undergraduate or graduate levels. Roxanne Panchasi is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. Her current research focuses on the representation of nuclear weapons and testing in France and its empire since 1945. She lives and reads in Vancouver, Canada. If you have a recent title to suggest for the podcast, please send an email to: panchasi@sfu.ca. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tonight we spoke to attorney LAWRENCE KOGAN about the Europeanization of the US, the real impact of the Deep State and the terrible power it wields against everyday American citizens. The Deep State exists and your property rights -- as well as other rights -- are being sacrificed. Power to the people? No; power to the government.

This week at In The Past Lane, the history podcast, we present Part 2 of our multi-episode examination of the Gilded Age. In this episode, we take a hard look at the dark side of the Gilded Age – all the troubling trends that challenged the ebullient celebration of progress in the late 19th century. We’ll start by talking about the broad fear that the US was becoming Europeanized – not ethnically, but rather politically and socially. If the great fear in the 20th century was that America might descend into communism, the 19th century equivalent was that America would regress towards Europeanism – that is, become a society dominated by an entrenched aristocracy, fixed social classes, stifled opportunity, and incessant social unrest. Then we’ll examine the key trends that stoked this fear of creeping Europeanization – the rise of powerful corporations, the extraordinary and undemocratic political power wielded by industrialists, the sense among workers and farmers that upward mobility was diminishing due to manipulation of the economy by big business, the troubling arrogance of “robber baron” industrialists, and the soaring incidence of labor-capital conflict. Among the many things discussed in this episode:  What troubling trends in the Gilded Age challenged the notion that it was an era of progress? What was different about the modern corporations that emerged in the Gilded Age. Why some Americans have always feared monopoly power. Why did many Americans in the Gilded Age fear the US was regressing towards a European-style society of inequality, aristocracy, and stifled opportunity? How and why the wealthy of the Gilded Age adopted the opulent lifestyles of European aristocrats. Why many Americans in the Gilded Age were concerned about the soaring number of labor strikes. Why American workers and farmers in the Gilded Age believed that big business was stifling their opportunities for success and upward mobility. How Gilded Age Americans came to fear the undemocratic political power of Big Business. Recommended reading:  Sven Beckert, The Monied Metropolis: New York City and the Consolidation of the American Bourgeoisie, 1850-1896 (2001) Rebecca Edwards, New Spirits: Americans in the Gilded Age: 1865-1905 (2006) Michael McGerr, A Fierce Discontent: The Rise and Fall of the Progressive Movement in America, 1870-1920 (2003) Edward T. O’Donnell, Henry George and the Crisis of Inequality: Progress and Poverty in the Gilded Age (2015) Nell Irvin Painter, Standing at Armageddon: A Grassroots History of the Progressive Era (1987) Heather Cox Richardson, The Death of Reconstruction: Race, Labor, and Politics in the Post-Civil War North, 1865-1901 (2001) Richard White, The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States during Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, 1865-1896 (Oxford, 2017) Recommended Viewing: PBS's American Experience documentary, "The Gilded Age"  Related ITPL Podcast Episodes: Episode 052 What Was the Gilded Age? Part 1  http://inthepastlane.com/episode-052/ Episode 044 with Richard White on the Gilded Age and Reconstruction http://inthepastlane.com/episode-044/  Music for This Episode Jay Graham, ITPL Intro (JayGMusic.com) Kevin McCleod, “Impact Moderato” (Free Music Archive) Jon Luc Hefferman, “Winter Trek” (Free Music Archive) The Bell, “I Am History” (Free Music Archive) Production Credits Executive Producer: Lulu Spencer Technical Advisors: Holly Hunt and Jesse Anderson Podcasting Consultant: Darrell Darnell of Pro Podcast Solutions Photographer: John Buckingham Graphic Designer: Maggie Cellucci Website by: ERI Design Legal services: Tippecanoe and Tyler Too Social Media management: The Pony Express Risk Assessment: Little Big Horn Associates Growth strategies: 54 40 or Fight © In The Past Lane, 2018

Kamran Bokhari and Jacob L. Shapiro discuss where IS came from, the history and politics of radical Islam, and what happens if IS is defeated in Raqqa. Sign up for free updates on topics like this! Go here: hubs.ly/H06mXwR0 TRANSCRIPT: JS: Hello, my name is Jacob Shapiro, I'm broadcasting today from Avignon, in the south of France. I'm joined by Kamran Bokhari, who I believe is in Washington, D.C. Is that right Kamran? KB: Yes I am. JS: I'm joined by Kamran Bokhari who is our senior analyst and who focuses on the Middle East, and we're going to be talking a little bit about ISIS. Thanks for joining us Kamran. KB: Pleasure to be here. JS: So, Kamran, I thought instead of talking about every single battle and every single report that seems to indicate ISIS is imminently falling, we might take a broader look at the subject for our listeners. So, how about we just start with a rather broad question – tell me about how ISIS started. How did ISIS come to be in the middle of Syria and Iraq? KB: Well if you recall, Jacob, this happened in the wake of regime change, or regime collapse, in Iraq, when the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, toppled the Saddam government and has since been unable to form a viable state. And it was not just the lack of a state, but it also brought to the fore forces that were until then very much contained under the autocratic leadership of the Baathist regime. And so what we had was the disenfranchisement of the Sunnis, the rise of the Shiites and of course the rise of the Kurds, in the form of regional autonomy. ISIS did not exist, in fact, there were hardly any Islamist groups of any shade in Iraq, but in war, especially when you have the sectarian problem in the Middle East where the Sunnis and the Shia are struggling with one another – yes, the Sunni government came down, but it's not like the Shiites were able to establish their own government. There was a window of opportunity in which the founders of ISIS, particularly Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who founded what used to be called al-Qaida in Iraq, laid the foundation for ISIS. And as the years rolled on, ISIS continued to gain strength from the conflict that was brewing. It was a complex conflict. There were Shiites fighting Shiites, Shiites fighting Sunnis, Sunnis fighting Kurds and Sunnis fighting the United States. So in that complex warlike scenario, that's where we find the birth of ISIS. JS: Yes, well, as usual in the Middle East, everybody is fighting everybody and it's all complicated. But so there's a lot there to unpack. So how about we start with this: You mentioned that the original name of ISIS was al-Qaida in Iraq and you also said that ISIS began, or really, its generation point came in 2003 after the U.S. invasion of Iraq. How about we go back a little step further, and can you talk about the relationship between al-Qaida and between ISIS and what the relationship was and how it's developed? KB: If we go back to the aftermath of 9/11 and after the United States invaded Afghanistan and destroyed the infrastructure of al-Qaida, disrupted its operations, forcing al-Qaida, the original organization, to disperse and relocate largely in northwestern Pakistan. Al-Qaida had basically very little power projection capability at that point. I'm talking between 2001 and 2003. And at that point in time, it seemed like al-Qaida's purpose for staging the 9/11 attacks, which was to bait the United States into militarily acting in a very large way in the Middle East, in the heart of the Muslim world, that didn't succeed. The United States sent in a small force, largely special operations forces and intelligence operatives and later NATO forces came in, but originally it was Afghan forces on the ground who toppled the Taliban regime. That didn't produce the kind of effect that al-Qaida was hoping for. But then when the United States invaded Iraq, that was an opportunity. But al-Qaida didn't have any horses in this race. Al-Qaida could not reach Iraq. But Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who ran his own jihadist training camp in Afghanistan pre-9/11, was able to make his way from Afghanistan between 2001, and by the time the United States invaded Iraq in the spring of 2003, he had set up his shop in the Sunni areas in northern Iraq. And he was able to take advantage of that vacuum that was created with the fall of the Saddam regime and he began an insurgency. But at that point in time his group used to be called something like Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad and it wasn't even called al-Qaida. But this individual and this outfit were on the ground, al-Qaida was at a distance. Both needed each other. Zarqawi's outfit was not getting the kind of coverage or the kind of support, financially or otherwise, because it was an unknown quantity. Al-Qaida was a brand at the time and therefore it was a marriage of convenience. Bin Laden and Zawahiri and al-Qaida, the original organization, or what was left of it, did not have the ability to act in Iraq. These guys were acting, so they formed an alliance and Zarqawi became the leader of what became the al-Qaida branch in Iraq. And that's sort of where these guys started to work together. Operationally, Zarqawi was his own guy, he didn't have to report on a daily basis, he did what he thought was right and he was essentially following strategic guidance from Bin Laden and the top leadership, to the extent that he cared to do that. But it was an arrangement that worked for a while. But effectively, Zarqawi became more and more powerful and at one point, he didn't really need to report back. He never rebelled, in his lifetime, he was killed in 2006, and by that time his group was institutionalized to the point where his successors were able to take the group to the next level. And as the years rolled on, until the United States in 2007-2008 were able to get the Sunnis to turn against Zarqawi and his al-Qaida in Iraq, these guys had put down quite a bit of roots inside the country. And therefore, I think that's where the foundation was laid. Now, everything that's happened since is sort of building upon this foundation. JS: Well if I can – I'll stop you there and I'll just say, one of the interesting things that you're saying is that Zarqawi wasn't in Iraq. But you also said that one of al-Qaida's original goals was to draw the United States into the Middle East. Another of al-Qaida's goals was to try and demonstrate to much of the Islamic world, especially the Arab world, that all of these secular dictatorships, or dictatorships that had been propped up by the West, had no legitimacy. They thought if they could bring the United States in and if they could show the people of the Middle East that their regimes had no legitimacy that there would be some kind of popular revolt. So they didn't – they weren't able to bring the United States into the Middle East right away, but the fact that Zarqawi was able to get himself to Iraq and found there a very fertile ground for recruits indicates that perhaps Bin Laden, and al-Qaida in general, had a much better assessment of the level of discontent in that part of the world than anybody else. Would you agree with that characterization? KB: I would, but I would also say that this wasn't sort of – this was one of those things that they, al-Qaida, the original organization led by Bin Laden, intended to do, but had it not been for Zarqawi and his efforts and his ability to implant himself in Iraq at a time when the United States was going to war in that country, I don't think we would've come this far. So there's a bit of luck if you think from al-Qaida's point of view. Now obviously, ever since, al-Qaida has taken sort of the backseat, and now ISIS as we know it, or the Islamic State, it's essentially a different organization. It has its roots in al-Qaida, in many ways it took al-Qaida's original view and ideas and really operationalized them in a way that al-Qaida could not because of the lack of capability and the fact that Bin Laden and his top associates traded away day-to-day operational control for physical security of the leadership of the movement, they thought if the leadership was killed then al-Qaida would collapse, and therefore, the price was that you allow these groups to operate on their own. Now they didn't think that al-Qaida in Iraq would become not just an independent organization but one that would eclipse al-Qaida itself. JS: That's true, too, but you made another interesting point that I want to take you back to, which is that you mentioned that Zarqawi was the right man in the right place at the right time. That's an important point because when we're dealing with geopolitics and especially when we're dealing with state actors, the role of the individual, generally speaking, is not that important. We put less emphasis on the individual. Maybe with a sub-state actor it has a little bit of difference. But I guess the question I would pose to you then, is, was it really Zarqawi that was that special or was there going to be a Zarqawi anyway? And was the situation going to mushroom into that anyway, or did it really require someone who had that connection to al-Qaida, who had that experience, who had that training, who had that world view, who knew how to operationalize it, who knew how to put it together, to go to Iraq and to take advantage of the situation? Or would it have been, when the United States went in and when things started going wrong in Iraq, that this kind of movement would've sort of organically sprouted up anyway? KB: I think that this was bound to happen. If it was not Zarqawi it could've been someone else, because in reality, Zarqawi the personality could only do so much unless the ground realities allowed for it, and there were enabling factors, the disenfranchisement of the Sunnis, created a lot of leaders. Back in the day, I'm talking 2003 to 2005-6 I remember that Zarqawi was just one of many militia leaders, one of many factions. At the time, the group had yet to distinguish itself. So there were no shortage of outfits and organizations. I think probably what did make a bit of a difference was the fact that this individual had experience in running training camps, in running an organization going back to the late '90s and I think that experience came in handy. But it's not that Zarqawi was so important to all of this. Now, the insurgency may have taken a different route, but the fact that there is a Shiite-Sunni struggle going on at the time, that didn't require Zarqawi. That was going on independent of any personality per se. And so I think that the ground was fertile. It required an individual and an outfit that had the experience. If you fast-forward just a little bit to 2012, and when the Syrian uprising morphed into a full-scale civil war, again it was Zarqawi's outfit – because of its experience – that was able to take advantage of the vacuum that was created in eastern Syria and was able to take over places like Raqqa and Deir el-Zour and the oil fields. And it became the biggest militia and really eclipsed the rebels who started the war. So I think there's something to be said about institutionalization. I'm not a big fan of personalities, I think that there were many others, and the fact that Zarqawi only lived for three years as the leader and we are now in year 14 of this entity, says a lot. I mean, there are a lot of leaders who had come by and taken over the same group and really moved on, so you know, there's institutionalization and there are ground realities that sustain these type of entities. JS: I want to talk about the sectarian part of all this and I also want to fast forward to the present day, but before we do that I want to ask you one more question that goes back a little bit and sets the stage, which is that, so we have now identified that there was a fertile ground there for recruitment for Zarqawi and for these other heads of militias to recruit for al-Qaida, to recruit for the general mission and this may be an impossible question for you to answer, but we specialize in impossible questions, so when do you think this moment in the Muslim world started happening? When did the discontent get to such an extent that people were so upset that they would be open to this kind of ideology? When did it start to move away from secular nationalism or any of the other things that were peoples' identifying political ideology, particularly Arab nationalism too – when did it go from that to Islam being one of the major things, and this radical version of Islam being something that could be used as a tool to create these organizations? KB: I think if I had to put my finger on a date, I would say right after the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, in which Egypt, Syria and Jordan suffered a major defeat at the hands of Israel. And I think that was sort of the turning point. But having said that, I will also point out that these are not, sort of, on-and-off switches. Things are taking shape in parallel. So a new movement is operating parallel to an older movement and at some point the new movement overtakes the pre-existing movement, in terms of its popular appeal. I think that the crisis essentially allowed, the devastating defeat of the Arab states really allowed for the Islamists to come out and say, what have the secularists given to this region, to the people of this region, to the Arabs, to the Muslims? And they were able to really craft a narrative, or take an existing narrative to the next level and say, it is because we have left the ideas that made us great in the past. We have abandoned that, that has led us to this kind of lull, and if we were to go back to Islam, then this region can regain its lost glory. I think that's the really turning point, but groups, if you were to measure Islamism in the form of groups, I would say that by the mid-'70s, these groups had started to come out, and I think by the end of the 1970s, Islamism had exploded onto the scene. We had the revolution in Iran, albeit a Shiite Islamist regime took over from the monarchy of the shah, but nonetheless, it had a real impact, a psychological impact on the majority Sunni Islamists. There was also the taking over of the Kaaba in 1979 in November by radical Salafis trying to overthrow the Saudi regime, and then I think that really the incubator that really took Islamism to the next level, was the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan that allowed for different Islamists from different parts of the Arab Muslim world to come together and have a shared experience for a decade and really become battle hardened and not just ideologically advance themselves, but acquire capabilities that make political change a bit more, if you will, realizable. JS: Would you say that though – I mean, yes, so Afghanistan was that ground where they all met, but I'm struck by the fact that most of the examples you use are Arab. Would you describe radical Islam and this particular strain of jihadism as an Arab phenomenon or a Muslim phenomenon? KB: I would say it's an Arab phenomenon. One of the things to note is that Egypt is the cradle of all ideologies that have spread across the Arab Muslim world. Secularism in the Arab world began in Egypt. Islamism, in the form of the Muslim Brotherhood ideology, began in Egypt. Jihadism, what later was made transnational by al-Qaida and more recently by ISIS, has its roots in Egypt. So definitely it is – and then of course the Salafism of Saudi Arabia and its input into the making of this broader phenomenon. So yes, there is no doubt that it is an Arab ideology at its core, at its root. That doesn't mean that it doesn't take other shapes, though the Chechens have Islamism in a different direction and have emerged as leaders, for lack of a better term, in the Caucasus region. We have Central Asian jihadists, Southeast Asia has their own jihadists. But really, jihadism and the entire Islamist project is very much Arab at its core. JS: It also seems to be very Sunni. So you brought up Iran a little earlier, but I guess we could talk about Hezbollah and I guess we could talk about some of these groups, but how do you account for the fact that the majority of these groups are Sunni? Is there something within Sunni Islam or within their particular interpretation of Sunni Islam that leads to this kind of ideology? Is it really just that the political and geographic circumstances in countries that were Sunni and were Arab were bad enough and were the right mix of things that it really wasn't anything embedded within Sunni Islam itself? It was just that there was a situation in those countries and Sunni Islam was the religion that they practiced and therefore that was how it got manifested? So how do you – and I know we're going to talk about sectarianism a little more because it's so important, especially for the rise of ISIS, particularly in Iraq, but how do you account for the fact that most of these groups when we talk about them are all Sunni? KB: So I think that the easy way to understand this is simply that Sunnis have always been the majority sect in Islam. And the overwhelming majority. Even today, there aren't real good, if you will, we don't have a reliable census that we can say – OK, you know what, this is how many percentage of Shiites and Sunnis per country. But it's fair to say, I would say, that a good 80 percent of the Arab Muslim world is Sunni. Therefore, you know, the ideology of jihadism or any other ideology that came before, has always been dominated by the Sunnis. And so it's demography, it's sectarian demography, but it's also geography. If you look at the history of the expansion of Islam, and how over time, it gets factionalized and geography imposes its limits, and creates problems and leads to the rise of new regimes and new ideas, it becomes very clear that it's not something inherent in Sunni Islam, necessarily. Yes, there is this crisis of what does it mean to be a Muslim in the here and now in a collective sense. And the Muslim world has not seen, has not really come far beyond the old imperial age, that for the rest of the world, is now a good – you know it's in its second century, that was 200 years ago that the rest of the world, or the Western world in particular, really left the imperial form of governance for a modern nation-state based on a secular order and a commitment to self-determination and democracy. I think that evolution has not occurred in the Muslim world and therefore there is this crisis. But I don't think it's necessarily something in Sunni Islam. If Shiites had been the majority, in a counterfactual reality, I think we'd be facing the same problems. JS: I think I agree with you, but I'll play devil's advocate for a second, which is to say that I think you're right generally and this is not so much a Muslim issue especially in the Middle East, but it goes beyond the Middle East. But Iran is the Islamic Republic, right? You talked about the Iranian Revolution and Iran is really the center of Shiite Islam in the world. And we could say that there is a much more mature political, or at least a much more mature idea, about what the relationship is supposed to be between politics and between religion in Iran. It's not necessarily all settled. There are obviously large disagreements within Iran itself, but we might say that Turkey is another example that is fighting through this right now. It's not stable, but there's a much, much more mature sense of what that relationship is between politics and religion. So how do you account for a country like Iran, which went through its own turmoil and it has its own pressure, or a country like Turkey, which is currently doing it right now, how do you account for those countries developing the way they're developing versus the Arab world, which is essentially cannibalizing itself right now? KB: So there are a number of factors with it. The first one is that Sunni Islam has been preoccupied for, you know, over a millennia with orthodoxy. Orthodoxy has been its obsession. What are the boundaries of justifiable behavior and thought? That's what Sunni Islam – and I think that there is a certain logic here, that if you are the majority, you're not worried about existential issues. You're worried about the, you know, legitimacy, authenticity in terms of religious ideas. And so I think that is something that the Sunnis have been preoccupied for a very long time. And, therefore, they were not open to experimentation, for a lack of a better term, or to, you know, what the noted Iranian philosopher Abdolkarim Soroush will call “extra-religious ideas,” in other words moving beyond the religious text and borrowing from other civilizations. Not to say that that did not happen, but I think that by and large, that kind of borrowing or attempt to borrow from other civilizations and advance your social and political discourse, that's something that the Shiites were much more open to from the very beginning. I mean, for them, it wasn't the orthodoxy. It was much more about the sect itself. Being a minority, you know, issues of survival, that force you to innovate and force you to look beyond, if you will, your own belief. And so I think that the Shiites have had a head start in social, political and economic development. And keep in mind, it's not just Shiites. It's the idea that, we have to keep in mind that there is Iran. Persian nationalism is also at play here. So it's the interplay between the Persian ethno-linguistic civilization that flourished for a very long time, predating Islam. So, I think that when we look at Iran, its Islamism – the Islamic Republic – is a blend of a lot of ideas that are not necessarily Islamic in origin. So I think that's why you have Iran looking very different and far more healthy than the Arab world. And jumping over to Turkey, I think Turkey – although a Sunni power – does not come from the orthodox core, i.e. Arab core of Islam. I mean, the Turks came from Central Asia. And they went from Central Asia to Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) and they set up shop over there. And before they did that, I'd like to add, they were in Europe (in Eastern Europe) and they were a European power well before they became a Middle Eastern power. And the Islam that is practiced over in Turkey is very different, or at least was very different. There has been a lot of blending and spillover of Salafism and these jihadi ideas and Islamic ideas, even in Turkey. But by and large, Turkey has had a different trajectory. And then, of course, secularism. And here I don't mean just Atatürk – Mustafa Kemal – the founder of the modern Republic. He didn't come out of nowhere. What he instituted, the Westernization of Turkey, the Europeanization of the Ottoman Empire and the building of the Turkish Republic along European lines, that didn't happen all of a sudden. It was built on the reforms that Sultan Mahmud II, (the Ottoman Emperor in the early 19th century), something he began and borrowed from Europe. So, you have very different trajectories here. And, of course, the geography of this region – I mean anybody who controls the Anatolian plateau, and anybody who is headquartered in Persia, is very secure. It's a strategic location from which you can build civilizations. The Arab world, if you go back to history, the Arabs really lost power and leadership of Islam, I would say, by the late 800s, mid-800s. They had lost the leadership of Islam because Turkic and Persianate dominions began to emerge and challenge the Arabs for leadership over Islam. And I'm not talking Shiite Islam, I'm talking Sunni Islam. JS: This is all interesting, and we're going a little bit over time, but I think it's worth it because this is an interesting conversation. I'd also just like to point out to our listeners that we didn't exactly plan this little divergence in the conversation. You can already see one of the reasons we appreciate Kamran, because he's a veritable encyclopedia for everything that has happened in the Muslim world ever. But one thing I want to ask you that is based on that, I want to take it a little away from what we were talking about before and then come back to ISIS to finish it of, is that I'm currently in southern France for some meetings, and for some conferences and for some other things, and obviously one of the main issues here and throughout most of Europe is the migration issue. You have, I wouldn't say a large number, it's a large enough number that the European Union is not able to organize itself to bring them in, in absolute terms it's not a huge number. But there are Muslim immigrants to Europe who are looking to find a place to live and to start a new life. And one of the concerns, especially here, especially in other places in Europe, is that they won't be able to assimilate, that they'll want to have their own culture, their own sense of law, and what is right and wrong, and that this presents a major challenge for the nation-states of Europe. Because how do they integrate them in? They don't want to just turn them away, but they don't want to lose the basic facts of their national identity. So you're talking about especially Sunni Islam and about the concern with orthodoxy and all these other things. I know that for instance in Jewish religion there is a rule in the religious text that is the law of the land is the law. It's supposed to supersede religious law. So, I've thrown a bunch of different issues at you off the cuff when I bring all those things up, what do you think about the migration crisis in general, and what do the things that we've talked about relating to Islam here say about the ability of Muslims who are coming to Europe or who are coming to the United States to assimilate? Do you think that Islam presents a major optical for them, or do you view those Muslims as any other group that has emigrated from one place to another and has to go through certain growing pains but will eventually assimilate? KB: I think it's a bit of the latter. But there are concerns, and I do have concerns that there are issues. And it's not because of Islam. Islam is what you make of it, if we are to borrow from Reza Aslan, the prominent author of the book on Jesus recently, and he now has a show on CNN. But really, I do think that Islam inherently is not something that prevents assimilation. I mean, we've seen this before, and I've just talked about how Persians and Turkic peoples and others, Chechens, took Islam in their own direction. I think that that's very much possible. But the question is, what is the geopolitics that we're dealing with when we talk about migration from the Middle East, particularly Syria, to Europe? In places like France, particularly, where there is sort of this if you will pre-existing strong, secular tendency and this desire by French people to have those who come to their country embrace that secularism with the same fervor. I think that's going to create some problems, and then of course, economic issues. So, there will be a lot of Syrian refugees for whom these issues are not really important. Because for them the first thing is, how do I get my family to safety? How can I escape war, get to a place where we're not going to be killed, and then of course, we have opportunities of livelihood. But I think that while they do that, a good chunk of them are still concerned about losing their religion in the process. And when that happens, and then you have this overarching, if you will, dynamic of ISIS and political Islam that these people can't ignore, then you're looking at a real recipe for conflict in these countries. And therefore, I think that the European states are justified in their fear. I don't buy the idea that this has something to do with religion, but I think that it's the geopolitical expression of religion that is the problem, and how immigrants are going to be welcomed or not, and how they see secularism. We say that there has to be moderation on the part of those who come from these areas, there has to be Islamist moderation. But I think at the same time that that's only possible if the European states also have a role to play in this. If they expect that these people will just say, oh you know what, I'm French now, and that's the way to go, I don't think that's going to happen. So there has to be a bit of give and take on both sides. And that give and take in the current geopolitical climate is really not possible where you're having terrorist attacks, there's the ISIS threat that's not going away, and economies are not doing well, there's not enough money to go around, and people are worried about losing their jobs to immigrants. And so in this atmosphere I think we're looking more at conflict rather than the ability to assimilate. JS: I'm afraid I agree with all of that. But to get us out of here, the question, and I'll take us back, we started all of this by talking about ISIS, and we sort of wandered around the Islamic world, even stepped our foot a little bit into Europe. I think one of the points we wanted to make in this podcast was that there's a lot of talk about the Islamic State is about to collapse. People have been saying the Islamic State is about to collapse for well over a year, a year and a half now. It's true that the Islamic State is facing a lot of pressure, a lot more pressure than it has previously on a lot of its borders. But I think the issue that you're really driving at here is that this isn't about one group, and it isn't just about a group in a particular state. It's really about a broader phenomenon, and it's a game of Whack-a-Mole. Sure, you might be able to hit the Islamic State and you might even be able to dislodge them out of Raqqa. It'll take a lot of casualties, but maybe you'll be able to get rid of the caliphate in that way. But the general ground, the fertile ground that Zarqawi came to after 2001 and was able to build this group into what it is today, I think what you're saying is that the ground is still fertile. The basic problems that we're talking about have not been resolved and perhaps have even been exacerbated because there's even less opportunity than there was before. Is that an accurate characterization of what you think? KB: Absolutely. I totally agree with you Jacob. I think that what we have to keep in mind is that we've been here before. So the predecessor organizations of ISIS, or IS, they were defeated at one point in time. But then they came back. And I'll give you a very clear example. In 2008, a large segment of Iraqi Sunnis had turned their guns away from fighting U.S. soldiers to fighting al-Qaida in Iraq, the predecessor to ISIS. And that group had been weakened. It wasn't completely uprooted, but it had been sufficiently weakened, and we saw respite. If you go back to between 2008 and 2011, the frequency of bombings had dropped, and things were looking better. But this group came out of the woodwork in 2011 when the United States left Iraq and the Shiite-dominated government basically double-crossed the Sunnis. They did not want to share power with the Sunnis fearing that the Sunnis had decades of experience, and if we let our guard down, it'll only be a matter of time before this Shiite-dominated republic falls, even before it's taking root. And so, that allowed for ISIS to come out. And then, on top of that, you had the Syrian civil war emerge and that created far more time and space for ISIS. And so, I think moving forward, if ISIS at the time, the predecessor of ISIS, which was muck weaker, much smaller, was able to revive itself in very difficult circumstances, I think that now they have far more opportunity to revive themselves, because that war that was confined to Iraq is now expanded. It's in Yemen, it's spilling over into Turkey, we see it playing out in Egypt and North Africa, and Syria is a mess. So, I think that maybe ISIS will be decimated as we know it today. Maybe the remnants of ISIS will form a new group that will eclipse ISIS of today, some other organization. We mustn't forget that al-Qaida is still there in Syria. And it's changed a few names, it used to be Jabhat al-Nusra, then Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, and now they have a new coalition in Idlib. There are plenty of forces to take this caliphate project and take it to the next level, because the underlying political problems are still there, Shiite-Sunni conflict is still there, both in Syria and Iraq and the wider region, Iran and Saudi Arabia are at each other's throats, and there is no viable political-economic model that we're seeing in the Arab world. So, this hollowing out of the Arab world that you've written about, I mean that is not going away. And I suspect that the problem that we're dealing with, which we today call ISIS, will be with us, but with a different name in the years to come. JS: Well, thanks Kamran, and thanks for staying overtime a little bit with us to talk about this issue. I know it's a complicated one, and it's a really important one. So, I'm glad we were able to talk about it in some depth. Once again, I'm Jacob Shapiro, I'm the director of analysis for Geopolitical Futures. I was just talking with Kamran Bokhari, he is a senior analyst at Geopolitical Futures. We'll be doing another podcast next week. Please feel free to send us feedback on these podcasts by emailing us at comments@geopoliticalfutures.com, and for analysis on how ISIS is going to develop, and how all the things we have talked about are going to develop over time, you can check out our analysis in GeopoliticalFutures.com. Thanks.

This episode is a conversation with Mai’a Cross, Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at Northeastern University, about the definition of a European identity, and the challenges facing the trend of “Europeanization”. Cross analyzes the refugee crisis and the rise of right wing parties, emphasizing the centrality of democratic ideals in the development of the EU and the role of active and optimistic citizen engagement in European politics. Discussing the multiculturalism of the EU, Cross describes the evolution of Europeanization and the questions surrounding the importance of retaining the diverse cultural traditions and identities for the future generations of Europe. (Date of interview: March 3, 2016)

We discuss the new Lego Dimensions game, L Tom Perry counterfeitly fills up the rest of the episode.

We discuss the new Lego Dimensions game, L Tom Perry counterfeitly fills up the rest of the episode.

Sergio Carrera examines how the process of Europeanization, the development of the European Union, has played a role in migration law and on the meaning and mechanisms of integration. 'Integration' is a term that is used in many different places and contexts and is increasingly prominent within public debates about migration in the UK and elsewhere in the West. 'Integration' remains vague in definition, which is perhaps one reason it can be useful in many varying contexts. Is it a new assimilationism, a reactionary retreat from multiculturalism, or a progressive, dynamic model for thinking about diversity? How does it relate to cohesion, to transnationalism and to cosmopolitanism? Can, and should, it be measured and monitored? How is it framed in relation to the different scales of governance and belonging, from the neighbourhood to the 'super-diverse' city to the nation-state? This seminar series brings together scholars working ethnographically on everyday practices of integration with scholars working on the production, reproduction and contestation of integration discourse.

Professor Beckfield discusses whether the welfare state convergence is really taking place, or it is just regional integration, especially in the European context. The contemporary institutionalization of a transnational regional political economy in Europe raises questions about the role of regional integration in the convergence of European welfare states. To date, sociological work has emphasized processes of industrialization and globalization as the social changes that may drive increasing similarity among welfare states. Building on neoinstitutionalist theory and the Europeanization literature, we develop the argument that regional integration drives welfare-state convergence by generating, diffusing, and enforcing the adoption of policy scripts concerning "appropriate" European social policy. The hypothesis that deepening regional integration drives growing welfare-state convergence is tested with a three-stage analysis. The first stage examines trends in population-weighted and un-weighted dispersion for the OECD, the set of liberal market economies, and the set of EU-15 member states, since 1960. The second stage examines associations between regional integration and welfare-state dispersion using time-series data. The third stage employs fixed-effects models of dyad-year data. The results support the hypothesis: welfare-state convergence appears only among the EU-15; regional integration trends are associated with convergence; and pairs of countries belonging to the EU develop welfare states that are more similar, on average, than other pairs of countries. The findings are robust to three broad measures of the welfare state. Based on our results, we argue that in theorizing contemporary changes in the welfare state, sociologists should attend to the institutionalization of regional political economy. Welfare states can be conceptualized as embedded in regional, as well as global, systems and institutions.

An introduction to the methodology of comparative legal studies, and Europeanization of private law in Europe.

This morning I spoke to leading US economist James K. Galbraith on the phone from Athens for this month’s Le Monde diplomatique podcast. James is professor of government/business relations at the Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. He’s the author of six books, including The Predator State: How Conservatives Abandoned the Free Market and Why Liberals Should Too. “rich countries will have a lot of new poor people on their doorsteps” The interview accompanies and amplifies his article in the current issue of Le Monde diplo, which looks at what he calls “the Europeanization of Mediterranean debt” forced on the EU by speculators, and what he predicts will become a vicious circle of budget cutting, debt deflation and depression. He further predicts that old patterns of hardship migration will re-emerge: “rich countries will have a lot of new poor people on their doorsteps because they weren’t willing to deal with them at home”. To listen to the podcast, click here.

A presentation given by Research Fellow Cristina Parau at Wolfson College on February 24th 2009. Dr Parau is also a member of the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies in Oxford. Europeanization scholars study the impact of the European Union (EU) on domestic politics. The literature on the impact of the EU on the domestic politics of accession countries in Eastern Europe has focussed too narrowly on the formal conditions for accession to the EU stemming from Brussels. Accession conditionality and the EU body of legislation (the acquis) which the accession countries must adopt have been claimed to be the drivers of domestic change. Research has omitted the class of phenomena where no real EU rule exists yet domestic change happens as if there were, or where an EU rule does exist yet has little or no impact. This paper examines several cases of such phenomena. It reveals how transnational networks outside Brussels, but with help from inside, were able to (re-)construct accession conditionality amid the wider enlargement context. Some networks, by heightening its uncertainty and 'accession anxiety', made the accession candidate government constrain itself before a phantom 'extra-conditionality' where virtually no EU acquis existed and Brussels declined formal intervention; others emboldened it to defy real conditionality where the acquis commanded obedience and Brussels intervened forcefully. When uncertainty and anxiety are high, an accession candidate will be susceptible to irrational influence, as of an objectively unreal conditionality; whereas, when uncertainty and anxiety are low, the candidate may even get away with flouting real conditionality.