Jonathan Nitzan will be presenting his latest book, Capital as Power. A Study of Order and Creorder, and discuss its implication for understanding the global political economy, including conflict in the Middle East. Jonathan Nitzan is a Professor of Political Economy at York University (Toronto, Canada). His works, together with Shimshon Bichler, have made him one of the most interesting, original writers on the subject of international political economy. His book The Global Political Economy of Israel offers a new analytical perspective of Israel's political economy, as well as of the dynamics of power in the United States and their impact on the Middle East.

Presentation chaired by Ferran Izquierdo, Lecturer in International Relations at the Autonomous University of Barcelona

These two round table discussions will be debating the role of political Islamism in the Middle East and in North Africa. On one hand, participants will discuss the ability of political Islamism to carry out democratic political reforms, and on the other, the need (or lack of same) to structure a dialogue between international actors and said political groups. The speakers on this round table will include Fred Halliday (IBEI), Moataz Fattah (Cairo University / Michigan University); Sami Zubeida (Birkbeck College), Fuat Keyman (Koç University, Istanbul); Saad Jawad (London School of Economics) Madawi Al-Rasheed, (King’s College) and Umut Ozkirimli (Bilgi University and LSE).

A debate on the priorities of Spain's upcoming presidency of the EU in the Mediterranean, held to coincide with the presentation of the second edition of Researching the Mediterranean, published by the British Council, the CIDOB Foundation and IEMed. The event will feature the participation of: Chris Hickey, Director of the British Council in Spain; Jordi Vaquer, Director of the CIDOB Foundation; Iván Martín, ICEI, joint editor of Researching the Mediterranean; José Luis Pardo, Deputy-Director General for General and Economic Affairs at the EU (MAEC) and Richard Gillespie, University of Liverpool, joint editor of Researching the Mediterranean.

Marking the occasion of the awarding of grants to study at the London School of Economics

The Obra Social de Caixa Catalunya and the CIDOB Foundation are to hold the 6th awards ceremony for grants to study Master's degrees at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). The event, which will be chaired by Narcís Serra, President of the CIDOB Foundation and Caixa Catalunya, will include the participation of Oriol de Solà-Morales, of the LSE Alumni Association of Catalonia (ALSEC) and Andrés Rodríguez-Pose, who will be giving a lecture on “The economic returns of decentralisation”.

Over the past four decades, many countries have embarked on processes of political and fiscal decentralisation. In light of the historical, cultural and identity-related arguments that have traditionally been used to justify the increase of autonomy, today’s decentralisation processes are fundamentally promoted on the basis of the potential economic benefits of self-government. However, very few studies have attempted to analyse whether these benefits exist or not; whether the transferral of powers and resources to sub-national governments encourages not only an increase in growth but also greater territorial cohesion. The lecture tackles this issue from a comparative point of view.

Closing event in the consultation process on the Mediterranean and the Middle East organised to help in the planning of of the strategic plan for Catalonia's external action. Representatives of the Generalitat and of other public administrations, together with experts, academics and social actors will debate the conclusions of the process with the aim of identifying the context, priorities and instruments with which to develop coherent, effective action in the Mediterranean region and the Middle East.

Presentación y discusión sobre la investigación “Desgobierno, violencia y política de abandono en el norte de México”, a cargo de Luis Alfonso Herrera Robles, Profesor-investigador Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juárez.

El año 2008 ha sido un mal año para el mundo entero, crisis económica y desempleo han sido algunos de los varios temas que este año nos ha dejado. Para el caso de la frontera norte de México, a la crisis financiera y desempleo se le han sumado el narcotráfico, más feminicidios, la militarización, deportaciones masivas de los Estados Unidos, entre otras cosas que de manera inusitada ha producido una cultura de la violencia, y lo que algunos autores llaman el “desgobierno de la ciudad”.

Comentaristas:
Carlos González (El Colegio de Chihuahua)
Servando Pineda Jaimes (Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juàrez)
Joan Subirats (Instituto de Gobierno y Políticas Públicas, UAB)
María Jesús Izquierdo (Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona)
Jaume Curbet (Universitata Oberta de Catalunya)

To coincide with the commemoration of World Refugee Day, this year's debate workshop will be focusing on the reform of legislation on asylum in Spain. The aim of this workshop is to promote an expert debate between academics and practitioners in which they will be referring back to debate and key issues that have already been discussed – as well as those that deserve to be tackled in the future – in the reform of Spain's legislation in the area of asylum.

The event will be incorporating different perspectives that will cover the issues to be discussed in an expert, multidisciplinary manner. If possible, and if it is considered opportune, an agreed document of recommendations may be drafted.

The second seminar of the work group on the Mediterranean for the INEX project, funded by the European Commission's 7th framework programme. In this seminar, participants will debate, firstly, the research carried out on the state of the literature on the security dimension in the European Neighbourhood Policy, and secondly, the implications of the application of said policy on countries in the southern Mediterranean area.

Presentación y discusión sobre la investigación “La participación de la sociedad civil en las relaciones Unión Europea-Mercosur: lecciones aprendidas y algunas reflexiones para un mayor protagonismo en el diálogo birregional” a cargo de Ignacio Jotvis, Responsable de Campañas en el equipo de la Unión Europea del Secretariado Internacional de Amnistía Internacional en Londres, Reino Unido.

Como en cualquier diálogo birregional, la importancia de la participación de la sociedad civil en las relaciones Unión Europea-Mercosur radica fundamentalmente en que la misma, además de dotar de legitimidad al diálogo, constituye un elemento básico para impulsar la inclusión de la dimensión social en la agenda birregional.

Moderadora: Anna Ayuso, Programa América Latina, Fundación CIDOB
Comentarista: Manuel Cienfuegos, Universidad Pompeu Fabra

La Fundación CIDOB y Casa África, en colaboración con la Comisión Económica para África de Naciones Unidas (UNECA), organizan el primer encuentro sobre la Agenda de Desarrollo Africano (ADA).

De manera análoga a la exitosa iniciativa llevada a cabo para América Latina (denominada Agenda de Desarrollo Iberoamericano), esta iniciativa tiene por objetivo, mediante el debate académico y político, promover una nueva Agenda de Desarrollo Africana, que más allá del abordaje tradicional de las políticas e instrumentos de cooperación se centre en el análisis de las políticas públicas y las estrategias privadas surgidas en el propio continente.

“The Second Generation in Barcelona: A Longitudinal Study” by Alejandro Portes and Rosa Aparicio comprises the preliminary results of the first stage of the longitudinal study on the social and economic adaptation of the sons and daughters of immigrants, the so-called ‘second generation’, in Spain. The first stage of the ILSEG study (Investigación Longitudinal de la Segunda Generación) has produced a statistically representative sample of second-generation students (in both public and private schools) in the metropolitan areas of Madrid and Barcelona. More than 7,000 teenagers with foreign parents (over 60 nationalities have been recorded in the sample) have been interviewed as part of the project, the first of this type to have been carried out in Spain.

The results of this study for Madrid were presented at the beginning of the year, and this will enable the authors to present the results for Barcelona using a comparative perspective with respect to the Madrid results.

Speakers:

Alejandro Portes, Director of the Center for Migration and Development of Princeton University

Rosa Aparicio, researcher at the Institute for Migration Research of Comillas Pontifical University

The event will be brought to a close by
Oriol Amorós, Secretary for Immigration of the Generalitat of Catalonia