From the Chair Students and Alumni David Cameron Left a Note on the Desk Continue to Connect I Have Now Inherited
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Volume 2 / Issue 2 Fall 2012 From the Chair Students and Alumni David Cameron left a note on the desk Continue to Connect I have now inherited. In part, it said: In early November, the Department of “As you well know, this is an excellent Political Science launched the Senior department with exceptional faculty Undergraduate Alumni Mentorship and staff.” That is certainly one reason Program. Spearheaded by Professor I agreed to follow in his footsteps. But Robert Vipond, the program connects another was more important. upper-year Political Science majors Not for one moment during the past and specialists with alumni who have quarter century have I ever regretted an built successful careers on the basis of earlier decision to leave a promising po- their academic experience. Students sition on Bay Street to accept an Assis- in their 3rd and 4th years have been tant Professorship in Political Science at matched with mentors on a one-on- the University of Toronto. Why? Let me one basis. The novel approach to this count the reasons. Anthony Fernando, program is that it pairs undergrads Joanna Langille, Sean Willett, Michael with graduates who were once in their Varey, Noah Blackstein, Roger Parkin- shoes. Alumni who are mentors are son, Jennifer Jeffs, Sarah Eaton, Érick Heather Bastedo, Frank Cesario, Peter Lachapelle, Su-Mei Ooi, Erin Hannah, Chang, Barbara Dick, Adam Halim, Joshua Hjartarson, Marketa Evans, Jason efficiently, or consistently. It simply Rob McLean, Mark Redinger, Alex Davis, Rhema Kang, Natalia Loukache- means that we recognize no CEO when Shprintsen, Michael Stickings, Dani- va, and many, many more names from it comes to preserving and advancing elle Takacs and Marcy Vigoda. This among the equally outstanding under- our scholarly community. To chair a year mentees are Laura Correa Ochoa, graduates, graduate students, and post- meeting of colleagues hardly resembles docs who have taught me so much over managing a bureaucracy. Decisions are the years. What a blessed life professors nevertheless made, and they constitute enjoy; therefore, what obligations we our much-respected department. have to give back. For a glimpse of the myriad implica- All faculty members decide for them- tions of those decisions, peruse the fol- selves precisely how to give back, or, in lowing pages. Space limits prevent us other words, how to pass on this gift of from covering all of the recent accom- the university, and all it does and means, plishments of our students, faculty, and Alex Shprintsen (L), Nicole Stoffman (R) to the next generation. We value the au- staff. Even if we can only hint at their continued on page 11 tonomy and support granted us by our intellectual gifts, the reader should un- society for the purpose of advancing In This Issue derstand that these people are among the cause of our teaching and research. Political Economy and Geography ...............2 the best in the world of political sci- They oblige us to make necessary col- The Keith Davey Forum .......................... 3 ence. lective decisions collegially. That term Canadian Journal of Political Science ............4 A few weeks ago, we had a visit from New Faces, New Places .........................6 is not synonymous with congenially, Awards, Prizes, and Milestone ....................8-9 continued on page 5 PSAA Moves Forward ..........................11 1 Political Economy and Economic Geography By Michael Kunz and Harald Bathelt integrated evolutionary thinking to is grounded in space: personal and allow for a clearer understanding of professional networks of people and Since political science addresses the how change comes about and how it firms exist within territories and/or political in the organization of society, persists over time. This openness to across them; they overlap locally or it necessarily intersects with economic, other fields has allowed economic create trans-local linkages or are not social, psychological, and many other geography to integrate many useful linked at all. In any case, the existence aspects of human life. Political econo- approaches while offering a model or non-existence of such linkages my, in particular, is subject to the fact of how political science could look to influences the generation of wider that the actions and interactions of other fields to approach some of its networks and supports contextual economic agents in space cause fun- most pressing questions more com- practices. At an individual firm level, damental disparities which affect the prehensively. structures that might be perceived as political system and its institutions. An example of how an inter- being associated with a specific capi- The study of the origins and impacts disciplinary perspective may enrich talist model become contextualized of political institutions, in this con- studies in political economy can be and can in practice vary quite widely text, naturally leads to opportunities found in the varieties-of-capitalism lit- (and probably more so than on an ag- to pursue, and often demands an in- erature. Peter A. Hall and David Sos- gregate level). But to realize this, and terdisciplinary perspective. Economic kice’s original work is conceptualized deal with it appropriately, requires geography is a valuable field in this as a relational perspective that draws moving beyond a narrow disciplinary respect because it requires and is built from strategic (inter)action of firms, focus. It is a similar set of arguments on an interdisciplinary approach. To building up an argument at an aggre- that led Paul Krugman to take eco- bring together perspectives from po- gate level to identify multiple, persis- nomic geography seriously in his work litical economy and economic geogra- tent national capitalisms. Much of the on inter-firm trade. phy can lead to a better understanding critique or support of this conceptu- Of course, the benefit of interdisci- of the recursive connection between alization neglects this original inten- plinary work is not a one-way process. the distribution of economic activity tion and engages in debates based Political science has much to offer and the impact of public policy. on aggregate, typically national-level for economic geography in under- Relative to political science, eco- data. In so doing, entire countries are standing the role of agency in societal nomic geography has had a tighter classified as supporting or contradict- change. Integrating these perspectives focus on the understanding of change ing given typologies of economies towards broader trans-disciplinary and this background can offer insights while neglecting the fact that subna- debates might be necessary to bring to political scientists. At its core, eco- tional (regional) disparities are often about a clearer understanding of how nomic geography has always been an much more prominent and more se- political processes can be purposefully approach that combines techniques vere than cross-national differences employed by independent agents to from many disciplines in order to un- (see Canada or the U.S. as examples). change regional and national devel- derstand a variety of research ques- Even worse, at an individual firm lev- opment paths. It is such trans-disci- tions related to the determinants of el, predictions from this debate are plinary projects that are, in our minds, economic differentiation and con- almost always wrong. at the very core of the future of the nection between regions. In the study Economic geography fundamen- social sciences. of change, economic geography has tally recognizes that economic action 2 Social Media: Good for Democracy? Mention Arab Spring and images of pros and cons of whether or not social Facebook and Twitter immediately come media is good for democracy, or even to mind. That is because we often attri- expands its scope. Hirsh argued that bute the success of social movements the internet is not democratic. Rather, to how well they utilized social media studies suggest people spend hours to mobilize supporters. The question is searching for news sources and for not whether we would have seen a move- people with similar outlooks. Instead ment like the Arab Spring were it not of looking for the truth, Hirsh stated for social media, but whether we would that people are looking for validation. have seen such a movement mobilize so Such narrowness can lead to balkaniza- quickly and successfully. This issue was tion, and the emergence of on-line debated at the Keith Davey Forum on lynch mobs seeking to punish anyone Public Affairs on Wednesday, October who challenges or disagrees with con- 17 between Jesse Hirsh, President of ventional assumptions. Metaviews Media Management Ltd., and Rainie focused on the positives that Lee Rainie, Director of Pew Research, social media brings to democracy, such with Lou Pauly from the Department of as building networks. Social media al- Political Science as the emcee, and Steve lows for the mobilization of informa- Paikin as the moderator. tion in cheap and efficient ways. More The views between Hirsh and Rainie importantly, Rainie stated that the in- did not break down along political lines ternet and on-line communities are of right and left, but more along the stratified along socio-economic lines. continued on page 4 Eisenhower in War and Peace Together with Trinity College and the resulted in an offer from Tom Easter- leader.” Smith portrays an Eisenhower Munk School of Global Affairs, on Octo- brook to join the Department of Politi- who “engineered an end to America’s ber 3, 2012, the Department welcomed cal Economy. Smith eventually served as three-year no-win war in Korea, resisted back distinguished scholar and author Associate Chair until Political Science calls for preventive wars against the So- Jean Edward Smith. Professor Smith is became its own separate department in viet Union and China, and boldly de- the John Marshall Professor of Political 1983. He remained at the University of ployed the Seventh Fleet to protect For- Science Emeritus at Marshall University, Toronto until 1999.