Religion and Humanitarianism in the New Age of Nationalism
A Conference and Discussion
Matrix is located on the 8th floor of Barrows Hall, on the UC Berkeley campus, near Telegraph and Bancroft Avenues, just up the hill from Sather Gate. There are entrances at both ends of the building, but only one of the elevators on the eastern side goes directly to the 8th floor. You can alternatively take the stairs to the 7th floor and walk up the stairs.
Please register by March 9 to join us for a two-day conference (Mar 16-17) focused on important questions, such as:
- What has been the role of religion—churches, institutions of civic society, intellectuals—in the creation and political successes of forms of exclusivist nationalist rejection of moral universalism?
- What is the relationship between established ecclesiastical authority and humanitarianism?
- What are the internal debates and fracture lines within particular religious communities and especially among the laity on issues like immigration and gender/sexual equality that figure so prominently in thinking about moral universalism?
- What roles can or should important non-religious actors like international business, NGOs, and states play in mitigating the anti-humanitarian impulses of the new religious nationalists and nationalisms?
- What roles can or should various religion-based institutions play in mitigating the anti-humanitarian impulses of the new religious nationalists and nationalisms?
This event is co-sponsored by Social Science Matrix, Townsend Center for the Humanities, Human Rights Program, Center for Democracy, Toleration, and Religion, Institute for South Asia Studies, and the Berkeley Center for the Study of Religion.
Discussants
The discussion will involve scholars, activists, and clergy from the United States and abroad, including:
- John Shattuck, former Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights (keynote presenter)
- Adam Chmielewski, Institute of Philosophy, Wroclaw University
- Bennett Freeman, Former Deputy Asst. Secretary for Human Rights, Former Senior VP for Sustainability Research & Policy, Calvert Investments
- Samuel Moyn, Yale Law School
- Andras Lazlo Pap, Slovak Academy of Sciences/Hungarian Academy of Sciences/Central European University
- George Rupp, Columbia University & Former President of the IRC
- Tehila Sasson, Emory University
- Rev. Prof. Jane Shaw, Dean of Religious Life, Stanford University
- Jodok Troy, Visiting Scholar at The Europe Center, Stanford University
- Olivia Wilkinson, Joint Learning Initiative on Faith and Local Communities
- Molly Worthen, University of North Carolina
Space is limited. Request to attend by March 9.
For more information, contact Eva Seto at evaseto@berkeley.edu.
