PORTEFEUILLE

Various crises, political or economic, have served as reason for serious concern of academics and the political elites for the last several decades. After WWII the world has experienced many: triggered by terrorist attacks, economic hardships or aggressive, hard power politics of countries unhappy with the collapse of the Soviet Union, international in nature as well as regional, crises differ in complexity and longevity.

For developing countries, especially in the region like Southern Caucasus, crisis, in different forms is constantly part of political life and presents an especially threatening challenge to the fragile statehood of the young states; it often puts under question the democratization efforts undertaken by the governments. In contrast to western democracies, where states manage to fight political or economic hardships through joint effort or thanks to local expertise rooted on historic experience and strong institutions, states like Georgia have sometimes to fight for the very survival when faced by unexpected external developments. Even some internal critical issues, lead these societies to the brink of serious conflicts. Instead of stirring up discussions and causing the local communities to reflect on and to rethink existing traditional norms and attitudes, crisis emerges from the inability of main actors to negotiate and leads to damage.
On the other hand, while some regard crisis as a threat, others argue it is the only way to development and learning. Can we take crisis for something that makes the system more resistant to challenges and play in certain situations a positive role, for example in the case of external threats to the state, consolidating the population?

How do governments respond to crisis? Can crisis management be learnt and what kind of meaningful assistance can be provided by outside forces in crisis situations? How does theory differ from reality when talking about large scale political, economic or any other crises? These are questions the public lectures will address. Ilia State University and ASCN will hold a series of public lectures under the general topic of crisis during the spring semester 2015 (March-June).

Renowned academics from European countries, as well as from the US will travel to Tbilisi to give public lectures for ISU students and general public. In total, 6 lectures are planned. Ilia State University will serve as the main venue for the events. The series of lectures is a good opportunity for Georgian students to attend lectures of prominent scholars and in case of interest receive ECTS points if they do some work after the lecture. For local scholars, the lectures are a good chance for networking.

Die Vortragsreihe war ein grosser Erfolg. Alle Gastredner sind vor vollen Sälen aufgetreten. Das Publikum war breit und vereinte sowohl Studierende und Universitätsangehörige, als auch eine interessierte Öffentlichkeit. Der anschliessende Aperitif bot die Möglichkeit zum Networking. Nicht zuletzt hat die Vortragsreihe auch dazu beigetragen, Georgien auf der Landkarte von bekannten Koryphäen, wie Prof. Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, zu verankern. Letzterer hat den Besuch ebenfalls dazu genutzt sein neues Buch «The Power of Philology» vorzustellen.