Smart Power, Smart Philanthropy – Hard, Soft and Smart Power in the American Century
An international workshop, funded by the British Academy, on 20th century U.S. philanthropy, at the University of Manchester
1st - 2nd December 2011
This workshop – organised jointly by Dr Katharina Rietzler (Cambridge) and Professor Inderjeet Parmar (Manchester) - will assess the relationship between U.S. foundations - Ford, Carnegie, Rockefeller and others - and American power in the world through a century of warfare.
In the course of the twentieth century, American philanthropy dealt with the problems of war and peace in numerous, often ambiguous ways. Philanthropic foundations have spent their energies on mitigating the negative effects of war but have also bolstered the war-making powers of national governments, for example by funding strategically important research. Indeed, the major US foundations have been central to constructing “the American century” and remain significant today in their own right and as models and collaborators with new emerging philanthropies such as the gargantuan Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
As several foundations prepare to celebrate their centenary, this workshop will assess philanthropy's impact on national societies and the international system from the First and Second World War, to the Cold War and the post-9-11 Global War on Terror.
Programme
9.30am Registration
Thursday 1 December 2011
9.45 am - 11.15 am
Philanthropy & War, 1919-1945
Katharina Rietzler (Cambridge), 'Fortunes of a Profession:American Foundations and the International Law Community in the Interwar Years'
Andrew Johnstone (Leicester), 'The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Promotion of the United Nations during World War II'
David Ekbladh (Tufts), 'The Interwar Foundations of Security Studies: Edward Mead Earle, the Carnegie Corporation and the Depression Era Origins of a Field'
Coffee Break
11.30 am - 1 pm
Waging the Cold War
Giles Scott-Smith (Roosevelt Study Centre, Middelburg), 'Constructing the Transatlantic Imaginary: The Ford Foundation and the Successor Generation Concept'
Bruce Cumings (Chicago), 'Biting the Hand That Feeds You: Why the 'Intelligence Function' of American Foundation Support for Area Studies Remains Hidden in Plain Sight'
Scott Lucas (Birmingham), 'Witting and Unwitting: Revisiting Foundations, the CIA, and the State-Private Network in Historical and Contemporary Contexts'
1 pm: Lunch
3.00 pm - 4.30 pm
Philanthropy & Knowledge-Based Networks
Nick Cullather (Indiana), 'Stretching the Surface of the Earth: The Foundations, Neo-Malthusianism, and the Modernizing Agenda'
Jon Harwood (Manchester), 'The foundations and agricultural biotechnology: What was learned from the Green Revolution?'
7 pm: Conference Dinner
Friday 2 December 2011
9.30 am - 11 am
Philanthropy and the American Century
Professor Donald Fisher (University of British Columbia), 'Rockefeller Philanthropy and the Long Twentieth Century: The State and Cycles of Accumulation'
Professor Hugh Gusterson (George Mason University), 'The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation: A Catalyst For Change'
Coffee Break
11.30 am - 1 pm
Hard and Soft Power
Rasmus Bertelsen (Aalborg University), 'American Missionary Universities in the Middle East, China and Japan and American Philanthropy: Interacting Soft Power of Transnational Actors'
Professor Inderjeet Parmar (Manchester), 'War, Foundations and the American Century'
1 pm: Lunch and Workshop Conclusion
Venue
Boardroom, Arthur Lewis Building. Campus map
Registration
Registration is now available online.