Conference: Towards a New History of the League of Nations

Later this week, on August 25-26, the Graduate Institute of International Studies will host a conference on "Towards a New History of the League of Nations." The program is here. Here's the idea:

The past decade has seen a flowering of new work on the history of the League of Nations. A group of research scholars at universities across four continents will convene on August 25-26, 2011 for a conference dedicated to presenting and discussing the findings of those scholars who have been re-examining the League’s history through the use of its archives in Geneva. This conference is being hosted by the Graduate Institute of International & Development Studies in Geneva and is made possible by the generous support of the Fonds National Suisse, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and the Du Bois foundation.

The conference program features panels on the League and security; on the role of experts and the practices of internationalism; on competing visions of global order; on popular internationalism and mobilization; and on the role of the League in the shaping understandings and regimes about rights. There will be invited speakers for each of these sessions, but the conference organizers anticipate and welcome the participation by additional scholars around the world interested in the history of the League of Nations. Scholars interested in attending the conference are thus invited to “table” additional papers relevant to specific panels, and while those papers will not be formally presented, they will become part of the collective discussion.

The Conference Organizing Committee includes Davide Rodogno (GIIDS), Patricia Clavin (Oxford), Susan Pedersen (Columbia) and Corinne Pernet (St. Gallen). Questions about the conference, including requests to attend and to “table” papers, should be addressed in the first instance to Davide Rodogno, at davide.rodogno@graduateinstitute.ch