91福利

Congratulations to recent PAIS graduate Dessi Ekzarova, who has won an essay competition organised by the United Nations.

Here is what Dessi had to say on her achievement:

'Many Languages One World' is the name of the essay competition I was lucky enough to participate in and become one of the winners. It is organised by the United Nations and its aim is to celebrate the various languages and cultures around the world!

I wrote an essay on the topic of the Post-2015 UN Developmental Agenda and the best ways to put it into practice. The rules demanded that the papers are written in one of the 6 official UN languages (English, Russian, Chinese, Arabic, French or Spanish) and it cannot it be in a language native to the writer.

As a Bulgarian, it was greatly rewarding to write a paper on a topic so important to me, in the language which I feel allows me to express myself best - English.

All the other winners and I get to travel to the UN Headquarters in New York and have a week of exciting projects, while enriching ourselves by getting to know people from all over the world

Dessi flew for a week in New York where she took part in exciting UN projects at their headquarters.

Speaking about her experience in New York, Dessi said:

I just came back home from my week in New York, involving the presentation in the UN General Assembly. Safe to say it was one of the best experiences in my life! The other essay winners in the English group and I got the privilege to speak on sustainable economic growth and the necessity of decent work for all.

The presentation can be viewed online, , with Dessi appearing at the 9 minute 30 mark.

Dr. Maria Koinova has a new article "Sustained vs. Episodic Mobilization among Conflict-generated Diasporas," published in International Political Science Review on July 8, 2015. It is appears just in time for the 20-th anniversary of the fall of the Srebrenca enclave and the commemoration of the death of more than 8.000 Muslims, killed by Serbian paramilitary forces in 1995. On the basis of a comparative study of Bosnian Muslims, Serbs, and Croats in the Netherlands, the articles argues that a non-resolved issue between a host-state, home-state, and diasporas, such as the failure of Dutch peace-keeping forces to protect the Srebrenica enclave in 1995, is still alive today in the Netherlands. This is despite earlier half-measures by the host-state to take some responsibility and more recent court cases. This issue is very important why migrants have a difficulty to move on from their traumatic pasts in the Netherlands, unlike in Sweden, and that they mobilise in sustained ways.

More information about the article could be found here:

On the anniversary of the 7/7 terror attacks in London, Dr. writes on how it changed the way Britain mourns victims of terrorism, for The Conversation.

Tucked into the south-east corner of Hyde Park in London, have stood since July 7, 2009. These make up the official memorial for the victims of the London bombings of 2005 – an unobtrusive testament of which many people are unaware. Each pillar purposefully contains slight individual characteristics to symbolise the individuality of each life lost on the London transport network during 7/7.

Compared to the gaping wounds that tear into the earth at Ground Zero, in the form of Michael Arad’s design, the British might consider their memorial reaction to the London bombings as understated.

We might contemplate London’s memorial in the context of British historical familiarity with political violence and a steadfast determination to just get on with it, with little fuss. We might think the memorial represents a continuity of historical approach when dealing with bombings, while also remaining respectfully apolitical in its simple, victim-oriented design.

But on many of these points, we would be wrong. The 7/7 pillars actually represent a dramatic shift in British memorial culture.

Rune Møller Stahl, a visiting PAIS PhD student, has written an extended article for the Jacobin Magazine on the results of the recent General Election in Denmark and its implications for the Danish left. The full article can be found here under the title of 'Denmark's Nativist Threat':