Multicultural Initiatives
Friday, November 2nd
9am-6pm International Festival Information & Welcome Table
Kirr Commons
10am-5pm Life Inequalities
UC Art Gallery
The inequality in average wage and quality of life across the globe is astounding. Carnegie Mellon Design students present an interactive gallery that will illustrate this disparity in poignant photographs, alarming statistics, and tangible goods.
10:30-11:30am Globalization, Economic Stability, and the Role of Women in the MENA Region
Peter Room
An increasingly held view is that many of the economic and social problems confronting most Middle Eastern countries stem from their failure to become more integrated into the global economy. Compared to other regions in the world economy, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is less integrated into trade and financial rings of the global economy, participating largely as an exporter of oil and receiving less Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) than other middle-income regions. This has implications for female labor and employment patterns. Women of MENA still have lower rates of employment than women in other parts of world. Despite the fact that economic globalization has been generation of jobs for women in export-processing, free trade zones, and world market factories, much of the work available to women is poorly paid, demeaning, insecure; and accompanied by high rates of turnover.
This presentation will be given by Professor Fatma El-Hamidi from the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at University of Pittsburgh, and seeks to advance the gender equality discussion in the region by framing the issues in terms of economic necessity. It analyzes the potential of women’s greater economic contribution to the region’s new development model, and identifies key economic and sociopolitical impediments to women’s increased labor force participation and empowerment.
10:30-11:30am Globalization & International Corporate Responsibility
Dowd Room
Globalization is fueled by market transactions that are predominated by large multinational corporations. Business ethicists scrutinize the conduct of these corporations and attempt to answer a set of fundamental questions having to do with international corporate responsibility. Does multinational corporate practice create benefits or perpetrate harms? Do these colossal organizations advance progress for the people of the world or do they hinder people from achieving their full human capabilities? Are they good or are they evil? In this talk, Peter Madsen, Distinguished Service Professor for Ethics and Social Responsibility at Carnegie Mellon, will explore several issues of international corporate responsibility. He will offer a somewhat surprising answer to the fundamental question about whether multinationals are good or evil and offer “prudential justice” as a new conceptual framework in business ethics.
11am-12pm World Poverty
Wright Room
More than 2.7 billion people have less than $2 a day on which to live. The world's 358 richest people have more money than the combined annual incomes of countries with 45% of the world's population. Is this distribution of wealth just? Do those of us in the developed world have any obligations to the global poor? This session, hosted by Philosophy Professor Nicole Hassoun, will explore some of these questions in light of the festival's theme.
11am-12pm What is a World Class City?
McKenna Room
Throughout history, certain cities have emerged as centers of global commerce, culture and/or politics. What factors are required to do so? And if a city is constantly in flux, how does one represent it? These questions, among others, will be addressed by Kelly Hutzell and Rami el Samahy, Assistant Professors at the Carnegie Mellon School of Architecture and visiting scholars teaching courses on architecture and urbanism in Doha in the spring of 2008. They will discuss the ways and means of global city-making through a presentation of student work from their seminars, Mapping Urbanism and Contemporary Middle Eastern Cities, courses that encourage architects and other visual thinkers to investigate the social, economic and political factors that influence physical space.
12:30-2pm The Wal-Mart Effect Keynote Lecture & Lunch
Rangos Ballroom
Charles Fishman, award-winning journalist and author of The Wal-Mart Effect, will offer the International Festival keynote lecture. Lunch will be provided to all in attendance. Tickets are free and are available at the University Center Information Desk beginning Monday, October 22nd. A book signing will follow the lecture.
By influencing the way we shop, the products we buy, and the prices we pay everyday, Wal-Mart continues to purposefully drive the American economy. On the other end, it affects the operations of the suppliers and changes what is sold, how these products are packaged and presented, and the very lives of the factory workers who make these products around the world. It is, as Charles Fishman describes, the most powerful and influential company in the world. Find out more about the phenomena, the lives it has touched, and what it means for the future of globalization.
2-3pm Fair Trade vs. Free Trade: A False Dichotomy?
Wright Room
The debate over fair trade and free trade often takes place in highly polemical, even emotional terms. Each side tends to believe that their model of trade is the best way to alleviate world poverty. This presentation given by History Professor John Soluri will attempt to "unpack" the current debate by providing a brief historical explanation of the rise of "free trade" and the much more recent "fair trade" movements. We will also consider both key differences and shared assumptions held by free traders and fair traders.
2-3pm The Significance of Chinese Tourism: The World’s Biggest Industry in Its Most Populous Country
Connan Room
Tourism is a modern activity that has come to China quite recently. What do middleclass tourists from Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing look for and find in China’s interior? How do the organization and ideology of Chinese tourism reflect the peculiarities of the PRC's late socialist government? How is tourism transforming particular places like Dali, Huanglong and Jiuzhai, and how are local ethnic groups responding to the challenges? And how will international tourism be transformed by the opening of China? This illustrated lecture, hosted by History Professor Donald Sutton, will be based on five summers of fieldwork and include time for discussion.
2:30-3:30pm Moving From a Socialist Society to a Free-Market Economy: The Psychology of Work
McKenna Room
This presentation will focus on changes in Central and Eastern Europe as they move from state controlled socialism to various forms of free-market economies. Dr. Irene Frieze, a professor of Psychology and Business Administration at University of Pittsburgh, will draw on her research on changing attitudes in young adults in this region to talk about how these economic changes affect people's daily lives and their beliefs about the future and about work and family issues.
3-4pm Changing the Rules of the Game: How Corporate Strategy Drives Public Policy and the Visa Versa
Dowd Room
A rapid and dramatic shift in public policy anywhere in the world can change, create, and even destroy an IT company or even an entire industry. The larger that shift in policy the more wrenching the impact on unprepared businesses large and small. Such policy shifts can be within a country, such as with the Telecom Reform Act of 1996, or between nations, such as with a new international trade agreement. As a consequence, CEOs, corporate strategists, and investors must to be able to: (1) predict when, where, and how these large policy shifts will happen, (2) have a strategy to mitigate or take advantage of it, or (3) change the rules to their favor. This session, facilitated by Professor Mark DeSantis from the Heinz School, will help participants understand all three options.
3:30-4:30pm Trade Union Solidarity – A Response to Corporate Globalization
Wright Room
The United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) is a progressive national union, headquartered in Pittsburgh. The UE is known for its innovative international work which includes cross-border solidarity in its organizing, education and cultural projects. In this inter-active workshop, the Editor of the UE News, Alan Hart, will share some of the union's experiences in building relationships with trade unions in other countries and what this has meant for workers here in the US. For more information about the UE visit www.ranknfile-ue.org and www.ueinternational.org
4-5pm Russian Energy: Impact on the Economy and Foreign Policy
McKenna Room
Robert Donnorummo, the Associate Director of Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, will lead a presentation on Russian energy issues. He will discuss oil and gas production in Russia, the central and dominating role of energy in the Russian economy, and how the export of oil and gas is being used as leverage in the pursuit of Moscow's foreign policy objectives.
4:30-5:30pm Student Cultural Food Fair
Rangos 3
Join multicultural student organizations for free samplings of food and cultural traditions from around the world.
7-8:30pm Anthropological Data: A Dramatic Performance
McConomy Auditorium
“Anthropological Data: (with actual human footage!)” is written and directed by Anya Martin, a CMU School of Drama alumna, and currently the assistant to the Head of the Drama School. It was first created and performed in February of 2007 at Lancaster Country Day School, a college preparatory school in Lancaster, PA. As an artist working with children and young adults at the time, Martin was struck by a phrase, which seemed to be everywhere on a recent trip to Ellis Island, “For my children.” For millions of immigrants this phrase provided courage enough to risk starting over in a strange land. And amidst all the media attention, political ranting, and emotional debates that the topic of immigration has brought up in recent months, Martin wondered if anyone had ever bothered to ask “the children” what they thought about it all. As part of the audition process for the show students prepared theatrical pieces around the question, “where do you come from?” The responses Martin received in auditions were as wide open as the question—from singing sperm, to mimed ancestral sea travel, to political rants. So that’s where we began, with big ideas, sweeping questions about the origin of man, and ponderings about how we as individuals fit into this seemingly endless cycle of anthropological data.
Tickets are free and seating is first come, first served. Doors open at 6:30 pm. The director would love to hear your feedback about the show. Please feel free to e-mail her at aamartin@andrew.cmu.edu.