Harney Lecture Series
Sponsored by the R.F. Harney Program in Ethnic, Immigration and Pluralism Studies and the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, the Harney Lecture Series brings prominent scholars and practitioners from around the world to explore cutting-edge topics in citizenship, migration, and diversity and to enrich the research community at the University of Toronto.
All events (unless otherwise stated) will be open to the public and require pre-registration at the Munk School event registration URL.
Please contact harneyprogram@utoronto.ca for all questions regarding the lectures.
Visit this page frequently for event updates.
Upcoming Events
Harney Lecture Series ― October 21, 2021 4.10 ― 5.45 pm
Wampum Diplomacy in the Early Middle Encounter Period
Lecture by Douglas Sanderson, Prichard Wilson Chair in Law & Public Policy, Decanal Advisor on Indigenous Issues, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto.
Ayelet Shachar (moderator), R.F. Harney Chair in Ethnic, Immigration and Pluralism Studies, Munk School.
For more than three hundred years, British, French and Dutch officials engaged in diplomatic missions and exchanges according to Indigenous diplomatic protocols. This talk by Douglas Sanderson (Amo Binashii) of the Beaver Clan, from Opaskwayak Cree Nation, outlines some of the ways colonial officials learned to conduct themselves in the international law milieu of the early-and-middle-encounter period in history.
Douglas Sanderson (Amo Binashii) is a member of the Opaskwayak Cree Nation. He is an associate professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Toronto. He earned his Juris Doctor at the University of Toronto and his LLM at Columbia University, where he was Fulbright fellow. Professor Sanderson is the Prichard Wilson Chair in Law and Public Policy, and this year was awarded the The Ludwik and Estelle Jus Memorial Human Rights Prize in recognition of a lifetime of work in human rights.
Harney Lecture Series ― November 18, 2021 4.10 ― 6.00 pm
Divided by the Wall: Progressive and Conservative Immigration Politics at the U.S.-Mexico Border
Lecture by Emine Fidan Elcioglu, Assistant Professor, Sociology, University of Toronto
Ayelet Shachar (moderator), R.F. Harney Chair in Ethnic, Immigration and Pluralism Studies, Munk School.
Why is immigration a controversial topic in the United States? Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork spanning 2010 to 2016, I begin to answer this question by examining the motivations and life histories of Americans who are active in politically-opposed volunteer organizations in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. By focusing on activists who, because of the privileges of whiteness and U.S. citizenship, are not directly impacted by immigration policy, I consider why they nevertheless feel strongly enough to engage in this political struggle. I find that division around immigration is rooted in deep phenomena: the long-standing trend of growing economic inequality, racialized anxiety in the post-civil rights era, and ultimately, the search for personal reconciliation. Although Trump amplified these dynamics, he did not create them and they will not disappear in the wake of his presidency. I conclude by discussing how my findings may explain, in part, why immigration is such a polarizing issue and how addressing the underlying problems of social inequality may help mitigate the current contentiousness of immigration and border policy in the United States. Emine Fidan Elcioglu is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Toronto. At the intersection of the sociology of migration and political sociology, her research examines how citizens make sense of non-citizenship and national gatekeeping. She is the author of Divided by the Wall: Progressive and Conservative Immigration Politics at the U.S.-Mexico Border
, published by University of California Press in 2020.
Emine Fidan Elcioglu is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Toronto. At the intersection of the sociology of migration and political sociology, her research examines how citizens make sense of non-citizenship and national gatekeeping. She is the author of Divided by the Wall: Progressive and Conservative Immigration Politics at the U.S.-Mexico Border, published by University of California Press in 2020.
Harney Lecture Series ― January 27, 2022 4.10 ― 6.00 pm
Reconsidering Reparations
Lecture by Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò, Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, Georgetown University
Ayelet Shachar (moderator), R.F. Harney Chair in Ethnic, Immigration and Pluralism Studies, Munk School.
Most theorizing about reparations treats it as a social justice project – either rooted in reconciliatory justice focused on making amends in the present; or, they focus on the past, emphasizing restitution for historical wrongs. I will argue that neither approach is optimal, and advance a different case for reparations rooted in distributive justice, which I refer to as the “constructive” view of reparations. I’ll also present some of what I take to be the political and policy implications of this view.
Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University. He works on social/political philosophy and ethics, with an emphasis on figures and themes from anticolonial, anticapitalist, and Black radical traditions. His new book, Reconsidering Reparations, is forthcoming with Oxford University Press.
Past Events
Harney Lecture Series ― 21 January 2021 2.10 ― 4.10 pm
Ta’al Bachir (Come Tomorrow): The Politics of Waiting for Citizenship
Lecture by Noora Lori, Assistant Professor of International Relations, Pardee School, Boston University
When it comes to extending citizenship to some groups, why might ruling political elites say neither “yes” nor “no,” but “wait”? The dominant theories of citizenship tend to recognize clear distinctions between citizens and aliens; either one has citizenship or one does not. In this presentation, Dr. Lori will discuss her recent book that explains how and why some minorities are neither fully included nor simply expelled by a state. Instead, they can be suspended in limbo – residing in a territory for extended periods without ever accruing any citizenship rights. This in-depth case study of the United Arab Emirates uses new archival sources and extensive interviews to show how temporary residency can be transformed into a permanent legal status, through visa renewals and the postponement of naturalization cases. In the UAE, temporary residency was also codified into a formal citizenship status through the outsourcing of passports from the Union of Comoros, allowing elites to effectively reclassify minorities into foreign residents.
Harney Lecture Series ― February 4, 2021 4.00 ― 6.00 pm
Racial Borders
Lecture by E. Tendayi Achiume, Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law / UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance
Harney Lecture Series ― February 25, 2021 3.10 – 5.00 pm
Automation and Immigration
Lecture by Kieran Oberman, Senior Lecturer in Politics, University of Edinburgh and Tom Parr, Associate Professor, University of Warwick
Access the video recording of this lecture here.
This lecture was co-sponsored by the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity
Migration and automation are dominant trends of our age. Both are changing how we work and live. When it comes to migration, many voters want tighter restrictions. They are worried that migrants are ‘stealing their jobs’ and ‘changing the culture’. Politicians are responding with promises to get tough. Automation is different. People worry about automation but not in the same way. Voters are not calling for the numbers of machines to be reduced or even controlled. There are no anti-robot political parties. Politicians do not win elections by getting tough on computer chips.
The question is ‘why?’ Why is there such significant opposition to migration and yet so little to automation? Why limit migrants but not robots?
The paper asks these questions not only in relation to the public debate on migration but also the debate amongst philosophers. In the first part, it looks at some of the main philosophical arguments for immigration restrictions and shows how the arguments apply equally to automation. In the second part, the paper offers a hypothesis as to why migration, not automation, generates public opposition. It is human to classify other humans in terms of in-groups and out-groups. Migrants, being human, are readily identified as an out-group. Machines are not human. In short, anti-migrant prejudice seems to explain the difference. If prejudice is so crucial in explaining opposition to immigration, we have further reason to doubt the permissibility of immigration restrictions.
Harney Lecture Series ― March 12, 2021 12.00 – 2.00 pm
The Rise of Authoritarianism and Populism: Challenges to Critical Analyses of Law
Panel with Professor Guenter Frankenberg, Goethe University, Frankfurt; Helena Alviar Garcia, Science Po Law School, Paris; Bojan Bugaric, University of Sheffield
Co-sponsored with Critical Analysis of Law Workshop, Faculty of Law, & Max Planck Fellow Group in Comparative Constitutionalism
Harney Lecture Series ― March 25, 2021 2.00 – 4.00 pm
How Embedded Interventions Controlled Contagion: Ideas, Institutions and the First Vaccine in China and India
Lecture by Prerna Singh, Associate Professor of Political Science and International Studies, Brown University
Access the video recording of this lecture Part 1 and Part 2
Co-sponsored with the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity and the Centre for South Asian Studies, Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy
