College News - 2007-08

Major events and news during the academic year 2007-8

Appointments, awards and other news

Roger Goodman, former Acting Warden of St Antony's, has been appointed Head of Oxford University's Social Sciences Division with effect from 1 April 2008.
The School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies (SIAS) has announced two appointments. Joe Foweraker, currently Director of the Latin American Centre, will become Head for a three-year period on 1 October 2008. In the interim, William Beinart, Rhodes Professor of Race Relations, will be Acting Head of SIAS.
St Antony's elects a proctor - The College is delighted to announce the election of Dr Philip Robins as Proctor for the proctorial year 2009-10. Dr Robins will take up the post on March 18 2009.
Paul Collier has been awarded the 2008 Lionel Gelber Prize for his book, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It (Oxford University Press). The Prize is awarded annually by The Lionel Gelber Foundation in partnership with the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto and Foreign Policy magazine. It honours the world’s best books on international affairs. Professor Collier also delivered the annual Lionel Gelber Lecture. A webcast of the ceremony, including Professor Collier's lecture, is available through the Gelber Prize website.
Jaideep Gupte's doctoral research on extralegal security and urban vulnerability in Mumbai has been awarded the 2007 Global Development Network Medal for Outstanding Research. The GDN Research Medals and Awards form the largest worldwide competition for research on development issues. Jaideep's paper, entitled Linking Urban Vulnerability, Infra-power and 'Communal' Violence: extralegal security and policing in Nagpada, Mumbai was shortlisted under the category of Rule of Law: Providing Security for Development. All finalists were invited to present their research at the Annual Global Development Network conference in Brisbane, Australia. The photo shows Jaideep receiving the award from the former President of Mexico, Ernesto Zedillo, in Brisbane.
Paul Collier has been awarded the 2008 Arthur Ross Book Award Gold Medal for his book, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It (Oxford University Press). The prize is awarded annually by the US Council on Foreign Relations to recognize books that make an outstanding contribution to the understanding of foreign policy or international relations. Professor Collier will be honoured at an event in June at the Council's New York headquarters.
June 2008 - The Queen's Birthday Honours List included awards for Antonians. Paul Collier, Director of the Centre for the Study of African Economies, has been awarded a CBE for services to Scholarship and Development. Rear Admiral Neil Latham, Hudson Visiting Fellow 2001-2, has also been awarded a CBE. Michael Crawford has been awarded a CMG.
Rachel Murphy, University Lecturer in the Sociology of China, was awarded an £80,000 British Academy grant to investigate the effects on children living in rural China whose parents have left them behind as they migrate to the cities for work.
Paul Chaisty has been awarded a Nuffield Foundation Social Sciences Small Grant to support his research into Particularism and Legislative Behaviour in the Russian Federation.
John Loughlin, Visiting Fellow 2006-7 and SCR member, has met with the Indian government to discuss how local people can have a greater say in the way their community is governed. Professor Loughlin is Chair of the Advisory Group of Experts on Decentralisation for the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT), which has produced a set of Guidelines on Effective Decentralization.
Foreign Policy magazine's Top 100 Public Intellectuals includes several Antonians such as Anne Applebaum, Ian Buruma, Paul Collier, Thérèse Delpech, Thomas Friedman, Michael Ignatieff, Enrique Krauze and Tariq Ramadan.

Honours given to Antonians

2008 New Year Honours List - Professor Robert Cassen, Emeritus Fellow of St Antony's College and Emeritus Professor of the Economics of Development, was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to education.
George Gomori (1957), the first Hungarian student in St Antony's, has been awarded the Commander's Cross of the Hungarian Republic, one of the highest distinctions in Hungary.
Benjamin T Jealous (1997) has been elected President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in the US. At 35 he will be the youngest leader in the organization’s 99-year history. He will take over as president in September.
Professor Suranjan Das (1984) has been appointed Vice-Chancellor of Calcutta University.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar pro-democracy advocate and Honorary Fellow of St Antony's, was awarded in May 2008 the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest civilian honour awarded in the United States.
Encaenia 2008 - Montek Singh Ahluwalia (1966) was awarded the Degree of Doctor of Civil Law, honoris causa, at this year's Encaenia. Mr Ahluwalia, an economist, is Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Government of India. He has been extensively involved in India’s economics reforms as Commerce Secretary and in posts at the Ministry of Finance and Department of Economic Affairs. He was also the first Director of the Independent Evaluation Office at the International Monetary Fund.
Joanna Kavenna, Alistair Horne Fellow 2003-4, has won the Orange Broadband Award for New Writers for her novel Inglorious, about a London journalist facing a crisis.

Deaths

Professor Geoffrey Lewis - It is with great sorrow that we announce the death of Professor Geoffrey Lewis, who died suddenly on February 12th. Professor Lewis was a Research Fellow at St Antony's from 1961 to 1965, a Governing Body Fellow from 1965 to 1987 and a regular visitor to the College as Emeritus Fellow from 1987 onwards. Professor Lewis’s funeral was held on Tuesday 19 February at Wolvercote Chapel and Cemetery. Obituaries appeared in The Times of 20 February, The Guardian of 12 March, the Oxford Times of 29 February and The Oxford Mail of 28 February 2008.
Michael Vinay Bhatia - Michael Bhatia, a student at the College since 2001, was tragically killed in Afghanistan on 7 May 2008. A video of his commemoration service and other links are available on the page dedicated to Michael.
Walter Blackburn – We were saddened to hear of the death of Walter Blackburn, who worked in the maintenance department from 1978 to 2000. He passed away on Monday 24 March, 2008. The funeral was held at the Oxford Crematorium on 4 April.

Departures of College fellows and staff - St Antony's was sad to lose the following:

David Washbrook, University Reader in Modern South Asian History and Professorial Fellow, resigned from the Governing Body at the end of Michaelmas term to take up a position at Trinity College, Cambridge. He is to retain his association with St Antony's as a Visiting Fellow until the end of 2008. (See photo, right, courtesy of Agnes Thambynayagam.)
Ray Allen, the Computing Manager for eight years, left in September for OUP. Peter Micklem is holding the fort until a replacement is appointed.
Joan Yardy retired in May after just over 14 years in the College Accounts Office.
Graham Jowett, the College Accountant, left in February. We are pleased to welcome Fiona Shickle as the new Accountant.
Ken Wilkinson, one of our longest-serving Lodge Porters, retired at the end of January after more than twelve years' service. Malcolm Tyrrell has joined the team in his place.

Jill Flitter, our College Secretary of 21 years. (See photo, right, courtesy of Agnes Thambynayagam.) She has been replaced by Margaret Couling (College Registrar).
Jackie Willcox, the Secretary and Librarian of the Russian and Eurasian Studies Centre, retired at the end of 2007 after more than 25 years with the College. She continues in a part-time capacity looking after the Parliamentary Fellows Programme. We welcome in her place Richard Ramage.
Janet Pearson worked in various parts of the College, most recently as Senior Members' Assistant. Julie Irving has taken over as Senior Members' Administrator.
Hilary Maddicott, Library Assistant for more than 17 years, has retired. She has returned to College on a part-time basis to catalogue the Deakin Gift.

A selection of prominent events
- Refurbishment of the Russian Library – Thanks to generous donations, a major programme of refurbishment got underway in April 2008.
- STAIR's latest edition, The Politics of Human Trafficking, was launched on 30 April with an evening of debate at St Antony's College. STAIR - St Antony’s International Review - is a peer-reviewed, academic journal of international affairs established by graduate students at St Antony’s and featuring established commentators from around the world. To find out more or order copies of this and previous editions, contact sales@stair-journal.org.
- 1 May 2008 - Dr Olli Rehn (1990), Member of the European Commission responsible for Enlargement, spoke on The EU's smart power in its region and the world as part of the SEESOX (South East European Studies at Oxford) programme. The text of the speech is available in .pdf format.
- 31 March 2008 - Librarians' Conference. St Antony's hosted the first joint conference of Oxford and Cambridge college librarians.
- 29-30 March 2008 - Olympic Legacies Conference. Details of the programme can be found in the flyer and schedule.
- 4 March 2008 - The Chancellor's Seminar featured Güler Sabanci, Chairperson of Sabanci Holding and founder of Sabanci University, in conversation with the Chancellor, Chris Patten, on the subject of Bridging Worlds.
- 18 February 2008 – George Alogoskoufis, Greek Minister of Economy and Finance, spoke on Globalisation and the European Social Model. Click to read the full text of the speech.
- 27 November 2007 - HE Mr Ron Proser, Israeli Ambassador to the UK spoke on Ninety Years to the Balfour Declaration: Where Do We Go from Here?
- 20 November 2007 - A book launch was held for Avi Shlaim's new book, Lion of Jordan, at the Middle East Centre Library.
- 20 November 2007 - St Antony's JCR Ambassadorial Seminar - HE Dr Yoon-je Cho, South Korean Ambassador to the United Kingdom, spoke on Recent Developments on the Korean Peninsula. Click to see the Powerpoint presentation of his talk.
- 19 November 2007 - Robert Mabro, Emeritus Fellow and former Director of the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, was presented with a Petroleum Research Award by the King of Saudi Arabia.
- 6 November 2007 - Mrs Dora Bakoyannis, the Foreign Minister of Greece, delivered the SEESOX Annual Lecture under the title Does Europe have a message for the World? The text of the speech is now available. SEESOX - South East European Studies at Oxford - is part of the European Studies Centre.
- 26 October 2007 - Mexico: After NAFTA, Average Growth of 3%. The Missed Opportunity. Former President of Mexico, Carlos Salinas de Gortari, spoke in a JCR Special Seminar. Mr Salinas was President of Mexico between 1988 and 1994. During his government the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was negotiated and signed. The seminar was chaired by Professor Laurence Whitehead, Official Fellow in Politics, Nuffield College. This event was sponsored by the St Antony's JCR and the Oxford University Mexican Society.
- 23 October 2007 - Workshop honouring the work of Professor Sir Adam Roberts, Montague Burton Professor of International Relations, followed by Professor Roberts's Valedictory Lecture: International Relations after the Cold War.
- 19 October 2007 - Seize the Hour: When Nixon met Mao. The Warden, Professor Margaret MacMillan, spoke on the topic of her recent book.
- 11 October 2007 - the European Studies Centre's Annual Lecture was given by Mr José Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission. The subject of Mr Barroso's speech was ‘Britain’s Role in a Global Europe’. Video clips of the visit are available on the European Commission's website.
- 24 November 2007 - The Men's Football Team won the MCR League Championship for the first time in College history. St Antony's remained undefeated, winning five games and drawing one to top the 21-team league. The final against Green/Osler was the most dramatic, as witnessed by more than 30 St Antony's fans on the sidelines. The team went down three times (0-1, 1-2, 2-3) during the game, coming back each time to equalize and scoring the winning goal five minutes before the end.
- Oxford tops league tables again - The latest British university league tables, published by The Times place Oxford top for the seventh year. Oxford has now topped all three major British league tables this year, including those of The Independent and The Guardian. Of particular relevance to St Antony's, The Times lists Oxford top of the subject tables for Anthropology, Politics, and Middle Eastern and African Studies.
- Oxford University has launched a film, Oxford Today, as part of the new Development Campaign, Oxford Thinking. The films can be viewed on the Campaign website. It is narrated by Michael Palin and features our Warden, Margaret MacMillan.