Fragmenting Globalization: The Politics of Preferential Trade Liberalization in China and the United States
by Profs. Xiaojun Li & Ka Zeng (University of Arkansas)
Global supply chain integration is not only a rapidly growing feature of international trade, it is responsible for fundamentally changing trade policy at international and domestic levels. Ka Zeng and Xiaojun Li argue that global supply chain integration pits firms and industries that are more heavily dependent on foreign supply chains against those that are less dependent on intermediate goods for domestic production. Given that final goods are produced with both domestic and foreign suppliers, businesses whose supply chain will be disrupted as a result of increased trade barriers should lobby for preferential trade liberalization to maintain access to those foreign markets. Moreover, businesses whose products are used in the production of goods in foreign countries should also support preferential trade liberalization to compete with suppliers from other parts of the world.
This book uses multiple methods, including cross-sectional, time series analysis of the pattern of Preferential Trade Alliance formation by existing World Trade Organization members; a firm-level survey; and case studies of the pattern of corporate support for regional trade liberalization in both China and the United States. The authors show that the growing fragmentation of global production, trade, and investment is altering trade policy away from the traditional divide between export-oriented and import-competing industries.
Distributed Democracy: Health Care Governance in Ontario
by Prof. Carey Doberstein
The governance of health care in Ontario has long provided opportunities for citizens and stakeholders to participate, deliberate, and influence health care policy and investment decisions. Yet, despite providing opportunities for deliberation and influence amongst citizens, we don’t know how democratic the system actually is.
Distributed Democracy advances an original analytical framework to guide an investigation of democracy and accountability relationships in complex policy making environments. Applying the analytical framework in the context of health care governance in Ontario from 2004–2019, Carey Doberstein shows that the popular criticisms of health care governance in Ontario are misplaced. The democratic system of local health care governance is often plagued by severed connections among the various layers of deliberation and policy-making. An incisive analysis with considerable relevance for policy-makers and across academic disciplines, Distributed Democracy makes an important contribution to our understanding of policy development and decision-making as well as the limitations and potential of distributed democratic accountability.
Assistant Professor in International Relations
The Department of Political Science at The University of British Columbia (Vancouver) invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in International Relations. The area of specialization is open.
The successful candidate will have a completed Ph.D. in Political Science (or related field), or be able to demonstrate all Ph.D. requirements are sufficiently close to completion. The successful candidate is expected to have a Ph.D. for the start of the appointment. The anticipated start date is July 1, 2021.
The successful candidate will be expected to develop and maintain an active program of research leading to peer-reviewed publications and the securing of external research funding, and to contribute to the education and training of undergraduate as well as graduate students.
This position is subject to final budgetary approval. Given uncertainty caused by the global COVID-19 pandemic, applicants must be prepared to conduct interviews remotely if circumstances require. A successful applicant may be asked to consider an offer with a deadline without having been able to make an in-person visit to campus should travel or other restrictions apply. Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.
To apply, applicants must upload online the following in order HERE. Job ID: 37878.
- an application letter;
- a curriculum vitae;
- a statement (maximum 2 pages) of teaching philosophy, interests and accomplishments;
- a description of current and future research interests (maximum 2 pages);
- evidence of teaching effectiveness, e.g., summaries of teaching evaluations (official preferred), peer reviews of teaching, sample course material; and
- a 1-page statement about the applicant’s experience working with a diverse student body and contributions or potential contributions to creating/advancing a culture of equity and inclusion.
- one electronic sample of research or publication similar in length to a journal article.
In addition, applicants should arrange for three confidential signed letters of recommendation to be sent separately to the Department of Political Science care of Jeff Yupitun, Assistant to the Department Head, at poli.recruitment@ubc.ca. Review of applications begins on October 1, 2020, and will continue until the position is filled.
UBC-Vancouver’s Point Grey Campus is located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Musqueam people, with whom UBC shares a framework Memorandum of Affiliation. For information relating to Aboriginal initiatives that are available at UBC, visit the UBC Vancouver Aboriginal portal at: http://aboriginal.ubc.ca/. The Department of Political Science at UBC is committed to increasing Indigenous engagement within its curriculum.
Equity and diversity are essential to academic excellence. An open and diverse community fosters the inclusion of voices that have been underrepresented or discouraged. We encourage applications from members of groups that have been marginalized on any grounds enumerated under the B.C. Human Rights Code, including sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, racialization, disability, political belief, religion, marital or family status, age, and/or status as a First Nation, Metis, Inuit, or Indigenous person. All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadians and permanent residents of Canada will be given priority.
Assistant Professor in Political Theory
The Department of Political Science at The University of British Columbia (Vancouver) invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in Political Theory. The area of specialization is open.
The successful candidate will have a completed Ph.D. in Political Science (or related field), or be able to adequately demonstrate all Ph.D. requirements are sufficiently close to completion. The successful candidate is expected to have a Ph.D. for the start of the appointment. The anticipated start date is July 1, 2021.
The successful candidate will be expected to develop and maintain an active program of research leading to peer-reviewed publications and the securing of external research funding, and to contribute to the education and training of undergraduate as well as graduate students.
This position is subject to final budgetary approval. Applicants must be prepared to conduct interviews remotely if circumstances require, and understand that a successful applicant may be asked to consider an offer with a deadline without having been able to make an in-person visit to campus should travel or other restrictions apply. Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.
To apply, applicants must upload online the following in order HERE. Job ID: 37879.
- an application letter;
- a curriculum vitae;
- a statement of teaching philosophy, interests and accomplishments (maximum 2 pages);
- a description of current and future research interests (maximum 2 pages);
- evidence of teaching effectiveness (e.g., summaries of teaching evaluations (official preferred), peer reviews of teaching, sample course material); and
- a 1 page statement about the applicant’s experience working with a diverse student body and contributions or potential contributions to creating/advancing a culture of equity and inclusion.
- one electronic sample of research or publication.
In addition, applicants should arrange for three confidential signed letters of recommendation to be sent separately to the Department of Political Science care of Jeff Yupitun, Assistant to the Department Head, at poli.recruitment@ubc.ca. Review of applications begins on October 1, 2020, and will continue until the position is filled.
UBC-Vancouver’s Point Grey Campus is located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Musqueam people, with whom UBC shares a framework Memorandum of Affiliation. For information relating to Aboriginal initiatives that are available at UBC, visit the UBC Vancouver Aboriginal portal at: http://aboriginal.ubc.ca/. The Department of Political Science at UBC is committed to increasing Indigenous engagement within its curriculum.
Equity and diversity are essential to academic excellence. An open and diverse community fosters the inclusion of voices that have been underrepresented or discouraged. We encourage applications from members of groups that have been marginalized on any grounds enumerated under the B.C. Human Rights Code, including sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, racialization, disability, political belief, religion, marital or family status, age, and/or status as a First Nation, Metis, Inuit, or Indigenous person. All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however Canadians and permanent residents of Canada will be given priority.
The United States and Canada: How Two Democracies Differ and Why It Matters
by Prof. Paul J. Quirk
The United States and Canada share the longest border in the world, maintain one of the closest alliances, and are notably similar in many ways. Yet the two countries also have important differences, including sharply contrasting political institutions. In The United States and Canada, Paul J. Quirk has gathered a distinguished cast of contributors to present an integrated comparative examination of the political systems of the United States and Canada-with special attention to the effects of political institutions and their interaction with political values, geographic and demographic factors, and other influences. The volume explores the differences between the American presidential (or separation-of-powers) system and the Canadian parliamentary system-focusing on electoral and party systems, executive leadership and the legislative process, bureaucratic influence, and federalism. It proceeds to examine patterns of governance in a wide range of issue areas: economic policy; climate-change policy; healthcare policy; civil rights/integration and immigration; and abortion and gay rights. A sweeping comparative account, this volume serves as an authoritative guide for anyone interested in why the two countries differ and where they might be headed.
Courting Gender Justice: Russia, Turkey, and the European Court of Human Rights
by Prof. Lisa McIntosh Sundstrom and Valerie Sperling (Clark University), with Melike Sayoglu
Women and the LGBT community in Russia and Turkey face pervasive discrimination. Only a small percentage dare to challenge their mistreatment in court. Facing domestic police and judges who often refuse to recognize discrimination, a small minority of activists have exhausted their domestic appeals and then turned to their last hope: the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). The ECtHR, located in Strasbourg, France, is widely regarded as the most effective international human rights court in existence. Russian citizens whose rights have been violated at home have brought tens of thousands of cases to the ECtHR over the past two decades. But only one of these cases resulted in a finding of gender discrimination by the ECtHR-and that case was brought by a man. By comparison, the Court has found gender discrimination more frequently in decisions on Turkish cases. Courting Gender Justice explores the obstacles that confront citizens, activists, and lawyers who try to bring gender discrimination cases to court. To shed light on the factors that make rare victories possible in discrimination cases, the book draws comparisons among forms of discrimination faced by women and LGBT people in Russia and Turkey. Based on interviews with human rights and feminist activists and lawyers in Russia and Turkey, this engaging book grounds the law in the personal experiences of individual people fighting to defend their rights.
Will Big Business Destroy Our Planet?
by Peter Dauvergne
Can these companies, as so many are now hoping, provide the solutions to end the mounting global environmental crisis? Absolutely, the CEOs of big business are telling us: the commitment to corporate social responsibility will ensure it happens voluntarily.
Peter Dauvergne challenges this claim, arguing instead that corporations are still doing far more to destroy than protect our planet. Trusting big business to lead sustainability is, he cautions, unwise — perhaps even catastrophic. Planetary sustainability will require reining in the power of big business, starting now.
National Pathways to Low Carbon Emission Economies: Innovation Policies for Decarbonizing and Unlocking
Edited by Prof. Kurt Hübner
The science is clear: climate change is a fact and the probability is extremely high that it has been caused by humans. At the same time, policy responses are hesitant, rather lukewarm and differ substantially between nation-states. The question is, what drives and what blocks radical action? This book makes the case that institutional settings, path dependence and emerging change coalitions are critical in explaining climate policies across the global political economy.
Technological and social-political innovations are key drivers for dealing with climate change. This class of innovation is very much guided, or suppressed, by a national economy’s established institutional settings. By anchoring national case studies in a version of the well established ‘varieties of capitalism’ approach, the chapters of this book show why some economies are policy leaders and others become policy followers, or even policy interlockers. Moreover, the case studies demonstrate the extent to which external events and institutional constraints from the international polity influence national innovation strategies. Taking a unique analytical approach, which combines insights from innovation policies and a variety of capitalism literature, the authors provide genuine comprehension of the interplay between institutional settings, political actors and climate policies.
National Pathways to Low Carbon Emission Economies offers a valuable examination of these issues on climate change that will be of interest to academics and postgraduates researching climate policy, economic policy and social movements. Furthermore, it is relevant for policy analysts and policy makers who are interested in learning from climate policies in the context of innovation strategies for a range of countries.