Dear Colleagues: As I reported in my last message to you, COCTA will sponsor three sessions at the IPSA World Congress to be held in Quebec from Aug. 1-6, 2000. You are cordially invited to attend and if you want to participate in any of these sessions, please let me know. Since Andreas Schedler, the co-chair of IPSA/COCTA and my successor as chair, is planning the second session, he alone is responsible for it. However, if you are interested, you should contact him directly -- the theme was announced in my previous memo and in the latest issue of PARTICIPATION. As for the first and third sessions, they are roundtables which increases the number of possible participants, and I am finalizing the list which has to be reported to the program committee by February 1. The first session will focus on different concepts represented by the word, "globalization," which is a focal term for the Congress and increasingly popular in our literature. As I think you know, the results of the Montreal Roundtable and the ISA exercise on "Globalization" are reported on my Home Page. You can find a classified list of the meanings found in texts submitted by participants at: http://www2.hawaii.edu/~fredr/glocon.htm#class This is obviously only a preliminary exercise and I know corrections need to be made, additional concepts can be added, and I am open to suggestions for change. Eventually, we should produce a small glosssary for "globalization" that can be widely used as a reference work. If you want to participate in expansion and revision of this material at the Quebec congress, please let me know. To supplement this basic material, I have compiled a set of links to texts on the INTERNET that you can read just by clicking your mouse. Please take a look at: http://www2.hawaii.edu/~fredr/sites.htm#sem This list also includes bibliographies and some archived discourses. They illustrate a broad range of understandings and attitudes about globalization. The word is not only very fuzzy and ambiguous, but it does identify a sea-change of great magnitude that has begun to transform the world as we enter the 3rd millennium. Admittedly these changes have been taking place for a long time, but I think they have also escalated in recent years, and the INTERNET iteslf is the most dramatic symbol these changes which enable individuals, like us, to engage in global communication with others who share our interests regardless of where they may live. The third COCTA panel will be about the development of key concepts in Political Science. If you are interested please, let me know. I am preparing a memo about it which I will send you shortly. The basic goal is to look at the most important concepts that identified this discipline as it emerged in university curricula, text books, and the panels of professional conferences. Americans tend to equate this evolution with what happened in American institutions, but people living in other countries may have quite different notions about the nature of politics and political science. I hope we will have a broadly cosmopolitan array of participants in this panel who can help us see how the discipline has evolved, conceptually, in different parts of the world. Even if you are not a Political Scientist and do not plan to attend the Quebec Congress, please join us in discussing these suibjecft on the INTERNET. Your contributions on this List will always be welcome, and I am sorry that we have not heard more from you. Please let me know your opinions about the meaning of "globalization" and the key concepts of Political Science. I look forward to hearing from you, both on the list and by personal messages. Cheers and aloha, Fred Sent by: ************************************************************* * * * FRED W. RIGGS, Professor Emeritus * * Political Science Department, University of Hawaii * * 2424 Maile Way, Honolulu, Hawaii 96822, U.S.A. * * Phone: (808) 956-8123 Fax: (808) 956-6877 * * e-mail: FREDR@HAWAII.EDU * * Web Page: http://www2.hawaii.edu/~fredr/ * * * ************************************************************* * * * Century old slogan of the Cosmopolitan Clubs: * * * * ABOVE ALL NATIONS IS HUMANITY * * * *************************************************************