BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:talks.ox.ac.uk BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Imperial and Postcolonial Regimes of Expertise: Medicine\, Develop ment\, and Environmental Limits - Sudarshana Banerjee (University of St An drews)\, Rishabh Bajoria (National University of Singapore) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260311T140000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260311T153000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/2369f8f7-2fd2-462e-9b78-fa4fda234296/ DESCRIPTION:Sudarshana Banerjee (University of St Andrews)\, Incorporation and Marginalization: Medical Knowledge-Making\, Power\, and the Politics of Knowledge Circulation during the Company Era\n\nThis paper examines the contested nature of scientific and medical knowledge-making in colonial s paces and the complex politics of knowledge transmission beyond the coloni al borders in the early nineteenth-century by focusing on the activities o f George Playfair (1782–1846)\, an East India Company official and membe r of the Indian Medical Service. Playfair’s medical career in India\, sp anning from 1805 to 1842\, was marked by active engagement with indigenous remedies and medical texts and efforts to incorporate them into Western m edical practices. Recent scholarship on the transnational circulation of k nowledge has emphasized the need to recognize the barriers to knowledge tr ansmission. While earlier studies have focused on the movement of knowledg e\, they have often overlooked the role of the State and institutional str uctures in shaping what knowledge was allowed to circulate. Playfair’s c areer offers a lens through which to explore these frictions in medical kn owledge circulation during the Company era. This paper analyzes two key mo ments: Playfair's attempt to introduce Mudar (powdered form of a plant abu ndantly found in various regions of India and utilized by native healers) into Western medicine as a remedy for various disruptive diseases like lep rosy\, and his English translation of the Taleef Shereef\, an eighteenth-c entury Unani medical text (Playfair’s translation was published by the C alcutta Medical and Physical Society in 1833). I will contrast and interro gate the enthusiasm with which knowledge of Mudar was circulated and recei ved in the British medical press with the relative silence surrounding the Taleef. I will demonstrate that while early nineteenth-century knowledge- making by Company officials within the Indian subcontinent was characteriz ed simultaneously by processes of collaboration (albeit marked by asymmetr ical relations of power) and erasure\, the circulation and reception of th is knowledge within the metropole and broader Empire were further shaped b y concerns of imperial utility\, commercial profitability and racial preju dice. Operating both at the level of the Company-State and metropolitan me dical press these concerns ensured selective\, calculated incorporation an d systemic marginalization of indigenous medical knowledge.\n\nRishabh Baj oria (National University of Singapore)\, High Developmentalism and Stubbo rn Ecologies: A Pre-History of the Indus Waters Treaty\, 1948-54\n\nThis p aper focuses on attempts by diplomatic elites to decontextualise the Indus rivers from the territory over which they flow—the disputed region of K ashmir. The most pronounced of such attempts was by David Lilienthal in 19 51. Lilienthal was the former Chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority —an ambitious dam-building project designed to be the centrepiece of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal in the US South—and his intervention reflected the same ‘high developmentalist’ ideal. I show how Lilienthal changed the future of Kashmir and the Indus waters by argu ing that harnessing the waters for India and Pakistan’s postcolonial dev elopment required setting aside Kashmiri demands for self-determination. L ilienthal’s 1951 piece for Collier’s magazine set the agenda for World Bank-led negotiations between India and Pakistan during 1951-54. The pape r draws on diplomatic archives from the US\, UK\, and India to trace how L ilienthal’s proposal to set up a Tennessee Valley Authority [‘TVA’] for the Indus could not be realised because even while the territory of Ka shmir could be abstracted from the Indus waters in legal and political dis course\, the ecology of Kashmir could not be disappeared from riparian pol itics altogether. Thus\, it explores how the inability of regional and glo bal elites to align recalcitrant ecologies with their developmental agenda s opened up political possibilities for subalterns to assert self-determin ation over Kashmiri territory and waters. Six decades on\, dams constructe d under the Treaty continue to cause flooding in Kashmir\, placing the env ironmental costs of New Delhi and Karachi’s development onto Kashmiris.\ nSpeakers:\nSudarshana Banerjee (University of St Andrews)\, Rishabh Bajor ia (National University of Singapore) LOCATION:Room 20.402\, The Schwarzman Centre TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/2369f8f7-2fd2-462e-9b78-fa4fda234296/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Imperial and Postcolonial Regimes of Expertise: Medicine\ , Development\, and Environmental Limits - Sudarshana Banerjee (University of St Andrews)\, Rishabh Bajoria (National University of Singapore) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Leviathan's health: state capacity and epidemics from the Black De ath to Covid - Professor Sheilagh Ogilvie (University of Oxford) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260311T170000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260311T183000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/5c9916aa-3a9e-49a1-9bcf-8db835364dc4/ DESCRIPTION:\nSpeakers:\nProfessor Sheilagh Ogilvie (University of Oxford) LOCATION:Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies\, Marston Road OX3 0EE TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/5c9916aa-3a9e-49a1-9bcf-8db835364dc4/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Leviathan's health: state capacity and epidemics from the Black Death to Covid - Professor Sheilagh Ogilvie (University of Oxford) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:How Economic Reform Revived Totalitarian Rule in China - Professor Minxin Pei (Claremont McKenna College) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260311T170000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260311T183000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/5d5d759b-2de1-440c-9052-e2a3e4511612/ DESCRIPTION:When China embarked on modernization in 1979\, many hoped that the country’s turn toward capitalism would put its totalitarian past to rest and moved it toward a more democratic future. Instead\, China has re verted to a neo-totalitarian regime after more than four decades of econom ic reform and globalization. The fundamental cause is Deng Xiaoping’s st rategy of saving one-party rule with capitalism. He steadfastly kept intac t the institutional foundations of totalitarianism even as he unleashed pr ivate entrepreneurship and courted foreign investment. Only a fragile bala nce of power among duelling factions prevented the rise of a totalitarian leader after Deng’s death in 1997. But this temporary equilibrium collap sed when Xi Jinping rose to power in late 2012 – and revived many totali tarian practices that are likely to set China back decades politically\, e conomically\, and geopolitically. \n\nMinxin Pei is the Tom and Margot Pri tzker ‘72 Professor of Government and George R. Roberts Fellow at Clarem ont McKenna College. In 2019 he was the inaugural Library of Congress Chai r on US-China Relations. Prior to joining Claremont McKenna College in 200 9\, he was a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and served as its director of the China Program from 2003 to 2008. H e was an opinion columnist for Bloomberg (2023-2024) and the author of Fro m Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Un ion (1994)\; China’s Trapped Transition: The Limits of Developmental Aut ocracy (2006)\; China’s Crony Capitalism: The Dynamics of Regime Decay ( 2016)\; The Sentinel State: Surveillance and the Survival of Dictatorship in China (2024)\; and The Broken China Dream: How Reform Revived Totalitar ianism (2025). Minxin received his PhD in government at Harvard and taught at Princeton University (1992-1998). \nSpeakers:\nProfessor Minxin Pei ( Claremont McKenna College) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre (lower ground floor))\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/5d5d759b-2de1-440c-9052-e2a3e4511612/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:How Economic Reform Revived Totalitarian Rule in China - Professor Minxin Pei (Claremont McKenna College) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Ideology Without Unity: The Logic of Xi Jinping Thought - Professo r Chris Mittelstaedt (University of Zurich) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T120000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T133000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/693fa1e0-5b6d-45ba-b2e4-a945e28eee9f/ DESCRIPTION:This talk reconceptualizes Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism wit h Chinese Characteristics ('Xi Thought') not as a coherent doctrine but as a rhizomatic ideological formation. Drawing on Deleuze and Guattari\, it treats Xi Thought as a configuration in which coherence is not presupposed but produced through the continual recombination of fragments across inst itutional sites. Based on an analysis of official publications\, including collected works\, excerpt volumes\, and study readers\, Prof. Mittelstaed t shows how Xi’s speeches are disassembled and reassembled across domain s such as law\, economy\, diplomacy\, and culture. These recompositions re nder ideology modular and resilient\, allowing elements to be activated\, reweighted\, or sidelined without destabilizing the system as a whole. Pro f. Mittelstaedt further argues that ideological coherence is generated thr ough distributed and compulsory participation by Party and state actors\, who are required to embed fragments of Xi Thought into institutional pract ice. Conceptualizing Xi Thought as a rhizome shifts analysis from doctrina l meaning to the operational logic through which ideology acquires adminis trative force within the Chinese Party-state.\n\nJean Christopher Mittelst aedt is Professor of Modern Chinese Studies and Chair of Modern Chinese St udies at the University of Zurich. He previously held positions at SOAS\, University of London\, and the University of Oxford. His research focuses on the ideological and institutional foundations of Chinese Communist Part y rule\, with particular attention to Party governance and cultural govern ance. His work has appeared in The China Quarterly\, Modern China\, Asian Survey\, and China Information\, among others.\nSpeakers:\nProfessor Chris Mittelstaedt (University of Zurich) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre (lower ground floor))\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/693fa1e0-5b6d-45ba-b2e4-a945e28eee9f/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Ideology Without Unity: The Logic of Xi Jinping Thought - Professor Chris Mittelstaedt (University of Zurich) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:From Politics to People? Changing Protagonists and the Transformat ion of NHK Television News - Dr Yosuke Buchmeier (Nissan Institute of Japa nese Studies\, University of Oxford) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T170000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T190000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/0e9e88d5-a026-4e46-bacf-3b435bf6b094/ DESCRIPTION:As digital transformation\, political pressure\, and audience fragmentation reshape contemporary media environments\, public service med ia face growing challenges in maintaining their democratic role. This talk examines how these pressures are reflected in everyday editorial choices by focusing on changes in television news at NHK\, one of the world’s la rgest public broadcasters. Taking NHK’s flagship evening news programme as its starting point\, the talk looks at how television news has changed over time at the level of topics\, narrative styles\, and the portrayal of political and social actors. It asks how developments in routine news con tent and representation relate to broader shifts in Japan’s political sy stem\, media environment\, and public expectations of journalism. The talk then considers why such changes take place\, situating micro-level develo pments in news production within a wider set of influences\, including ins titutional constraints\, political pressure\, journalistic routines\, and competition for audiences. By linking changes in everyday news content to macro-level transformations in Japan’s politico-media environment\, the talk contributes to broader debates on the evolving democratic role of pub lic service media in the digital age.\nSpeakers:\nDr Yosuke Buchmeier (Nis san Institute of Japanese Studies\, University of Oxford) LOCATION:St Antony's College (Pavilion Room\, 4th Floor Gateway Building)\ , 62 Woodstock Road OX2 6JF TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/0e9e88d5-a026-4e46-bacf-3b435bf6b094/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:From Politics to People? Changing Protagonists and the Tr ansformation of NHK Television News - Dr Yosuke Buchmeier (Nissan Institut e of Japanese Studies\, University of Oxford) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Transnational Propaganda and Ethnic Polarization: Experimental Evi dence from Malaysia - Dr Jeremy Siow (University of Oxford) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T170000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T183000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/0b8a2d72-7528-48f3-b8a6-cdbe1409f713/ DESCRIPTION:Authoritarian regimes increasingly engage in transnational inf ormation campaigns to expand their political and cultural influence beyond national borders. We argue that such operations can exacerbate ethnic pol arization in target countries\, specifically between diaspora communities and ethnic majority populations. Drawing on Social Identity Theory\, we th eorize that transnational propaganda exacerbates affective polarization by reducing intergroup social and political tolerance\, while also increasin g polarization in foreign policy preferences in racially diverse settings. To test these expectations\, we conduct a preregistered survey experiment in Malaysia and examine whether China's transnational propaganda affects intergroup and foreign policy attitudes among ethnic Chinese and Malays. T he results show that China's propaganda decreases Malays’ social toleran ce toward Chinese Malaysians while strengthening Chinese Malaysians' – b ut not Malays' – agreement with China's foreign policy positions in the region. These findings highlight how transnational propaganda can undermin e social cohesion and create divergent policy preferences within multicult ural societies.\n\nDr Jeremy Siow is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Qua ntitative Political Science at the University of Oxford’s Department of Politics and International Relations. His research focuses on education po licy and the politics of identity in Malaysia and Singapore. His work has appeared in the Journal of Politics and the Proceedings of the National Ac ademy of Sciences. Prior to his PhD\, he graduated with an MA in Political Science and International Studies from Yonsei University\, and a Bachelor ’s degree in Political Science from the National University of Singapore .\n\nSpeakers:\nDr Jeremy Siow (University of Oxford) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre)\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/0b8a2d72-7528-48f3-b8a6-cdbe1409f713/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Transnational Propaganda and Ethnic Polarization: Experim ental Evidence from Malaysia - Dr Jeremy Siow (University of Oxford) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Ancient Stones\, Living Meanings: Local Turkish Interpreters' Enco unters with Antiquities\, 1608–1864 - Hüsamettin Şimşir (Oxford Centr e for Islamic Studies) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T171500Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260312T181500Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/85fb7386-d894-4571-8598-42dc7e7c6b96/ DESCRIPTION:\nSpeakers:\nHüsamettin Şimşir (Oxford Centre for Islamic S tudies) LOCATION:Lecture Room\, Khalili Research Centre\, 3 St John St\, Oxford OX 1 2LG TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/85fb7386-d894-4571-8598-42dc7e7c6b96/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Ancient Stones\, Living Meanings: Local Turkish Interpret ers' Encounters with Antiquities\, 1608–1864 - Hüsamettin Şimşir (Oxf ord Centre for Islamic Studies) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Students Against Apartheid: Collective Emotions and the Making of a Global Movement - Daniel Manulak (Toronto & Oxford) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260313T140000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260313T160000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/47528cbe-5c6c-4323-8b73-300ab1febbce/ DESCRIPTION:\nSpeakers:\nDaniel Manulak (Toronto & Oxford) LOCATION:Balliol College (Gillis Lecture Theatre)\, Broad Street OX1 3BJ TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/47528cbe-5c6c-4323-8b73-300ab1febbce/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Students Against Apartheid: Collective Emotions and the M aking of a Global Movement - Daniel Manulak (Toronto & Oxford) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Intercultural Collaboration in the Context of China - Opportunitie s and Risks - Farooq Chaudry OBE (Fengling Productions) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260313T170000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260313T183000Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/bfb0174a-1e3c-47ae-b2c0-4281839b65c2/ DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Farooq Chaudhry OBE\, Artistic Director\, Fengling Pr oductions.\n\nSpeakers:\nFarooq Chaudry OBE (Fengling Productions) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre (lower ground floor))\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/bfb0174a-1e3c-47ae-b2c0-4281839b65c2/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Intercultural Collaboration in the Context of China - Opp ortunities and Risks - Farooq Chaudry OBE (Fengling Productions) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:China–Russia Relations and Allies and Subsidized Capacity Buildi ng - Dr Oriana Skylar Mastro (Stanford University) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260316T120000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260316T131500Z UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/96c67d76-b23e-46d3-9df9-e2428d82a3ca/ DESCRIPTION:What is the nature of Sino-Russian alignment\, its main driver s\, and its evolution since 1949? Which factors have influenced the relati onship most? How does the nature of this alignment affect peace\, stabilit y\, and the liberal international order? Existing alliance literature does not fully explain why two great powers\, China and Russia\, with a histor y of ideological differences\, asymmetric capabilities\, and shifting thre at perceptions have periodically deepened\, downgraded\, and reoriented th eir military cooperation since 1949. This research argues that the relatio nship is best understood as alignment without alliance: a flexible partner ship that generates security gains while preserving autonomy and minimizin g entrapment. Dr Mastro introduces 'subsidized capacity building' as a dis tinct mode of alignment in which states leverage partner support to accele rate the development of durable\, sovereign military capabilities through technology and knowledge transfer\, energy and defence-industrial base sup port\, and operational learning\, while avoiding integrated command struct ures or binding war commitments. This lens clarifies both why the partners hip deepens under shared external pressure and why it remains short of all iance institutionalization. Dr Mastro concludes that subsidized capacity b uilding may stabilize the dyad by lowering mutual threat perceptions\, yet increase systemic risk by shifting balances of power and complicating det errence across Europe and the Indo-Pacific.\n\nOriana Skylar Mastro is a C enter Fellow and Director of the Indo-Pacific Policy Lab at the Freeman Sp ogli Institute for International Studies and Courtesy Assistant Professor of Political Science at Stanford University where her research focuses on Chinese military and security policy\, Asia-Pacific security issues\, war termination\, and coercive diplomacy. She is also a Non-Resident Scholar\, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She continues to serve as a Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Air Force Reserve for which she currently works at the Penta gon as Deputy Chief of Reserve China Global Strategy. For her contribution s to US strategy in Asia\, she won the Individual Reservist of the Year Aw ard in 2016 (CGO) and 2022 (FGO). She has published widely\, including in International Security\, Security Studies\, Foreign Affairs\, Journal of S trategic Studies\, The Washington Quarterly\, the Economist and the New Yo rk Times. Her most recent book\, Upstart: How China Became a Great Power ( Oxford University Press\, 2024)\, evaluates China’s approach to competit ion. Her book\, The Costs of Conversation: Obstacles to Peace Talks in War time (Cornell University Press\, 2019)\, won the 2020 American Political S cience Association International Security Section Best Book by an Untenure d Faculty Member. She holds a BA in East Asian Studies from Stanford Unive rsity and an MA and PhD in Politics from Princeton University.\nSpeakers:\ nDr Oriana Skylar Mastro (Stanford University) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre (lower ground floor))\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/96c67d76-b23e-46d3-9df9-e2428d82a3ca/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:China–Russia Relations and Allies and Subsidized Capaci ty Building - Dr Oriana Skylar Mastro (Stanford University) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Islamic China: An Asian History - Dr Rian Thum (University of Manc hester) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260504T160000 DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260504T180000 UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/7d5126ff-2bc4-4fe0-bb41-6849331b7709/ DESCRIPTION:For more than a millennium\, Islam has been a Chinese religion \, and native-born Chinese Muslims have played important roles in their ho meland\, from royal astronomers to butchers\, merchants to diplomats\, and scholar-officials to farmers. Yet the Muslims of China are often depicted as inherently foreign\, their religion as incompatible with Chinese cultu re. Islamic China offers a re-appraisal of this history\, endeavoring to r ecapture the ordinariness of Chinese Muslim communities as they created a bewildering diversity of Islamic cultures\, in constant conversation with Muslims abroad and non-Muslims at home. In doing so\, it explores how thes e communities\, whose categorization has so often been seen as problematic \, can teach us something about the ways social categories are made.\n\nSp eakers:\nDr Rian Thum (University of Manchester) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre (lower ground floor))\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/7d5126ff-2bc4-4fe0-bb41-6849331b7709/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Islamic China: An Asian History - Dr Rian Thum (Universit y of Manchester) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:2026 George Rousseau Lecture: "Poland was but a breakfast": or\, w hy 1772 helps us to understand 1776 - David Armitage (Harvard) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260513T170000 DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260513T180000 UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/45ed4617-01a1-4a73-96b7-fcba0c1f9a01/ DESCRIPTION:The American Revolution is now widely accepted to have been th e last civil war within the British Empire of the Atlantic world. However\ , British\, imperial\, and Atlantic contexts do not exhaust the historical frames essential to understand the Revolution or\, more specifically\, 17 76. For contemporaries on both sides of the Atlantic\, Europe—particular ly the European balance of power—was the most important setting for the fears raised by the American War. The greatest assault on that balance of power had occurred only four years before 1776 in 1772 with the first Part ition of Poland by Austria\, Prussia and Russia. This lecture shows how fe ars of partition\, "Poland like"\, drove the decision for American indepen dence and how the Polish response to partition shaped the British counterb last to the Declaration of Independence.\n\n*David Armitage* is the Lloyd C. Blankfein Professor of History and former Chair of the Department of Hi story at Harvard University\, where he teaches intellectual history and in ternational history. He is also an Affiliated Professor in the Harvard Dep artment of Government\, an Affiliated Faculty Member at Harvard Law School \, and an Honorary Professor of History at the University of Sydney. Befor e coming to Harvard in 2004\, he taught for eleven years at Columbia Unive rsity. He is the author or editor of fifteen books\, among them _The Ideol ogical Origins of the British Empire_ (2000)\, _The Declaration of Indepen dence: A Global History_ (2007)\, _Foundations of Modern International Tho ught_ (2013)\, _The History Manifesto_ (co-auth.\, 2014)\, and _Civil Wars : A History in Ideas_ (2017). Among his edited works are _Shakespeare and Early Modern Political Thought_ (co-ed.\, 2009)\, _The Age of Revolutions in Global Context\, c. 1760-1840) (co-ed.\, 2010)\, and _Pacific Histories : Ocean\, Land\, People_ (co-ed.\, 2014). \n\nThe lecture will be followed by a drinks reception.\nSpeakers:\nDavid Armitage (Harvard) LOCATION:Magdalen College (Auditorium)\, High Street OX1 4AU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/45ed4617-01a1-4a73-96b7-fcba0c1f9a01/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:2026 George Rousseau Lecture: "Poland was but a breakfast ": or\, why 1772 helps us to understand 1776 - David Armitage (Harvard) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Do Old-Age Security Concerns Still Motivate Fertility in China? - Professor Yang Hu (University College London) DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260604T170000 DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20260604T183000 UID:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/e19ccd0f-a32f-4b09-9536-5ddaaf47132a/ DESCRIPTION:Demographic changes in China are characterised by the dual cha llenges of fertility decline and population ageing. Bringing together thes e two trends\, this talk examines the old-age security motive for fertilit y in contemporary China. The long-standing norm of yang’er fang lao (养 儿防老) has traditionally encouraged individuals to have children\, par ticularly sons\, to secure their old age. With China’s socialist reform and post-socialist transitions\, however\, do people’s concerns about ol d-age security still motivate them to have children and fuel a preference for sons today? How does this motive relate to China’s latest three-chil d policy and its efforts at establishing an old-age welfare system? Drawin g on large-scale analysis of nationally representative data spanning 2010 –2023\, Prof. Hu demonstrates how the future of fertility in China hangs in a delicate balance between the resilience of traditional family values \, the individualisation of old-age care\, and the country’s welfare ref orm.\n\nYang Hu is Associate Professor in Sociology at UCL Social Research Institute\, University College London\, where he also directs the MSc/MA programmes in Sociology. Yang is a member of the 2029 Research Excellence Framework (REF) Sub-Panel for Sociology. He is Co-director of the Work and Family Researchers Network (WFRN) Early Career Fellowship Programme. Yang ’s research examines family and work changes and inequalities in a globa l context. His recent work has been published in journals such as Nature H uman Behaviour\, Gender & Society\, European Sociological Review\, Journal of Marriage and Family\, and Human Relations.\nSpeakers:\nProfessor Yang Hu (University College London) LOCATION:Dickson Poon Building (Kin-ku Cheng Lecture Theatre (lower ground floor))\, Canterbury Road OX2 6LU TZID:Europe/London URL:https://talks.ox.ac.uk/talks/id/e19ccd0f-a32f-4b09-9536-5ddaaf47132a/ BEGIN:VALARM ACTION:display DESCRIPTION:Talk:Do Old-Age Security Concerns Still Motivate Fertility in China? - Professor Yang Hu (University College London) TRIGGER:-PT1H END:VALARM END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR