Symposium tackles global cities

    The annual Norris and Margery Bendetson Education for Public Inquiry and International Citizenship (EPIIC) symposium concluded yesterday after five days of panels on topics ranging from finance to terrorism.
    Entitled "Cities: Forging an Urban Future," the symposium brought together experts from around the globe.
    Institute for Global Leadership (IGL) Director Sherman Teichman called the programming a "slam-dunk victory."
    "The content has been just galvanizing," he told the Daily. "The interactions have been extraordinary."
    In the symposium's first lecture, Columbia University Professor of Sociology Saskia Sassen spoke about the state of the world's cities in a time of financial crisis and evolving power structures.
    In her talk on Wednesday night entitled "Global Cities/Global Slums," Sassen termed the global city as "one of these grand strategic places" where powerless, informal political actors have the chance to execute their projects.
    "The global city is a frontier space, which means that two actors from different worlds encounter each other, but there are no rules for engagement," she said. "Then the work begins."
    Turning to the global financial downturn, she talked about the destructive power of financial investors and their role in causing the subprime mortgage crisis.
    Above all, though, she encouraged those in attendance to continue their inquiries about global urban politics.
    "I have questions. I want to understand the making of power, the making of politics, the making of powerlessness," Sassen said. "Where does this become complete and critical?"
    In a Friday panel, "Targeted Cities: Terror in the 21st Century," speakers discussed terrorism and counterterrorism in the context of urban areas. Specifically, panelists focused on why terrorists target specific places and on how attacks influence the evolution of cities.
    Before the panel began, senior Saumini Shah and junior Nethra Madurai showed  "Tribute to Mumbai," a narrated slideshow accompanied by a vocal performance.
    Following the slideshow, Gwyn Prins, the director of the London School of Economics' Mackinder Programme for the Study of Long Wave Events, talked about his experiences with terrorism in cities.
    Prins addressed the distinction between conditional and unconditional terrorists. Unconditional terrorists, he said, have no interest in negotiation; they can only be preempted or surrendered to. Conditional terrorists, meanwhile, have demands and can be deterred.
    As an example of unconditional terrorists, he referred to the planners of the Mumbai attacks. He also argued that, paradoxically, Barack Obama's international standing, not India's financial markets, was the principal target of the attacks.
    Like other panelists, Prins warned of future attacks. "The next 9/11, when it comes — and we haven't had it yet — … will have the added components," he said. "It will include dirty bombs, it will include chemical weapons."
    Panelist Yona Yahav, the mayor of Haifa, Israel, focused his presentation on the 2006 Israel-Lebanon War.
    Yahav argued that Haifa should serve as a model for the rest of Israel. The city, Israel's third-largest, has a mix of Muslim, Christian and Jewish citizens who coexist in relative peace. He noted that years before the war, he had fought for Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon. As a result, he questioned why Hezbollah chose to attack his city.
    "The whole war was, for me, a personal slap in my face," he said, highlighting the efforts he took to save lives and maintain stability during the fighting.
    The third panelist, retired Marine Major John Williams, discussed the military side of counterterrorism and counterinsurgency efforts in urban areas.
    According to Williams, who is currently the deputy director at the U.S. Naval Academy's Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies, these campaigns are difficult and should used sparingly.
    "I'd like to state early and clearly and emphatically … that employing military forces in a town or city is to be avoided at all costs, absolutely," he said.
    Still, he conceded that these tactics are occasionally necessary to secure certain ends, like neutralizing enemies or providing security and stability in a city.
    The main focus of such operations is "winning the hearts and minds" of populations in terrorist strongholds, Williams said.
    He spoke at length about collateral damage and about the need to secure the trust of local citizens during counterinsurgency campaigns.
    A 1,000-pound bomb, for example, can eliminate enemy forces, but it can also create new enemies as a result of collateral damage, he noted.
    Throughout the symposium, organizers aimed to integrate arts and humanities into the programming. Specifically, the symposium featured poetry and vocal performances.
    According to Teichman, EPIIC alumni were struck by this focus, which differentiated this symposium from prior ones.
    Teichman also praised the efforts of current EPIIC students.
    "Those students performed wonderfully," he said. "You know you've done it when your students are regarded as highly as they are by professionals in the field."