Edited Volume Read Along: Global Systems Built on Unequal Foundations

We have reached Part III, which is titled “Structural Inequalities.” This is a very broad and significant topic, and the essays featured in this section cover a wide range of problems and solutions. The section begins with an introduction by Dr. Kate Seaman called “Acknowledging and Addressing the Inequalities in the International System.”

In this chapter, Dr. Seaman points out the ways that the fundamental structure of our international systems plays a direct role in the possibilities and limitations of responding to global problems and building peace. Institutions like the UN were created in a period that is very different than our current moment. In 1945 there were only 74 recognized sovereign nations, while today, there are 195. Additionally, colonialism, imperialism, and racist social science, heavily influenced past conceptions of global governance. While conscious values and terminology have changed, the power and influence of that systemic inequality remain. 

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Still protected: Employed mothers-to-be in the land of milk and honey during the COVID-19 pandemic – Dr. Orna Blumen and Naama Bar-On Shmilovitch

This is a reflection written by Professor Orna Blumen, Faculty of Social Welfare and Health Sciences, Department of Human Services,  University of Haifa, Israel, and Naama Bar-on Shmilovitch, a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Social Welfare & Health Sciences and the manager of the Center for the Study of Organizations & Human Resource Management at the University of Haifa, for the new series from The Bahá’í Chair for World Peace on Learning During the Covid-19 Pandemic.

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Insights: Searching for the Impossible

This is a reflection written by Esther Kaufman on the lecture given by Dr. Nicole des Bouvrie on the 30th of November 2016.  

Why We Should Search for the Impossible

What if the question, “Can Women Think?” is not an absurd question? Dr. des Bouvrie began her lecture by introducing historic western philosophers whose ideas have established the foundation of Western thinking. From ancient times, white male philosophers have built identities based on differences. Following their philosophies women cannot think, or at least, not as men do. Continue reading

About ‘In-Depth’

“The faculty to think objectively is reason; the emotional attitude behind reason is that of humility. To be objective, to use one’s reason, is possible only if one has achieved an attitude of humility, if one has emerged from the dreams of omniscience and omnipotence which one has as a child. Love, being dependent on the relative absence of narcissism, requires the development of humility, objectivity and reason.” – Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

The Bahá’í Chair for World Peace at the University of Maryland is an endowed academic program that advances interdisciplinary examination and discourse on global peace. Viewing humanity as a collective and organic whole, the Chair’s incumbent, Professor Hoda Mahmoudi, explores the role that social actors and structures play in removing obstacles and creating paths to peace. The Chair’s explanation focuses on a number of thematic issues including, structural racism, climate change, human nature, women’s inequality, and leadership and global governance. Continue reading