Re-thinking the conflicts in the Middle East: Can the new U.S. administration play a constructive role?
Herbert C. Kelman,the Richard Clarke Cabot Professor of Social Ethics, Emeritus, at Harvard University
Scheherezade Faramarzi,reporter for the Associated Press in Lebanon and Nieman Fellow
Herbert C. Kelman is the Richard Clarke Cabot Professor of Social Ethics, Emeritus, at Harvard University and was (from 1993 to 2003) director of the Program on International Conflict Analysis and Resolution at Harvard’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. He received his Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Yale University in 1951. Professor Kelman is past president of the International Studies Association, the International Society of Political Psychology, the Interamerican Society of Psychology, and several other professional associations.
He is recipient of many awards, including the Socio-Psychological Prize of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1956), the Kurt Lewin Memorial Award (1973), the American Psychological Association’s Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychology in the Public Interest (1981), the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order (1997), and the Austrian Medal of Honor for Science and Art First Class (1998). He has been engaged for many years in the development of interactive problem solving, an unofficial third party approach to the resolution of international and intercommunal conflicts, and in its application to the Arab-Israeli conflict, with special emphasis on its Israeli-Palestinian component.
The discussions in the Anticipating Change: Resolving Conflict in the New Era series focus on exploring the relationship among government, news media, and the conflict resolution community in framing and responding to conflict. Topics examine how conflict is framed and how that influences the escalation and de-escalation of conflict and the public understanding of various responses to terrorism. In general, participants will consider ways to strengthen the capacity to prevent, resolve, and transform ethnonational conflicts.
This Herbert C. Kelman Seminar on International Conflict Analysis and Resolution series is sponsored by the Program on Negotiation, the Nieman Foundation for Journalism, the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and Public Policy, and the MIT-Harvard Public Disputes Program, as well as Boston area members of the Alliance for Peacebuilding.