3. The Global Food Crisis and the Ukraine War

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OxPeace Conference 2023: Learning from Ukraine

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Exploring the three elements that intersect and contribute to the global food crisis.

There is a global food crisis. It is connected with the Russian invasion of Ukraine in several ways. The aspect that gained publicity is the interruption of wheat supplies from Black Sea ports to international food markets. This has been addressed by the ‘Black Sea Grain Initiative’ led by the UN and Turkey. A second aspect is the ripple effects from the emergent war economies and the Atlantic and eastern blocs. A third is that principled multilateral engagement in crises in the Global South has been supplanted by rivalrous transactional diplomacy. All three elements intersect in food-vulnerable regions of the world such as the Horn of Africa to calamitous effect.

Professor Alex de Waal is executive director of the World Peace Foundation and Research Professor at the Fletcher School, Tufts University. He has worked on the Horn of Africa, and on conflict, food security and related issues since the 1980s as a researcher and practitioner. He served as a senior advisor to the African Union High Level Panel on Sudan and South Sudan. He was listed among Foreign Policy’s 100 most influential international intellectuals in 2008 and Atlantic’s 29 ‘brave thinkers’ in 2009. De Waal’s recent books include: The Real Politics of the Horn of Africa: Money, War and the Business of Power (Polity 2015), Mass Starvation: The history and future of famine (Polity 2018), and New Pandemics, Old Politics: 200 years of the war on disease and its alternatives (Polity 2021).

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OxPeace Conference 2023: Learning from Ukraine

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Keywords

Department: Department of Politics and International Relations (DPIR)

Date Added: 12/05/2023

Duration: 00:28:58

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2. Exiting Russia: the effects of multinational withdrawal

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OxPeace Conference 2023: Learning from Ukraine

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Can corporate action contribute to human rights, peace, and conflict prevention?

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine triggered not only massive economic and financial sanctions imposed on Russia, but also a significant but incomplete exit of multinational corporations from Russia. This exit has been driven by varying degrees of ethical as well as reputational considerations but has stalled as companies cite operational and legal dilemmas. Nonetheless important precedents have been set that may make companies—and their investors—more conscious and responsible actors in conflict situations. Companies and investors alike may integrate longstanding political risk analysis with emerging human rights due diligence to inform decisions whether to remain in certain countries. They may also consider human rights and humanitarian factors both to ensure a responsible exit and to determine possible post-conflict re-entry in ways that can contribute to peace and prevent further conflict. Such commitments and actions can encourage a new geopolitical corporate responsibility to support the rules-based order that defines the international community and underpins the global economy—and in turn enables the cooperation critical to alleviating inequality and diminishing the climate crisis.

An innovative leader and standard-setter for responsible business and investment, Bennett Freeman has co-founded multi-stakeholder initiatives and coalitions focused on the extractives, technology and apparel sectors. Bennett holds degrees in History from the University of California at Berkeley (1979) and Oxford (1981; English-Speaking Union Scholar, Balliol). He served as a Clinton presidential appointee in three positions at the US Department of State, including as deputy assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labour from 1999-2001. He was senior VP for sustainability research and policy at Calvert Investments, 2006-15. As principal of Bennett Freeman Associates LLC, he currently advises multinational corporations, international institutions and NGOs on policy and strategy related to human rights and labour rights. He was the lead author of Shared Space Under Pressure: Business Support for Civic Freedoms and Human Rights Defenders (2018) and is an Associate Fellow of the International Law Programme at Chatham House.
Bennett is a co-founder and Steering Committee member of Business for Ukraine (B4Ukraine), a coalition that seeks to complete the exit of foreign companies from Russia and to set higher standards for human rights due on the part of companies and investors in conflict situations—and in turn to contribute to a new ethic of geopolitical corporate responsibility to support the international rules-based order.

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OxPeace Conference 2023: Learning from Ukraine

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Keywords

Department: Department of Politics and International Relations (DPIR)

Date Added: 12/05/2023

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1. Russia and Christian nationalism: the background of a conflict

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OxPeace Conference 2023: Learning from Ukraine

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How the global resurgence of traditionalist, religion-based nationalism relates to the specifics of the present conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

The aggression in Ukraine is rooted in a long history of mythologised versions of Russian identity, which need to be better understood. But it is also an instance of a wider resurgence of nationalism allied to a traditionalist religious and moral agenda.

Rt Revd & Rt Hon. Dr Rowan Williams DD, FBA was born in 1950 into a Welsh-speaking family in Swansea. He read Theology at Cambridge, and gained his doctorate in Oxford on the work of the Russian émigré theologian Vladimir Lossky. Ordained priest in 1978, he taught at Mirfield and in Cambridge, moving to Oxford as Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity 1986-1991. He became Bishop of Monmouth 1991-1999, Archbishop of Wales 1999-2002, Archbishop of Canterbury 2002-2012. He received a life peerage in 2012 and was Master of Magdalen College, Cambridge, 2013-2020, also serving as a member of the House of Lords 2002-2020. Author of a number of theological works and sermon collections, Rowan is also an accomplished poet.

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OxPeace Conference 2023: Learning from Ukraine

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Keywords

Department: Department of Politics and International Relations (DPIR)

Date Added: 12/05/2023

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Sleep and the Rhythms of Life

The COVID pandemic exposed the extent to which sleep is entwined with social conditions - sleep is highly dynamic and very little about sleep is unchangeable. For example, changed social conditions over the past 100 years appear to have had a marked impact upon key elements of sleep. Studies on circadian rhythms and sleep, along with historical insights, have shown that such changed societal conditions have resulted in a detachment of these key biological rhythms from the geophysical cycle of light and dark, with major deleterious effects upon human functioning, wellbeing, and creativity.
Rhythmicity is not only at the heart of sleep and chronobiology, but is also fundamental to the humanities.
The network is led by Dr Sebastian Klinger (Modern Languages), Professor Sally Shuttleworth (English), Professor Russell Foster (Sleep and Circadian Neuroscience Institute) and Dr Alessandra Aloisi (Medieval and Modern Languages).

Karisha Anne Cruz

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Sai Pramod Bathena

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Michael Ainomugisha

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Building Resilient Education Systems: Evidence from Large Scale Randomised Trials in Five Countries

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CSAE Research Podcasts

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Education systems need to withstand shocks that routinely close schools. Researchers discuss results from randomised trials evaluating the provision of education in emergency settings across 5 countries.

Shocks such as weather, natural disasters, disease, and conflict frequently disrupt schooling. Education systems need to build resilience and be able to continue to provide education during these shocks. Following on from Youth Impact's work on distance education during the Covid-19 pandemic in Botswana, researchers ask would this approach scale to new settings, with government, and other education in emergencies? Focusing on a method called 'connectEd', a phone call tutorial programme used to deliver high quality education through mobile phone calls, this project replicated and scaled the work from Botswana in five randomised controlled trials in India, Nepal, Kenya, the Philippines, and Uganda.

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CSAE Research Podcasts

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randomised controlled trial

scale

government

education in emergencies

Department: Department of Economics

Date Added: 11/05/2023

Duration: 00:36:25

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Nattawan Kularbkeo

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Not Getting Tangled

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Future of Business

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The importance of red tape in growing economies.

In this episode, Jordan Zele, Oxford Saïd MBA and host discusses regulation with Nattawan Kularbkeo, a fellow student and Senior Investigation officer at SEC Thailand. Nattawan challenges the idea that markets must choose between growth and regulation, suggesting that for sustainable growth, regulation is necessary. The episode explores emerging challenges across all markets, highlighting the fundamental role regulators must play in the future of business. Of note, this episode was recorded before the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank.

Featuring:

Nattawan Kularbkeo - https://www.linkedin.com/in/nattawan-kularbkeo/

Jordan Zele - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordan-zele-1504b95a/

Link to the school website - https://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/

Link to the podcast - https://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/about-us/school/our-community/future-business-podcast/season-five

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Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK (BY-NC-SA): England & Wales; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/