CFP: The 1st Kadir Has University Conference on International Relations

CALL FOR PAPERS

Two Hundred Years since the Congress of Vienna: The State of International Relations as a Discipline and Alternative World Views

Department of International Relations
Kadir Has University
22-24 October 2015
Istanbul

Napoleon: “But I am a soldier. I need honour and glory. I cannot reappear among my people devoid of prestige. I must remain great, admired, covered with glory."
Mettenich: "But when will this condition of things cease, in which defeat and victory are alike reasons for continuing these dismal wars? If victorious, you insist upon the fruits of your victory; if defeated, you are determined to rise again."
Napoleon: “Alas. Then we shall meet at the gates of Vienna”.
(Napoleon’s written exchange with Metternich asking for Austrian neutrality in European wars – Summer of 1813)
2015 is a truly exceptional year from the perspective of International Relations history. It marks the 200^th anniversary of the Congress of Vienna, the 70^th of Yalta and Potsdam Conferences, as well as the founding of the United Nations, the 40^th anniversary of the Helsinki Final Act and the 20^th anniversary of the Dayton Accords.
The Congress of Vienna, whose final act of June 1815 was the most comprehensive treaty the Great Powers had signed leading to the reorganization of Europe after the Napoleonic Wars. With the principal objectives being the prevention of the emergence of new imperialisms such as the Napoleonic one and to put a check on political revolutions in Europe via the maintenance of the balance of power and the status quo, it proved successful for a while but ultimately failed to prevent the rise of Imperial Germany or the political revolutions of the 19^th century that led to the emergence of nation-states in Europe and Central and South America at the expense of many of the European Empires. Nevertheless, its legacy proved influential as it provided for the emergence of a security culture in Europe with the Concert of Europe basically holding for most of the 19^th Century.
130 years later, Yalta and Potsdam aimed to address the realities of the emergent post war order in Europe of 1945 – a similar setting, as a larger-than-Europe effort had neutralized a European crisis – while, the United Nations focused on the need to accommodate the victors of the war on a global scale and create a multifaceted and sustainable global security complex.
30 years later, The Helsinki Final Act of 1975 paved the way for erasing dividing lines between East and West and contributed to the end of the Cold War. Since then forty years have passed and we find ourselves in the midst of a Helsinki + 40 process whose objective is to contribute to an inclusive security community and strengthening co-operation within the OSCE.
Finally, this year also marks the 20^th year anniversary of the Dayton Accords of 1995 which brought an end to the Bosnian war under the aegis of the International Community which touted its own efforts to rebuild crisis ridden countries in the Post Cold Era in a new spirit of international cooperation.

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