IES Blog

by Evan Gong

On February 27, the Institute of European Studies was honored to host a panel discussion with Stavros Lambrinidis, the Ambassador of the European Union to the United States, and Eleni Kounalakis, the current Lieutenant Governor of California and former U.S. Ambassador to Hungary (2010-2013). Moderated by IES Director Jeroen Dewulf and Berkeley Law Professor Katerina Linos, this timely conversation focused on the social, political, and economic challenges currently facing the EU, as well as opportunities for closer cooperation between California and Europe.

On February 25, the Institute of European Studies hosted a liaison meeting of experts on wood supply chain management at the University of California, Berkeley with generous support from the Austrian Ministry of Science and the Austrian Marshall Plan Foundation. The meeting was organized by Christoph Kogler, a current visiting scholar at the Institute of European Studies. The discussion involved a diverse group of researchers from the Department of Industrial Engineering, Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management, Haas Business School, Berkeley Forests, and the Institute of Transportation Studies. Visiting scholars from the European Commission were also invited.

by Ellen Harper

On February 18, the Institute of European Studies welcomed Dr. Steven Press, Assistant Professor of History at Stanford University and an affiliate of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, the Center for African Studies, and Stanford Law School’s Center for Law and History. In his lecture titled “Revisiting the Economics of German Overseas Imperialism, 1884-1918,” Press challenged the conventional perception of the economics of German colonialism in the former colony of German South West Africa (present-day Namibia), arguing that its diamond mining industry can be seen as a microcosm of the reality of German imperialism.

by Tianxing Cao, Evan Gong and Alexandra von Minden

On February 11, IES was delighted to welcome senior fellow Zachary Shore (Professor of History at the Naval Postgraduate School). In his lecture, entitled “From Vengeance to Virtue: The Problem of Postwar Germany,” Shore explored the context and reasoning surrounding the U.S. treatment of its perceived enemies during and after World War II.