About This Issue

: Volume 24 Number 2, Spring 2010; This Centerpiece focuses on the end-of-year activities at the Weatherhead Center with inclusion of a photo essay on recent events. Our first feature, “Method and Discovery: Upending Conventional Wisdom in the Field,” by Crystal M. Fleming, is a sociological look at the transatlantic slave trade, anti-racism, and identity among French Caribbeans. The second feature, “Melting Ice and Drifting Interests: Dawn of a New Arctic Era? ” by Elisa Burchert, is on global warming as an issue of Arctic security. Finally, our director's message focuses on the interdisciplinary nature of Weatherhead Initiative research.
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Main Cover Image: The Knafel Building and the first signs of spring. Photo credit: Megan Countey.

Features

Method and Discovery: Upending Conventional Wisdom in the Field: By Crystal M. Fleming; The transatlantic slave trade—in which an estimated ten million Africans were kidnapped and forced into bondage in the New World—is often represented as a tragedy of devastating proportions. Although an ocean of time has elapsed since the end of African slave trade in the nineteenth century, the history of slavery seems to wash up on our shores again and again in the conversations of intellectuals, the pronouncements of politicians, and the claims of activists.…; Read More

Melting Ice and Drifting Interests: Dawn of a New Arctic Era?: By Elisa Burchert; Three events have significantly influenced recent debates on Arctic affairs. First, in its 2000 Petroleum Assessment report the United States Geological Survey postulated that a high percentage of the World’s untapped energy resources is located north of the Polar Circle. The ensuing surge in public interest increased further when a Russian submersible planted the Russian flag on the seabed near the North Pole in August 2007.…; Read More

One of the key roles of the Weatherhead Center is to promote interdisciplinary research on international affairs. Faculty Associates of the Center come from departments all across the social sciences at Harvard, including Anthropology, Economics, History, Government, and Sociology. They also come from the Law School, the Business School, Harvard Kennedy School, and other Harvard professional schools. Still, interdisciplinary research is more often talked about than actually achieved.…: Read More