KIE Senior Fellow and Duke Law Professor Laurence Helfer traveled to Africa this summer to further an ongoing project working with sub-regional legal organizations in Africa. The three courts, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the East African Community (EAC), and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), all have the power to bring suits against countries within their sub-regions.

Helfer says, “These courts are similar in many ways: They are located in Africa, they exercise jurisdiction over countries in various stages of transition to democracy, and they were initially created to advance economic integration and trade in their respective sub-regions. Perhaps most remarkably, the dockets of all three courts expanded to include human rights cases at around the same time.” Further information may be found at Duke Law.

Call for Work

The Icon Industry:
The Visual Economy of Human Rights

Deadline for Submissions:  October 16, 2013
Opening: November 4, 2013

The Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University is seeking works of art—in all visual mediums—for a fall exhibit: The Icon Industry: The Visual Economy of Human Rights. The call for work is open to all graduate and undergraduate students.

The term “visual economy” in art is commonly defined as a minimalist approach. But, what happens when this search for simplicity becomes a standard for representation of human rights? Often one iconic image comes to define events, groups or issues, boiling down the complexity into a singular representation that we grab onto as the “right” image. For example, how has the 1984 National Geographic cover image photographed by Steve McCurry of then-refugee Sharbat Gula, known as “the Afghan girl” come to represent—even today in Western culture—a population of Afghan women? It is arguably one of the iconic images of the 20^th century, forever referential.

This exhibit asks artists to explore, critique, and/or celebrate the notion of the iconic image in human rights issues as seen in our news media. Artists are encouraged to approach the work through a sense of awareness, examining the role of the image, creation of icons, the role of the image subject as a human rights agent and as a symbol, the use of simplicity in visual communication and/or our image obsession. Repurposing iconic and other images depicting human rights subjects/issues is allowed and encouraged in the debate, but respect must be given to the subject of the image. Further, artists are asked to consider how their work contributes to the continued dialog overall. This exhibit aims to call awareness, and in doing so create a space for reflection on our current state of visual rhetoric, but also look forward to a more engaged public in the ethics of representation.

Submissions and questions should be emailed to:
caitlin.kelly@duke.edu
Caitlin Margaret Kelly
2013-2014 Kenan Graduate Arts Fellow

Graduate Research Award: Regulatory Governance
Application due date: November 15^th, 2013
Award notification: December 15^th,  2013

Rethinking Regulation at the Kenan Institute for Ethics invites graduate and professional students to apply for small research grants to fund the costs of research related to the analysis of regulatory governance, either for a pilot study that might turn into an eventual dissertation topic, or for an already formulated dissertation project. The Institute will furnish up to $2,000 per award, which must be used for research expenses (travel, purchase of research materials, etc.). We anticipate making three awards.

All proposals related to the broad domain of regulatory governance will be considered. Our priority areas include:
1)  Crisis and Risk Regulation:  How crises reshape risk perceptions, both among the general public and policy-making elites; and how regulators respond to such events?
2)  Adaptive Regulation:  How regulatory authorities cope with extremely rapid change, either in technology or economic conditions?
3)  New Directions for Competition Policy:  What are the appropriate approaches to regulating monopoly, oligopoly, and competition?
4)  Regulatory Strategies in Emerging Economies.  What are the patterns of policy diffusion (whether from the US and the EU to emerging economies; between emerging economies; or from the “periphery” to the “core”) and the ways that globalization is shaping those patterns?

Application Requirements:

• Applicants must be enrolled in a Duke graduate or professional program for the Fall 2013 and Spring 2014 semesters.
• Applicants must submit the following to Jenny Cook at jennifer.cook@duke.edu:
  • Brief research proposal describing the research project, its connection to the study of regulatory governance, the amount of funding requested, and the specific ways in which the funds will be used. This statement should not exceed three (3) pages.
  • Two letters of recommendation, one of which is provided by the student’s faculty advisor or mentor for the project.
  • Copy of current Duke Transcript.
  • Curriculum Vitae, including a list of previous grants and awards.

Interdisciplinary Research Workshop
Recipients of Research Awards will be expected to present a paper or dissertation chapter draft based on the supported research to a graduate student workshop held by the Rethinking Regulation working group.

Rethinking Regulation Events
Recipients will be strongly encouraged to participate in Rethinking Regulation events, including a monthly interdisciplinary Faculty-Graduate Student Seminar and public events.

The Measuring Morality project, a part of Moral Attitudes and Decision Making at KIE, has just made its data publicly available. The dataset serves as a nationally representative baseline for measuring morality. The survey questions were chosen in consultation with an international group of scholars from sociology, psychology, and linguistics, and represent a wide range of theoretical traditions. By making the data available to researchers, the project aims to serve as a Rosetta Stone for moral attitude inquiry and interdisciplinary comparison.

The Measuring Morality dataset is now available for download by all researchers, with the condition that they register their names and institutional affiliations as well as promise to send a copy of any publications that reference the data. In this way, project leaders can track the data’s use. KIE Senior Fellow and Associate Professor of Sociology Stephen Vaisey is the Principal Investigator for the project. Measuring Morality is supported by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation.