The Cadre Journal presents a discussion with Thongchai Winichakul—former Thai student leader and historian—on the Thai social movement in the 70s, the rise of socialism and anti-imperialism, American influence over Thai politics, and the atrocities that followed.

About the October 6 Massacre

On October 14, 1973, the Thai people succeeded in throwing out the military dictatorship that had been ruling Thailand for 16 years. The victory allowed for unprecedented freedom of expression and assembly. Interests in socialism and anti-imperialism flourished. Students, workers, and farmers joined forces to continue their struggle for a better future.

The right fought back through propaganda and violence. Paramilitary groups were set up. Assassinations were rampant. This concluded on the morning of October 6, 1976, during a sit-in at Thammasat University where people were protesting the return to the country of the previously ousted dictators. Police started shooting into where students were before advancing onto the campus. The massacre left at least 41 dead, with other estimations going up to hundreds

About the Speaker

Thongchai Winichakul was a student organizer in the 70s. He was one of the people arrested and later imprisoned on October 6, 1976. He and other student leaders were released 1978 on the condition that he was not involved in further political activities.

He is now Emeritus Professor of History at University of Wisconsin-Madison, a Research Fellow Emeritus at Institute of Developing Economies (IDE-JETRO), Japan, and currently a Visiting Professor at the Pridi Banomyong International College (PBIC), Thammasat University. His book, Siam Mapped (University of Hawaii Press, 1994), was awarded the Harry J Benda Prize from the Association for Asian Studies (AAS, USA) and the Grand Prize from the Asian Affairs Research Council (Japan). His other book, Moments of Silence: The Unforgetting of the October 6, 1976, Massacre in Bangkok (University of Hawaii Press, 2020) was awarded the humanities book prize by the European Association for Southeast Asian Studies in 2022.

His research interests are in the intellectual foundations of modern Siam under colonial conditions (1880s-1930s) including modern geography and sovereignty, historical ideology, and the legal system. He has published eight books and several articles in Thai. He is also a well-known critic of Thai political and social issues.

PACS Distinguished Lecture

Dmitri Alperovitch, a leading national security expert, will explain why he believes that China's Xi Jinping is preparing to conquer Taiwan in the coming years—and the dire stakes for the world if he is not deterred. Alperovitch makes the case that we are already in the midst of a second Cold War with Taiwan as the perilous strategic flashpoint of this new conflict. The conflict risks triggering a devastating war between major nuclear powers in a similar role that West Berlin nearly played during the first Cold War.

Laying out a comprehensive strategy to deter war and maintain the United States' status as the world's leading superpower in the face of rising China, Alperovitch breaks down the significant weaknesses that can prevent China from surpassing the U.S. and the key policies that will enable America to maintain primacy even as China ramps up its efforts. As Alperovitch explains, we must play to our strengths and address our weaknesses, using our leverage as the strongest nation on the planet to tactfully navigate the next Cold War.

About the Speaker

Dmitri Alperovitch is an internationally recognized thought leader on geopolitics and national security. He is co-founder and executive chairman of Silverado Policy Accelerator, a think-tank focused on policy solutions in national security, trade and industrial security, and ecological and economic security. He is also the co-founder of the leading cybersecurity company CrowdStrike Inc.

Alperovitch serves on the Homeland Security Advisory Council of the Department of Homeland Security and as a founding board member of the U.S. government's Cyber Safety Review Board. He has previously served as a special advisor to the Department of Defense. He is the host of Silverado's "Geopolitics Decanted" podcast and author of an upcoming book, World On the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the 21st Century.

Event Host

Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, part of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies

Part of Cornell’s yearlong exploration of freedom of expression, this event from Global Cornell brings together the campus community to discuss how Cornell can protect academic freedom while collaborating with institutions and scholars in places with different political realities and views on free speech.

Allan Goodman, chief executive officer of the Institute of International Education, joins Vice Provost for International Affairs Wendy Wolford to discuss:

How can universities like Cornell provide a safe haven for scholars whose right to free expression is threatened?How can universities act to promote scholarship, free expression, and global collaboration?Cornell has worked with the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund (IIE-SRF) for over a decade to provide yearlong fellowships for displaced academics and human rights defenders. IIE also supports the Humphrey Fellows Program in the Department of Global Development and Fulbright fellowships for undergraduate students from across the university.

Goodman and Wolford will be joined by these panelists:

Sharif Hozoori (Afghanistan) | IIE-SRF fellow in the Einaudi Center’s South Asia ProgramPeidong Sun (China) | Einaudi Center’s East Asia Program and Associate Professor of History, A&SAzat Gündoğan (Turkey) | Florida State University, former IIE-SRF fellow in the Einaudi Center’s Institute for European Studies***

If you can't attend in person, register for a Zoom link to join the livestream here.

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About Allan Goodman

IIE’s CEO Allan E. Goodman is a Council on Foreign Relations member and serves on the selection committees for the Rhodes and Schwarzman Scholars and the Yidan Prize. He also serves on the Council for Higher Education Accreditation International Quality Group advisory council and the Education Above All Foundation board of trustees. Goodman has a PhD in government from Harvard, MPA from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, and BS from Northwestern University.

About the Institute of International Education

For more than 100 years, the Institute of International Education has promoted the exchange of scholars and researchers and rescued scholars, students, and artists from persecution, displacement, and crises. IIE conducts research on international academic mobility and administers the U.S. Department of State’s Fulbright Program.

Supporting Scholars Under Threat

Learn more about how Global Cornell supports Scholars Under Threat.

November 3-4, 2023 Statler Hotel, Cornell University Open to the Public

The symposium will explore investment and development finance which is an important area of policy discussions in Africa and other developing areas of the world, as well as those that will give a brief overview of the scale of both Chinese and Middle Eastern investment in Africa. Multifaceted and multidisciplinary analytical approaches that will consider the role of Chinese and Gulf State investments in the development of Africa, especially Africa’s efforts to create a free trade area are welcomed. Furthermore, the symposium will look at the role foreign investment can play in resource mobilization for infrastructure development as well as the links between law, trade, and regional integration.

Sponsored by the Institute for African Development and the Clarke Initiative for Law and Development in the Middle East and North Africa

Co-sponsored by the East Asia Program

Funded by the Einaudi Center for International Studies Cross Program Initiative

LACS Film Series

‘Icaros: a vision’ is a story about fear and the release from fear – the fear of illness and of death, but also the fear of life and living. It’s about the possibility of living through one’s fear – which is what the Amazonian plant Ayahuasca is good at getting you to do. Centered on the nightly ceremonies that are the main feature of shamanic retreats, Icaros revels in darkness, replicating a shamanic journey. Set in the Peruvian Amazon among the Shipibo-Conibo community, the film is also driven by the conviction that acknowledging the power of plants is the best way to change the jeopardized future of the Amazon – itself like a dying patient.

Directors:

Matteo Norzi: Artist, designer, filmmaker and indigenous rights activist, currently serving as Executive Director at Shipibo Conibo Center in New York City. Co-founder of Cobino Productions with Leonor Caraballo and Abou Farman, which aims to promote the creativity and knowledge of the Amazonian Shipibo Conibo communities through a range of media.

Leonor Caraballo: Worked as a photographer and video artist between Buenos Aires and New York. She won a number of fellowships and grants, including the Latin American Guggenheim Fellowship, a New York Foundation for the Arts grant, and an Eyebeam Art and Technology Center residency. Aspects of the film are based on co-director Leonor Caraballo’s true experiences. Although she dedicated herself to the project until the very end, sadly she died before she could see the film finished.

There is an installation of the Shipibo-Conibo artist Celia Vasquez Yui at the Johnson Museum right now, so we recommend visiting the exhibit before going to the screening.

Presented by Kanopy

There'll be free pizza!

Register

The seminar series for fall 2023 explores the future of African land, agriculture and food, digging into the contestations, conflicting and converging visions from a wide range of perspectives. How might land be used, valued and lived in, across cities, rural communities, forests, deserts and grasslands on the continent in the future? Who is proposing different visions of land futures in Africa, what are the histories, politics, socio-cultural, environmental and economic implications of these potential visions? In one of the regions with the most youthful populations, how are young people considering possible futures? What are ways that land, agriculture and food systems could be resilient, healthy, ecological, thriving and just? Can there be a decolonial agriculture and food future in Africa that celebrates Indigenous and local foodways?