Conflict Management: the ethical and moral dimension

Are you interested in improving the human condition?

You might be suited for the Conflict Management concentration at SAIS.

In the video below, Prof. Terrence Hopmann, director of SAIS's Conflict Management program, describes why students choose the concentration, what kinds of backgrounds they often have and what they end up doing after SAIS.

Michael Cornish, who is currently a student at SAIS Bologna, in this recent post told us why he chose Conflict Management (CM).

Prof. Hopmann said CM concentrators want an ethically and morally desirable course of study and can come from a variety of backgrounds. They end up in a range of jobs in both the private and public sectors.

His advice to prospective candidates? To get as much international experience as possible, including in the field.

CM concentrators produce an original research project before they graduate. Students generally identify the topic for their research in the first year and complete the project in the second year.

They also can participate in the Peacekidz workshop, which allows SAIS students to teach children from disadvantaged backgrounds how to manage conflict in their daily lives. Second-year SAIS students go on a field trip in a conflict-ridden region.

In previous years, CM concentrators have traveled to Kosovo, Tunisia, Haiti, Northern Ireland and Cyprus. Next year students will go to the Philippines, Myanmar or Thailand and speak to government officials and representatives of organizations that promote conflict resolution.

If you're reading this post on email, click here to watch the video.

Amina Abdiuahab

A trip to DC to discuss the future of Europe

SAIS can help open doors to an impressive range of experiences.

Earlier this month, SAIS students Selim Koru and Martha Simms traveled to Washington, DC to attend a conference hosted by the Center for German and European Studies at Georgetown University. During the two-day conference they presented a research paper to a panel. More on their experience below.

Martha and Selim

We got involved with the Georgetown Center for German and European Studies (CGES) Conference through the SAIS European Studies department and their network of graduate-level opportunities in European affairs.

We already had the idea of combining our concentrations (Martha’s in European Studies and Selim’s in Middle Eastern Studies) and developing economics skills in a paper on U.S. and EU economic policies towards the Middle East/North African region.

When this opportunity appeared in our inboxes, we realized we could edit our draft to fit the bill.

Georgetown later contacted us about presenting our paper in their graduate student conference on the future of Europe, and the opportunity seemed too good to pass up.

Thanks to generous support from both the European Studies and Middle East Studies departments, we were able to make the trek to DC during the first week of the semester.

The conference took place on Friday and Saturday, ending with a dinner for all participants. It was entirely student-run and included participants from the U.S. and Europe.

Key note speaker João Vale de Almeida, the EU ambassador to the United States, gave a solid opening lecture on the continuing importance of the EU.

Students’ topics covered everything from financial regulation to European identity.

We were among the younger participants. Many of the others were PhD students at the beginning of their graduate work and presented preliminary research.

It was the first time either one of us had spoken on a panel, but it went surprisingly smoothly. The audience seemed very excited about our ideas and gave us great feedback.

We flew back to Bologna Sunday night, just in time for Monetary Theory with Professor Taddei at 8:30 am on Monday.

Combining the abstract and the practical

Since its inception, SAIS has combined the theoretical and the practical to educate leaders able to tackle a range of challenges. It is in its DNA.

In January, 15 SAIS students traveled to Honduras to help build classrooms for an elementary school in a small town. The trip was one of many organized by students to complement learning in the SAIS classroom.

"Service trips are a perfect way of turning what we learn in the classroom into real-life experiences," Rose Stratmeyer, a first-year SAIS student, told the bimonthly publication SAIS Reports.

During this year's winter break, students from the Bologna, DC and Nanjing campuses traveled to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia, Britain, China, Hong Kong, India, Netherlands, South Africa and several Southeast Asian countries to participate in study and career development programs.

The same issue of SAIS Reports explores work by the International Reporting Project, which for 15 years, while many mainstream media organizations cut back foreign coverage and bureaus, has been encouraging media coverage of global issues.

Interested in summer courses at SAIS? On the last page of SAIS Reports you can read about the kinds of courses offered in June and July.

Nelson Graves

Summer internships: a fantastic way to begin to explore options

Most students at SAIS Bologna work an internship in the summer between their first and second year of study. 

The range of activities and destinations is as diverse as the student body itself. Click here to watch a video in which last year's students talk about their summer plans.

Today, we asked Kathryn Knowles, associate director of European Studies, to tell us about some of the new internship opportunities for SAIS Bologna students.

(Quiz: In which European capital would you see the cathedral pictured below? First person to answer correctly wins a SAIS Bologna tee shirt. You can respond by commenting on this post or via email to admissions@jhubc.it)

Summer 2013 in Brussels, Copenhagen or Istanbul? How about Paris, Warsaw or Zagreb?

These are a few of the European destinations where more than a dozen SAIS students will be spending the summer as interns at a variety of organizations across the public, private and non-governmental sectors.

The unique SAIS model of providing a trans-Atlantic education means that students have the opportunity to study international relations first from a European perspective in Bologna and then from an American one in Washington DC.

One of the goals of the SAIS European Studies program in particular is to provide a “third country experience” during the summer between the first and second years of study, allowing program concentrators to experience living and working in yet another European capital.

The program has teamed up with Career Services in Bologna to provide a number of new opportunities for the summer of 2013. Students interested in gaining private sector experience in public affairs consulting will head to Acumen Public Affairs or FIPRA in Brussels or the Vlahovic Group in Zagreb.

Kathryn Knowles

Those interested in designing their own research projects will go to Copenhagen to work with the Danish Emergency Management Agency or to Warsaw to the Polish Institute for International Affairs.

Trans-atlanticists can explore their interest in EU-US relations at the German Marshall Fund or the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU, both in Brussels; another will go to Washington DC to work with the Transatlantic Academy.

Understand Russian? How about a business development internship with Fox International Channels in Istanbul focused on markets in the Caucuses?

Parlez-vous français?  That will come in handy at the European Union Institute for Security Studies in Paris or Brussels.

One lucky student will even get to continue his or her Bologna experience by working with CRIF, the market leader in continental Europe in the field of banking credit information based right here in town.

All internships are posted in SAISworks and are open to students in every concentration. The diversity of internship opportunities reflects the vastness of career choices for SAIS students after graduation - a summer internship is a fantastic way to begin to explore these options.

Kathryn Knowles

Photo gallery: The Austrian Ball

Among SAIS Bologna's most venerable traditions is the Austrian Ball.

Generations of Bologna Center students have donned their finest garb on a Saturday evening in February and then thrown themselves into a Viennese waltz and the odd tango beneath the frescoed ceilings of the Hofburg Palace.

Last weekend most of this year's class piled into three buses for the trip to Vienna for this year's Ball.

The annual rite underscores SAIS Bologna's longstanding ties with Austria, which has sent nearly 400 students to the program since its inception in 1955. That makes Austria the 4th largest nationality among SAIS Bologna's more than 7,000 alumni.

(Can you guess what the three leading nationalities are?)

Thanks to Marwa Abdou, Veronika Bauer, Tendai Madenyika, Markus Tozman and Guli Du for providing us with these pictures.

Nelson Graves

How cities transform international relations

Today, more than half of the world's population lives in cities, and in the next decades the number will rise.

"With most people living in urban areas, what happens in and between cities will shape the world of the future -- and transform international relations", writes SAIS Dean Vali Nasr in the latest edition of SAISPHERE, the journal for alumni and friends of the SAIS community.

Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York and a Johns Hopkins alumnus, discusses the challenges facing New York and how cities can address some of today's most critical global issues.

Kenneth Keller, SAIS Bologna Director and professor of Science and Technology Policy, explains the term "smart city" and discusses how "properly employed information and communication technology can enhance physical community and hence its role in creating smart cities".

Seth G. Jones, professorial lecturer in the Strategic Studies Program at SAIS and associate director of the International Security and Defense Policy Center at RAND, looks at how "the trend towards urban insurgencies will have an impact on the nature of insurgency -- and counterinsurgency".

Erik Jones, director of SAIS's European Studies Program, and second year MA student Jozefien Willemen look at whether London or New York is the world's financial capital.

Inside the magazine, more on cities from all around the world and views from experts across SAIS.

Amina Abdiuahab

Travel: the transformative power of the SAIS experience

Before coming to SAIS Bologna, I knew the experience would transform my intellectual landscape. I was not quite prepared for another powerful aspect of the experience.

Castelo da Pena taken from Castelo dos Mouros (Portugal)
by David Gorgani

If you come to SAIS, it will change you, and not just academically speaking. You will leave SAIS a different person. Here's what I mean.

Before arriving at SAIS Bologna, I considered myself relatively well traveled for my age. I had lived in New Zealand for six months during high school; visited Washington, DC, New York City and the U.S. West Coast, and traveled through large parts of Europe.

Most readers will be familiar with the uneasiness one can feel during one's first days abroad, the sense of being lost and a vague desire for the comforts of home. I am fortunate enough to be able to return to a loving family in Germany and great friends. But now that is no longer enough.

I have become a travel and culture enthusiast thanks to my fellow SAIS Bologna students who have traveled through the remote areas of the Baltic states, hopped through European capitals and trekked through the deserts of Morocco. Like them, I want to venture forth, log my own experiences and make the absolute best use of my time by travelling to far-flung places.

Relaxing in Fez
by Marina Grushin

At SAIS you are almost sure to have someone in your class who has been to those destinations and who can help you with contacts and advice, and perhaps even find you a travel companion. Bologna is a travel hub, with convenient train connections to the rest of Italy and Europe, and an airport that is served by two low-budget airlines -- much appreciated by budget-conscious students -- plus the major carriers.

SAIS has transformed me into a travel enthusiast who is eager to expand his horizons with friends from all over the world. It took only one semester.

This is part of the power of the SAIS experience.

Felix Amrhein (BC13)