On October 11th we had the pleasure to inaugurate the new academic year and welcome new amazing students to our academic family.

The audience was greeted by the representatives of Wydział Studiów Międzynarodowych i Politycznych UJ: Rector Andrzej Mania, the Vice-Dean for Educational Affairs - dr hab. Ewa Trojnar, prof. UJ and the Director of the Center for International Studies and Development, dr hab. Marcin Grabowski.

The inaugural lecture was given by Dr Ruairidh J Brown: Can we get beyond a Politics of War and Enmity? War, Enmity, and Politics in a Post-pandemic Age.

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic the paradigm of ‘war’ was constantly invoked to frame and inform responses. This was notable in China – with the Chinese Communist Party channelling revolutionary history to call a ‘People’s War’ on the virus – but the analogy was later adopted by most States as well as the United Nations.

Nonetheless, whilst noting such analogies may have some short-term benefits, this paper argues that such benefits are outweighed by overall negative consequences. Most notably, the need to identify an ‘enemy’ to be eliminated is problematic given the intangible nature of the COVID-19 virus. Struggling to come to terms with this abstract opponent, frequently enmity and hostility is redirected to tangible human proxies. This resulted in enmity lines falling back into the contours of human conflict, such as the ongoing US-China rivalry and disputes between Brexiting Britain and European Union members, most notably France.

Recognising the limitations of enmity, this paper argues that we need to rethink our political future on the framework of amity. It proposes this will be especially important if we are to survive the crisis of climate emergency, likely to be one of the greatest challenge we face in the post-pandemic age.

 

We wish you unforgettable moments at the Uniwersytet Jagielloński.