SASNET: Workreport 2008

6. Appendices delivered along with the printed work report (as pdf-files):

1. Introduction and Summary

• For a number of reasons, SASNET’s activities during 2008 differed somewhat compared from previous years. One reason was SASNET’s strong involvement in Lund University’s application for a European Commission funded mobility programme – the Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Window (EMECW) lot 15 – regarding mobility for 400 students, researchers, and academic staff between India and Europe. SASNET’s coordinator, Anna Lindberg, devoted six weeks at the beginning of the year to writing this project application on behalf of Lund University’s International Office. The deputy director/web master, Lars Eklund, was also occupied with the application, in addition to setting up the project’s webpage. The application was successful, and Lund University now coordinates the Indo-European university consortium that runs the mobility programme.

• SASNET’s work during 2008 has also differed in character due to the fact that financial support from Sida/SAREC will come to an end on December 31, 2009. The coordinator has therefore spent a large part of her working hours drafting a new strategy document proposing ways in which SASNET may renew and consolidate itself in order to explore other funding possibilities. Unfortunately, however, the coordinator fell ill in April 2008 and had to go on sick leave for eight months. This affected the long-term strategy work, even though a competent substitute coordinator, Sidsel Hansson, held SASNET’s positions during Anna’s absence.

• Routine business has been going on as usual. SASNET has organised a large number of seminars and lectures at Lund University, often in collaboration with other departments or the Association of Foreign Affairs at the university.
In August 2008, SASNET also financed and co-organised a conference on Environmental History in South Asia in collaboration with Uppsala University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU).

• SASNET’s director and deputy director have been actively networking. During 2008, they visited several Swedish universities and met with researchers and educators involved in South Asia-related studies. They have also interacted with the South Asian embassies in Sweden and have participated in international conferences and seminars in Europe. Lars Eklund participated in the 20th European Conference on Modern South Asian Studies (ECMSAS), held in Manchester. In addition, SASNET has collaborated with the Sweden India Business Council, organising events for the business community.

•The SASNET website has steadily expanded, providing information on such matters as South Asia-related research at Swedish universities and conferences being held worldwide. Newsletters have been sent via e-mail to approximately 1,700 subscribers every month.

• The staff also continually provides advice to students and researchers who approach SASNET by telephone or e-mail.

• In August, a SASNET Student Forum was launched. This interactive web forum provides a meeting location for research students interested in South Asia. Doctoral candidate Malin Gregersen created the web forum.

• On December 1, 2008, SASNET launched the Karl Reinhold Haellquist Memorial Collection (KRHMC) web site on Mahatma Gandhi. The site presents unique material on Gandhi from the private collection of the renowned Swedish historian, that has been donated to Lund University. SASNET hired librarian Erik Svanström to digitalize the collection and create the Gandhi web site.

• Finally, in order to facilitate and strengthen South Asia-related research and educational programmes at Swedish universities, while also contributing to network building, SASNET has made planning grants available. These are intended to develop collaborative projects between Swedish and South Asian researchers and educators, as well as underwrite the organisation of interdisciplinary conferences and invite guest lecturers from South Asia to visit Swedish universities. In 2008, SASNET distributed SEK 1 m in this regard.

• The financial balance sheet for 2008 showed a loss of SEK 79 000 and an actual cash deficit (negative administrative capital) of SEK 43 000 that must be restored in the 2009 budget. (see Appendices 1 and 2).

These activities and results lead us to believe we have reached the goals and fulfilled the directives of SASNET’s Board at its meetings on 5 February and 26 August.

2. Organisation

Decisions taken at the Board meeting on 5 February guided most SASNET activities in 2008. For the minutes, see Appendix 6.
For the minutes of 26 August, see Appendix 7

Anna Lindberg worked as Director and Coordinator on a 50% basis from January to March, and on 25% during the month of December.
Lars Eklund worked as full-time Webmaster and Deputy Director throughout the year.
Sidsel Hansson worked as substitute Director and Coordinator (50%) from April to November.
Stig Toft Madsen was employed on a 25% basis as an Assistant Director in December.

The Internet Gateway has now been established as an authoritative source of information for students, researchers, and others interested in South Asian studies. It has received worldwide recognition for its wealth of information. In 2008, SASNET’s website logged 38,000 visitors. Since this is SASNET’s main tool of communication, considerable time is spent updating and developing its content. New information is added daily and it is maintained according to the standards of professional journalism.
On April 9, 2009, the website contained 1,490 pages, with 2,500 photos and 13,300 external links. Lars Eklund has done all the work with the gateway. However, for a short period in September-October he received some assistance in updating information on the web pages by Ms. Maria Tonini. She worked on a voluntary basis.

On January 27, 2009 the Board set the agenda for SASNET’s activities during 2009.
For the minutes, see Appendix 8.

3. Networking Activities

During 2008 we interacted with a great number of researchers, teachers, and students by exchanging e-mails and telephone calls. In all these contacts we used our Internet Gateway as a source of information. Some of the more important activities are listed in Section 4 below.

SASNET distributes newsletters and updates its Internet Gateway on a daily basis. The distribution list presently contains about 1,700 e-mail addresses.

All the newsletters can be found at: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/sasnet.html. They represent a detailed archive of SASNET’s major activities in SASNET during the year, with links to relevant documents and homepages.

The last date for applications was 15 June 2008. By that time 52 applications were received for SASNET planning grants. The total amount applied for was SEK 4.29 million.
On August 26, 2008, the reference group made up of Arild Engelsen Ruud (Institute for Cultural Studies and Oriental Languages, University of Oslo), Ewa Wäckelgård (International Science Programme, Uppsala University), and Jytte Agergaard Larsen (Department of Geography, University of Copenhagen), approved grants for the following persons, projects, and programmes

The Masters Programme in Asian Studies at Lund University was begun on 1 September 2003 at the Centre for East and Southe ast Asian Studies (ACE). The South Asian Studies track has had up to 15 students in its programmes every year between 2003 and 2007. The SASNET root node has taken part in the programme with Staffan Lindberg and Stig Toft Madsen teaching courses on region-specific development and supervising some students. Lars Eklund provided information about sources for South Asian Studies and made the SASNET magazine library available to students.

SASNET launched its Student Forum in 2008 with PhD Candidate Malin Gregersen, Dept. of History, Lund University as coordinator of the forum.
A working committee led by Dr. Kristina Myrvold, Lund University, and PhD Candidate Ferdinando Sardella, Gothenburg University, have begun planning for the SASNET conference for young Scandinavian scholars to be held in Falsterbo in August 2009.

We are continually updating our page called “Recommended reading/listening for South Asia scholars” (see http://www.sasnet.lu.se/recreading.html) with new interesting articles.

In the Swedish magazine Omvärlden, published by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency Sida, an article on SASNET appeared in its December 2008 issue (No. 7/2008). The article, written by senior journalist Jöran Hök, is titled ”Unikt svenskt nätverk blir förebild för fler forskare” (Unique Swedish network becomes a model for more researchers). Read the article!

13 March. Anna Lindberg participated in a meeting at the Dept. for Asia and the Pacific Region, Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (UD) in Stockholm. The aim of the meeting was to discuss Sweden’s new strategy for development cooperation with India announced by the government.

11 August. Sidsel Hansson and Lars Eklund participated in the celebration of the Indian independence day in Stockholm. During this occasion, a chance was given to say farewell to the outgoing Indian Ambassador to Sweden, Ms. Deepa Gopalan Wadhwa, and also meet a large number of India related academics, cultural personalities and diplomats.
Lars also met with the outgoing Pakistani Ambassador to Sweden, Mr. Shaheen A. Gillani.

10 April. SASNET and SIBC (Sweden-India Business Council) organised a half-day business seminar in Lund in collaboration with the Ideon Science Park. The seminar was entitled ”Operating in India” (Verksam i Indien), and included presentations focusing on challenges that Swedish companies face when they establish businesses in India. SASNET’s former Director, Prof. Staffan Lindberg, was the moderator, and deputy Director Lars Eklund introduced the seminar. The issue of corporate social responsibility (CSR) was a key concept, and representatives of IKEA, Indiska magasinet, Lufthansa, and the Swedish Export Council discussed their experiences of CSR. Read a report from the business seminar.

7–8 May. SASNET’s acting director, Dr. Sidsel Hansson, and its deputy director, Lars Eklund, participated in the Globe Forum Conference 2008, held in Stockholm. Globe Forum is an annual international conference held in Stockholm for business leaders, entrepreneurs, academics, political leaders, and state officials working in the most dynamic growing markets. The theme for the 2008 conference was: ”Business Innovation for Sustainable Growth”. The primary focus of the conference was to share views and information from the fastest growing markets: China, India, Central and Eastern Europé, and the Gulf region, and inspire new business opportunities in the light of global environmental and social challenges. The conference addressed the technology industry, consumer perspectives, and the broader energy areas, including energy availability and usage, transport, and environmental issues. Sida was one of Globe Forum's partners this year. Its new Director-General, Anders Nordström, was one of the keynote speakers. Other invited speakers at the 2008 Globe Forum included Dipal Chandra Barua (photo to the right), Deputy Managing Director for Grameen Shakti (the Nobel Prize Laureate microcredit institution); K.P. Nyati, Principal Adviser, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII); and Bharti Patel from the Society for Voluntary Action Revitalisation and Justice (SVARAJ) in Bangalore. Mr. Barua and Ms. Patel participated in a seminar on ”The Rise of Microfinance: How Village Women Challenge Wall Street Men”. Read a SASNET report from Globe Forum 2008

4. SASNET’s Root Node Activities 2008

6 February. The documentary film Killing Time, focusing on the Bhutanese refugees now living in camps in Nepal, was shown at an open SASNET seminar in Lund on Wednesday 6 February 2008. The screening of the film, organised in collaboration with the Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies, Lund University, was followed by an open discussion with Swedish-Canadian Director Annika Gustafson, about refugees, religion, development aid, exile, war, education, and the Gross National Happiness concept.

10 March. Dr. Soumyajit Samantha of North Bengal University, Siliguri, India, held a SASNET lecture in Lund on Monday 10 March 2008 on ”From Salman Rushdie to Arundhati Roy – Modern Indian Novels as Analysis of Changing India and as World Literature”. The seminar was organised in collaboration with the Association of Foreign Affairs (UPF) and the Dept. of Comparative Literature, Lund University. Dr. Samantha’s visit to Sweden was underwritten by a SASNET guest lecture tour grant. He spoke at Lund University and Växjö University.

12 March. Lars Eklund visited the Institute for Security and Development Policy (ISDP) in Nacka-Stockholm on Wednesday 12 March 2008. A fruitful meeting was organised by ISDP’s deputy director, Robert Nilsson, in order for Lars to introduce SASNET to Director Niklas Swanström and other ISDP researchers currently working on projects related to South Asia and Afghanistan. ISDP was established as an independent research institute in October 2007, but its roots go back to the Silk Road Studies Program launched at Uppsala University in 2002.

13 March. Dr. Hans Blomkvist and Dr. Katrin Uba from the Dept. of Government, Uppsala University, held a joint SASNET seminar in Lund on Thursday 13 March 2008. Prof. Blomkvist, currently doing research on institutions and political decision making in India on energy and bioenergy in particular, talked about ”Energy Challenges in India's Rapidly Growing Economy”. Dr. Uba, who defended her PhD thesis in 2007 on political activism in developing countries, talked about ”Protests against privatisation and their outcomes in India”. Her presentation provides an overview of the privatisation process in India from 1991 till 2003, actors opposing the process, and the eventual impact of protest mobilisation.

16-17 March. Professor Asoke Bhattacharya from the Adult and Continuing Education and Extension Centre at Jadavpur University in Kolkata, visited SASNET and Lund University on 16–17 March 2008. During the spring of 2008, Prof. Bhattacharya spent three months as a visiting scholar at the Danish University for Pedagogy in Copenhagen. His research focuses on the work by the 19th century Danish priest, poet, and writer N.F.S. Grundtvig, who is considered to be a pioneer in the field of adult education. While in Denmark, Prof. Bhattacharya’s new book, Education for the People, was launched during a function at the Centre for Grundtvig Studies, University of Aarhus. Besides visiting SASNET, with which Prof. Bhattacharya has a long-standing relationship he also met researchers at Lund University’s Dept. of Education to discuss possible new collaboration projects.

19 March. Associate Professor Aida Aragão-Lagergren, Dept. of Social and Economic Geography, Uppsala University, visited the SASNET root node office in Lund on Wednesday 19 March 2008. She discussed the status of her ongoing research project, ”Children Left Behind. A Study on Children of Migrant Women in Sri Lanka”, carried out in collaboration with Prof. Kumudu Wijewardena, University of Sri Jayewardenepura (SJP), Sri Lanka. The project was initially given a SASNET planning grant, and later on awarded major research grants from Sida/SAREC and the Swedish Research Council.

1 April. Dr. Anirudh Krishna, Associate Professor of Public Policy and Political Science at the Sanford Institute of Public Policy, Duke University, Durham, N.C., USA held a lecture in Lund on Tuesday 1 April 2008. The lecture, jointly organised by SASNET and the Association of Foreign Affairs at Lund University (UPF), was entitled ”Active Social Capital: Tracing the Roots of Development and Democracy in India”, which is also the title of Dr. Krishna’s recently published book.

18 April 2008. On Friday 18 April 2008, Lars Eklund and Sidsel Hansson from SASNET visited Gothenburg University and Chalmers University of Technology. In the morning they participated in a seminar on ”Indien – ett framtidsland?” (India – Land of the Future?), organised by the Board of Regional Research in West Sweden (Reväst) and held at the Dept. of Human and Economic Geography, School of Business, Economics, and Law at Gothenburg University (see photo). In the afternoon, an informal meeting with researchers interested in South Asia-related projects focusing on technology was organised at Chalmers University of Technology. The meeting was convened by Dr. Catharina Hiort at Chalmers Biocenter, which co-ordinates bioengineering activities at Chalmers with an aim to strengthen research related to biology, biotechnology, and medicine. For full information about the SASNET visit to Göteborg, see http://www.sasnet.lu.se/gbgapril08.html

12 May. Professor Venkatesh B. Athreya, MS Swaminathan Foundation, Chennai, India, held a well-attended SASNET/UPF lecture at Lund University. The lecture, jointly organised by SASNET and the Association of Foreign Affairs at Lund University (UPF), was on the subject of ”Wealth and Poverty in Rapidly Globalising India”. Currently, Prof. Athreya is co-operating with Swedish sociologists Göran Djurfeldt and Staffan Lindberg, Dept. of Sociology, Lund University; and two Indian researchers, Dr. R. Vidyasagar from the Madras Institute of Development Studies in Chennai, India, and Dr. A. Rajagopal from SaciWATERs in Hyderabad, in a restudy of 300 agricultural households in the Tiruchirapalli District, Tamil Nadu, originally interviewed in 1979/80. Prof. Athreya came to Lund to participate in a concluding workshop regarding this project. More information, with fact sheets from the lecture: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/venkalund.html

13 May. Lars Eklund and Sidsel Hansson from SASNET again visited Gothenburg University. In the morning they visited different medical departments at Sahlgrenska Academy that are involved in research collaboration with Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. In the afternoon a meeting was organised at the School of Global Studies for several researchers working on South Asia-related projects in different divisions within the School of Global Studies, as well as some researchers from other departments in the Faculty of Humanities at Göteborg University. Full information about the SASNET visit to Göteborg on May 13, 2008: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/gbgmay08.html

27-29 May. Lars Eklund participated in the conference on current Swedish development research that was held in Uppsala. It was the fourth in a row of conferences initiated and financed by Sida/SAREC – the unit for research cooperation within the the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency Sida. The 2008 conference was organised by the Centre for Sustainable Development in Uppsala, an inter-disciplinary centre for education and research redundant, jointly run by Uppsala University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in Uppsala. The general theme for the three-day conference was “Meeting Global Challenges in Research Cooperation”. Researchers and development professionals were invited to gather and discuss key themes at the frontiers of research and global development issues. Read Lars Eklund’s report on South Asia-related research presented at the Uppsala conference. http://www.sasnet.lu.se/sidaconf08.html

8-11 July. Lars Eklund participated in the 20th European Conference on Modern South Asian Studies (ECMSAS) that was held in Manchester, UK. The 2008 conference was hosted by the School of Arts, Histories and Cultures at the University of Manchester. 40 panels were included in the programme, covering a vast field of scientific areas, from ”Censorship, Subjectivity, and Subversion: Cultural Regulation in India from the Colonial Era to the Present” to ”Vegetarianisms: the communicative power of meat in South Asia” and ”Routes and Roots of Democracy in the Himalayas”. Professor Sanjay Subrahmanyam, Professor of Indian History at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), held the keynote lecture on ”Cultures of Travel between Anjou and Agra in the Early Modern World”. The conference also offered a range of cultural events including an illustrated lecture on the textiles trade between Manchester and South Asia held at the Whitworth Art Gallery, and a reception at Manchester's spectacular town hall, built during the 1880s.

26 August. SASNET was very much involved when Baul Shilpi, a group of baul singers from Bangladesh, visited Lund at the end of August 2008. The group came to Sweden on the invitation of Dr. Christina Nygren from the Dept. of Musicology and Theatre Studies, Stockholm University. The group consisted of four professional baul singers – Kajal Dewan, Akkas Dewan, Aklima Begam, and Nasima Dewan – and two other musicians, plus the tour leader, all from villages near to Dhaka. On Tuesday 26 August, SASNET organised a seminar on baul music and other forms of Bengali folk culture with Dr. Nygren. The seminar was also held at Sagohuset (where a well-attended concert was held the same evening). More information: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/lundactiv.html#baul

10 September. Parul Sharma, CSR Advisor, Group Assurance, Sandvik AB, held a SASNET lecture at Lund University. The lecture was entitled ”A Globalised South Asia and Human Rights”, and drew an audience of more than 40 people (mostly students from the Masters programme in Asian studies at Lund University’s Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies (ACE), and the Raoul Wallenberg Institute for Humanitarian Rights (RWI). Ms. Sharma has an affiliation to the Dept. of Law, Stockholm University, and the National Law School of India University in Bangalore, India, but has also worked for the Amnesty Business Group. Since August 2008, she is employed at the Swedish company Sandvik AB. Her lecture focused on the current interest in how the business operations have been promoted by heightened debates about human rights in the South Asian region. More information about the seminar: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/parulsharma.pdf

19 September. Prof. Radhika Desai, Dept of Political Studies, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada, held a lecture on ”The Dynamics of Caste, Class and Hindu Nationalism in India” in Lund. The seminar was organised in collaboration with the Dept. of Political Science, Lund University. Prof. Desai said the politics of Hindutva and those of caste are generally assumed to be opposed in India. Her paper contests by comparing an original account of caste, and its modern dynamics, and their interaction with class, especially in the context of liberalizing economic policy since the late 1960s. The main reason for Radhika Desai coming to Sweden was to participate in the 2008 European Social Forum in Malmö on 17-21 September. More information: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/radhikadesai.pdf

24 September. A seminar/panel discussion on Afghanistan titled ”Upptrappning Afghanistan. Vilken roll spelar de svenska soldaterna?” (Escalation in Afghanistan. Which role do the Swedish soldiers play?), and was jointly organised by SASNET, the Association of Foreign Affairs at Lund University (UPF), the Swedish Committe for Afghanistan (SCA) in Lund, and the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies (MES). The participants were Mr. Bengt Kristiansson, former general secretary for SCA Sweden; and Mr. Allan Widman, MP representing Folkpartiet, specialising in defence policy issues. Dr. Catarina Kinnvall, Dept. of Political Science, Lund University, moderated the discussion. More information: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/afgseminar08.pdf

25–26 September. Lars Eklund travelled to Gothenburg to visit the 2008 Göteborg Book Fair, an important event with several South Asian features. Seminars were held with Mahasweta Devi, Ambai, and other invited Indian writers, who had their works translated into Swedish through the ongoing Indo-Swedish translation project. Read Lars Eklund’s report from the book fair. http://www.sasnet.lu.se/bookfair08.html
While in Göteborg, Lars also visited the Nordic School of Public Health (NHV), a highly regarded institution of higher education funded by the the Nordic Council of Ministers. He met with the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Göran Bondjers, and discussed new South Asia-related research projects at NHV.

4 October. SASNET was represented by its then Acting Director, Dr. Sidsel Hansson, at the so-called India Platform UGent meeeting at Ghent University, Belgium. The meeting was organised by the Research Centre Vergelijkende Cultuurwetenschap (Comparative Science of Cultures) at Ghent University. Its purpose was to explore potential forms of collaboration among a network of European universities. The ambition was to form a so-called India Platform UGent to coordinate and facilitate setting up European collaborative research and educational projects related to India in the humanities and social sciences. Not much resulted from the Ghent meeting, but discussions will continue at a forthcoming session at the University of Tartu in Estonia to be held during 2009. See the call for the Ghent meeting: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/ghentmeet08.pdf

7 October. Dr. Durre S. Ahmed, Head of Communication & Cultural Studies, National College of Arts, Lahore, Pakistan, gave a seminar in Lund, entitled ”Human Rights and Women’s Activism in Contemporary Pakistan” on Tuesday 7 October 2008. The seminar was jointly organised by SASNET, the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies (CME), and Lund University’s Human Rights programme (based at the Centre for Theology and Religious Studies). Dr. Ahmed has a doctorate in Communications from Columbia University in New York and is also a practicing psychotherapist. More information. http://www.sasnet.lu.se/ahmeddurre.pdf

9-10 October. SASNET’s Acting Director, Sidsel Hansson, participated in a conference on “Pakistan – Consequences of Deteriorating Security in Afghanistan” that the Swedish Defence Research Agency, FOI, organised in Stockholm on 9–10 October 2008. The keynote speakers included Dr. Stephen Cohen, author of Four Crises and a Peace Process (2007), Shuja Nawaz, author of Crossed Swords: Pakistan, its Army and the Wars Within (2008), and others. Several speakers at the conference drew attention to a recent report by the Pakistan Policy Working Group entitled ”The Next Chapter: The United States and Pakistan”. This report suggests a new Pakistan policy for the incoming administration in the United States.
The October conference followed up a previous workshop organised by FOI in April 2008, in which Lars Eklund also participated with others from different Swedish universities, research institutes, and government departments. The April workshop and the October conference form part of an ongoing FOI research programme on Asian Security. Within this framework, the Swedish Defence Research Agency has initiated a number of sub-projects dealing with Pakistan.

21 October. SASNET participated in a half-day seminar on Indo-Swedish research and educational collaboration organised by the Faculty of Engineering (LTH), Lund University. A large number of researchers gathered to listen to presentations by Tomas Aronsson from the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems (VINNOVA), who talked about the formalised India-Sweden collaboration within the field of Science & Technology; and Prof. Ramon Wyss, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Stockholm, who introduced INSTEC, the national network for India-Swedish Cooperation on Technical Research and Education. Lars Eklund then spole about SASNET and its role as a national resource base for increased collaboration between researchers and institutions in Sweden and India (as well as the rest of South Asia). Finally Prof. Per Warfvinge, Vice-Dean for International Relations at the Faculty of Engineering gave a talk on the European Commission-funded Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Window (EMECW) programmes, and especially the new India lot being coordinated by Lund University. Prof. Warfvinge talked about the great possibilities of the EMECW programme and the urgent need for a quick process to recruit students and researchers. From December 1, 2008, Sidsel Hansson works as the coordinator for this EU-India programme.

23 October. A joint SASNET/UPF (Association of Foreign Affairs at Lund University) seminar on the political developments in Nepal was held. David Ludden, Professor of Political Economy and Globalization in the Dept. of History at New York University, USA, was the main speaker with a presentation entitled ”Where is the revolution? Towards a Post-National Politics of Social Justice”. Prof. Ludden received his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in 1978 and was Professor of History there from 1999-2008. His research concentrates on South Asia and on histories of development in very long-term perspective, focusing on economic development, agrarian conditions, health environments, empire, inequality, and social conflict. In August 2008, he was invited by the Social Science Baha to hold the 2008 Mahesh Chandra Regmi Lecture in Kathmandu.
Other participants in the Lund seminar were Dr. Katak Malla of the Dept. of Law, Stockholm University, who spoke about ”Nepal from Monarchy to Republic: the Ongoing Political Process”; and His Excellency the Ambassador of Nepal to Denmark (with a side accreditation to Sweden), Mr. Vijaykant Lal Karna, who is also a political scientist by profession, having worked at Tribhuvan University for 20 years. SASNET’s former Director, Prof. Staffan Lindberg, Dept. of Sociology, Lund University, was the moderator for the seminar that drew a crowd of about 40 people. See complete information about the seminar and the three speakers (as a pdf-file). http://www.sasnet.lu.se/ludden.pdf
During their stay in Lund, Ambassador Karna and Dr. Malla, old colleagues fom Tribhuvan University, also visited SASNET’s root node office at Scheelevägen. A fruitful discussion took place regarding the ongoing democratic transition process in Nepal and the urgency of support for this positive development. The Ambassador welcomed such initiatives from Sweden, and thought SASNET should play a facilitating role. Earlier the same day, Prof. Ludden also held a lecture on the concept of Asian area studies for Master’s students at Lund University. In an illuminating talk, he briefly explained the US national agenda behind the establishment and funding of area studies departments at US universities. SASNET’s Maria Tonini attended the lecture and gave a report: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/luddenareastudies.pdf

28 October. Prof. Rana P.B. Singh gave a SASNET lecture on ”Indian Village: Tradition, Modernity and Change” in Lund on 28 October. The seminar, focusing on developments in a village in Uttar Pradesh not far from Varanasi, was organised in collaboration with the Dept. of History and Anthropology of Religions, Lund University. Rana P.B. Singh is a Professor of Cultural Geography at Banaras Hindu University, BHU. He has long been closely connected to Sweden, regularly coming here since 1988, mostly as a visiting professor at Karlstad University, but has also given lectures at the universities of Lund, Göteborg, Uppsala, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Aarhus, Åbo, Vasa, Oslo, and Bergen. Read a summary of the SASNET lecture. http://www.sasnet.lu.se/ranalund08.pdf

6-7 November. SASNET was represented at the International conference on ”Peacebuilding in Afghanistan: Local, Regional and Global Perspectives” that was held in Stockholm. The conference focused on what the peacebuilding efforts look like in the country? What roles do the Afghan authorities, the International Community, the UN and the Nato-led ISAF forces play? Do they contribute to peace or armed conflict? Are there local initiatives at grassroots level promoting peace and how does the civilian population contribute to the reconstruction of the country? Why does Afghanistan receive so little funding for reconstruction compared to other areas of armed conflict? Have the complex developments in Afghanistan become something that the West would rather not have to deal with? What actions are needed in order for Afghanistan to become a country of peace and stability? The conference was organised by the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA), in cooperation with ENNA (European Network of NGOs in Afghanistan). Invited speakers included prominent persons such as Sima Samar (photo), Chairperson of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission; Kristian Berg Harpviken, senior researcher at the International Peace Research Institute (PRIO) in Oslo; and the eminent Pakistani writer/journalist Ahmed Rashid. Read a report by Lars Eklund: http://www.sasnet.lu.se/afghkonf08.html

11 November. Prof. James Heitzman was to have given a SASNET lecture on ”The City in South Asia: Historical Templates and Contemporary Challenges” in Lund on 11 November, in collaboration with the Division of Housing Development and Management, Lund Institute of Technology, Lund University. However, due to health problems he was forced to cancel his tour of Scandinavia and the seminar in Lund. Sadly, on 15 November 2008, Prof. Heizman passed away.

20 November. Marie Yoshida, coordinator for the Asian Dynamics Initiative (ADI) at the University of Copenhagen visited SASNET on 20 November. Ms. Yoshida, who is based at the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies (NIAS) in Copenhagen wished to strenghten links to SASNET. Possible forms of future collaboration were discussed. Lars Eklund also demonstrated SASNET’s website and its wealth of information on South Asia-related research at Swedish universities.

1 December. Dr. Seteney Shami, Program Director for Eurasia, Middle East and North Africa at the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) in New York, USA, visited SASNET’s root node office in Lund on 1 December. During the academic year 2008/09, Dr. Shami is serving as a research fellow at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study (SCAS) in Uppsala. She came to SASNET to discuss possibilities for setting up an international collaborative network for the study of inter-Asian processes and developments. SSRC is planning for a project entitled ”Inter-Asian Connections”. SASNET was represented by its Director, Anna Lindberg, and Acting Director, Sidsel Hansson. Dr. Leif Stenberg from Lund University’s Centre for Middle Eastern Studies (CME), and Prof. Roger Greatrex from the Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies (ACE) also participated in the meeting. After fruitful discussions, it was suggested that Lund University host a network planning meeting in the Spring of 2009 with people representing different institutions across Asia as well as Europe and America.

10 December. Lars Eklund made a visit to Umeå University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in Umeå. Lars met with a large number of researchers, university teachers and administrators interested in South Asia-related collaboration projects both in research and education, and the possibilities that SASNET might offer in facilitating such. He visited departments where South Asia-related research and/or education is going on, including the Unit for Epidemiology and Public Health Sciences, the Dept. of Social Work, and Umeå Plant Science Centre (UPSC), run jointly by Umeå University’s Dept. of Forest Genetics and Plant Physiology, and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in Umeå. Read Lars Eklund’s report from Umeå. http://www.sasnet.lu.se/umea2008.html

17 December. Dr. Christer Norström, Dept. of Social Anthropology, Stockholm University and former SASNET board member, represented SASNET at the first so-called Sida Science Day held in Stockholm. The event was organised by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), and is expected to become an annual event to monitor the implementation of Sida’s strategy for the advancement of research in developing countries during the period 2009–13. The Sida Science Day should enable context analysis in the area of research policy in low income countries and present major research findings from research cooperation programmes. The Sida Science Day 2008 consisted of two parts, the first only open to Sida staff, and stakeholders within Sida, and focusing entirely on Africa. The second part was open to a broader audience and had a wider scope. Representatives of the Swedish Ministry of Education, directors of the Swedish Research Councils, as well as Vice Chancellors and Professors of Swedish universities and university colleges were invited to discuss issues such as ”The Swedish Research Bill 2008”; ”The Swedish Policy for Research Cooperation with Developing Countries”; and ”The Swedish Experience of Research Cooperation”.

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Last updated 2010-04-22

SWEDISH SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES NETWORK

SASNET Work Report 1 January – 31 December 2008:

Swedish South Asian Studies Network, Lund University – Administrative Report No. 9

Lund 15 April 2009

1. Introduction and Summary

2. Organisation

3. Networking Activities

4. SASNET’s Root Node Activities 2008