Venue: Public Lecture Theatre, Old Arts (Building 149)
Presenters: Professor Philomena Murray
The Wednesday Lectures 2016 hosted by Raimond Gaita
It is striking how often people now speak of 'a common humanity' in an ethically inflected register, one that expresses a fellowship of all the peoples of the earth. More often than not, however, we refer to the idea of a common humanity when we lament the failure of its acknowledgment. The forms of that failure are depressingly many: racism, sexism homophobia, the dehumanization of our enemies, of unrepentant criminals and those who suffer severe and degrading affliction. As often as someone reminds us that 'we are all human beings', someone will reply that to be treated like a human being you must behave like one.
Many people appear now to fear that within twenty years or less national and international politics will be dominated by crises that caused and inflamed by the shameful gap between the rich and the poor nations, aggravated by the effects of climate change. They fear their children and grandchildren will not be protected as they have been from the terrors suffered by most of the peoples of the earth because of impoverishment, natural disasters and the evils inflicted upon them by other human beings. In such circumstances the ideal and even the very idea of a common humanity is likely to seem to have been a foolish illusion.
The six Wednesday Lectures of 2016 will explore what sustains and what erodes the idea of a common humanity and, more radically, whether it is a useful idea with which to think about the moral, legal and political relations between people and peoples.
Wednesday, 31 August: The European Union - Beacon of Hope or a Values Community in Crisis?
For many people throughout Europe and across the globe, the European Union seemed to present a noble narrative of peace and human rights. It was a values community that inspired many countries to join its ranks. Beyond Europe, it was admired for its strong stance on human rights and its huge aid programmes. Yet this Union is in crisis. The noble narrative of the EU as a peace project is in question. Many are casting doubt on its very existence.
The refugee crisis is the latest to test these founding ideals and values. They have been questioned within Europe, as the EU appears to be the source of problems and not solutions. Murray will examine what that uncertainty, now at a point of crisis, means for Europe and the rest of the world.
Speaker: Philomena Murray is Professor in the School of Social and Political Sciences and Research Director on Regional Governance in the EU Centre on Shared Complex Challenges, The University of Melbourne. She holds Australia's only Personal Jean Monnet Chair (ad personam) awarded by the European Union. She received a Carrick Australian Learning and Teaching Council Citation for Outstanding Contribution to Student Learning for pioneering the first EU curriculum in Australia and leadership in national and international curriculum development. She is a former diplomat.
She is a Research Associate of the School of Business at Trinity College Dublin, Visiting Professor at the College of Europe, Bruges, Associate Research Fellow at United Nations University’s Institute for Comparative Regional Integration Studies, Bruges, and an Academic Associate, Queen’s College, the University of Melbourne.
Her publications include Longo, M. and Murray, P, Europe's Legitimacy Crisis: From Causes to Solutions; Brennan, L. and Murray, P, Drivers of Integration and Regionalism in Europe and Asia: Comparative Perspectives; Christiansen T, Kirchner E, Murray P (Eds.) The Palgrave Handbook of EU-Asia Relations; Murray P (Ed.), Europe and Asia: Regions in Flux Basingstoke Palgrave and Murray, P. (2005) Australia and the European Superpower.
from
https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/7137-the-european-union-beacon-of-hope-or-a-values
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