War Zones in the Bazaar: Markets, Volatility and Global Security

A Seminar for Students and Faculty with Aisha Ahmad, Co-Director, Initiative in Islam and Global Affairs, Munk School of Global Affairs
Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science

Moderated by Ritu Birla, Director, Initiative in Global Governance, Economy and Society,  Munk School of Global Affairs
Associate Professor, Department of History

Response by Dr. Joseph McQuade, SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow, Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs

In what ways would the analysis of contemporary global security shift if we began by inhabiting markets rather than identifying imperatives of state?  This seminar, grounded in readings on Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, will consider this question with Aisha Ahmad, political scientist, expert on political economy of civil war and international security policy, and author of Jihad and Co: Black Markets and Islamist Power (Oxford, 2017).  Moderated by Ritu Birla, an historian of capitalism, speculative finance and market governance, the session will address informal and formal economies to analyze volatility—financial and political.  Dr. Joseph McQuade, SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow at the Asian Institute, and specialist on the category of the terrorist and its deployment by the postcolonial state in South Asia, will respond.

Coffee/tea and snacks reception to follow