Opening of the Centre for Peace History at the University of Sheffield

Wednesday, 18 November 2009

5.30pm, Jessop West Exhibition Space, University of Sheffield, 1 Upper Hanover Street, Sheffield S3 7RA

Opening Notes
Professor Keith Burnett, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sheffield
Professor Bob Moore, Acting Head of the Department of History

Introduction by Drs Mike Foley, Holger Nehring and Benjamin Ziemann, Co-Directors of the Centre for Peace History

Inaugural Lecture

Professor Helge Pharo, University of Oslo:

‘The Nobel Peace Prize in History - Purpose, Principles and Politics’

There was much debate about the recent award of the Nobel Peace Prize to US President Barack Obama. Professor Pharo - an academic adviser to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, a renowned expert on the history of international relations and director of the Forum for Contemporary History at the University of Oslo - will reveal the historical background to this decision. He will talk about the politics, principles and procedures that have guided the half a dozen or so Norwegian MPs on the Nobel Peace Prize Committee throughout its history.

The event is followed by a drinks reception.

Background and mission statement of the Centre

The new Centre for Peace History at the University of Sheffield aims to produce world-leading research that advances our understanding of peace throughout history from a transnational and interdisciplinary perspective. It is devoted to the inter-disciplinary study of practices, representations and reflections of peace and peaceful conflict resolution. This makes the Centre a unique institution, not only in the UK, but also in Europe and the wider world.
The Centre for Peace History at the University of Sheffield aims to:
- advance our understanding of the historically contingent ways in which people have thought about and, quite literally, have made peace.
- produce high-quality outputs through a research, seminar and lecture programme that maintains an inter-disciplinary orientation
- engage the wider public in Sheffield and beyond in issues regarding peace making in history

The Centre’s co-directors and its international advisory board

The Centre builds on the expertise and the dense network of national and international contacts of the three founding co-directors, Dr Michael S. Foley, Dr Holger Nehring and Dr Benjamin Ziemann. Mike Foley, who is on the executive board of the Peace History Society and co-edits the journal The Sixties: A Journal of History, Politics, and Culture, is an expert on the peace movements in the USA after 1945. Holger Nehring, currently chairman of the German Association for Peace History (Arbeirtskreis Historische Friedensforschung), has written and edited books on the history of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, West German peace movements since 1949, the Cold War and the history of peacemaking in Europe since the end of the First World War. Benjamin Ziemann is an expert on the social history of the First World War and its aftermath as well as on the history of violence in the twentieth century. He is, together with Holger Nehring, co-founder of the European Network of Peace Historians, and has published widely on European peace movements since 1945.

The founding directors of the Centre for Peace History closely collaborate with an international advisory board of renowned scholars, underscoring the interdisciplinary vision and practice of the research centre.