The University of Sydney and Q Station
20-22 February 2014

From a Youtube video of an oil spill, to an Instagram of a human rights violation, to a Twitter realtime feed of a terrorist bombing, to a Wikileak of classified documents, multiple media interventions are transfiguring global politics. Events phase-shift in a single news cycle from states to sub-states, local to global, public to private, organized to chaotic, virtual to real – and back again.  Complex, volatile, and emergent peace and security issues require new and timely thinking as well as responses. 

Q applies the latest innovations in the natural, social and human sciences to a reconfiguration of global power, developing peace and security issues and the role of networked global media in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond. Q will examine rising powers, new actors, financial crises, terrorist attacks, cyberconflicts, uberveillance, pandemics, natural and unnatural disasters as well as white swans.  With Sydney universities leading the way in quantum computing and communication, Q will also consider the political, strategic, diplomatic, financial and ethical implications of the moment when quantum shifts from the microphysical and metaphorical to the macrophysical and actual.

Schedule

Thursday, 20 February 2014

Michael Hintze Lecture

Speaker: Lene Hansen, University of Copenhagen

Friday, 21 February 2014

Panel 1 – The Q Effect: Micro-, Macro- and Meta-physical

Moderator: James Der Derian, CISS

Participants:

David Reilly, Quantum Nanoscience Lab, USYD
Jairus Victor Grove, University of Hawaii
Parag Khanna, Hybrid Reality Institute
Katina Michael, University of Wollongong

Panel 2 – Geosecurity: Risky States, States at Risk, and the Indo-Pacific

Moderator: Bates Gill, USSC/USYD

Speaker: Vice Admiral Ray Griggs, Chief of Navy, RAN

Participants:

Ryan Griffiths, CISS
Justin Hastings, CISS
John Lee, CISS
Sarah Phillips, CISS
James Reilly, CISS
Thomas Wilkins, CISS
Jingdong Yuan, CISS

Film Screening of The Unknown Known (Errol Morris)

Saturday, 22 February

Panel 3 – Biosecurity:  Microbes, Food, and Genes

Moderator: Adam Kamradt-Scott, CISS

Participants:

Alison Bashford, USYD/Cambridge
Monika Barthwal-Datta, UNSW
Stefan Elbe, University of Sussex
Kathleen Vogel, Cornell University

Panel 4 – Infosecurity: Cyberworlds, Surveillance, and Global Media

Moderator:  Simon Tormey, USYD

Participants:

Roland Bleiker, University of Queensland
Charlotte Epstein, CISS
Carolin Kaltofen, CISS/Aberystwyth
Rebecca Adler-Nissen, University of Copenhagen

Panel 5 – Global Security: Crisis, Stasis, or Opportunity?

Moderator: Roy MacLeod, CISS

Participants:

Peter Hayes, Nautilus Institute/RMIT
Megan MacKenzie, CISS
Sarah Percy, UWA
David Schlosberg, CISS                 

Panel 6 – The Final Q Table
Moderator: James Der Derian, CISS

Participants:

Thomas Biersteker, The Graduate Institute Geneva
Lene Hansen, CISS/University of Copenhagen
John Keane, USYD
Colin Wight, CISS

Film Screening of The End of Time  (Peter Mettler)