Wednesday Talk: February 5 , 2025, at 2-4pm. It is in-person and on Zoom
- This event has passed.
February 5 @ 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Speaker: Matthew Light, Centre for European and Eurasian Studies, Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies, U of T
Title: “Ukraine: The Stakes for Canada”
Abstract: As the war in Ukraine drags on for its third year, it has somewhat dropped out of the headlines and public consciousness in Canada. Matthew Light argues that while the war is often seen in Canada primarily as a pressing humanitarian and human rights problem, the outcome of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine matters deeply for the future of Canada and its place in the world. What are the stakes of the war for Canada? What consequences would different scenarios for the end of the war bring to this country?”
Bio: Associate professor at the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies and Centre for European and Eurasian Studies, University of Toronto, Matthew Light received his juris doctor (law) degree from Yale University in 1999 and doctorate in political science at Yale in 2006, focusing on comparative politics, with a specialization in contemporary Russia. From 2006 to 2008, he was visiting assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
His research has concerned migration control, law enforcement, and criminal justice in different states of the post-Soviet region, in which he has spent considerable time on research trips. His doctoral dissertation and then book, Fragile Migration Rights (Routledge, 2016) analyzed the internal migration policies of regional governments in contemporary Russia that explored the nature of citizenship in the Russian state and the relationship between central and regional political elites. His recent and ongoing research is devoted to different aspects of policing and public safety in several post-Soviet states, including the Republic of Georgia, Armenia, Estonia, and Ukraine. Publications have examined public and private aspects of security, such as the evolution of private security companies and the regulation of civilian ownership of weapons along with questions of institutional restructuring of public police services. He co-leads a five-year Insight Grant funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to investigate the process of police reform and related aspects of public safety in Ukraine since 2014, including policing decentralization, gun control, and civil defence.
The link to register is https://forms.office.com/r/Ei3cQPL28g
The deadline to register is the Monday before the event at noon. The Zoom link will be sent to registrants only.
