Founded in Fall 2015, the Colloquium is an initiative by the Faculty of Law, the Department of Philosophy, and the Department of Political Studies. It consists of a series of seminars and workshops within the broad ambit of the Colloquium’s mandate. Students registered with the course meet with the Colloquium convenors to discuss a recent paper by a leading scholar. The following week, the students meet with the author, along with other faculty members and invited guests, for a workshop about the paper.

The Colloquium’s aim is to promote closer collaboration between legal, philosophical, and political studies, by bringing together students and faculty from these overlapping disciplines to engage in rigorous intellectual engagement. The Colloquium contributes to the Queen’s Collaborative Program in Political and Legal Thought.

In Fall 2020, the Colloquium convenors are Professor Jean Thomas and Professor Grégoire Webber. The Colloquium is funded by Professor Webber's Canada Research Chair in Public Law and Philosophy of Law.

Further to the decision of the University that the Fall 2020 semester be held remotely for the majority of students, all Colloquium sessions listed below will be hosted remotely. 

All members of the Queen's community are welcome to attend the workshops and are invited to communicate with the convenors in order to receive information on how to do so.

Kristen Rundle (University of Melbourne)

Kristen Rundle joined Melbourne Law School in 2015 and teaches in the areas of administrative law and legal theory. She became the Co-Director of the Centre for Comparative Constitutional Studies in December 2016. Kristen previously held appointments at the London School of Economics and Political Science, the University of New South Wales and the University of Sydney, as well as adjunct, visiting and honorary appointments at the University of Toronto, Erasmus University, the University of Ottawa, and the Whitlam Institute, Western Sydney University.

Kristen's research is located at the intersection of legal theory and public law in its effort to trace the conditions necessary for law to act as a limitation on power. Led by her work in legal philosophy on the intellectual legacy of the legal philosopher, Lon Fuller, Kristen's interest in interactions between legal forms and human agency has also informed her research into the connections between law and the Holocaust, her work on the legal and institutional attributes of the British child migration program, and her ongoing inquiry into questions of theory and practice arising from the neoliberal redesign of the administrative state, especially with respect to contracted-out public functions.

Kyle Hanniman
Assistant Professor,  Department of Political Studies, Queen's University

One of the greatest sources of Canada’s resiliency in recent years has been the public sector’s ability to borrow. It allowed us to run countercyclical deficits during the global financial crisis and to build bridges for struggling businesses and households during the current pandemic. But this capacity varies considerably across orders of government. The federal government is in a far better position than the provinces to stabilize its debt-to-GDP ratio. It is also less vulnerable to credit shocks. This asymmetry is not unique to Canada. Still, it poses special risks for us because of our unparalleled stock of subnational debt. Canada needs to slowly stabilize provincial borrowing, while ensuring other policy goals, including the provision of adequate services, investment, and fiscal stabilization, are met. This talk will discuss the sources of provincial debt and possibilities for stabilizing it going forward.    

Details

Title: The political consequences of austerity: how incumbents (and future generations) lose from austerity

Speaker: Olivier Jacques, Skelton-Clark Post-Doctoral Fellow

Abstract: What policies do governments prioritize when they implement austerity? What are the political consequences of austerity? Many scholars in the political economy suggest that governments can implement austerity with impunity and that fiscal consolidations can help to reorient public expenditures toward productive investments. In contrast, I argue that governments choose the path of least resistance when they engage in fiscal consolidations. When governments implement austerity packages, they tend to prioritize policies benefiting large and influential constituencies and those offering short-term benefits, while cutting back on long-term investments. Using a compositional dependent variable analysis in 17 OECD countries from 1980 to 2014, I show that austerity, measured with the narrative approach to fiscal consolidations, is associated with a decrease in the proportion of public investment in research and development and gross fixed capital formation and an increase in health care and pensions’ proportion of budgets. Thus, austerity is detrimental to intergenerational equity as it leads to a decline of long-term investments. Regarding the political consequences of austerity, I show that spending cuts decrease government approval, especially during economic downturns, but tax increases’ impact on approval remains minimal. Finally, left- and right-wing governments are equally likely to lose approval after implementing austerity.  

The Political Studies Graduate Student Association (PSGSA) is hosting a one-day graduate student conference centered on the ever-timely theme of Governance in Crisis? The Politics of Participation and Polarization with a special extra half-day focus on Political Participation in Canada at 150 Years. Our second annual conference will be held on May 12th & 13th, 2017, with support from the Department of Political Studies. Graduate students from across the social sciences will present their papers on panels organized by subject to generate dialogue between the presenters, and between the panelists, and the audience

We are excited to announce our two Keynote speakers:

Registration is FREE

Please direct any inquiries to the conference planning committee: queens.psgsa.conference@gmail.com

The Political Studies Graduate Student Association (PSGSA) is hosting a one-day graduate student conference centered on the ever-timely theme of The Politics of Borders and Belonging at Home and Abroad. This inaugural annual conference will be held on May 6, 2016, with support from the Department of Political Studies. Graduate students from across the social sciences will present their papers on panels organized by subject to generate dialogue between the presenters, and between the panelists and the audience. There will be an external keynote speaker (TBD) who will address the conference theme of “borders and belonging” in both the Canadian and the international context. This is the first graduate student conference hosted by the PSGSA and the intention is for the conference to become an annual event, eventually attracting graduate student scholars from across Canada.

Please see Queen's PSGSA for updated information about the conference along with a list of further questions that may help you consider papers to submit for this conference. Please address any questions or accessibility concerns to queens.psgsa.conference@gmail.com