As the IMF warns leaders once more to find ways to overcome their populist pressures and redouble efforts to improve trade, can the UK and China provide a path through? China's ambitions for BRI (Belt and Road Initiative) are well known. Britain's concepts of a ‘rules based order’ are still sketchy. But can we combine the ideas to make progress across what will soon become the world's most important trade zone? And if so, how?

As scholars from a range of disciplines have compellingly argued, the boundary between war and peace has grown more faint through the Global War on Terror. The concatenating series of global episodes that could happen most anywhere at nearly any time remediates the global scope of the Cold War, but in such a way that has enabled a more mutable cast of smaller non-state actors to proliferate. This scaling down toward the level of the individual has meant a shift in the methods of targeted persuasion to mobilize fighters, affect morale, and prompt defection.

"If no one fought except on his own conviction, there would be no wars." he said.
"And that would be splendid," said Pierre.
Prince Andrei smiled ironically.
"Very likely it would be splendid, but it will never come about..." -- War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy

Join Professor Harold Koh for a discussion of his new book, The Trump Administration and International Law.

The event will be chaired by Dapo Akande, Professor of Public International Law and Co-Director of the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict.

Shaheed Fatima QC will be a discussant.

Motherhood and professional advancements often conflict. Studies of female academics highlight gender disparities in senior ranks. One explanation for this inequality is unequal caregiving responsibilities borne by women, particularly early in their children’s lives. This project asks whether differential maternity leave provisions across 160 UK higher education institutions exacerbate differentials in the productivity, career paths and job satisfaction of female academics. Research on maternity benefits usually is confined to case studies of a few universities or is discipline specific.

The interdisciplinary project aims to create a knowledge-based platform for academics, practitioners, policy-makers and the wider public to understand the changing character of conflicts across different epistemologies and methodologies. While we might not be able to stop some conflicts, we may well be able to prevent a drastic increase in casualties or erosion of social fabric if we understand the main patterns of organized violence.