CfP: Mini Conference on Social Systems Theory and Europe

Council for European Studies
Seventeenth International Conference
Montreal, Canada
April 15-17, 2010

Call for Papers:
Europe offers one of the most interesting natural laboratories for the examination of emerging and declining social systems in response to the increasing complexity of social communications. Contemporary European experiments with social, economic, political and legal integration continue to raise questions with respect to the limits and possibilities of governance, regulation, cooperation, and control in a contingent world.

There may be a certain irony in the fact that in North America the contribution of Niklas Luhmann's social systems theory is almost entirely absent from discussion of these issues. This absence appears extraordinary, if one remembers the global scope of Niklas Luhmann's theory and the central place of complexity and contingency in its evolutionary account of the emergence and development of social systems.

This mini conference intends to question the reasons for this absence and in some way to compensate for the failure of North American analyses of developments in Europe to take Luhmann seriously.  It will seek to illustrate the contribution of social systems theory to the study of Europe
in various fields, including social theory, law, science, politics, and economy. Here is the link to the call for papers for the general conference.

http://www.ces.columbia.edu/conf/conf.html

But instead of submitting individual panels and papers we are inviting interested scholars to submit panel proposals, paper topics, and abstracts
to the address below by Oct 10th so that they could be included in a collective proposal for a mini conference by the deadline, Oct 15th.

Submissions are welcome in all fields. We particularly encourage papers on Social Theory, Economy, Governance, Law, and Science and Innovation. Each participant can submit two papers.

Signatories:
Jean Clam, CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique), Paris/Berlin

Alberto Febbrajo, University of Macerata
Michael King, University of Reading
Loet Leydesdorff, Amsterdam School of Communications Research
Richard Nobles, Queen Mary University of London
John B. Paterson, University of Aberdeen
David Schiff, Queen Mary University of London
Gert Verschraegen, University of Leuven
Helmut Willke, University of Bielefeld

Please send submissions to Katayoun Baghai, McGill University: katayoun.baghai AT mcgill.ca