Traditional approaches to territorial conflicts would suggest that the value of a disputed territory—be it strategic, economic, religious, or historical—drives conflict. Standard explanations of the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute often fit this trope, pointing to the military or economic benefits possessing the islands would confer upon the claimant states. This presentation takes a different view, arguing that it is not the value of the islands that drives the conflict, but rather the role of the islands as a tangible object of conflict that generates their value.

Professor Scott Sagan (Stanford University) will present his paper with Professor Benjamin Valentino (Dartmouth), entitled "Just War and Unjust Soldiers: American Public Opinion on the Moral Equality of Combatants". Professor Jeff McMahan (Oxford) will serve as discussant. The session will be chaired by Dr Janina Dill (Oxford).

Recent scholarship highlights the multifaceted nature of non-state armed movements, raising important questions about their internal politics and their governance of territory and civilians, i.e. their ‘domestic’ politics. What has received little attention, however, are the ‘foreign’ affairs of non-state armed groups.

Professor Martha Nussbaum will be in conversation about her new book 'The Monarchy of Fear', and also about the relationship between history and philosophy, and feminism and its future.

Commentators:

Prof. Jonathan Wolff (Oxford, Blavatnik): Philanthropy and public policy
Prof. Katy Wells (Warwick): The philosophy of philanthropy
Prof. Frank Prochaska (Oxford, History): The recent history of female giving and the feminisation of philanthropy

Please note that copies of Rob Reich’s new book 'Just Giving: Why Philanthropy is Failing Democracy and How it can Do Better' (Princeton University Press) will be available for sale at the event.