Pierre Hassner will deliver Fourth Annual Lipset Lecture

Russia’s Transition to Autocracy: The Implications for World Politics,” is the topic of the fourth annual Seymour Martin Lipset Lecture on Democracy in the World, which will be delivered by Pierre Hassner on Thursday, November 15 at 6:00 pm at the Embassy of Canada in Washington, DC.

Pierre Hassner is research director emeritus at CERI (the Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales) in Paris. For many years he was a professor of international relations at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Paris and a senior visiting lecturer at the European Center of Johns Hopkins University in Bologna. Currently a visiting professor at the Université du Québec à Montréal, he has previously held visiting appointments at the University of Chicago, Harvard University, and the Institut des Hautes Etudes Internationales in Geneva. Professor Hassner’s major writings have focused on war and peace, totalitarianism, ethics and international relations, and international order. In 2005 he received France’s prestigious Tocqueville Prize, which is awarded every two years; past recipients include such luminaries as Raymond Aron, Karl Popper, Octavio Paz, and Leszek Kolakowski.

The Lipset Lecture, which is cosponsored by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the Munk Centre for International Studies of the University of Toronto, is named for one of the great scholars of democracy and public intellectuals of the twentieth century. “Marty Lipset’s scholarship on themes like the conditions for democracy, political parties, voting behavior and public opinion constitutes one of the most prolific and insightful bodies of work on democracy ever produced by a single author,” said NED President Carl Gershman.

Lipset, who died in December 2006, was also one of the most important comparative analysts of the two great democracies of North America, and a strong advocate for US-Canadian cooperation. The joint US-Canadian sponsorship of the Lipset Lecture provides an opportunity for influential audiences in both countries to hear and discuss a major intellectual statement on democracy each year and serves as a catalyst for further cooperation between Canada and the United States in the promotion of democracy and democratic ideas around the world. The lecture also serves as an intellectual platform for men and women who, like Lipset, have made important contributions to our thinking about key issues of democracy through their writings and other accomplishments.

For more information on the National Endowment for Democracy, please visit www.ned.org.
For more information on the Embassy of Canada, please visit www.canadianembassy.org.

This event is open to the media. Press should RSVP to Jane Jacobsen at 202-378-9700 or jane@ned.org.

Who: Pierre Hassner, National Endowment for Democracy
What: Fourth Annual Seymour Martin Lipset Lecture on Democracy in the World
Where: Embassy of Canada, 501 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC
When: Thursday, November 15, 2007, 6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.

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