January 31, 2003 — Beginning Tuesday, Feb. 4, the University of Utah will host a series of lectures on the mounting Iraqi-American tensions. Similar in format to the 9-11 lecture series organized by the University in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, this nine-part series, scheduled to run through mid-April, will feature a variety of perspectives from leading experts on regional and international politics. On Tuesday, the first speaker, Adeed Dawisha, will lecture on “The Use of Force Against Iraq: Constraints and Opportunities,” at 3 p.m., in the Dumke Auditorium in the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, which is located next to the David Eccles School of Business.

Dates and speakers for the series will be announced as they are confirmed. For updates on the programming, go to www.hum.utah.edu/mec or call the Middle East Center at the University of Utah at 801-581-6181.

This series is organized by the University’s Middle East Center and is co-sponsored by the Office of the President, the College of Humanities, the College of Social and Behavioral Science and the Political Science Department. The series will extend from Feb. 4 to the third week of April.

“Sponsoring such lecture series has become a tradition for the University’s Middle East Center as part of its responsibilities to the Utah community,” notes Ibrahim Karawan, director of the Middle East Center at the University. According to Karawan, in the aftermath of 9-11, U President Bernie Machen sent a clear message that the U has a key role to play in the greater community by contributing insights that are characterized by both depth and diversity.

Tuesday’s speaker, Adeed Dawisha, who is a native of Iraq, obtained his Ph.D. from the London School of Economics, served from 1979 to 1985 as the deputy director of research at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. He taught at The Johns Hopkins University, Princeton University and served as a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars. He is a distinguished professor of international relations at Miami University in Ohio. His articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The International Herald Tribune, The Washington Post and The London Times. In addition to over 70 book chapters and articles in scholarly journals, he has published 10 books on Middle East comparative and international politics. His most recent book is Arab Nationalism in the Twentieth Century: From Triumph to Despair, released this month by Princeton University Press.

More information on the series may be obtained by calling the Middle East Center at the University of Utah at 801-581-6181.