Author Archives: Catherine Guisan

About Catherine Guisan

Catherine Guisan is Visiting Associate Professor at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA. She has also taught at Utrecht University and Amsterdam University College, Netherlands, at Science Po, University Pierre Mendès-France in Grenoble, France; and, as a Fulbright Scholar at European University, Saint Petersburg, Russia. She is the author of two books A Political Theory of Identity: memory and policies (London and New York: Routledge 2011) and Un sens à l’Europe: Gagner la paix 1950-2003 (Paris: Odile Jacob 2003). The books discuss the ethical foundations of European integration and its interface with the thinking of great contemporary political theorists such as Hannah Arendt, Jürgen Habermas, Paul Ricoeur and Charles Taylor. Catherine Guisan has also published on the American political culture of international relations, the transatlantic relationship, political reconciliation, and cosmopolitan politics in academic journals, including Constellations, The Journal of Common Market Studies, and in several edited volumes. She is occasionally available to give lectures related to the content of her research in Europe and the US. Topics include: Civic Understanding: Why Memory Matters to the European Union’s Democratic Deficit The Greek Crisis and Direct Democracy (after July 2012) US Influences on European Integration 1947-50 and post 2001 EU borders and the “Enlarged Mentality” The recognition of the Other and EU Enlargements: The Case of Turkey Remembering the Principle of Reconciliation, 1945-2010.

Power to the powerless? Learning in Cyprus, Fall 2018

Posted on November 29, 2018 by Catherine Guisan

Doesn’t the lack of solution to the “Cyprus problem” confirm the fact that peace activists are rarely effective, as a friend in the know suggests to me? I am quite ready to believe her as I fly to Cyprus. My … Continue reading →

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Letter to Simone Veil (1927-2017)

Posted on August 16, 2017 by Catherine Guisan

Dear Simone Veil, Your passing on June 30, 2017 barely made a ripple in the American news media; and yet even far away, there is so much we can celebrate and learn from you. You had it ‘all’: good looks, … Continue reading →

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Strangers Drowning: Grappling with Impossible Idealism

Posted on February 6, 2017 by Catherine Guisan

Strangers Drowning: Grappling with Impossible Idealism, Drastic Choices, and the Overpowering Urge to Help Larissa MacFarquhar, New York: Penguin Press, 2015 This is a strange book about an unusual kind of “strangers”, people endowed with impossible idealism and overpowered by … Continue reading →

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Retrieving an alternate tradition of US foreign policy….

Posted on February 6, 2017 by Catherine Guisan

Retrieving an alternate tradition of US foreign policy… Response to “Friendless Obama needs Middle Eastern allies of convenience”, Financial Times, Wednesday September 24, 2014 Sir, Francis Fukayama and Karl Eikenberry critique President Obama for “overpromising” when he states that the … Continue reading →

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What Do I Think of Russia?

Posted on January 13, 2014 by Catherine Guisan

My St Petersburg students ask me during our last class: What do you think of Russia? What can I answer except that I have not “seen” Russia having been in St Petersburg, Moscow and Kaliningrad, and in the last two … Continue reading →

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Leaving Saint Petersburg: Mourning and Celebration

Posted on January 4, 2014 by Catherine Guisan

Why all the mourning as I prepare to depart? “Home” is being dismantled. I give away the few objects I bought to improve my daily life: a cotton area rug, Ikea lights, two humidifiers, a nice green plant, a printer. … Continue reading →

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The Poetry of Gardens and shared spaces

Posted on October 30, 2013 by Catherine Guisan
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The Poetry of Gardens: Russian Parks as Civic Spaces

Posted on October 30, 2013 by Catherine Guisan

I hear it from people I meet on the train, in places of work or entertainment: Russians, but for a few exceptions, do not engage politically; they make poor citizens. Yet I cannot but be struck with the plastic notion … Continue reading →

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Monolingualism or pride precedes the fall

Posted on September 18, 2013 by Catherine Guisan

I still remember discovering a French translation of “The Ugly American” on my mother’s bedside table in my early mid-teen in Switzerland. I read some pages feeling slightly puzzled. Yet it confirmed my vague impressions of the Americans as a … Continue reading →

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Remembering foundings in Russia and the European Union

Posted on September 18, 2013 by Catherine Guisan

Do the European Union and Russia share a similar difficulty in coming to terms with the memories of their political origins?  This question comes up at the end of my second class session on The Politics of European Integration with … Continue reading →

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