The university is one of two sites for a conference on federalist states that is being funded by the Dept. of Foreign Affairs. It will be held Sept. 30-Oct. 3.
Called Identities, Involvement, Living Together in Federal States: International Aspects of Federalism, the conference opens Sept. 30-Oct. 1 at Laval University in Quebec City before moving to UBC.
It will bring together scholars and others from Europe, Canada and the United States to look at issues such as history and identity, self-determination, regional alienation, national identity in multicultural societies, and ethnic and class differences.
"Unlike other recent conferences that focused on special issues in Canadian federalism, this will take a broader approach," said David Elkins, a political science professor and organizer of the UBC sessions of the conference.
Some of the speakers at UBC include Guy Laforest, a Laval political scientist and prominent separatist, and Peter Schmidhuber, president of Germany's Deutsch Bank. UBC scholars taking part include political scientists Alan Cairns, Phil Resnick and Barbara Arniel.
The conference is open to the public and there is no registration fee.
Elkins said he hopes students take advantage of the opportunity to listen to some European scholars who are seldom heard in North America.
The UBC end of the conference opens with a session at the First Nations Longhouse at 1 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 2. The next day it moves to Cecil Green Park House, with sessions from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.