Institute of Asian Research

Program on Inner Asia

Coordinator: Dr. Julian Dierkes

The Institute of Asian Research has recognized that expertise on Inner Asia and Central Asia is lacking not only at the IAR, but at UBC and in Canada more broadly. While we are not in a position to address this gap comprehensively, we are attempting to raise the profile of research on this area of great interest to Canadians and hope to establish more sustained activities in the future.

Research on Central and Inner Asia has gained renewed prominence in the 21st century as more attention in the social sciences and in the policy community is focusing on the interplay between religious and ethnic identities and some of the Asian states as well as on issues surrounding the management of natural resource endowments. A policy-context to some extent dominated by the legacies of the Soviet Union only makes these issues more pressing and thus command international attention.

A number of past research projects have heightened our awareness of the research being done on Inner Asia around the world. IAR researchers and other colleagues have thus examined or are conducting projects on:

• policy-making in the periphery of the People's Republic of China
• contemporary Tibetan studies
• human security and educational policy in Mongolia
• mining regulation and resource-based development in Mongolia.

We hope to continue to build expertise in these fields and related areas of inquiry and welcome suggestions from colleagues and the interested public as to future topics and activities.

Supporting the Program

The Program on Inner Asia has recently benefitted from a very generous anonymous donation to support its activities in the academic year 2007-08. If you are interested in opportunities to support the program, please contact Dr. Julian Dierkes.

Some Future, On-Going and Past Activities

• In 2005, we inaugurated our Mongolia Lecture Series as a first concrete attempt to engage with Inner Asia more regularly.
• The Program on Inner Asia is organizing a conference on "Contemporary Mongolia - Transitions, Development and Social Transformations" for November 15-17, 2008. The call for proposals for the conference attracted almost 100 proposals.
• In January 2008, Julian Dierkes, co-ordinator of the Program on Inner Asia, published an editorial in the Vancouver Sun, entitled "Canada's Opportunity in Mongolia" commenting on Minister of International Trade Emerson's visit to Ulaanbaatar and advocating a Canadian foreign policy in support of well-informed mining regulation in developing economies.
• During the academic year 2007-08, the Program on Inner Asia, together with the Buddhism and Contemporary Society Program and the Contemporary Tibetan Studies Program is benefiting from a generous grant by the Silkroad Foundation in organizing a lecture series on "Tibet-Mongolia Links in Religion and Medicine".
• On Monday, March 26, 2007, the Mongolian film "The Cave of the Yellow Dog" was screened as a part of the IAR Asian Film Festival
• In the fall term of the 2006/07 academic year, we offered an experimental course, entitled "Mining in Mongolia" within the Master of Arts-Asia Pacific Policy Studies. The participants (graduate students in Asia Pacific Policy Studies and in Mining Engineering) drafted a report that provides some background information and recommendations on mining policy in Mongolia.

Please contact Julian Dierkes to learn more about the activities of the Program.

February 2008