Lauder Intercultural Ventures
Lauder Intercultural Ventures (LIVs)
Lauder Intercultural Ventures (LIVs) provide an opportunity to road test earlier lessons on intercultural leadership in the context of a week-long off-site immersion and related pre-departure academic work. Each LIV, led by a faculty member, focuses on a theme relevant to the site’s historical, social, political, economic, and/or cultural context. LIVs are scheduled during Fall and Spring break, and each student will enroll in two LIVs throughout their two years at Lauder. A LIV combines academic and experiential learning activities, and thus has contextual knowledge objectives (such as learning about environmental issues, consumption habits, religious studies, etc.) as well as field-based exercises and leadership development opportunities.
Fall 2024 LIVs
Switzerland, Germany, and France
Trinational Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Heart of Europe
Switzerland, Germany, and France
This LIV explored transnational innovation and collaboration between France, Germany, and Switzerland. Although featuring distinct heritages and languages, the three neighboring countries are focused on creating and sustaining a common space characterized by a vibrant exchange of ideas and culture. The unique area is nestled between the Jura Mountains on the Franco-Swiss border, the Black Forest in Germany, and the Vosges Mountains in France. Geographically divided by the Rhine River and steeped in history, which at times was highly turbulent, this flourishing region in the heart of Europe strives to remove borders and barriers that existed for centuries. It is known for its pioneering trinational collaborations and innovations in education, politics, industry, economy, mobility, and sustainability. This forward-looking approach fosters an ecosystem for entrepreneurship and innovation, which has proven highly beneficial for the area’s residents.
During the LIV, students studied trinational initiatives aimed at forging even closer ties between the populations of the three countries for example, creating a common education and research space and developing seamless cross-border transport systems powered by renewable energy sources. One of the key questions students investigated is how this region managed to become an economic powerhouse built on distinct national cultures and preferences.
Students visited various key sites and companies that illustrate how transnational, albeit regional, collaboration can lead to competitive advantages rather than economic disadvantages. In discussions, talks and guided visits, students examined how France, Germany, and Switzerland must collaborate on various political levels, while operating under different policies and regulations, in order to overcome challenges that result in part from the fact that Switzerland is not one of the 27 EU Member States. Students also had the opportunity to expand their knowledge in history, art, and European affairs during visits to the three main cities Basel, Freiburg, and Strasbourg as well as to the enchanting Alsatian town of Colmar.
Past LIVs
China
Infrastructure and Urban Renaissance
China
Urbanization initiatives and infrastructural investments have been the primary drivers of China’s economic growth and social transformation for decades since the launch of economic reforms by the central administration in the 1980s. High-speed rails, highways, new towns, and monumental structures are trademarks of China’s modernization. Chinese society is standing at crossroads again, and it is crucial to understand how China’s development model might shift and to what extent it would influence the built environment of the world’s largest urban nation.
This LIV examined Chinese cities and society from the perspectives of architecture, city planning, real estate, and urban policies. It explored how urbanization and large-scale developments have reshaped the physical and social environments of cities and neighborhoods; how new paradigms and practices have emerged in planning and development; and, the new national directives toward sustainable development and decarbonization.
Although students were based in Shanghai, China’s economic powerhouse, the LIV included excursions to adjacent cities like Suzhou and some satellite towns in the metropolitan area. Students examined the emerging practice of urban regeneration in China by focusing on the transformation of Shanghai’s waterfront areas along Huangpu River and Suzhou Creek from heavily polluted industrial belts to state-of-the-art cultural, technological, and recreational corridors.
This LIV took place in March of 2024.
Georgia
Edge of Empires
Georgia
Wedged between Russia, Turkey, Armenia, and Azerbaijan in the midst of the dramatic Caucasus Mountains, Georgia has long been a crossroads of civilizations and a natural edge of empires. Though modern Georgia sees its future in the West, it has continued to be a target of Russian imperial expansion after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Russia invaded Georgia in 2008 and still occupies twenty percent of Georgian territory, especially the ethnic enclaves of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
The Georgia: Edge of Empires LIV explored the unstable and mountainous border between Russia and Georgia, the role Georgia now plays as a transit point for evading Russia sanctions, why so many Russians have taken refuge in Tbilisi after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and how they are received by the local population. This LIV examined the living history of past empires that have left their traces in Georgia’s rich ethnography, amidst vaulting mountains and fertile wine valleys. As a natural barrier between dozens of civilizations, the Caucasus mountain region has become one of the most linguistically and ethnically diverse places on earth, with dozens of spoken languages representing the Caucasian (Georgian, Dagestani, Abkhaz), Indo-European (Greek, Iranian, Slavic), and Altaic (Turkic and Mongol) language groups. Each intercultural meeting created an opportunity for students to gain a deeper understanding of Georgia’s unique geopolitical place in the world.
This LIV took place in March of 2024.
Ghana
Interfaith Dynamics
Ghana
The first African nation to acquire independence in 1957, Ghana has the reputation of being one of the most stable countries in West Africa. The peaceful cohabitation of citizens of different faiths is particularly remarkable in a region roiled by conflicts between and within religious communities. This LIV explored the ideological foundations and practices of religious tolerance in Ghana. Students focused primarily, but not exclusively, on the relationships between Christians and Muslims that form respectively 70 and 20 per cent of the population of Ghana, examining the political, theological, and spatial forms of expression of religious conviviality in Ghana. What roles did institution building and political inclusion play in fusing the large immigrant and indigenous Ghanaian Muslim community into the predominantly Christian citizenry? What can the quietist Suwari tradition that was central in the Islamization of pre- colonial Ghana teach us about contemporary interfaith dialogues? How has the separation between ethnicity and religion, typical of Ghanaian society, and the culture of Zongos (Muslim enclaves in majority non-Muslim space) impacted the formation of a culture of religious tolerance in Ghana?
To explore interfaith dynamics in Ghana, students met with leaders of Christian, Muslim and indigenous faith groups for grassroots interconfessional conversations. Participants also met with high-ranking government officials, scholars, and customary chiefs involved in developing ideas and crafting policies related to the role of government and civil society organizations in preserving and consolidating harmony between Ghana’s diverse religious communities. In addition to engaging scholars and community leaders, students visited sacred religious sites and Zongos to gain an understanding of everyday lived experience of religious tolerance.
This LIV took place in March of 2024.
India
Cosmopolitanism and Consumption, Where Culture and the Economy Meet
India
To be cosmopolitan, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) reminds us, is to be a “citizen of the world;” the term refers to someone “who regards or treats the whole world as [their] country…[and] has no national attachments or prejudices.” Being worldly, knowledgeable, and comfortable interacting with others: these qualities are what make people cosmopolitan. Many social theorists go further, by connecting cosmopolitanism to globalization – that is, to networks of trade and consumption. We may think of cosmopolitanism as a cultural phenomenon, these theorists argue, but the economy is what makes it happen.
This LIV travelled to India – and specifically to Mumbai and the Malabar Coast – where cosmopolitanism emerged at the intersection of cultural and economic exchange. Known before 1995 as Bombay, Mumbai is a city shaped by its history as an Arabian Sea port, a place which in the past century has confirmed its status as the financial and entertainment capital of India and as the center of the Bollywood film industry. As a signal of its cultural breadth and depth, Mumbai is also a place where one is as likely to find a musical performance of, say, Carnatic violin as jazz or blues. Along the Malabar Coast, students travelled to the state of Kerala to visit Kochi (formerly Cochin), a historic center for the peppercorn trade and the place where the Portuguese explorer and circumnavigator of Africa, Vasco da Gama (1469-1524), spent his last days. Finally, students visited Munnar, a “hill station” famous for rich farmlands that grow tea, coffee, spices like cardamom, and now also chocolate, to satisfy global demands.
These three places claim vibrant cultures that continue to evolve in response to changing needs, interests, and opportunities in the country and the world at large. Very diverse, and indeed cosmopolitan, they are home to people who come from many linguistic and religious backgrounds. In short, this LIV examined how culture and the economy, production and consumption, have combined historically and until today to create local societies that are at once worldly (in the sense of being sophisticated) and tied into the world (in the sense of moving within global economies).
This LIV took place in March of 2024.
Thailand
Buddhist Material Culture and Magic
Thailand
This LIV provided students with an alternative perspective to pop-cultural stereotypes about Buddhism by engaging them with Buddhist material culture and ritual practices in Thailand. Popular references to Buddhism perpetuate curated ideals of mindfulness, non-attachment, “emptiness”, minimalism, and disdain for material goods and consumerism. However, these assumptions are true for only a select number of Buddhist schools, like Zen Buddhism, which is part of the larger Mahayana branch of Buddhism. As such, these assumptions undermine everyday practices of a majority of Buddhists across Southeast Asia, which is part of the Theravada branch of Buddhism. Questions like, “Is Buddhism a philosophy, a religion, or a way of life?”, entrap Buddhism to fit a particular mold that does not accurately reflect practices in reality.
Students observed how Buddhism in Thailand can be all three – philosophy, religion, and a way of life. Students also explored how the material and ritual aspects of Buddhism are an integral part of everyday life. Buddhist materials — like statues of the Buddha, other Buddhist deities, even Hindu deities, Buddhist monks, Buddhist kings, alongside Buddhist amulets, talismans, and yantras, as well as embodied materials like sacred Buddhist tattoos or magical diagrams inscribed on taxi cabs and buildings, and spirit houses, too — are ubiquitous.
The geographic focus of the LIV was situated in the capital region of Bangkok. The LIV included a guided tour of an amulet market and the Buddhist products district, temple visits, and meetings with monks, including one who specializes in Buddhist astrology and oracle cards. Students also participated in a one-day meditation retreat, to juxtapose the material culture with the Buddhist soteriological goal. Students met with guest lecturers including Sulak Sivaraksa, a socially engaged Buddhist activist who was twice nominated for the Nobel peace prize.
In talks, discussions, and guided visits, students learned how Buddhist objects are inseparable from Buddhist practice in Thailand, even for those practitioners who claim to focus only on meditation, scriptures, or philosophy of Buddhism. These objects connect the sangha (Buddhist clergy) with the laity, demonstrating their symbiotic relationship. Without these Buddhist material things, and without the “consumption” of these things, there would be no Buddhism.
This LIV took place in March of 2024.
Switzerland
Living Sustainability
Switzerland
Following the success of the Switzerland LIV in October 2022, this LIV was repeated in October 2023. It explored Switzerland’s dedication to sustainability in various aspects of daily life, education and business. The country as a whole, as well as several of its major cities, consistently rank at or near the top of various global sustainability surveys, and Swiss residents enjoy some of the highest living standards and life expectancies in the world.
Students learned about the United Nations Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs) and Switzerland’s various approaches to achieving the SDGs, for example, by limiting CO2 emissions, reducing energy consumption, using renewable energy sources, enhancing the circular economy, sourcing of alternative raw materials for the industry, and preserving and increasing urban green spaces and forested areas. One of the key questions posed to students was how sustainability measures can be applied to some of the largest companies in the world. During the LIV, students visited various key sites to illustrate that sustainability measures can and will lead to competitive advantages rather than economic disadvantages. In discussions, talks and guided visits, students explored how sustainability is deeply rooted in Swiss culture, how residents are genuinely connected to nature, and how education from Kindergarten to University plays a crucial role in promoting the value of a clean and healthy environment. Students also learned why the Alps are experiencing an increase in temperature that is twice that of the global average, why actions to protect the residents are so important, and why extraordinary investments are required to enhance the safety of mountain communities. Moreover, government policies and measures taken by the private industry, often in tandem, are crucial in promoting responsible behavior in all aspects of life and business, in enhancing the appreciation of the fragility of our planet, and in increasing the resilience of the population.
This LIV took place in October of 2023.
Argentina
Understanding a Nation through Sports
Argentina
In this LIV, students travelled to Argentina — a fútbol-mad nation recently crowned for the third time as FIFA Men’s World Cup champions, and the birthplace of some of soccer’s greatest icons. The LIV analyzed the extent to which sports (soccer, polo, rugby, hockey, among others) helped shape the national and civic identity of Argentina. Organized sports arrived in Argentina in the second half of the nineteenth century thanks to the athletic pursuits of middle-class British merchants, bankers, engineers, educators, and manual laborers. Most of these immigrants settled in Buenos Aires and towns that developed along the growing railroad system. Soon, sports spread beyond the exclusive Anglo-Argentine civic clubs and gained popularity with natives (criollos), immigrants, and second-generation Argentines.
This early sporting craze led to a unique model that still exists today. By 1910, over three-hundred clubs existed in Buenos Aires alone, with many more in the provinces. These non-profit civic associations have always relied on the growth of club membership, as well as the revenue generated by gate receipts from soccer matches, to fund other sports and activities for adults and children. Sporting and cultural events deepened ties between the club and the surrounding neighborhood. Because clubs are owned by members (socios) and their families, civic pride ran deep. Sometimes, though, such pride resulted in intense rivalries between clubs from different barrios; or, in some cases, between clubs within the very same neighborhood. Where else but in Buenos Aires will you find two soccer stadiums with a capacity for over 50,000 spectators located just two city blocks from each other?
Students visited stadiums, club museums, and heritage sites of national significance – such as the house of soccer player Diego Maradona. The trip also included a 2-day excursion across the Rio de La Plata to Uruguay – the host nation for the first-ever FIFA World Cup held in 1930. In Uruguay, students examined the similarities and differences in how soccer helped shape national identity in the region.
This LIV took place in October of 2023.
Peru
Global Heritage, Desert Cities and Living Legacies
Peru
Peru boasts one of the greatest archaeological and heritage landscapes in the world, as well as a vibrant and complex array of cultures, communities, and socio-economic challenges. This LIV focused on diverse historic sites in their current setting from urban Lima to coastal pyramid complexes, examining issues of tourism, environment, development, colonialism, and rights. Students learned about these sites within the context of how UNESCO’s World Heritage program, Peru’s own Ministry of Culture, heritage NGOs, and community driven initiatives are crafting Peru’s national image as a major heritage destination. Students were asked to consider how heritage places are entangled with issues of national branding, ethical business development, the role of extractive industries, conflict and resettlement, and the potential for community benefits. This LIV brought together global forces and local outcomes in the context of Peru, providing lessons that can be applied internationally.
In geographic terms the LIV was based in the capital Lima moving north to Chiclayo, the ancient Moche heartland. In Lima, students visited the Archaeological Sanctuary of Pachacamac, the Larco Museum, and De la Puente’s colonial mansion. The group then followed the Moche Route, a tourist destination promoted by the Peruvian government, beginning in the city of Trujillo that once was the seat of power of the Moche culture known as The Temples of the Sun and the Moon. Other sites explored included Chan Chan, Túcume, Señor de Sipán with its golden treasure, El Brujo and the pyramids of the Sun and Moon. This route is today marketed by ministries of culture and trade for its beautiful beaches, diverse gastronomy, as well as its deserts, pyramids, mummies and museums with breath-taking objects of gold and precious stones. The LIV concluded with a trip to the Historical Centre of Callao, the most important port of Peru since colonial times and recently transformed by contemporary artists into a modern and pop art hub.
Kenya
Education for Transformation, Transforming Education
Kenya
The role of education in individual and societal transformation is evident, however, calls for changes in education have been a stable part of the history of post-colonial Kenya. Various stakeholders and communities in Kenya frequently debate the extent to which education enables upward socioeconomic mobility, and advances equity in society. Participants in this LIV explored how these issues are at play in the discourse and everyday activities of scholars, practitioners, and students. Kenya has received accolades from the World Bank and UNESCO for progress towards increasing access to education and school enrollment rates – including its attainment of 100 percent transition from elementary/primary to secondary school. The LIV used this as a starting point to trace the last two decades of educational transformation and examine challenges associated with the implementation of educational reform such as the competency-based curriculum aimed at improving quality and appropriateness of education. Particular attention was devoted to the history and contemporary reality of how politics, financing, sponsorship, philanthropy, values, staffing, and questions of equity have influenced education in Kenya.
While in Kenya, participants met with key education experts and transformative leaders to learn about innovative strategies that are advancing formal education as well as learning in the areas of youth and gender empowerment, natural resource and environmental conservation, gender equality, democracy, peace, and human rights.
Tunisia
Insights into the Arab Spring
Tunisia
When a street vendor from the remote town of Sidi Bouzid in southwestern Tunisia immolated himself in December 2010 to protest against the harsh conditions of his life and the indifference of the authorities to his predicament, he inadvertently ignited a powder keg of discontent that had been building up for several months. The conflagration of protests quickly spread throughout the country, leading to the fall of the Ben Ali regime, and the flight of President Ben Ali to Saudi Arabia in January 2011. When other peoples of the region saw Tunisians get rid of their dictatorship, a deeply entrenched regime that was once thought to be unshakable, they were inspired to rise against their own autocratic governments.
This wave of upheavals quickly spread throughout the MENA region, including Egypt, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain, Libya, Morocco and Jordan. These protests were met with different responses, ranging from brutal repression (Syria, Yemen, Bahrain, Libya) to strategic concessions (Jordan, Morocco); some regimes fell when they could not control the protests, leading to elections and new constitutions (Tunisia, Egypt). Twelve years later, the MENA region is totally transformed as a result of these events; different countries have followed different paths and reached varied outcomes, for the most part different from what they had aspired to in 2011.
The analysis of this period raises a number of interesting questions: What is the balance sheet of twelve years of revolution? Is the Mena region experiencing revolution fatigue? What are the implications of the new “New World Order” on MENA democratic transitions? What is the role of external actors and also of women as actors and stakeholders? Is democratic transition possible without economic decline?
Tunisia, the cradle of the Arab Spring, an Arab / Muslim / African / Mediterranean country with a three-thousand-year history at the crossroad of many cultural influences, presented an ideal vantage point to study and investigate these questions.
India
Cities of Tomorrow, Blueprints of Yesterday
India
Cities of Tomorrow, Blueprints of Yesterday
This LIV engaged with the central question of how cities and spaces with illustrious premodern histories and visible pasts contend with the opportunities and challenges of imagining new urban futures. It explored India’s urban heritage and architecture – what might have been involved in building them and maintaining them over time, and how their significance has changed for patrons, visitors, and citizens over the generations. In a parallel set of readings and questions raised throughout the LIV, students explored how different constituencies in contemporary India maintain, celebrate, or reject particular aspects of the rule of law, city and urban planning, the politics of municipal governance, and the contentious histories of medieval architecture. Which social groups might typically be invested in preserving particular visions of an urban future, and who might be keen to challenge those visions? Questions were explored of how and why monuments from several centuries ago, urban heritage including old walled cities, dilapidated forts and palaces turned into luxury hotels, and other contentious urban forms have become flashpoints for debates about India’s present, as well as how India should manage its enormous diversity of cultures, religions, and socio-economic classes. This LIV also examined the role of institutions, ranging from government bodies like planning authorities to private organizations, and commercial real estate developers to citizens themselves.
While the geographic focus was Delhi, its neighboring areas, Agra and Udaipur, the historic focus spanned the twelfth century to current times. During the LIV, students visited heritage landmarks of architectural significance, analyzed the multiple city sites of India’s capital Delhi, and interacted with those directly involved in transforming the urban fabric of India’s dense metropolitan settlements.
Israel
Consumption, Innovation, and Diversity on the World Stage
Israel
CONSUMPTION, INNOVATION, AND DIVERSITY ON THE WORLD STAGE
This LIV explored how diverse people and organizations in Israel contribute to the global economy, develop ties to world markets, and cultivate local identities built upon understandings of history and links to the landscape. The program focused on consumption styles, local markets, and innovations as they relate to the country’s food sector. During the venture, students visited markets, restaurants, research centers, and businesses and meet experts in many fields. Talks and activities covered innovations in agriculture and bioengineering; the evolution of cuisines through the integration of local, regional, and global food cultures; the impact of religion on dietary practices; the role of food in shaping “gastronationalism” and forms of “culinary diplomacy;” and the significance of food as an arena for competition, collaboration, and exchange between Israel and other countries. Students emerged with a greater awareness of Israel’s diverse Jewish and non-Jewish communities. Participants learned, too, about non-citizen inhabitants, including recent refugees from Eritrea and Sudan, and guest workers from countries like Thailand, many of whom work in food-service positions in restaurants and cafés, or on farms.
The study of food and foodways illuminate modern and contemporary migrations and trade networks. Participants saw, for example, how Jews with connections to Iraq and India popularized amba, a mango chutney sometimes served with falafel, while others brought the hot sauce called zhug out of Yemen; or how migrants from central Europe brought the pastry known as hamantaschen (associated with the holiday of Purim), but over time swapped fillings made from poppy seeds or dried apricots for newer ingredients ¬like chocolate, made from beans imported from West African countries like Ghana. Students also became aware of how tensions regarding Israeli-Palestinian and broader Israeli-Arab affairs have involved debates over foods like hummus, and how concerns about “McDonaldization” tie the rise of industrial fast food to globalization and various forms of soft power.
Poland and Hungary
In or Out of Europe?
Poland & Hungary
IN OR OUT OF EUROPE?
Borders have shifted frequently in European history, with massive repercussions. Today, the European Union’s eastern boundary separates the mostly prosperous and secure nations of Central Europe from those perched precariously outside looking in. Yet, Poland and Hungary, two of the most successful economies in the region, have elected and re-elected populist governments that question the very nature of the European Union (EU) integration project, from which both have benefited greatly. Meanwhile, Moscow asserts its own “zone of privileged interests” in neighboring countries, such as Belarus and Ukraine, creating a dramatic tug of war between Russia and the West that some liken to a new cold war. This LIV explored the nature of the European project and its boundaries in their geopolitical, economic, religious, cultural, architectural, and historical dimensions.
The trip started in Warsaw, the capital of Poland, a regional power and arguably the most successful economy to emerge from communist rule in 1989. The group studied with executive MBA students at University of Warsaw, learned the geopolitics of Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia with leading Polish experts, and visited the Eastern gateway city of Lublin to explore the extensive Ukrainian immigration to Poland which included hearing a church perspective on Europe from the Catholic University. En route to Budapest, the group made brief stops in Poland’s beautiful second city of Krakow, the magnificent Orava Castle in Slovakia that has guarded trade routes between Poland and Hungary since the 13th century, and the ancient Slovak/Hungarian/German mining city of Banska Bystrica. In Budapest, a self-professed “illiberal” democracy, the group explored Hungary’s highly divided society by soliciting both pro- and anti-government perspectives on the meaning of Europe and by visiting controversial cultural monuments over which these perspectives frequently clash. The LIV also explored the meaning of European economic integration, business practices, and media conditions in a semi-authoritarian system.
Senegal
Muslim Civil Society and Peace Making
Senegal
MUSLIM CIVIL SOCIETY AND PEACE MAKING
Senegal is one of the rare Muslim-majority countries where Sufism (mystical Islam) remains dominant. It is also the sole West African nation to have enjoyed continued civilian rule and peaceful transfer of power since acquiring independence in 1960. This LIV explored how Sufi Muslim civil society has contributed to establishing peace and social cohesion in post-colonial Senegal. The group focused primarily, but not exclusively, on exploring the role and influence of the Cadre Unitaire, a civil society organization founded recently by Muslim intellectuals to promote peace and political stability in Senegal. The Cadre has emerged as an effective peace maker as its role in ending the violent political protests that shook Senegal’s cities last March demonstrates. During the LIV, students met with the founders of the Cadre Unitaire to learn about their motivations in founding this organization, their goals and strategies, with special attention to the Cadre’s intervention during the March disturbances. Students also met with other civil society stakeholders, particularly those engaged in peace building. In addition to engaging civil society organizations in Dakar, students met the leadership of Senegal’s two largest Sufi orders, the Muridiyya and the Tijaniyya, in their holy cities of Tuubaa and Tivavouane.
LIV Application
Students will be asked to apply for a LIV that focuses on a theme of greatest interest to them. The Institute aims to meet student interest, but cannot guarantee first choices. Students will submit an application for participation in which they provide first, second, and third LIV choices and submit an application essay. Criteria for LIV assignments are: the quality of the academic rationale and the availability of slots. Once a LIV has been assigned, students will sign an agreement that commits them to participating in all the planned activities related to the LIV and to follow the policies. After signing the agreement, students cannot change their LIV.
