BU Research Blog

March 9, 2023

BU HL team wins award at the BISA Model NATO at FCDO in London

BU2025, Events, Fusion, Fusion themes, Global engagement, humanities, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Exchange and Impact Team, Knowledge Transfer, Knowledge Transfer Partnership, RKE development framework, Strategic Investment Areas, Student Engagement edolea

BU students in the Humanities and Law Department, Shahidah Miah (3rd year Law student), Alex Carey (2nd year History student) and Josh Pitt (3rd year Politics student) won the Distinguished Delegation Award at the BISA Model NATO. The event took place at the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office on Friday, March 3rd, and was organized by the British International Studies Association in partnership with FCDO.

Over 100 students from 30 UK universities participated at the 2023 edition. It is the first time BU takes part in this simulation and wins a team award, against some powerful teams from universities with long tradition of politics and international studies.

What is BISA Model NATO – This is a simulation type of event. Students are randomly allocated a country and each student is part of a specialised NATO body – the Military Committee and the Civil Emergency Planning Committee. The students then have to agree a detailed set of actions to be endorsed in a final declaration by a simulated North Atlantic Council, NATO’s highest authority. BU team successfully represented Canada.

In BISA’s press release summing up the event, Mark Webber (BISA President) said: “The simulation is designed to provide students with experience of crisis decision-making; to get them into the heads of people having to make tough choices in very testing circumstances. The students rose to this challenge very well. The Model concluded with a declaration agreed by all the student delegates on how NATO should respond to a major natural disaster. The students performed just like seasoned diplomats.”

Employability skills demonstrated. Simulation events are a recognised model of learning and allow participants access to insights unobtainable in a traditional classroom setting. Our BU students had very good & concise interventions, demonstrated excellent negotiating skills, proposed great initiatives and worked brilliantly as a team representing Canada, thus contributed to reaching overall consensus at the end of the day. They were true diplomats for a day. And they also networked with fellow students, staff from other universities and diplomats from FCDO. They received glowing praises for their interventions during the day.

Why this is so timely – Students participating in the model are working on the aftermath of a natural disaster – multiple earthquakes across the eastern Mediterranean and South-East Europe resulting in significant loss of life and mass displacement of populations. Given the current context, both geopolitical with the War in Ukraine and the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, but also more broadly the climate change and the likely increase of natural disasters in the near future, working on such scenarios helps prepare students for real life situations. In addition, such events are inspiring students to embark upon careers and projects in diplomacy, government, non-governmental organisations and the military.

BU delegation at BISA Model NATO was advised and supported by Associate Professor Alina Dolea and Senior Lecturer Scott Keefer.

The full press release featuring our students is available here – BISA/FCDO Model NATO 2023 – Over 100 students from 30 universities | BISA

February 23, 2023

War in Ukraine anniversary: Webinar on March 1st & Academic Forum co-edited by Dr Alina Dolea

BU research, Events, Featured academics, Global engagement, humanities, international, Research Centres, Women's Academic Network edolea

On February 24, 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine, the “What can we do?” question was obsessively emerging in our private talks, in our professional conversations, in social media interactions. Russia’s invasion was literally hitting very close to home for Dr. Alina Dolea, as an Eastern European scholar with personal experiences of life under Soviet domination and of the dissolution of the Eastern Bloc in the early 1990s, as well as parents and family living in North Romania, close to the border with Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova.

She initiated conversations with colleagues in the field which resulted in an academic Forum co-edited with Nadia Kaneva (University of Denver, US) and Ilan Manor (Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel) for Place Branding & Public Diploma cy. The Forum Public diplomacy and nation branding in the wake of the Russia–Ukraine War | SpringerLink aims to identify academic concepts, theories, and assumptions from the field which have been cast in doubt—or need to be re-examined—in light of the Russia-Ukraine war. In order to encourage continued engagement, each of the eleven essays in the Forum, as well as the editorial Introduction, conclude with a section that outlines specific gaps in public diplomacy scholarship and directions for future research.

To mark the publication of the Forum, the co-editors are organizing a webinar on March 1, starting with 4pm. Together with Nadia Kaneva, Nicholas Cull, Maria Repnikova, Roman Horbyk, Ilan Manor (PhD), Alina will reflect on nations’ reputational security, the need to reconceptualize soft power, the use of transmedia storytelling and memes in war, the consequences of displacement for Ukrainian refugees and the relevance of emotions and trauma in diaspora and public diplomacy.

Please join the webinar and RSVP here: Public Diplomacy & Nation Branding in the Wake of the Russia-Ukraine War Tickets, Wed, Mar 1, 2023 at 4:00 PM | Eventbrite

October 16, 2022

Dr Alina Dolea awarded trophy at Romanian RePatriot Gala 2022

BRIAN, BU research, BU2025, humanities, Impact, international, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer, Public engagement, Research Centres edolea

Dr. Alina Dolea, Associate Professor in Strategic Communication and Public Diplomacy, has been awarded a trophy at the RePatriot Gala organized in Iasi (Romania) on October 7th, 2022, in recognition of her research on Romanian diaspora, nation branding and public diplomacy. Alina was named one of Top 100 Romanians in Diaspora who make a difference, excel and inspire in 10 different fields of activity, top published by Romania’s Newsweek magazine. She was acknowledged for her work and contribution to Education, alongside other 9 Romanian researchers and professors (Categoria Educație | Repatriot). This was the fifth edition of the Gala organized annually by RePatriot, was recorded and is to be aired by the Romanian National Television.

The Gala event was the highlight of the RePatriot Summit 2022 attended by over 200 participants who gathered to find solutions to the economic crisis and the Ukrainian war at the border. Opening remarks were delivered by state secretaries of the Romanian President, the President of the Republic of Moldova and the Romanian Prime Minister. During the Summit, Alina contributed to the discussions within the Education Strategic working group, a format of networking and know-how exchange that will continue with regular meetings throughout the year.

Alina’s insights are all the more relevant as according to the latest UK settlement scheme statistics, Romanians are now the largest national group in the UK (with close to 1,3 million applications), followed closely by Polish and then Italian nationals.

RePatriot is a community of Romanian entrepreneurs and business leaders established in 2015 with the aim to connect Romanians abroad with business, investment and development opportunities in Romania. Currently, over 5 million Romanians (of a total population of around 20 million) live abroad and constitute collectively the biggest investor in Romania through the remittances (money) they sent back. This community aims to act as a networking platform to encourage more business investments in Romania and know-how transfer.

September 1, 2020

BU researcher co-authors open access article on country images, migration and populism

BRIAN, BU research, BU2025, conferences, EU, Global engagement, Grants Academy, innovation, international, open access, Publishing, Research Centres, Research communication, Research news, writing edolea

Dr. Alina Dolea, member of BU Centre for Comparative Politics and Media Research, published open access together with Prof. Diana Ingenhoff from University of Fribourg (Switzerland) and Dr. Anabella Beju from Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu (Romania) the article “Country images and identities in times of populism: Swiss media discourses on the ‘stop mass immigration’ initiative” in International Communication Gazzette: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1748048520913462

The research was carried out during Dr. Dolea’s SCIEX postdoctoral fellowship at University of Fribourg and funded through the SCIEX competitive grant “Discourses on country image promotion and identity in Western and Eastern Europe. A comparative study on Switzerland and Romania (DiCoPro)”. The Scientific Exchange Programme (Sciex-NMSch) was part of the Swiss Contribution to the New Member States (NMS) of the European Union.

The article shows country images are instrumentalized in public debates beyond strategic communication contexts and practices. The authors innovatively linked studies on country images and identities with migration and populism as communication phenomenon and ideology discursively articulated by political and media actors. They used Critical Discourse Analysis to show how media construct, re-construct and mobilize various representations and descriptors of Switzerland (as a country, as a state or as a nation) in the debates following the 2014 Swiss referendum on “stop mass immigration initiative”. Projecting fictitious scenarios, fear and uncertainty, media have ultimately constructed Switzerland’s image through a populist type of discourse, reproducing the populist ideology of dividing society into polarized categories through strategies of inclusion and exclusion.

This is a great example of multidisciplinary research carried out within the International Communication Association, as authors linked streams of critical research emerging within the Public Diplomacy Interest Group with more established research on populism within the Political Communication Division.

July 2, 2020

BU academic launches institutional collaboration to advance Public Diplomacy in COVID-19 times

BU2025, conferences, COVID-19, Fusion, Fusion themes, Global engagement, humanities, Impact, international, Knowledge Transfer, open access, PG research, Public engagement, Research Centres, Research communication, research staff, Women's Academic Network edolea

Dr. Alina Dolea launched officially the institutional collaboration between the International Communication Association’s (ICA) Public Diplomacy Interest Group and International Studies Association’s (ISA) International Communication Section (ICOMM) during the ICA virtual conference in May 2020: in the inaugural ICA & ISA roundtable, public diplomacy scholars across the world had a chance to discuss not only the linkages between different theories and institutions, but also to reflect on innovative practices to continue academic conversations with the reality of COVID-19 influencing nearly every aspect of our lives.

A video recording of the roundtable on Public Diplomacy and “what is next after COVID-19” is now available here. Co-chaired by Alina and Efe Sevin of Towson University, Maryland, USA (ISA ICOMM Section Chair 2019-2020), the roundtable gathered Caitlin Byrne (Griffith University, Australia), Constance Duncombe (Monash University, Australia), Natalia Grincheva (Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia) and Steve Pike (Syracuse University, USA). Among the topics discussed were soft power in Australia and Asia Pacific region, ZOOM diplomacy, social media and a need for ‘slower thinking’ in PD, museum soft power mapping, competing discourses in PD, or US PD; a detailed summary of interventions can be read here.

Serving as elected chair of the ICA PD IG, Alina has worked closely with the leadership teams of both organizations, since 2019, and discussed how the gap in between the disciplines of Communications and International Relations can be bridged to advance the field of public diplomacy. The idea of joint panels at the main ICA and ISA annual conferences was agreed, but the pandemics led to the last minute cancelling of the ISA2020 convention; therefore, the launch of the institutional collaboration happened virtually, during this roundtable. Future plans include the organization of similar virtual sessions and events throughout 2020 and 2021, open to doctoral, early career researchers, mid-career and senior scholars from all over the world, as well as joint editorial projects and publications, such as this.

Alina is a founding member of the ICA Interest Group established officially in 2016, following a collective effort of raising signatures that she co-ordinated as a volunteer. The Group has grown fast to over 100 members worldwide and brings together scholars investigating topics related to public diplomacy, nation branding, country image and reputation, public relations for and of nations, as well as political, global and cultural communication influencing international relations. She organized the 2018 doctoral and postdoctoral Public Diplomacy preconference in Prague and the 2019 Washington “Public Diplomacy in the 2020s”, including a panel hosted by the US Department of State.

ICA is the premier international academic association for scholars in communication research, gathering more than 4,500 members from 80 countries; ISA is one of the oldest interdisciplinary associations dedicated to understanding international, transnational and global affairs, founded in 1959, with more than 7,000 members (academics, practitioners, policy experts, private sector workers and independent researchers).

Tagged / public diplomacy

BU HL team wins award at the BISA Model NATO at FCDO in London

War in Ukraine anniversary: Webinar on March 1st & Academic Forum co-edited by Dr Alina Dolea

Dr Alina Dolea awarded trophy at Romanian RePatriot Gala 2022

BU researcher co-authors open access article on country images, migration and populism

BU academic launches institutional collaboration to advance Public Diplomacy in COVID-19 times

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