A three-day interdisciplinary conference on the topic The West at War will be held at Saint Vincent College on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, April 14, 15 and 16.  This is the seventh major conference on cultural and public affairs sponsored by the Center for Economic and Policy Education in cooperation with the Alex G. McKenna School of Business, Economics, and Government at Saint Vincent College.  The conference will feature 10 prominent speakers from the United States and Canada.

The conference will open Thursday evening, April 14, 7:30 p.m., in the Robert S. Carey Student Center Auditorium, with welcoming remarks by James F. Will, Vice Chancellor and President of Saint Vincent College. Also presenting opening remarks and a conference overview will be Dr. Bradley C.S. Watson, Philip M. McKenna Professor in American and Western Political Thought, Conference Director and Fellow in Politics and Culture of the Center for Economic and Policy Education.

The keynote lecture, “A Failure of Imagination: Thinking About Culture, Tradition, and Society After 9/11,” will be presented by Dr. Akbar Ahmed. Dr. Ahmed is the former High Commissioner of Pakistan to Great Britain.  He currently holds the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, and is professor of international relations at American University in Washington, DC. He has advised President George Bush and Prince Charles on Islam, and has lectured world wide, including at the bipartisan Congressional retreat in Greenbrier, the National Defense University in Washington, the State Department, and London’s House of Lords.  With Dr. Judea Pearl, father of murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, Dr. Ahmed has been engaged in public dialogues across the country and abroad.  Dr. Ahmed has made several appearances on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” and has been interviewed on CNN, MSNBC, PBS’s “Think Tank,” NBC Nightly News and NPR.

Speakers on Friday, April 15 will include Dr. James Kurth, Swarthmore College, who will discuss "Western Identities Versus Islamic Terrorists: Christians, Liberals, and Pagans at War," Dr. Barry Cooper, University of Calgary, who will talk on "Understanding Terrorism After 9/11," and Dr. Ken Weinstein, Hudson Institute, who will lecture on "No Tolerance for the Intolerant: Lessons From Early Modern Political Philosophy for the War on Terror. Also speaking on Friday will be Dr. Leon Craig, University of Alberta, who will talk about "The Liberal Regime Under Attack," and Dr. David Corey, Baylor University, who will discuss "Neither Niebuhr Nor Yoder: The Christian Just-War Tradition."

Speakers on Saturday, April 16, will include Dr. Paul Marshall, Freedom House, who will lecture on "Understanding Radical Islam," Dr. David Tucker, Naval Postgraduate School, who will talk about "Terrorism and the Western Way of Warfare," Dr. Alberto Coll, Naval War College, who will address the topic "True to Liberty and Law: Fighting the War Against Terrorism Without Surrendering Our Values," and Dr. Robert Alt, John M. Ashbrook Center for Public Affairs, who will lecture on " Regime Change in Iraq: The View From the Ground."

Conference sessions presented on Friday, April 14, will begin at 8:30 a.m. and continue through 2:20 p.m. in the Science Center Amphitheatre.  Registration will begin at 8 a.m. on Friday.  Saturday lectures, which will begin at 1 p.m. and continue through 4:35 p.m., will be held in the Westmoreland Room of Placid Hall.  Registration will begin at 12:40 p.m. on Saturday.  There are no fees to attend the conference, but registration is required.  The deadline for registering is April 13.  To receive a detailed conference brochure, contact the Center for Economic and Policy Education by phone, 724-537-4597 or by e-mail, ekunkel@stvincent.edu.