On 12 December Ozan Ozavci is presenting at the workshop Global Connected Histories of Empires in World Politics, organized by the University of Leiden.

During his presentation, Ozavci will offer an exploratory introduction to how the councils in MENA came into existence and why it is crucial to consider their work as the onset of sanitary internationalism.

Drawing on the findings of the ERC COOPERATION project from archives in Europe, North America, MENA and Russia, he will argue that rather than top-down Great Power imposition on MENA polities alone, it was the reciprocal interest calculations that prompted these decentralised, more dynamic and yet largely overlooked forms on transimperial cooperation in pursuit of health security. Yet, all along, the councils had to overcome the familiar barriers to collective action such as Orientalist and racial prejudices, economic and financial considerations, as well as religious and nationalist backlashes within a multi-polar, imperial world.

The ERC-COOPERATION team wishes Ozan Ozavci a successful presentation!