Columbia Global Centers

Columbia Global Centers are research facilities established by Columbia University in five locations around the world, as part of its initiative to further establish an international research university.^[1] The first of these centers opened in March 2009 in Beijing, China and Amman, Jordan, and Columbia opened facilities in Paris, France, Mumbai, India in March 2010 and Nairobi, Kenya in January 2012.^[2] Additional locations in Istanbul, Rio de Janeiro, Santiago de Chile and Kazakhstan are currently being developed.^[3]

Purpose

Columbia created the global centers "to promote and facilitate international collaborations, new research projects, academic programming and study abroad, enhancing Columbia’s historical commitment to global scholarship."^[4] Columbia Global Centers act as regional hubs for a wide range of activities intended to enhance research in respective areas and at Columbia. The university aims to establish a network of centers in international capitals that brings together regional private enterprise, public officials, scholars, and students to collaboratively address global issues.

Centers

Columbia Global Centers | East Asia

The Beijing Center launched in March 2009 provides a base for activities throughout East Asia.^[5]

The Center's current projects include co-hosting the Summer Palace Dialogue of Chinese and American Economists (SPD) with the Chinese Economist 50 Forum.^[6] SPD brings together a small group of American and Chinese economists to debate and discuss economic cooperation between the two countries. Past years' Dialogues have centered around the global financial crisis and U.S.-China cooperation on climate change.^[7][8]

Another project of the Center is Urban China Initiative, a joint program between Columbia Global Centers | East Asia and McKinsey & Company.^[9] Another project is the Collaborative Center for Advanced Genomic Research between Tsinghua University and Columbia, as well as the Executive Public Policy Training Program at Peking University--a mid-career program for senior Chinese government officials that combines training in policy, economics, and management, and is taught by faculty from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, Peking University, the London School of Economics, and Sciences Po.^[10] Columbia faculty base themselves at the Beijing center and interact with Columbia scholars who are in the city for other projects.

Held at the end of October 2009, CGC Beijing worked with Initiative for Policy Dialogue (IPD) to organize a conference in Beijing with the China Task Force, a collaborative research project of IPD with several Chinese and British universities.^[11]

Xiaobo Lü, professor of political science at Barnard College and former director of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia, served as the first Director of the East Asia center, followed by Chinese economist Geng Xiao. The current director is Professor Safwan M. Masri.^[12]

Columbia Global Centers | Middle East

The Amman center, officially called the Columbia University Middle East Research Center, opened with the assistance of Jordan's Queen Rania Al Abdullah and was funded by grants from both the US government and the government of Jordan.^[13]

Current activities in Amman include collaborating with Jordanian resources toward accomplishing educational reforms and enhancing teacher and social worker skills, as well as undertaking several initiatives in the arts and architecture.^[14] The signature program, and catalyst for the center’s launch in Jordan, is a training center with Queen Rania through the Queen Rania Teacher Academy (QRTA), a collaborative effort of the Center, Columbia’s Teachers College, and Jordan’s Ministry of Education. The training center provides Jordan's first-ever induction program for new teachers, training nearly 400 teachers in 2009.

The Center has also been selected, working with the Earth Institute, as the MENA-region node of the Global Soil Mapping Initiative. Jordan’s Ministry of Agriculture is to delegate a full-time staff member to begin gathering soil composition data throughout North Africa and the Middle East, and the information will be digitized in publicly accessible, searchable databases.

Columbia’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation will launch a research lab at the Amman center for collaborative research, projects, exhibitions, events, and cultural exchanges involving students, scholars, and designers from Columbia University and the Middle East. Columbia's School of the Arts, its Arts Initiative, and university libraries are also pursuing initiatives in the region, including the Music of the Muslim World archive.

Columbia Business School faculty Safwan Masri directs the global center in Amman.

Columbia Global Centers | Europe

In March 2010, the Columbia Global Center | Europe was formally launched at Reid Hall, Columbia's Paris property.

According to a signed memorandum of understanding between Columbia and L’École des Hautes Etudes en Santé Publique (EHESP), Reid Hall will host the consortium’s ambitious project to shape public health in the 21st century. As a part of the agreement, Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health (MSPH) and EHESP will utilize Reid Hall for joint, innovative programs of mutual interest, including research and teaching. Reid Hall also serves as the base of operations for an Arts-focused initiative in West Africa.^[3]

Columbia Global Centers | South Asia

Columbia's Global Center for South Asia was launched in Mumbai, India, in late March 2010.

Earth Institute economist Nirupam Bajpai has called the Center "a huge project both physically and in its programming." One major initial project will be "India 2047", a sustainability initiative meant to celebrate the one hundredth anniversary of India's independence.^[3]

Among the new collaborations is Studio-X Mumbai, a GSAPP project. Studio-X serves as the Columbia architecture school’s international network of leadership laboratories for research, public dialogue, and exhibitions about the future of the constructed environment.

Columbia Global Centers | Africa

On the 13th of January, 2012 the latest addition to Columbia University’s network of global centers opened its doors in Nairobi, Kenya, the first institution of its kind in Africa. In addition to providing a base for Columbia’s research and academic activities in the region, the new facilities host the MDG Centre for East and Southern Africa as a flag ship program, and the regional Millennium Villages Project office in Nairobi.

References