“Innovation in development: Challenging convention to advance human welfare in low- and middle-income countries.”

Green Templeton College Human Welfare Conference VII

University of Oxford, May 23-24th 2014

Call for papers

In low- and middle-income countries billions of people continue to be deprived of the opportunity to fulfil their potential and struggle to build a better future for their families and communities. The magnitude of the challenges they face calls for more than conventional responses: It requires seizing the technological opportunities of our time, the combined knowledge of our disciplines and all of our creative potential.
The annual Green Templeton College Human Welfare Conference brings together leading graduate students, academics, and practitioners from around the world to debate key issues that shape human welfare today. In 2014 the conference will focus on innovative approaches to advancing wellbeing in low- and middle-income countries. We invite graduate students from all disciplines to submit papers, based on their original work and research, relating to new ideas that challenge conventional approaches and promise sustainable and significant change. For example, this includes work concerning:
- New ideas that challenge convention in defining and responding to particular human welfare challenges in low- and middle-income countries, including those associated with health, education, environmental degradation, gender equality and women’s empowerment, conflict and governance.
- Innovative approaches, which can be applied to a range of human welfare challenges in low- and middle-income countries and the challenges, risks and opportunities of realising these ideas. This could for example involve discussion of cross-disciplinary and market-based approaches, use of new technologies and partnerships.
- Insights into current practice in institutions, companies and NGOs, which are innovating their strategies to advance human welfare in low and middle-income countries.
- Historical and theoretical perspectives on innovation in advancing human welfare, including perspectives on the role of failure, and the significance of local-level innovation.
While the conference committee will give priority to submissions on the above themes, it also welcomes contributions that build on earlier years' conferences or address further key issues of human welfare in the Twenty-First Century.

Submission Guidelines
Please submit your abstract (500 words max) with a title to hwc@gtc.ox.ac.uk with “HWC Submission” as the subject line by February 15, 2014. If you have any queries about how your paper might fit into the conference, please contact diana.koester@gtc.ox.ac.uk. For further details, please see http://hwc.gtc.ox.ac.uk.

Reaching beyond academia and beyond the university
The 7th HWC aims to involve ‘non-university’ partners (NGOs and other organisations with a focus on human welfare) in order to broaden the scope of the conference and facilitate future collaborations. Furthermore, to continue expanding the connectivity of the college this year’s conference also hopes to attract several local community and student groups working to promote human welfare beyond the university and around the city of Oxford. If you have links with such organisations or know someone who does, and you feel that your organisation cannot be missed at the HWC, please contact angelica.neville@gtc.ox.ac.uk about the possibility of taking part in the conference.

Conference Description
The annual Green Templeton College Human Welfare Conference brings together graduate students, academics, and practitioners to engage with the specific challenges and opportunities of systematically improving human welfare in both academic and professional contexts. It is organised by students, and in keeping with tradition, the 7th HWC will take place in the Radcliffe Observatory, Green Templeton College. Participants will be able to present their own original work related to human welfare and relevant to today’s challenges. Discussions will be led by established academics, with the conference being opened and closed by prominent keynote speakers. The Human Welfare Conference offers participants an excellent opportunity to develop their personal and professional skills and to meet graduate students from a range of disciplines, as well as world-leading academics.

About Green Templeton
Green Templeton College is Oxford's newest graduate college, founded in 2008 following the historic merger of Green College and Templeton College. Its distinctive academic identity derives from its focus on subjects relating to human welfare, ranging from medicine and management studies through to education and the social sciences. It has a strong emphasis on linking scholarship with the professions, practice and policy, and seeks to further public understanding of science and the challenges facing societies. International in membership and lively and supportive in spirit, Green Templeton aims to lead the way in graduate education in Oxford.