VCU news

By Brian McNeill

Five years after the revolution in Libya that toppled the dictatorship of Moammar Gadhafi, the promises of freedom, democracy and prosperity for which Libyans united and fought have yet to materialize, and the country has descended into failed statehood marked by chaos and the increasing presence of terrorist groups.

A symposium at Virginia Commonwealth University will seek to assess the challenges facing Libya, exploring topics including human rights, education, health, state-society relations and local governance, all with an eye toward finding the way forward for the country.

The symposium, “Libya, Five Years After the 2011 Revolution,” will be held April 13 from 10 a.m. to 5:40 p.m. in the University Student Commons Theater, 907 Floyd Ave. It will be free and open to the public.

The symposium will feature a number of prominent Libyan scholars, activists and dignitaries, notably including the senior representative of Libya to the United States, H.E. Wafa Bughaighis, the charge d’affaires of the Embassy of Libya in Washington, D.C.

Bughaighis, who will be introduced by McKenna Brown, Ph.D., executive director of VCU’s Global Education Office, will deliver the symposium’s opening address at 10:25 a.m. and will take part in a Q&A session.

The symposium is sponsored by the VCU Golden Key Honor Society, the Institute for Global Leadership at Tufts University, the Fares Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies at Tufts University and the VCU Global Education Office, with the assistance of VCU’s Arabic Club.

“Being a Libyan-American woman, I was inspired by the current earth-shaking events in the world, in the Middle East and especially in Libya, to organize this symposium with my students who serve as officers of the Golden Key International Honor Society and Arabic Club in order to educate Virginia Commonwealth University’s students , the surrounding universities and community,” said Salwa Sheibany, an instructor of Arabic, French and Arab cinema and adviser of the two student organizations in the School of World Studies in the College of Humanities and Sciences.

Presentations at the event will include:

• “The Libyan Political Agreement: Where Does It Stand Today?”
• “The Health Care System in Libya”
• “Challenges and Opportunities for Reforming the Libyan Education System”
• “Radical Islamist Groups in Derna, Five Years after the 2011 Revolution”
• “Status of Libyan Women Five Years after the 2011 Revolution: Challenges and Prospects”
• “Assessment and Perspectives of Municipal Council Administrations”
• “The Role of Religious and Traditional Leaders in Track I and II Diplomacy: Challenges and “Opportunities”
• “State-Society Relations in Post-Gadhafi Libya”

For the full schedule and a list of speakers, visit global.vcu.edu/media/GEO/pdf/Libya_Symposium.pdf.