Staff and Fellows

The IIRE carries on its work with a small permanent staff and a large number of volunteers from both the Netherlands and abroad. The permanent staff is led by our Director, Dr. Peter Drucker. Among his many other responsibilities, Dr. Drucker directs the IIRE's publications as well as lecturing on international relations, history and sexuality.

Eng Que is as Building Manager primarily responsible for the upkeep and use of our Amsterdam headquarters, office management and relations with our renters and supporters. Her linguistic virtuosity and knowledge of the institute enable her to help with various other tasks: in addition to English and Dutch she studied Castilian (Spanish) at the University of Nijmegen. She has also taken part in two different IIRE Youth Schools.

Paul Mepschen, part-time Programme Associate, assists the Director with our courses and publications. Appropriately, Paul's first major task was preparation of the last IIRE Youth School - he too participated in an IIRE Youth School ten years ago. He is currently completing his work for a degree in anthropology at the University of Amsterdam, and serves as editor-in-chief for the Dutch socialist newspaper Grenzeloos.

Working in collaboration with the resident staff is the Director of our Youth Schools and programmes, Penelope Duggan. Formerly our Director of Women's Studies, Ms. Duggan is a historian who lectures on women's participation in politics as well as general issues of radical strategy and organization.
She is the author of Working Papers no. 14, Helena Molony: Actress, Feminist, Nationalist, Socialist and Trade-Unionist, and no. 33, The Feminist Challenge to Traditional Political Organizing, and co-editor of Notebook for Study and Research no. 22, Women's Lives in the New Global Economy

Reinforcing the international character of the IIRE's programme is Eva Olaer Ferraren from the Philippines. Having just completed a master's degree at the University of Amsterdam, Eva is moving on to complete her doctorate, under sponsorship of the IIRE. As well as drawing on the institute's resources for her studies Eva is acting as an IIRE Fellow during her time here, so that we benefit not only from her scholarship but also from her extensive experience as a feminist and peace activist in the southern Philippine region of Mindanao. As a Fellow resident in the Netherlands (unlike most of our other Fellows), she is participating fully in our discussions and curriculum planning and development process.

Our board of directors, working on a volunteer basis, oversees the Institute's finances and general development. Dr. Joost Kircz, Chairperson of the IIRE Board, directs a project at the University of Amsterdam on the changing pattern of scientific communications in the electronic era, and works in electronic publishing. His main interest is in the relationship between science and social thought and action.
He is the author of Working Paper no. 32, Materialism and the 'Makability' of the World.

Our permanent staff is unable to maintain the Institute alone. Each course needs a broader, ad hoc team. Through the years an international network of Fellows has been built, most of them teaching at university level, combining scholarly and activist expertise. Besides coming to Amsterdam to lecture at the Institute and take part in discussions, Fellows contribute to and edit our publications, maintain links with organizations that wish to participate in our activities, and help shape the Institute's overall direction.

Fellows discuss IIRE's future course

Among our Fellows are:

• Gilbert Achcar (Lebanon/Germany), Centre Marc Bloch, political scientist and author of books including Clash of Barbarisms and Eastern Cauldron , editor of The Legacy of Ernest Mandel.
• Daniel Bensaïd (France), Université de Paris VIII, author of numerous studies in philosophy, sociology and politics including Les discordances du temps.
• Susan Caldwell (Canada), Dawson College, lecturer in psychology, women's studies and North-South studies
• James Cockcroft (USA/Canada), author and Latin Americanist whose new books in 2000-01 were La esperanza de México, América Latina, Latino Visions, and Salvador Allende.
• Stephanie Coontz (USA), Evergreen State College, historian, author of feminist studies including The Social Origins of Private Life and The Way We Never Were.
• Janette Habel (France), Université de Paris VIII, author of Ruptures à Cuba.
• Michel Husson (France), Institut National des Statistiques et des Etudes Economiques, author of workers including Sommes-nous trop?
• Michael Löwy (Brazil/France), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique-Paris, sociologist of religion and author of many books including Redemption and Utopia. (see his articles in French on ecosocialism and in Spanish on Che Guevara )
• David Mandel (Canada), Université du Québec à Montréal, political scientist and editor of the bilingual Russian-North American journal Alternatives.
• Braulio Moro (Mexico), economist.
• Pierre Rousset (France), former IIRE director, author of works on both East Asian politics and ecology, and chair of the ecology working group of ATTAC.
• Catherine Samary (France), Université de Paris IX, economist and specialist on Eastern Europe, author of works including Yugoslavia Dismembered.
• Anthony Arthur Smith (USA), Iowa State University, philosopher and author of books including Dialectical Social Theory and Its Critics.
• Eric Toussaint (Belgium), director, Committee for Cancellation of Third World Debt, author of works on Latin American history and international political economy.
• Josette Trat (France), Université de Paris VIII, author of works of feminist theory and former editor of Cahiers du féminisme.
• Marcel van der Linden (Netherlands), International Institute for Social History , labour historian and co-editor of The Formation of Labour Movements, 1870-1914.
• Francois Vercammen (Belgium), Ernest Mandel Foundation, director of Brussels research centre.
• Peter Waterman (Netherlands/UK) specializes on the new social unionism, on the new global solidarity movements and on global solidarity culture and communications. He has recently written or co-edited, Labour Worldwide in the Era of Globalisation, Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms, Place, Space and the New Labour Internationalisms, and Labour Rights in the Global Economy. He also writes about and is active on the internet.
• Robert Went (Netherlands), University of Amsterdam, economist, former IIRE co-director, author of works including Globalization: Neoliberal Challenge, Radical Responses, co-editor of The Price of the Euro and author of The Enigma of Globalization (forthcoming in July 2002 from Routledge).

Former fellows