Southampton hosts workshop on social policy and regional governance

Representatives from South America, South Africa and Europe joined the two-day workshop organised by Dr Pia Riggirozzi from the University’s Centre for Citizenship, Globalisation and Governance (C2G2).

C2G2 encompasses participants from Social Sciences and across the University and merges insights from political science and international relations to focus on the central political questions of today’s world about power, cooperation, security, inequality and democracy.

The workshop Regional social policy: cross-border social standards to reduce inequity and poverty explored the empirical linkages between regional integration, social policy and social development. It also looked at the academic challenges bridging comparative regionalism, international political economy and social policy.

Speakers from academia, policy and advocacy led discussions into both of these areas over the two days. The speakers included Nicola Yeates from the Open University UK, Pieter Fourie from Stellenbosch University in South Africa, Manuel Riesco from the National Centre for Alternative Development Studies (CENDA) in Chile, Philippe de Lombaerde and Stephen Kingah from the United Nations University’s Institute on Comparative Regional Integration Studies in Bruges.

Pia, Lecturer in Global Politics at the University of Southampton, said: “The workshop was a great success and we heard many topical debates on how regional formations in Europe, South America and South Africa are seeking social policies in relation to health and migration, and the challenges of regionalism addressing issues of poverty and inequality and trans-border social harms.”