International studies professor Anita Weiss has a three-page list of interviews and appearances she’s granted or turned down since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Weiss, who teaches a class called “In the Wake of Sept. 11: Issues and Concerns” to 85 students this term, said she has been so busy talking about the politics and history behind the attacks and the U.S. response that she hasn’t even had time to clean her office.
“This is a mess,” she said, surveying the piles of papers and books strewn about the office, located on the third story of Prince Lucien Campbell Hall.
Looking at her upcoming schedule, it seems Weiss won’t have time to clean any time soon. She leaves tomorrow for Islamabad, Pakistan, where she will deliver the Distinguished Lecture at the Pakistan Society of Development Economists’ annual meeting. Weiss is returning to Pakistan for the second time this year; she was there on Sept. 11. This time she will spend four days in Pakistan and return to work after the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.
College of Arts and Sciences Dean Joe Stone said the invitation was a distinction for Weiss and an indicator of the University’s visibility.
“Exchanges between cultures build relationships that provide perspective when there is a time of crisis,” he said.
Weiss, who co-edited the recent book “Power and Civil Society in Pakistan,” has studied Pakistan and Islamic societies for more than 20 years. She has traveled in Pakistan many times, visiting parts of the country where she said “other people just can’t go.”
“I think it will be cathartic for me to go,” Weiss said. She added that she hopes “Pakistan hasn’t abandoned the promise that was showing before Sept. 11.”
Her lecture will focus on the need for Pakistan to develop an economic system tailored to the needs of its people rather than the demands of the global economy; she said she hopes that Pakistani economic leaders have similar ideas.
“It’s important to me to see how the (Pakistani) politicians are working,” she said. Prior to the attacks, the United Nations had imposed economic sanctions on Pakistan after the country conducted aboveground nuclear weapons testing in 1998. But Weiss said the country has strived to improve its economy and become more democratic.
Since the attacks, however, Pakistan has faced a number of internal and external problems. The Bush administration has courted the country as an ally against terrorism, and India has denounced it for allegedly supporting terrorists in the disputed territory of Kashmir.
The two countries have fought two wars over Kashmir in the past 50 years and the current dispute, which began after terrorists killed 14 people in an attack on the Indian parliament a month ago, has once again brought the two nuclear-armed nations to the brink of war. Weiss said the confrontation is a result of both the “Hindu Supremacist” attitudes of India’s administration and the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan.
By launching attacks against Afghanistan in order to hunt down Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, the United States has opened a “Pandora’s Box” of possibilities for cross-border terrorist pursuit, Weiss said.
Gibran AzamAli, a sophomore pre-business major from Karachi, Pakistan, visited his home country during winter break. He said both sides have been stubborn and that the situation has people scared.
“You’d see all these planes flying around and the army mobilizing,” AzamAli said. “People are leaving; they don’t think it’s safe.”
AzamAli — who met Weiss more than a year ago when she stayed with his family in Pakistan — said that while some are aware of his country’s situation, most Americans know little about the region.
Weiss echoed that sentiment. Many of the current problems facing Pakistanis are a result of the rest of countries such as the United States trying to force the country to integrate into the global economy without understanding its history, she said.
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