The Montréal Centre for International Studies (French: Centre d'études et de recherches internationales), known as Cérium, is a research centre of the Université de Montréal specializing in international studies.

Goals of Cérium

Launched in April 2004, Cérium is a new centre in the field of international research in Québec and Canada.

Cérium team

• Raymond Chrétien [1] (Chairman)
• François Crépeau (Scientific Director)
• Jean-François Lisée [2] (Executive Director)
• Jean-Philippe Thérien (Assistant Scientific Director)

The research units

• Canadian Centre for German and European Studies
• Centre for East-Asian Studies
• Centre on Development of International Research on Environment
• Chair in American Political and Economic Studies
• Canada Research Chair on International Migratory Law
• Jean Monnet Chair in European Integration
• Research Group in International Security
• Institute for European Studies
• Research Group on Development
• International Economy Network
• Research Network on Peace Operations
• Middle-East Network
• Chair in Contemporary Mexican Studies

Cérium activities

Every Spring, CERIUM organizes a major conference, alternating in focus between a European country and a North American topic. In the Spring of 2005, the conference What ever happened to Cool Britannia? The UK after eight years of Blair brought together thirty of the brightest scholars from Britain and North America to discuss the United Kingdom of Tony Blair. The Spring 2006 conference was entitled Conservative predominance in the U.S. A Moment or an Era?. Scholars from the US, Europe and Canada debated the different facts of American, and Canadian, conservatism. Former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum was keynote speaker.

Summer schools

The Cérium offers intensive summer schools organized for citizens interested in international issues, as well as local and foreign graduate students. These one week summer schools take place during the first two weeks of July, so during the Festival international de Jazz de Montréal.

Over the years, the program has become one of North America's most ambitious international-affairs summer school programs. Each school is given by a dozen experts in the field.

Subjects in 2009:

From June 29 to July 4:

The Obama Presidency: Year One

India: Surprising Modernity

Pluralism and Radicalization in the Arab-Muslim World

International and European Environmental Law/Climate Change

From July 6 to 11:

Biodiversity: current situation, challenges and management issues

China Risen: How it is Changing, and Changing Us

Understanding and Preventing Terrorism

Peace Operations: Manufacturing Peace

For further information and a short video

Reaction

The CERIUM runs a serious program that is at once educational and very enjoyable. The courses typically include regular instructors and invited participants of a very high quality. Even better, the student body is very international and very diverse (including working professionals, MA students, and undergrads mixed together). All of the students that I took profited enormously from it (and from their stay in Montreal - a beautiful, cosmopolitan city). The internationally-renowned jazz festival occurs during the first week of their summer session. The staff at UdeM is a delight and are very welcoming. And Montreal is a blast.

— Charles Noble, Chair, Political Science Dept., USC Long Beach, California

Aside from the outstanding quality of the conferences, I was impressed by the expertise of the participants and their involvement in the debates, which often drew on experiences in the field.

— Celestin Monga, Senior Economist, World Bank