Call for Papers 3rd PhD Global History of Empires Conference | University of Turin
“Global Technoscience, Energy, and Environment: Policies, Actors, Scales and Methods of Global History (19th-21st Centuries)”
Call for Papers
3rd PhD Global History of Empires Conference
Organized by Department of Cultures, Politics and Society - University of Turin
Deadline: April 30, 2025
18-19th September 2025
University of Turin
The PhD students of the “Global History of Empires” program at the University of Turin are pleased to announce the international conference “Global Technoscience, Energy, and Environment”, scheduled for 18th - 19th September, which is now accepting applications.
The call is open to PhD students and early career scholars from various universities and academic backgrounds, incorporating interdisciplinary and intersectional approaches, as well as diverse geographical and political scales. The conference is designed to foster a dynamic discussion space, providing a platform to discuss research in progress, to connect junior and senior scholars, to enrich the scientific debate in emerging fields of global history and critically engage with current pressing issues. The initiative aims to be as broad and transversal as possible, but it encourages contributions and discussions on emerging themes, actors, scales and sources in the global history of technoscience, energy and the environment, with a focus on the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries.
Scientific background
The global interaction between technoscience, energy and the environment has gained prominence, particularly since the late 19th century, accelerating throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. These periods were marked by significant industrial and technoscientific transformations, particularly in Western countries, which spurred economic growth while also giving rise to pressing environmental challenges. The exploitation of coal, oil, gas, nuclear and renewable energies allowed industrial expansion while bringing about far-reaching environmental and societal consequences.
In recent years, emergent studies at the intersection of environmental history, science and technology studies (STS) and energy history have provided critical insights into the global dimensions of these processes. Scholars have examined how imperial energy systems and technopolitical regimes operated beyond traditional geopolitical borders, revealing the circulation of scientific expertise and counterexpertise on a translocal scale. At the same time, global historians have increasingly engaged with these themes, integrating environmental and technoscientific dimensions in the study of transnational and imperial processes and underscoring the interdependence of human and non-human agencies.
By combining global, transnational and local perspectives, this conference aims to explore the policies, actors and methods that have defined the relationship between technoscience, energy and the environment. Participants are encouraged to contribute fresh insights into these emergent debates.
Key areas
PhD students and early career scholars are welcome to present their ongoing research and contributions on the following topics, although not limited to them:
- Governance and Policies: the role of international organisations, transnational networks, global and local actors in shaping environmental policies and energy transitions; technoscientific cooperation and competition across different political and geographical scales.
- Circulation of Knowledge, Technologies and Expertise: the global movement of technologies, ideas, experts and expertise, as well as counter-expertise; the construction, dissemination and contestation of techno-scientific knowledge across borders.
- Imperialism, Colonialism and Resource Extraction: the ways in which imperial and colonial energy systems, global trade routes, resource extraction, development cooperation policies and technopolitical regimes have shaped global inequalities and environmental degradation; indigenous and colonized activism and resistance to resource extraction.
- Economics at the Service of/in the Pursuit of Energy: the part played by economic policies and financial trends promoted by governmental actors and companies in fostering technoscientific development and taking charge of the energy market.
Participants are encouraged to present analyses that span multiple spatial scales (macro, meso and micro) and temporal scales (past-present relationships; circular time and deep time) and to look at different actors, including non-human agencies, infrastructures, and material flows that have increasingly been recognised as pivotal to global history. Finally, they are invited to highlight innovative approaches to sources and methodologies, including the use of multiscale archives, archives beyond the human, oral histories, audiovisual materials, intersectional and participatory methodologies that enable researchers to integrate marginalised voices and perspectives, thus enriching the study of global history with new layers of complexity.
Submission and deadlines
The conference is open to PhD candidates and recent PhD graduates (within one year of obtaining their degree) from diverse academic backgrounds, including researchers in global history, energy studies, environmental history, international relations, science and technology studies, or related disciplines.
To apply, participants must submit a single Word document containing the following:
- Name and institutional affiliation.
- A title and abstract of the proposed paper between 500 and 800 words, with three keywords.
- A list of essential bibliographic or archival references related to the abstract (max. half page).
- An academic CV, including research interests and any relevant publications (max. 2 pages).
Proposals must be submitted via email to ghempires.conf@gmail.com no later than April 30, 2025. The scientific committee will notify applicants of the selection results by the end of May 2025.
Program details
The conference will feature:
- A keynote lecture with a focus on the global history of science and technology held by Professor David Edgerton (King's College London).
- Panel discussions with brief participant presentations to allow ample time for discussion and peer feedback, moderated by senior scholars.
- A movie screening with discussion: “Terra Incognita” directed by Enrico Masi
- A workshop on the materiality of archives.
The conference will be held at the University of Turin, Department of Cultures, Politics and Society. Participation at the conference is on site, in the city of Turin. There is no attendance fee.
If you have any further questions, please reach out to the workshop organisers at ghempires.conf@gmail.com
Scientific and Organising Committee
Miriam Bettamin, Adna Čamdžić, Alessandro Favilli, Gabriella Rago