Democracy Dialogues Series – Lecture 40
Organised by New Socialist Initiative

Theme :
South Asian Futures in a Tri-Polar World

Speaker :
Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy
Eminent Physicist, author, public intellectual

Time and Date :
6 PM (IST)
Sunday , 27 th July 2025

The lecture is also live streamed at facebook.com/newsocialistinitiative.nsi

Abstract:

The Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union are long behind us, and we’re now hurtling toward a tri-polar world dominated by America, Russia, and China. These three powers vy to shape global influence, often competing but sometimes colluding. As the saying goes, “When elephants fight, the grass gets trampled.” So, the central question for this lecture is: What path are the nations of South Asia—including Afghanistan and Iran—likely to take? What alternatives and tools do they possess to navigate this landscape? Most importantly, what vision of society and power should guide them toward a viable future?

Speaker :

Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy is a nuclear physicist, author, and a prominent activist who is particularly concerned with promotion of freedom of speech, secularism, scientific temper and education. He is the founder-director of The Black Hole in Islamabad and as the head of Mashal Books in Lahore, he leads a major translation effort to produce books in Urdu that promote modern thought, human rights, and emancipation of women.

Prof Hoodbhoy received his undergraduate and doctoral degrees from MIT and has taught  physics and mathematics at Forman Christian College-University in Lahore, at the Quaid-e-Azam University (QAU) in Islamabad and later at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS).

He is a recipient of the Baker Award for Electronics and the Abdus Salam Prize for Mathematics. He was visiting professor at MIT, Carnegie Mellon University, and the University of Maryland. In 2003 he was awarded UNESCO’s Kalinga Prize for the popularization of science.

Here is a list of a few of his publications :

– Pakistan: Origins, Identity and Future, published by Routledge (London, New York), 2023.
– Confronting the Bomb – Pakistani and Indian Scientists Speak Out, (edited) Oxford University Press, 2013.
– Education and the State – Fifty Years of Pakistan, (edited) Oxford University Press, 1998.
– Islam & Science: Religious Orthodoxy and the Battle for Rationality, published by ZED Books, London, in 1991 with translations in Turkish, Malaysian, Indonesian, Arabic, Spanish, Sindhi, and Urdu.
– Proceedings of School on Fundamental Physics and Cosmology, co-edited with A. Ali, World Scientific, Singapore, 1991.