2:17 p.m., Sept. 10, 2009----Janusz Grzelak, professor of psychology at the University of Warsaw in Poland and an adjunct professor at the University of Delaware, will be the inaugural speaker in the Provost's Distinguished Visiting Scholars Lecture Series at UD this fall.

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Grzelak will address “The End of Communism in Central and Eastern Europe: Antagonism, Negotiation, and Compromise in Poland.” The lecture will be held at 4 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 23, in the Gore Recital Hall of the Roselle Center for the Arts.

According to Suzanne Austin, associate provost for academic affairs, lectures in the new series will address topics of broad significance and be inherently interdisciplinary in both their context and process. While they will be interesting and understandable to non-experts, lectures will be pitched at a high academic level to attract graduate students and faculty.

Most importantly, they will be delivered by individuals who have made significant contributions not only in their scholarly careers but also outside their scholarly area. “The intent of these lectures is to strengthen intellectual discourse and enhance global knowledge and awareness across campus,” Austin says.

“Professor Grzelak is exactly the right scholar to deliver the first of these distinguished lectures,” says Provost Tom Apple. “Not only is he held in the highest regard nationally and internationally for his research on conflict resolution, negotiation and mediation, and social movements, but his life as a scholar and political activist contributed to the peaceful transformation of Polish society from communism to capitalism in the 1980s and '90s.”

In addition to the lecture, Grzelak will make himself available during his visit to campus to meet with graduate students, individually or in small groups, to discuss their research. Apple credits Joseph Pika, James R. Soles Professor of Political Science and International Relations, for suggesting that the series focus on engaging graduate students.

“This is a superb opportunity for our graduate students across campus to engage in interdisciplinary conversations,” says Debra Hess Norris, vice provost for graduate and professional education. “We want to encourage graduate students not only to attend the lecture but also to actively connect with the highly respected speakers who will come to campus as part of the series.”

One of the leading activists of Solidarity, the democratic opposition movement in Poland, Grzelak participated in talks between Solidarity and Poland's communist government in 1981 and served as an adviser and liaison officer for Solidarity after the organization went underground following the declaration of martial law at the end of 1981. He was also a member of the underground Helsinki Committee for Human Rights and the Citizens' Committee in Poland.

In addition, Grzelak has served as vice-chairperson of the Education and Science sub-committee and also negotiation adviser in the Round Table Talks between the Polish government and the opposition. The Round Table Talks initiated systemic social, political, and economic changes in Central and Eastern Europe in 1989.

As deputy minister of education, Grzelak was responsible for policies related to higher education in the first post-communist Polish government, from 1989-91. As a scholar, he was a co-founder and first president of the Polish Society of Social Psychology.

Grzelak's scientific achievements during two decades of scholarly research include exploration of issues related to social interdependence, conflict resolution, negotiation and mediation, and interpersonal and social control. He was awarded the Polonia Restituta Order, a highly prestigious state honor in Poland given in peacetime and awarded in recognition of outstanding contribution to state transformations.

Grzelak has been invited to lecture at many universities including the University of Michigan and Columbia University. He has also served as a visiting professor at the University of Vienna in Austria, Old Dominion University, and the University of Tillburg in the Netherlands. In 2008, Grzelak received the Morton Deutsch Award from Columbia University for his outstanding contributions to negotiation theory and practice and social justice.

Article by Diane Kukich