UPDATE: We are hoping to welcome Prof. Clarke next term; unfortunately the event was cancelled due to events beyond our control.

Michael Clarke is currently the Director of the Royal United Services Institute. Until July 2007 he was the Deputy Vice-Principal and Director of Research Development at King's College London, where he remains a Visiting Professor of Defence Studies. He has been a Guest Fellow at The Brookings Institution, Washington, DC, and a Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. He has been senior Specialist Adviser to the House of Commons Defence Committee since 1997, having served previously with the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee 1995-7. In 2004 he was appointed the UK member of the United Nations Secretary General's Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters.

He will be speaking on whether the UK is still relevant in the modern world.

Entry to this event will be free to members, and £3 for non-members. As usual, membership will be available to purchase at the event, priced at £10 for a term, £15 for a year, or £20 for life.

The event will be followed by a drinks reception.

We are delighted to be able to offer the chance to have dinner with Professor Clarke before his talk on. Please sign up here.

Crispin Blunt is the Conservative MP for Reigate, and the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. He is also a former Captain in the British army, and has served on the Defence Select Committe, as well as a Parlaimentary Undersecretary of State in the Ministry of Justice. The event will be co-hosted by Oxford University Conservative Association.

Entry to this event will be free to members of IRSoc and OUCA, and £3 for non-members. As usual, membership will be purchasable at the event, priced at £10 for a term, £15 for a year, or £20 for life.

We are delighted to be able to offer the chance to have dinner with Crispin Blunt before his talk. Please sign up here.

The event will also see the launch of the Hilary edition of our journal, Sir, featuring articles on the topic of 'Changing players, changing game?'.

Mark Urban is a BBC journalist and currently works as the Diplomatic Editor for Newsnight. He served as an officer in the British army, Defence Correspondent with The Independent, and a Middle East Correspondent for BBC News, in addition to writing multiple books on military history. In his career, he has reported on the 1991 Russian coup, the Bosnian War, the Middle East peace process, and more recently on the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. He will be speaking on the emergence of a multi-polar world: what he calls the 'New World Disorder'.

Entry to this event will be free to members, and £3 for non-member. As usual, membership will be purchasable at the event, priced at £10 for a term, £15 for a year, or £20 for life.

We are delighted to be able to offer the chance to have dinner with Mark Urban following his talk on Tuesday. Please sign up here.

IR Soc is delighted to host Sir Sherard Cowper Coles KCMG LVO, who will be addressing the society on Tuesday 26th of January. Sir Sherard, a diplomat by training, studied Classics at Hertford and then joined the Foreign Office, serving as ambassador first to Israel, then Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. Following these appointments he was made special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2009, playing a key role in NATO counter-insurgency strategy. From 2011 to 2013 he worked for BAE Systems and is now a Senior Adviser to the Group Chairman and the Group Chief Executive of HSBC. Sir Sherard will be addressing IR Soc on the topic "What Do Arab States Really Want?"

Entry to the event is FREE for IR Soc members and £3 for non members; membership may be bought on the door. It will be followed by a drinks reception.

We are also offering the opportunity to have dinner with Sir Sherard before the event. This will be held at TSK at 18:15, priced at £16 for a three course meal: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/dinner-with-sir-sherard-cowper-coles-tickets-20969801240

We look forward to welcoming you to what promises to be a fascinating insight into Middle Eastern diplomacy.