2011 Conference proceedings

15:00 – 16:00 | Opening session

Thierry de Montribal

President and Founder of the WPC

“[…] governance is essential. Without governance, our highly interdependent system is likely to explode.”

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Heinz Fischer

President of the Republic of Austria

“Reinstating the primacy of politics is one of the major challenges – we cannot afford to waste this opportunity.”

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Abdullah Gül

President of the Republic of Turkey, Guest of honor of the 4th edition of the WPC

” […] no single power can cope with these challenges alone. There is a need for truly effective multilateralism with the participation of the emerging powers.”

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Debate

16:15 – 17:00 |  Plenary session 1

“The ECB and the sustainability of the Euro”

Introduction by Thierry de Montbrial

President and Founder of the WPC

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Peter Praet

Member of the ECB’s Executive Board

“The ECB will continue to remain an anchor of confidence and stability in a global economy characterized by marked uncertainties.”

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Debates

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17:00 – 19:00 |  Plenary session 2

“Arab spring and global governance”

Introduction by Volker Perthes

Chairman and Director of Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP)

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Amr Moussa

Former Secretary General of the League of Arab States, candidate to the Egyptian presidential elections

“We want to move together and have interaction where our world lives in a better way and with more connections.”

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Hrh Prince Turki Al-Faisal

Chairman of King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies

“Reform is no longer a choice for us. It is an imperative. For us to be able to meet these challenges of providing justice, livelihood and equal opportunity for all is an opportunity as well as a challenge.”

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Edward Djerejian

Founding Director of James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy, former US Ambassador to Syria

“In the long arch of history the United States identifies with the Arab Awakening’s quest for individual freedom, equality of opportunity and broader political participation.”

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Christophe de Margerie

Chairman & CEO of Total

“We may be mistaken, but as stakeholder in all these countries we are entitled to have our say.”

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Amr Moussa

Former Secretary General of the League of Arab States, candidate to the Egyptian presidential elections

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Hrh Prince Turki Al-Faisal

Chairman of King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies

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Debates

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19:00 – 20:15 | Plenary session 3

“Major catastrophes and global governance”

Introduction by Jim Hoagland

Associate Editor, Chief Foreign Correspondent of the Washington Post

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Yukiya Amano

Director General of the IAEA

“Showing the highest level of nuclear safety is a responsibility for each country. The role of the IAEA is to help them. Every country is varied and an international response is needed.”

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Scott Charney

Corporate Vice President, Trustworthy Computing of Microsoft

“I think the biggest thing that people need to start to appreciate in more detail is that the internet is now connecting everyone’s life.”

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Yukiya Amano

Director General of the IAEA

Scott Charney

Corporate Vice President, Trustworthy Computing of Microsoft

Yukiya Amano

Director General of the IAEA

Scott Charney

Corporate Vice President, Trustworthy Computing of Microsoft

Yukiya Amano

Corporate Vice President, Trustworthy Computing of Microsoft

Debates

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20:15 – 21:15 |  Welcome cocktail

21:15 – 23:00 |  Dinner at the Hofburg Palace (Conference Center)

“Dinner”

Introduction by Thierry de Montbrial

President and founder of the WPC

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Herbert Stepic

CEO of Raiffeisen Bank International

“[…] besides the very necessary consolidation process we need to focus on strategic growth programs. This will only be possible through solidarity.”

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Conclusion by Thierry de Montbrial

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9:00 – 10:15 | Plenary session 4

“Corporate social responsibility and global governance”

Introduction by Bruno Lafont

Chairman and CEO of Lafarge Group

“The novelty of the phenomenon of CSR is that it is […] increasingly seen not only as a condition of survival for the firm today, the licence to operate, but as a powerful lever to render sustainable value creation in the long run.”

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Mary Robinson

Former President of Ireland, President of Mary Robinson Foundation

“I believe the central challenge ahead is to turn the progress of the past decade into new actions that will move governments and markets sufficiently to make respect for human rights part of mainstream business practice around the world.”

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Narayana Murthy

President and founder of Infosys Technologies Limited

“As long as corporations seek respect from every stakeholder, I believe they will automatically use the power of corporate social responsibility to add value to society.”

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Debates

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10:45 – 12:15 | Plenary session 5

“The future of the G8 and G20: challenges and prospects for the economic and financial systems”

Introduction by Kemal Dervis

Vice-President for Global Economy at the Brookings Institution and Senior Advisor at the Sabanci University; former Minister of Economic Affairs of Turkey

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Jacob A. Frenkel

Chairman of JPMorgan Chase International, former Governor of the Bank of Israel

“Asia, led by the economies of China and India, will continue to grow at very rapid rates and latin America, which in the past was the source of economic turmoil, is now becoming a source of stability and growth.”

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Il Sakong

Presidential Envoy of the Republic of Korea

“The appropriate governance system is particularly crucial at the global community level in this age of non-polar or G-Zeeo world. The world at the time of the Seoul G20 Summit faced a heightened risk of global currency war.”

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Lourdes Aranda

Sherpa of Mexico to the G20, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mexico

The priorities for Mexico will be: economic stability, international trade, financial regulation, food security, and green growth.”

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Panelists’ Remarks

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Debates

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12:30 – 14:30 |  Lunch debate

Introduction by Thierry De Montbrial

President and founder of the WPC

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Kishore Mahbubani

Dean and Professor in the Practice of Public Policy of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore

“I feel optimistic because i would say that the world has now reached agreement on three new global consensuses.[…]That is why I say that the next 20 years will be the best 20 years the world has ever seen.”

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Debates

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14:45 – 15:30 |  Plenary session 6

“Debriefing of the European Council”

Jean-David Levitte

Diplomatic Advisor and Sherpa of President Nicolas Sarkozy

“We are not only determined to save the euro, but also determined to become one of the world’s most competitive area in the 21st century.”

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Debates

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15:30 – 17:00 | Plenary session 7

“Europe as a laboratory for global governance”

Introduction by Charles Kupchan

Professor in international relations at the Georgetown University

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Toomas Hendrik Ilves

President of the Republic of Estonia

“My question is how long can we sustain or expect the Parliament to sustain its pro-European solidarity in a democratic country when it is going against the wishes of the electorate?”

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Bartholomew 1st

Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople

“The European Union, and Europe more generally, is beyond all doubt a laboratory for global governance. However, as history shows, it is not the only one.”

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Fu Ying

Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China

“There are many discussions about if China is to “rescue” Europe and how. […]What Europe needs is not a savior but a cooperation partner.”

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Kemal Dervis

Vice-President for Global Economy at the Brookings Institution and Senior Advisor at the Sabanci University; former Minister of Economic Affairs of Turkey

“I do not believe that there can be a successful end of the story without the surplus countries – the north, particular Germany but not only Germany – accepting that they also have to make an effort so that their surpluses do not continue at very high levels.”

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Panelists’ Remarks

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Debates

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17:30 – 19:30 | Parallel workshops

Workshop #1 – Energy and environment

Introduction by William Ramsay

Senior Advisor of the Center for Energy at Ifri

“Energy policy makers are fully aware of what the policy options are and what the programmes could be. […] The economy around the world is too parlous and it is not a time when politicians make difficult decisions. “

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Manoëlle Lepoutre

Executive Vice President, Sustainable Development and Environment of Total

“Our first priority is to manage the risk associated with our operations, to avoid any major accidents and that is really a constant progress.”

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Paal Frisvold

Chairman of the Board of Bellona Europa asbl

“The fact is that we need to reduce emissions, we know that, but we also know that 80% of the world’s energy is based on fossil fuels and that the global energy demand is increasing rapidly and vastly […]”

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Kristina Rüter

Research Director of OEKOM research AG

“Key challenges in the Oil & Gas industry include climate protection and gradual shift to low-carbon/non-fossil energy sources, minimisation of environmental risks […]”

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Debates

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Workshop #2 – Food security

Introduction by Mostafa Terrab

Chairman and CEO of OCP Group

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Louise Fresco

Professor at the University of Amsterdam

“We have done a great deal with the so-called Green Revolution, but we have also seen the effects levelling off, and we need to find new ways to produce foods sustainably […]”

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Yashwant Thorat

CEO of the Rajiv Gandhi Trust

“High prices worsen food security in the short term but in the long run, they lead to investments being made in agriculture and to better food security, because countries feel they have to invest and increase productivity.”

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Jean-Yves Carfantan

“Food security claims to keep in mind two main points, first that most of the soil reservoir for feeding the population is located in wet tropical lands, especially in Africa, and these soils do not have the same behaviour as soil in Europe […]”

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Qu Xing

President of China Institute of International Studies (CIIS)

“I summarise the measures taken by Chinese governments in this regard into 11 fields: first, intensifying supervision on the quality and safety of agricultural products, second, establishing and strictly implementing market access systems for food quality and safety […]”

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Debates

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Workshop #3 – Health

Introduction by Jérôme Contamine

Executive Vice-President, Chief Financial Officer, and Member of the Executive Committee of Sanofi-Aventis

“It is clear that there is still a huge gap between what could be a reasonable and acceptable level of health for the worldwide population and where we are today.”

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Petra Laux

Head of Global Public Affairs at Novartis

“A global health citizenship index for all players to sign up to could be a good way of moving forward in health issues.”

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Steve Howard

Founding Secretary General of The Global Foundation

“If we put health too much into its own box, it might turn off all those who are not actually in the health sector.”

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Debates

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Workshop #4 – Global Governance and its current state

Introduction by Stewart Patrick

Senior fellow and director of the program on international institutions and global governance at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)

“Governance at the global level is obviously more complex in a system of sovereign states lacking overarching political authority.”

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Sean Cleary

Chairman of Strategic Concepts (Pty) Ltd

“The other possibility is that we develop a greater sense of humility, stop imagining that we know all the answers and we can go back to business as usual […]”

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Bruno Lafont

Chairman and CEO of Lafarge Group

“[…] we operate in a lot of different countries, and we see that there are limits to the approach of how we should approach global governance with different cultures.”

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Debates

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20:30 | Gala dinner at the Rathaus

Gala dinner

9:00 – 10:00 | Reports from parallel workshops

William Ramsay

Energy And Environment

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Louise Fresco

Food Security

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Jérôme Contamine

Health

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Stewart Patrick

Global Governance and its current state

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Remarks of Panelists

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Conclusion by Thierry de Montbrial

10:00 – 11:15 |  Plenary session 8

“Development and security”

Introduction by Jim Hoagland

Associate Editor, Chief Foreign Correspondent of the Washington Post

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M.K. Narayanan

Former National Security Advisor of the Prime Minister; Governor of West Bengal of India

“Emerging threats and challenges in the 21st century are likely to test the flexibility, ingenuity and ability of governments worldwide.”

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Yury Fedotov

Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

“In addition, while drugs and crime, often appear to be local in nature, our solutions must be global.”

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Debates

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11:30 – 12:30 | Plenary session 9

“Africa”

Jean-Michel Severino

Chairman of Investisseur et Partenaire, member of the French Academy of Technology

“2011 is the first year where the GDP of non-OECD countries will be higher than the GDP of OECD countries. It also leads us to try to see whether we can find ways out of the major economic crisis that the OECD world faces by introducing new partners into the game.”

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Lionel Zinsou

Chairman of PAI Partners

“[…] the perception of Africa by China is totally different. It is not neo-colonialism. It is just a country looking at a continent with a sort of pragmatic view and nothing like a colonial heritage.”

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Jean-Michel Severino

Chairman of Investisseur et Partenaire, member of the French Academy of Technology

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Lionel Zinsou

Chairman of PAI Partners

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Jean-Michel Severino

Chairman of Investisseur et Partenaire, member of the French Academy of Technology

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12:30 – 14:30 | Lunch debate

“Lesson learned: an experience of the Polish-Russian rapprochement”

Introduction by Thierry de Montbrial

President and founder of the WPC

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Anatoly Torkunov

Rector of the Moscow State Institute of International relations, Co-Chairman of the Polish-Russian Group on Difficult Matters

“Russia and Poland are countries with overlapping history and historic mythology about each other. […] Our countries always stress the morality of their foreign policy.”

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Adam Daniel Rotfeld

Former Foreign Minister of Poland, Co-Chairman of the Polish-Russian Group on Difficult Matters

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Debates

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14:45 – 15:45 | Plenary session 10

“Middle East”

Introduction by Steven Erlanger

Paris Bureau Chief of the New York Times

Ehud Barak

Former Prime Minister; Minister of Defense and Deputy Prime Minister of Israel

“I believe that those leaders in the Arab world who opened their societies more for many voices and for women’s advancement ended up more stable when they faced this Arab Spring.”

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Debates

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16:00 – 18:00 | Plenary session 11

“General debate”

Introduction by Dominique Moïsi

Special Advisor at Ifri

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Hubert Védrine

Former French Minister of Foreign Affairs

“The next developments in the great matter of governance will depend on whether or not alliances will be formed. If so, will they divide the world into hostile systems or will they make it possible to go beyond such hostility?”

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Joschka Fischer

Former German Minister of Foreign Affairs

“In the 21st century the defining force will be the rise of the new powers or, even more, the desire of the people to get out of poverty and achieve the same living standard that we have been used to in the West.”

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Igor Ivanov

Former Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs

“In our country, people want evolution, not revolution. We have had revolutions and suffered from them. We want evolution and our country to be a modern country with strong democratic institutions.”

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Robert Badinter

Former French Minister of Justice, former President of the Constitutional Council

“In order to establish its credibility, the international criminal justice system has to be universal. […]There are still too many states that benefit from absolute immunity thanks to the Security Council.”

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Debates

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18:00 – 18:15 | Conclusions

20:30 | Closing dinner