21st Century Trust - 2007 Conferences & Events

Encouraging Scientific Creativity and Innovation in the Digital Age: owning knowledge and open source

Climate change:
science, politics and the management of uncertainty
(In Partnership with the Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office)

John Elkington's Introductory Paper

Merton College, Oxford

17 - 23 September 2007

Senior Fellow

John Elkington Founder and Chief Entrepreneur, SustainAbility

Speakers

The science: on what should policy-makers be focusing?
Professor Nebojsa Nakicenovic	International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Vienna
Business: how are corporations reacting to the climate change debate?
Emily Farnworth	The Climate Group
Dr Paul Kielstra	21st Century Trust
The economics: how far has the Stern Review changed the paradigm of debate?
Dr Ottmar Edenhofer	Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
Venture capital and investing in the battle against climate change: what will its trajectory be?
David Stevenson	The Rocket Science Group, London, and contributor to the Financial Times’ Investors Chronicle
Russell Pullan	Director of New Energy and Clean Technology Ventures, Nomura International plc
The BRIC countries: what will be the impact of emerging economies?
Susannah Simon	Head, Climate Change and Energy Group, Foreign and Commonwealth Office
Case study: China
Isabel Hilton	Editor, chinadialogue.net
Technology: what are the prospects for the rapid development and take-up of mitigation technologies?
David Vincent	The Carbon Trust
The longer-term view: technologies and global consequences
Dr James Martin	Business consultant, author and lecturer, and founder of the James Martin 21st Century School, Oxford University
After Kyoto: what should be the international architecture responding to climate change?
Professor Steve Rayner	Director, James Martin Institute, University of Oxford
Governments and peoples - ministers, governors, mayors and communities: what will be the most dynamic sources of change?
Professor Stacy Vandeveer	University of New Hampshire

Advertised Synopsis
Even with the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report making ever clearer the scientific consensus about humanity’s contribution to global warming, the severity of its impact remains highly uncertain – world temperatures, for example, could increase anywhere from 1.1 to 6.4 degrees Celsius, and any given rise within this range also has consequences which can only be predicted with a wide degree of variability. Also, these consequences may unfold steadily and slowly, or there may be ‘tipping points’ when change occurs in a critical or even catastrophic way. This conference will consider the difficulties of making policies to address the problems of global warming within a context of such uncertainty. How effectively do scientists on the one hand, and economists and policy-makers on the other, communicate with each other and how can that be improved? How far have initiatives, such as the UK’s Stern Review, changed the paradigm of debate? What approach, or combination of approaches, is most likely to bring the highest ecological, social and economic benefits: attempts to reverse climate change, to mitigate partially its effects, or to adjust societies to new realities? What will be the hard choices – the increased use of nuclear power, for instance? How is the role of business changing, especially given growing concern over investment horizons and regulatory uncertainty? Reviewing lessons learned in recent years, from the working of the Kyoto Treaty to initiatives at the level of state governments such as California, or cities and communities, what can be best achieved at the international, national or sub-national levels? In what ways are the newly emerging economies, such as China and India, transforming the problem? How can policies and measures achieve the dynamic necessary to meet the challenge while being sufficiently differentiated to fit the needs and resources of diverse economies, or the various industrial sectors? Moreover, how does one address issues of international equity when it is difficult to judge ahead of time the particular degree of damage any particular country will face, and when the human activity causing global warming – in the IPCC’s opinion – goes back to the 1750s. This conference will use a scenario-building approach to try to examine different outcomes in these areas in order to help participants better grasp the nature of the long-term challenge which will face us over the coming decades. How we deal with them may affect the planet for centuries.

Advertised Synopsis
Populations are ageing worldwide with few exceptions: the world percentage of those over 65 is set to rise from 6.9% to 12% by 2030, with the developing world, if anything, experiencing changes to an even greater degree. This will induce societal shifts on a grand scale – from the political issues most resonant for voters, through the nature of business markets, to the areas of deepest focus for NGOs and society at large – which will tax the ingenuity of the current and rising generation of leaders and thinkers. Among a host of areas, health care, already undergoing technology and cost upheavals, will see some of the biggest changes. Pressing relevant issues include: the degree of demographic shift; its real impact as older individuals might be healthier and behave more like younger ones; changing disease loads, both the shift to chronic care, and the arrival of new viruses from HIV/AIDS to bird flu; increasing demands from better informed patients which in some cases expand the boundaries of medicine itself; finding resources to pay for already rocketing medical costs, especially when a smaller percentage of the population remains in full-time employment; the changing roles of public and private sectors both in developed countries and in fast-developing ones which are likely to see rapid expansion of the latter; the effects on medical provision of technological advance, globalization and the rise of the Asian economies; and the ongoing challenge of finding enough trained medical personnel. This conference will use a scenario-building approach to try to examine different outcomes in these areas in order to help participants better grasp the nature of the long-term challenge which will face us over the coming decades. On the skillful navigation of these challenges – by both current leaders and their successors – will depend our physical and even financial health.

Shereen El-Feki	MIT Technology Review
Dr Jason Pontin	MIT Technology Review

2007 Fellowship Programme
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1. Changing the world? The potential and pitfalls of the New Philanthropy

2. National identity and identity politics: where are the tensions and how are they best addressed?

3. Dialogue between the West and Islam: new approaches

1. Changing the world? The potential and pitfalls of the New Philanthropy

Columbia University School of Social Work, New York

27 - 28 April 2007

What’s new about the New Philanthropy?
Matthew Bishop	Chief Business Writer/American Business Editor, The Economist
Chris Page	Senior Vice President, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors
Theresa Lloyd	Consultant on strategic planning and fundraising to the non-profit sector, author of Why Rich People Give
How can philanthropy be scaled up further? What are the obstacles to be overcome?
Diana Aviv	President and CEO, Independent Sector
Lord Moser	Chairman, British Museum Development Trust, 1993–2003
Russell Willis Taylor	President and CEO, National Arts Strategies
What do business entrepreneurs bring to philanthropy? What are their greatest challenges in the sector?
Sally Osberg	President and CEO, the Skoll Foundation
Lance Laifer	Co-founder, “Hedge Funds vs. Malaria”
Mario Morino	Co-founder and Chairman, Venture Philanthropy Partners
Jacqueline Novogratz	CEO, Acumen Fund
What impact will the New Philanthropy have on long established foundations, and on the non-profit sector in general?
Dr Judith Rodin	President, the Rockefeller Foundation
Robert Dufton	Director, the Paul Hamlyn Foundation
How can social investment best be targeted? How can outcomes best be measured?
Jamie Cooper-Hohn	President, Children's Investment Fund Foundation
Stephan Gutzeit	Co-Chair, Executive Board, Stiftung Charité
Vanessa Kirsch	President and Founder of New Profit Inc.
What is the global reach of the New Philanthropy?
Thomas Eymond-Laritaz	President and CEO, Victor Pinchuk Foundation, Ukraine
Mike Green	UK Department for International Development
Noosheen Hashemi	President of the HAND Foundation and Chairman, PARSA Community Foundation
Trevor Neilsen	Partner, the Endeavour Group, and formerly Executive Director of the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS

Description
Philanthropy has never been bigger business. It hit the headlines in summer 2006 when the $31 billion which Bill Gates had handed over to his foundation was more than doubled by Warren Buffett, and there may be more to come from Bill Gates’ remaining personal wealth, estimated at $50 billion. This dwarfs all previous philanthropy, even on the scale of the Rockefellers or the Fords. The new philanthropy is not just new in scale, but in type. Many entrepreneurs, like Bill Gates, who have made their fortunes before reaching middle-age are directly supervising their own charitable endeavors rather than awaiting old age or death before bestowing their cash. How far can they transfer their entrepreneurial skills from their businesses to their foundations, boosting not just the numbers but the impact of the dollars spent? What will be the significance of a small but growing feature, ‘venture philanthropy’, where donors take risks traditionally shunned by major foundations, aiming for loans to be repaid through growing social enterprise and a virtuous cycle of investment and growth? This entails more successes, but also more failures: how well can charities adapt to ‘creative destruction’ in this way? And what will happen to charities’ relationships with governments, with civil society at large, and with each other?

These developments in the scale and approach of philanthropy may lead to a step change in tackling hitherto intransigent global problems, such as poverty or HIV/AIDS. But the new philanthropy brings also a new set of problems. Wealthy foundations already find it difficult at times to identify enough worthy projects to support, despite the apparently limitless demand, and this could grow even more problematic as giving is scaled up. With scale will come keener questions of accountability and democracy which already beset the NGO world. And with scale and accountability come bureaucracies, which may cramp entrepreneurial approaches, for all the reasons they can in business and more. Success and failure may be tricky to assess; the problems philanthropy seeks to tackle are complex and outcomes often hard to measure, especially in the shorter term. What will ensure that the new philanthropy is working optimally and really changing the world for the better?

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2. National identity and identity politics: where are the tensions and how are they best addressed?

Château Klingenthal, near Strasbourg
15 - 17 June 2007

Why is there a new emphasis on national identities?

Neal Ascherson Author and commentator

Ethnicity, the nation state and foreign policy

Professor Christopher Coker London School of Economics

Making peace, keeping the peace: Case study I - Northern Ireland

Alan Whysall Northern Ireland Office

Making peace, keeping the peace: Case study I - Bosnia

Toby Vogel Democratization Policy Council

The future of national identities and identity politics in a globalizing world

Dr Henry Farrell George Washington University

The national identity dilemma: who am I and where do I belong? What does this mean for my host country?

Andjela Jurisic Consultant for Europe, Middle East and Africa, HTSPE International Development Consultancy

Description
The last fifteen years has seen a dramatic resurgence of identity-based conflict, including the several civil wars in the interconnecting Balkan crises. This brought to the fore questions of national identity and how that relates to ethnic or other culturally distinct groups within a state. With the rapid development of globalization - including increased migration and also the impact on ‘imagined communities’ of electronic communication - these questions have taken on a new significance in a much broader range of countries. This conference will explore how ethnic and cultural rivalries have been managed, or mis-managed, the prospects for peace and conflict these pose for the future, and how anxieties about national identities may be best addressed in public policy in different countries.

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3. Dialogue between the West and Islam: new approaches

Kneze, Korcula, Croatia
2 - 5 August 2007

International Law, Islamic Law, and the Rule of Law: identifying common values, defining common goals

Omar Dajani Assistant Professor of Law, University of the Pacific

Western intervention in Islamic countries: perceptions and consequences

Minna Järvenpää Senior UN Co-ordinator of the board overseeing the implementation of the Afghanistan National Development Strategy

How to change the zero sum game: issues of security and dignity

Karim Sadjadpour Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Muslim communities in the West and the idea of a citizenship pact

Edward Mortimer Director of Programs, Salzburg Global Seminar

History, myth and identity

John Lotherington Director, 21st Century Trust

Dialogue in the age of satellite channels - a new approach

Ezzat Ibrahim Al-Ahram

Conclusions

Carl Bildt Foreign Minister of Sweden, Former Prime Minister of Sweden

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