Next Event
#3: Building a Culture of Peace at a Time of Global Turmoil
According to the Peace Research Institute of Oslo (PRIO), 59 state-based conflicts were recorded in 2023, the highest number since the end of World War II. The wars in Ukraine and Gaza were the primary generators of the tens of thousands of combat-related deaths as well as the loss of innocent civilian lives, with still no end in sight as 2024 draws to a close.
In parallel, inequality and insecurity about jobs and well-being, climate and diseases are on the rise, feeding a global wave of populist movements with authoritarian leanings. Xenophobic nationalism and shrinking civic space form part of that wave, with the Trump victory in the US elections likely to exacerbate the trend.
Faced by these multiple attacks and threats to peace, the international community seems to be struggling to imagine an alternative to confrontation and violence as a way forward. The seeming incapacity of international organizations, particularly the United Nations, to provide effective solutions to these issues has also eroded commitment to multilateralism as a path to the resolution of global problems.
Hence, the urgent question: How do we build a culture of peace under such conditions? In particular, how do we convince the world that peace is indeed a viable alternative? And how do we persuade parties on opposite sides of seemingly unbridgeable divides that it is possible to talk to one another to find common ground?
About this consultation
We will start the dialogue with the video of a brief interview with Gastón Aín, an expert in conflict prevention and mediation. Gastón has worked in various countries in Africa and Latin America with the United Nations, the Organization of American States and currently with the Inter-American Development Bank. He will share with us his thoughts on what makes this period in history especially challenging for peace building, and what strategies and methods can be effective for overcoming these challenges.
We will open up the discussion to all participants after this video. We would encourage participants to focus on the above questions, but they are also free to bring up others relevant to the topic. As with all consultations in our FOGGS Open Consultation Mondays series, we look forward to a frank and in-depth discussion that increases understanding of the issues at hand and helps identify concrete steps that would improve the situation in practice.
Register to take part here.
Past Events
#2: Shifting geopolitics and its impact on global governance and the UN
The recent BRICS+ Summit in Russia, the result of the US elections, the continuing wars in Ukraine, the Middle East and elsewhere, rising tensions in the China-Taiwan Straits and the Korean Peninsula, climate change related-disasters and the inability to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for all, are some of the signs that point to an emerging new global geopolitical reality. How is all this expected to impact the management of the planet we share, its commons like the atmosphere/climate, biodiversity but also cyberspace/internet & AI, Outer Space, global finance and trade? How can shared risks such as climate change, pandemics, increasing indebtedness, mounting human insecurity, the danger of accidental or intentional nuclear catastrophe be addressed for the sake of present and future generations of humanity? And who is able, willing and legitimized to express the common good, the will of “the international community” and “international law” in an effective and legitimate way under the circumstances?
#1: Israel, the UN and Gaza
This was the first in the series of FOGGS Open Consultation Mondays and focused on the Israel-Palestine conflict, which flared up again following the Hamas attack on southern Israel and the taking of hostages on 7 October 2023 and the subsequent relentless retaliatory actions by Israel in the Gaza Strip and beyond. The desperate humanitarian situation in Gaza and the involvement of other regional and international actors in the hostilities threatened to lead the region to a major conflagration with potential global consequences. How can the situation be de-escalated, the lives of civilians respected, destruction halted and the two-state solution implemented?