1. His Excellency Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations: Building and Sustaining Peace: The UN Role in Post-Conflict Situations, CSIS, 11-noon May 7
The Center for Strategic and International Studies Program on Crisis, Conflict, and Cooperation (C3) invites you to a Statesmen’s Forum with
His Excellency Ban Ki-moon
Secretary-General of the United Nations
On
Welcoming Remarks and Moderated by
Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski
Counselor and Trustee
CSIS
Monday, May 7, 11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m.
B1 Conference Room
1800 K Street, NW, Washington DC 20006
This event will be webcast live and viewable on this webpage.
For questions or concerns, please contact statesmensforum@csis.org.
Ban Ki-moon is the eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations. His priorities have been to mobilize world leaders around a set of new global challenges, from climate change and economic upheaval to pandemics and increasing pressures involving food, energy, and water. He has sought to be a bridge builder, to give voice to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people, and to strengthen the organization itself. Mr. Ban took office on January 1, 2007. On June 21, 2011, he was unanimously reelected by the General Assembly and will continue to serve until December 31, 2016.
2. Decline of Armed Conflict: Will It Continue? Stimonson, 12:30-2 pm May 7
SIPRI North America, 1111 19th St. NW, 12th floor, Washington DC 20036
There is a prevalent public perception that the world has become a more violent place. However, many leading experts agree that there has been a decline of violence and war since 1989. To expand upon these findings and explore their future implications, SIPRI North America will convene a roundtable discussion with two leading experts in the peace and conflict field.
The following key questions will be discussed by a panel of experts:
Welcome: Dr. Chantal de Jonge Oudraat, Executive Director, SIPRI North America
Speakers:
*Light lunch and refreshments will be provided
If you have any questions, please contact Masha Keller at sipri-na@sipri.org
3. Thinking the Unthinkable: Potential Implications of Oil Disruption in Saudi Arabia, Heritage Foundation, noon-1:30 pm May 8
If an “Arab Spring” uprising completely disrupted Saudi oil production, the U.S. and the global economy would face a massive economic and strategic crisis. Russia and Iran as oil-producing states would likely exploit the crisis to increase their power around the world while undermining U.S. influence, especially in the Middle East. A crisis in Saudi Arabia would have drastic implications for the United States, its economy, and the whole world.
The U.S. must plan ahead and develop pro-active, multi-layered preventive and responsive strategies to deal with political threats to the security of oil supply. These would combine intelligence, military, and diplomatic tools as well as outline domestic steps the United States should take in such a crisis. Please join our distinguished panel of experts as they discuss strategic threats to oil supply; policy options available to the United States and to the oil consuming and producing states; and examine lessons learned from other Heritage Foundation energy crisis simulation exercises.
Ariel Cohen , Ph.D.
Senior Research Fellow, The Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies, The Heritage Foundation
Bruce Everett, Ph.D.
Adjunct Associate Professor of International Business, The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Simon Henderson
Baker Fellow and Director, Gulf and Energy Policy Program, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
4. The Consequences of Syria for Minorities in the Levant, Middle East Institute, noon-1 pm May 9
The Middle East Institute is proud to host journalist and author Jonathan C. Randal for a discussion about the impact of the conflict in Syria on neighboring Lebanon and its complicated religious and ethnic make-up. A tired joke among Lebanese asks why their much-battered country has been spared most of the turmoil that has attended the Arab Spring and its often violent ramifications elsewhere in the Middle East. The jest’s cynical answer: because Lebanon is automatically seeded for the finals. Such gallows humor reflects fears Lebanon will end up footing the bill whether the Alawite regime prevails in Damascus or succumbs to the largely Sunni Syrian opposition. Once again, the region’s minorities feel threatened by outsiders’ geostrategic considerations pitting Iran and its Syrian and Hezbollah allies against the United States. Europe, and the Gulf monarchies. Will the Syria conflict, like so many earlier Middle East conflicts, end up undermining, the role and status of the Levant’s Christian and other minority communities? Randal will draw from his many decades covering Lebanon for the Washington Post and from his book about Lebanon’s civil war, Going All the Way: Christian Warlords, Israeli Adventurers and the War in Lebanon (1983, Viking Press) which has been reissued by Just World Books with an all-new preface as The Tragedy of Lebanon: Christian Warlords, Israeli Adventurers and American Bunglers.
Speaker: Toby Dodge, Consulting Senior Fellow for the Middle East, IISS
Venue: IISS-US, 2121 K Street NW, Suite 801, Washington, DC 20037
Dr Dodge will discuss the future of Iraqi politics.
Dr Toby Dodge is Consulting Senior Fellow for the Middle East at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. He is also a Reader in International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Dr Dodge has carried out extensive research in Iraq both before and after regime change, and has advised senior government officials on Iraq. He holds a PhD from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.
This meeting will be moderated by Andrew Parasiliti, Executive Director, IISS-US and Corresponding Director, IISS-Middle East.
IISS-US events are for IISS members and direct invitees only. For more information, please contact events-washington@iiss.org or (202) 659-1490.
6. Will Democratic Governance Take Hold in the Middle East? IRI, 3-5 pm May 10
9:00 am | Identifying the Hallmarks of 21st Century Conflict and How to Manage Conflict in Complex, Chaotic, and Fragile Environments
10:00 am | Results of the USIP-funded Peacebuilding Mapping Project
11:20 am | How Other Fields Manage Complexity — And What Peacebuilding Can Learn From Them
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