Shaping the future with think tanks

In 1993, the United Nations adopted the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women. Since then, various international norms and agreements have attempted to address the issues of gender-based violence and violence against women. Lars Engberg-Pedersen, Head of Unit and Senior Researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies, studied the evolution of those norms over time. How is violence against women framed in those international norms? Which actors are included or forgotten? Who has a responsibility to act?

Discussing his observations with Reem Alsalem, UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women, they address the current data on violence against women, the economic, social and political implications of women being subjected to violence, and the role of the international community to end this violence.

This episode is moderated by Hannah Reinl, co-lead of the Gender Programme for the think tank foraus and gender expert.

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Today, artificial intelligence is part of our everyday lives, from facial recognition tools to chatbots and algorithms. Discussions are ongoing about the need for a regulatory framework around AI to guarantee users’ safety and respect of fundamental rights.

In this episode, our two guest experts confront their views on the regulation of technologies directly impacting citizens: they discuss among others the challenges and expectations around the EU Artificial Intelligence Act and the impact of facial recognition on power relations. How to ensure the protection of fundamental rights when creating global norms around AI? 

A discussion between Alexandru Circiumaru, European Policy Lead for the Ada Lovelace Institute, and Ana Andrijevic, Ph.D candidate and research and teaching assistant at the Digital Law Center of the University of Geneva, moderated by Kevin Kohler, expert in cybersecurity politics and co-lead of the Programme Science&Technology for the think tank foraus.

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Evidence shows a clear asymmetry of knowledge production between countries from the Global South and the Global North. Research on public policies is mainly conducted and oriented by Northern players, while research institutions from the South are often left out of the dialogue on development issues.

How did the Covid-19 pandemic impacted the integration of Southern think tanks in knowledge production? Did it open new spaces and opportunities for research centres to play a more active role?

In this second episode, Darius Farman, head of the Think Tank Hub, moderates a discussion between Estefania Charvet,  head of Programmes at Southern Voice, a network of think tanks from the Global South, and Paul Ladd, director of UNRISD, the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development.

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Today, there are an estimated 10 million stateless people in the world. They either had to flee their country or have been denied citizenship. Without a passport or ID, they don’t have access to healthcare services, cannot vote or participate politically, cannot travel, drive or open a bank account. In sum, they are invisible and excluded from society.

What is the responsibility of states in this regard? What has been done by the international community to address this issue? This first episode offers a discussion with Eva Wuchold, programme director of the Social Rights Programme at the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung in Geneva.

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