Oxford Martin School: Public Lectures and Seminars: Recent Episodes
Oxford University
Public Lectures and Seminars from the Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford. The Oxford Martin School brings together the best minds from different fields to tackle the most pressing issues of the 21st century.
The Minister for Development and Africa, Andrew Mitchell MP, will join us to discuss how to address these challenges as well as seize new opportunities. The UK launched an international development White Paper in November 2023, setting out seven areas for action across a broad range of development themes and policy areas.The White Paper recognises the increasingly contested world we face, with a more complicated and fractured geopolitical environment. As the UK moves into implementing this vision, it will need to navigate this.The Minister for Development and Africa, Andrew Mitchell MP, will join us to discuss how to address these challenges as well as seize new opportunities.The panel will consider how to mobilise additional resources for genuine impact when fiscal and political conditions in the UK and traditional donor partners are unfavourable; how to work with new and emerging donors and balance the imperative for more funds against the UK’s commitment to its values; how to manoeuvre in the context of the wide choices of finance available to recipient countries, often with different terms and conditions; and how to balance a focus on climate mitigation, primarily in middle income countries, with finance to tackle extreme poverty and climate adaptation, primarily in the least developed countries.Panel:Rt Hon Andrew Mitchell MP, Minister for Development and AfricaProfessor Stefan Dercon, Co-Director, Oxford Martin Programme on African GovernanceDr Emily Jones, Associate Professor of Public Policy, Blavatnik School of GovernmentProfessor Ricardo Soares de Oliveira (Chair), Co-Director, Oxford Martin Programme on African Governance
Hannah Ritchie discusses her new book 'Not the end of the world' with Prof Charles Godfray. We are bombarded by doomsday headlines that tell us the soil won't be able to support crops, fish will vanish from our oceans, that we should reconsider having children.But in this talk, data scientist Hannah Ritchie, author of Not the End of the World: How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet will discuss with Professor Sir Charles Godfray, Director of the Oxford Martin School, that if we zoom out, a very different picture emerges.They will discuss how the data shows we've made so much progress on these problems, and so fast, that we could be on track to achieve true sustainability for the first time in history and we can build a better future for everyone.
Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator, explores the implications of growing paralysis, polarisation and uncertainty for a world in a race against time to achieve systemic and transformational change. Conflicts, climate change, rising inequalities…. the list of crises is long and growing.But it doesn’t really matter what we call this unprecedented moment in history, in which human activity has become the dominant force shaping the planet. Whether this is the “Anthropocene” – the Age of Humans – or the “Era of Poly-crises”, what matters is that it is real, changing our lives at extraordinary speed and challenging our post-war institutional architecture. At a time of unprecedented interdependence, are we losing our capacity for collective problem-solving and effective global governance? With the UN and Bretton Woods Institutions in the crosshairs of both governments and citizens for chronic failures in preventing conflict, climate change or the current financial/debt crisis, what hope is there for multilateralism in a multipopular world? How will citizens and institutions respond and what would it take to rebuild trust and confidence?Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator, will explore the implications of growing paralysis, polarisation and uncertainty for a world in a race against time to achieve systemic and transformational change. Drawing on a range of contemporary and contested policy arenas such as decarbonising our economies, reforming the international financial system and harnessing the disruptive power of technology and innovation, he will present ‘signals’ that imply fundamentally different future scenarios for ‘human security’ vs ‘national security’.Following his presentation, Achim Steiner will join Baroness Valerie Amos, Master of University College, to debate how paradigm shifts in geopolitics and economic orthodoxy can be achieved and how to build political movements and momentum - less focused on competition and confrontation and more on shared interest, cooperation and co-investing in our collective ability to tackle inequality and sustainability.
Adama Dieng, former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, July 2012 to July 2020, discusses the UN's role in the global collective responsibility to prevent genocide and other mass atrocities. Adama considers how the UN can learn from the past and take effective action to prevent mass violence set against a background of increasing commission of atrocity crimes globally, a rise in hate speech, identity-based discrimination and intolerance. He will also explore the UN's continued crucial role in de-escalating conflicts and the challenges that are preventing humanity from achieving its goal of a world without genocide and other atrocity crimes.
After a summer of extreme heatwaves, devastating wildfires and deadly flooding across the world, all made worse by climate change, the Rt Hon Sir Alok Sharma, President of COP26 in Glasgow 2021, will discuss the ongoing climate crisis. In the run up to COP28, Sir Alok will describe his hopes for the summit and his views on the future of the COP process, as well as the role of the UK in international climate policy. He will explore the importance of business in tackling climate change, and the challenges of financing the scale of climate action required. And climate action requires a facilitating political environment: how strong is the climate agenda and how much support does it have amongst citizens and in the private sector.Speaker: Rt Hon Sir Alok Sharma, President of COP26 in Glasgow 2021In conversation with: Professor Sir Charles Godfray, Director of the Oxford Martin School,
Yves Daccord, former CEO of the International Committee of the Red Cross, joins us at the Oxford Martin School. The history of humanitarianism is one of vulnerabilities, power, mobilisation and adaptation.This has been true since humanitarian aid became an industry in its own right and continues to be so today.The reaffirmed sovereignty of states, the zero risk practices of the major donors, and the rapidly changing needs and expectations of people and communities affected by wars and disasters are all challenges to the relevance of international humanitarian action. From Kiev to Damascus, from Bamako to New York, the adaptation of the humanitarian organisations will have to be radical. Join Yves Daccord, Executive Chairman of the Edgelands Institute & Former CEO of the International Committee of the Red Cross, as he asks 'is that still possible?'.
A discussion on leaders and populism with Lord Patten, Gideon Rachman, Margaret MacMillan and Ricardo Soares de Oliveira Since the beginning of the millennium, when Vladimir Putin took power in Russia, authoritarian leaders have come to dominate global politics.Self-styled strongmen have risen to power in Moscow, Beijing, Delhi, Brasilia, Budapest, Ankara, Riyadh and Washington. These leaders are nationalists and social conservatives, with little tolerance for minorities, dissent or the interests of foreigners. At home, they encourage a cult of personality and claim to stand up for ordinary people against globalist elites; abroad, they posture as the embodiments of their nations. And they are not just operating in authoritarian political systems but have begun to emerge in the heartlands of liberal democracy.This panel’s distinguished speakers will address the following questions: How and why did this new style of strongman leadership arrive? How likely is it to lead to global war or economic collapse? Most pressingly, we will be asking: are liberal societies, beset by internal turmoil and their own strongman dynamics, capable of checking and reversing this trend?This was a joint event with the Oxford Martin Programme on African Governance.
Nick Westcott, Director of the Royal African Society, discusses the African State. African states have been in flux since long before colonial powers carved up the continent into bite-sized chunks at the end of the 19th century.In the 60 years since most became independent, new trends have emerged. Some have reflected history, both colonial and pre-colonial, from ethnic rivalries and migrating populations to authoritarian structures, extractive institutions and irrational borders.Others reflect new dynamics both local and global - economic imbalances, demographic dynamism, changing climate and a changing balance of global power. But in particular there is a shift in the ideological basis of the state: how do people view it, what do they expect and what do governments think they should do?This is a joint event with the Oxford Martin Programme on African Governance
In this event chaired by Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, Oliver Bullough discusses his best selling and critically acclaimed book, 'Butler to the World: How Britain Became the Servant of Tycoons, Tax Dodgers, Kleptocrats and Criminals'. In Butler to the World, Bullough reveals how the UK has become a hospitable location for oligarchs and kleptocrats from all over the world - a place where they can hide their monies, build respectable reputations on the back of philanthropy and party donations, and influence those in power. From professional facilitators to politicians, Bullough’s book asks searing questions about today's political and economic life in the United Kingdom.
MPs Andrew Mitchell and Margaret Hodge discuss illicit finance and their work on improving regulations. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and resulting sanctions regime has shed light on the United Kingdom’s harbouring of illicit wealth from around the world.
It has also revealed the centrality of enablers in the legal and financial sectors in laundering oligarchs’ monies and reputations. As co-chairs of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Responsible Tax, Andrew Mitchell and Margaret Hodge have been at the forefront of the UK’s fight against dirty money, illicit finance and money laundering.
In this event, Andrew Mitchell and Margaret Hodge will discuss with Ricardo Soares de Oliveira and John Heathershaw past attempts at curbing professional facilitators, the inadequacy of present regulations and the prospect of improvement through the upcoming Economic Crime Bill, among other ongoing efforts. Most pressingly, they will be asking: after a decade of signalling reform intent, is change really about to happen?
Claire Craig and Sarah Dillon discuss their new book. There is an urgent need to take stories seriously in order to improve public reasoning.
The challenges of using scientific evidence, of distinguishing news from fake news, and of acting well in anticipation of highly uncertain futures, are more visible now than ever before. Across all these areas of public reasoning, stories create profound new knowledge and so deserve to be taken seriously.
The two authors, Claire Craig, Provost of The Queen’s College, and Sarah Dillon, Professor of Literature and the Public Humanities at the University of Cambridge, talk to Charles Godfray, Director of the Oxford Martin School, about their theory and practice of listening to narratives where decisions are strongly influenced by contentious knowledge and powerful imaginings in areas such as climate change, artificial intelligence, the economy, and nuclear weapons and power.
The event launched a book by the Emerging Markets Forum (EMF), a Washington DC based not-for-profit think tank focused on emerging economies. The book takes a long-term perspective of emerging market economies through 2060. It highlights some of the fundamental and structural changes in the global economy accelerated by the pandemic as well as changes in geopolitics. It looks at the global megatrends, and the key issues such as climate change, rising inequality and inequities, fragility of international monetary system as well as rapid technological changes and their impact on the way we work that will heavily impact the future direction of most economies and societies. Finally, the volume highlights the fact that while many of the issues highlighted require joint actions at the global level, the current multilateral system is no longer geared to tackle them. It needs a major revamp as does the global economic governance.
Harinder Kohli, Founding Director of EMF and primary editor of the book, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, former Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission and G-20 Sherpa of India, and Sir Suma Chakrabarti, Chairman of ODI and former President of EBRD discuss the book, chaired by Ian Goldin.
This talk is organised by the Oxford Martin School and the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Development.
Dr Leroy Hood, CEO of Phenome Health, discusses his strategy for precision population health If one takes a systems approach to healthcare, it is obvious that it should be predictive, preventive, personalised and participatory (P4).
This can be accomplished, in part, by a vision which includes following the health trajectory of each individual with a data-driven (genome/longitudinal phenome) approach to, after proper analyses, optimise wellness and avoid disease. This is the essence of what precision population health should be. To achieve this object, Dr Leroy Hood, CEO of Phenome Health, has proposed a “2nd human genome project”, termed Beyond the Human Genome, to analyse the genomes and longitudinal phenomes of one million individuals over 10 years with federal support. He has founded a non-profit company, Phenome Health, to develop the strategies and accumulate effective partners to carry out this initiative, which he will discuss in this talk.
The first three Ps have to do with science and they lead to what Dr Hood calls the science of wellness and prevention. The fourth P, 'participatory', has to do with education, psychology and sociology and is by far the most difficult to achieve. How does one persuade patients, physicians, healthcare leaders, regulators, and industrial members of the current healthcare ecosystems to accept this paradigm change in how medicine is practiced?
One clear need is a broad-scale education program to bring an understanding of just what P4 medicine is and how it can be achieved through the Beyond the Human Genome project. A second approach is to offer viable solutions to each of the five largest challenges of contemporary medicine - quality, ageing population, exploding chronic diseases, racial equity and excessive costs. The 10-year demonstration project of Beyond the Human Genome will provide striking new solutions to each of these challenges, as Dr Hood will discuss.
Stefan Dercon talks about his new book, with further discussion from David Pilling (Financial Times) and Melinda Bohannon (FCDO) In the last thirty years, the developing world has undergone tremendous changes. Overall, poverty has fallen, people live longer and healthier lives, and economies have been transformed.
And yet many countries have simply missed the boat. Oxford’s Stefan Dercon’s new book, “Gambling on Development: Why some countries win and others lose”, asks why it is that some of the previously poorest countries have prospered, while others have failed.
Stefan argues that the answer lies not in a specific set of policies, but rather in a key ‘development bargain’, whereby a country’s elites shift from protecting their own positions to gambling on a growth-based future. Despite the imperfections of such bargains, China is among the most striking recent success stories, along with Indonesia and more unlikely places, such as Bangladesh, Ghana and, tentatively, Ethiopia. Gambling on Development is about these winning efforts, in contrast to countries stuck in elite bargains leading nowhere.
At the talk, he is joined by David Pilling (Financial Times), Melinda Bohannon, (Director of Strategy at FCDO) and Ricardo Soares de Oliveira (Oxford University).
The event will debate some of the themes of the book: how economics and politics are deeply connected, how naïve policy prescriptions distract, how international policies and aid can help or distort, but also the remarkable role played in some countries by leading groups and individuals to drive progress, and the failures of local elites elsewhere.
Dr Tara Garnett (director of TABLE and fellow of the Oxford Martin School) in conversation with Dr Helena Wright, Dr Pablo Manzano and Dan Blaustein-Rejto, discuss livestock systems and greenhouse gas emissions. The food system generates around a third of human-made greenhouse gas emissions, with about half of these attributable to animal production; and yet food was markedly absent from official discussions at COP26. This, for many analysts, represented not only a major climate-relevant omission but also a missed opportunity for reshaping the food system in ways that could achieve broader set of social, environmental and economic benefits. That said, some of the major commitments agreed at the 2021 COP – notably around deforestation and methane – will, if implemented, require action from the livestock sector, and many activists are hoping that COP27 will see a far greater focus on livestock-related concerns than has been the case so far. But what exactly is the livestock problem that needs to be addressed? For some, the ongoing trend towards large-scale, capital-intensive, high density livestock production is the major issue. For others, this trend towards intensification is to be welcomed, since, it is argued, they are far more environmentally efficient than the traditional, extensive and low yielding systems they replace. And then there is the question of appetite. Is our growing demand for meat a given, and the challenge a matter of meeting this demand at least environmental cost; or are robust policies needed to incentivise a shift towards more plant-based, lower impact diets? Is everyone actually missing the point, using overly simplistic metrics to assess the environmental goods and bads of livestock production, and in so doing failing to recognise the numerous ecological, social, economic and cultural benefits of certain livestock systems and the importance of foregrounding equity and food sovereignty in discussions about livestock?
Dr Tara Garnett (director of TABLE and fellow of the Oxford Martin School) in conversation with Dr Helena Wright, Policy Director at the FAIRR Initiative, Dr Pablo Manzano, Ikerbasque Research Fellow at the Basque Centre for Climate Change, and Dan Blaustein-Rejto, Director of Food and Agriculture at the Breakthrough Institute.
This is a joint event with TABLE and the Oxford Martin School
Sir Dieter Helm discusses how we could shift to a sustainable economy. What would have to happen for this generation to live within its environmental means and to bequeath to the next generation a set of assets at least as good as it inherited?
What would the sustainable economy look like? How do we stop climate change and biodiversity loss?
Consumption would have to be on a sustainable growth path, having first ensured the proper capital maintenance of the infrastructures and the natural capitals. Polluters would have to pay, with prices reflecting the full costs of the pollution causes to make the stuff for us the ultimate polluters. Economic growth, driven by technological progress and ideas would continue, once the economy was put back to the sustainable level of consumption.
This would be very different from what happens now. The focus would not be on Keynesian boosts to aggregate demand, borrowing for current consumption, and quantitative easing. Living within our - and hence the environment's means - would mean radical shifts in our life styles, changes to national accounting and to the frameworks of economic policy.
Getting to the sustainable economy would be politically very difficult, but not doing so risks lots for climate change and further considerable destruction of biodiversity. Continuing on our current path is unsustainable: hence it will not be sustained.
Alison Wolf, Ian Stuart and Sir Chris Husbands join Sir Paul Collier to discuss vocational skills and the economy. This country has been worrying about vocational skills since the late 19th century. Since then we have had one government initiative after another, yet employers' complaints about skill shortages have steadily increased. At the same time, the country has continued to grow economically: so sceptics might wonder if there is really a crisis at all. This conversation brings three expert academic and practitioner perspectives on this vital issue.
Alison Wolf (Baroness Wolf of Dulwich) is Sir Roy Griffiths Professor of Public Sector Management at King's College London and a nationally recognized academic authority on skills and education. Sir Chris Husbands, is Vice-Chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University, where he has pioneered vocational training, now recognized nationally in its top-rated reputation with students. Ian Stuart is the Chief Executive of HSBC, which has just pioneered bank relocation out of London, moving its HQ to Birmingham. There, it will become a major employer of skilled jobs; and as one of Britain’s top banks for SMEs in the Midlands and North, has practical experience of whether the skills needed for entrepreneurship and in place.
This discussion brings together the editors of a special issue of the Oxford Review of Economic Policy on Capitalism. Rising levels of inequality, social exclusion, environmental degradation and political divisiveness are a of source growing disillusionment with our capitalist system. The OxREP issue includes articles by leading economists from around the world on the problems with the existing system and the changes that need to be made to address them. At the heart of the arguments presented is the notion of cohesive communities and societies, and their role alongside globalisation, privatisation and financialisation in restoring trust in capitalism.
Join Professor Kingsley Moghalu, Oxford Martin Visiting Fellow on the Oxford Martin Programme on African Governance and former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, as he discusses the challenges and opportunities of Nigeria's political economy Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country and the continent’s largest economy, is populated by dynamic and talented citizens, but has faced steep challenges in development, leadership and governance. Poverty is widespread. The country is currently embattled by terrorism, general insecurity, a depressed economy, and by challenges from separatist agitations to the existential legitimacy of the Nigerian state.
How can Nigeria achieve transformation economically and politically? Taking a political economy approach into the Nigerian conundrum, this public lecture by Professor Kingsley Moghalu, Visiting Fellow at the University of Oxford’s Oxford Martin School, examines how the West African country’s foundation as a British colony, and contemporary challenges of nationhood and political order formation, the resource curse of oil, corruption, and the absence of a strong leadership culture have created incentives for Nigeria’s current dysfunction. He identifies not just seven critical challenges, but also offers seven paths to reform and a longer term resolution of the country’s political and economic challenges. The result, if his prescriptions happen, could be the long-delayed emergence of Africa’s first truly indigenous global power.
Join Ron Emerson, Chairman of Bank North, & Professor Colin Mayer, Lead Researcher on the Oxford Martin Initiative on Regional Levelling-up, as they discuss the above and in what ways does Bank North’s business model address these needs? The UK has the most extreme regional inequalities in the OECD and one of the most centralised governance and financial systems all controlled from London.
How can the finance and banking world help level the playing field and shift all focus and control away from London? When it comes to finance and banking - why are they so important to levelling up? What has gone wrong with local access to finance? And what is needed to resolve this problem?
Dave Smith, Chief Executive of South Yorkshire City-Region Authority and Colin Mayer, Professor of Finance, discuss how South Yorkshire can forge a strategy for change. South Yorkshire, crucible of the Industrial Revolution, was once a proud, prosperous and highly-skilled society. In the 1980s its two major industries collapsed and it is now the poorest region in England.
It still has huge assets, including coherence between its economic geography and its political organisation. It has a nationally-central and under-utilised logistics hub at Doncaster, with fast road, rail, air and port connections. In the public sector it has two top-rated universities, and excellent teaching hospitals. In the private sector it has major clusters of SMEs, including a network of 800 IT firms. It has a vibrant civil society, with world-leading social enterprises. In other countries, similarly hit cities have revived.
Join Dave Smith and Colin Mayer as they discuss opportunities and challenges for the region.
Dr Alexandra Zimmermann, WildCRU, discusses the challenges of managing conflict between different groups in order to protect wildlife and natural resources The conservation of biodiversity and natural resources is unavoidably about managing conflicts between groups of people.To be able to withstand the additional pressures and impacts from climate change and the pandemic, conservation efforts need to become adept at preventing and mitigating conflicts over protected areas, wildlife, and access to natural resources. Tensions frequently arise over access to land, resources and benefits from protected areas, the management of wildlife, sustainable use, livelihoods, development, and social justice. The UN Convention on Biological Diversity’s 2050 Vision of ‘Living in Harmony with Nature’ envisages a world in which such environmental conflicts are much reduced. However, to reach this aspirational goal, managing and preventing conflicts over biodiversity is essential if global ambitions of nature recovery and sustainable coexistence are to become reality.
Join Dr Alexandra Zimmermann & Professor David Macdonald, from WildCRU, as they discuss the drivers, levels and characteristics of conflicts over biodiversity and explore what can be learned and adapted from the fields of conflict analysis, negotiation and resolution to improve our collective capacity to manage biodiversity conflicts effectively. This talk is a joint event with the Oxford Martin Programme on Natural Governance.
Diane Coyle and Ian Goldin discuss Diane's new book 'Cogs and Monsters' and how economics can face the challenges of technological change. Digital technology is disruptive, and it is not sparing economics from that disruption. What are the challenges facing economics and economists in the post-financial crisis, post-pandemic, world as they respond to fundamental structural changes?
Digital technology, big data, big tech, machine learning, and AI are revolutionising both the tools of economics and the phenomena it seeks to measure, understand, and shape.
In this talk Diane Coyle, Author of Cogs and Monsters, and Professor Ian Goldin, Director of the Oxford Martin Programme on Technological and Economic Change, will explore the enormous problems - but also opportunities - facing economics today if it is to respond effectively to these dizzying changes and help policymakers solve the world’s crises, from pandemic recovery and inequality to slow growth and the climate emergency.
Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme, speaks to the implications of the Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity, and how we can begin the journey to re-shape our economies, working with nature, not against it. Even as we seek to overcome the global pandemic, humanity faces three planetary crisis that threaten our future - the climate crisis, the biodiversity crisis, and the pollution and waste crisis – driven by decades of relentless and unsustainable consumption and production. In an important year for multilateral governance for the environment, Ms Andersen will address how the Dasgupta Review's findings can influence the finalisation of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, and open up financing for nature-based solutions, which must feature extensively in the updated and stretched Nationally Determined Contributions, to be submitted ahead of COP26 in Glasgow later this year. And finally, in this pivotal year, with countries making unprecedented investments to kick-start economies, and protect livelihoods, how can we use the Review’s findings to inform global efforts to “recover better” from the pandemic?
Join Professor Chris Dye, author of The Great Health Dilemma, and Professor Salim Abdool Karim, Director of CAPRISA, as they discuss ways to invest more money and effort in health promotion and prevention around the world today.
Join us for a conversation between the author of the Economics of Biodiversity Review, Sir Partha Dasgupta, and Professor Cameron Hepburn, where they will discuss the important messages from the review and the road ahead.
in most countries conservation of leopards is dependent on trans-boundary collaboration. In this talk, Dr Mohammad Farhadinia explores the critical role of mountains for biodiversity conservation amidst international political concerns.
The speakers explore the various approaches being proposed to store and preserve CO2 in the ocean, many inspired by mechanisms known to function naturally in the past, and assess the challenges and research hurdles for their implementation in the future. The modern ocean contains an enormous (38000 GtC) reservoir of carbon in dissolved form.
Recent geological history shows that the oceans have repeatedly absorbed CO2 from the atmosphere during the periodic glacial periods and released it during the warm interglacial periods. This additional capacity for CO2 storage, untapped in the modern, is on the order of 800 GtC, an amount equivalent to that which needs to be sequestered in the coming decades to attain net zero.
Net zero targets are proliferating across the world, covering not only countries but also business, investors, cities, states and provinces, universities, and many others. But are these targets credible? And how can we ensure they lead to change? A new report sheds light on both the scope and, critically, the quality of the groundswell of net zero targets globally.
Join Professor Thomas Hale, Blavatnik School of Government, Dr Aoife Brophy, Saïd Business School & Dr Steve Smith, Net Zero Initiative, in the ninth talk of the Oxford net zero: climate in the balance series of discussions.
In this conversation, Sir John Armitt, who is chair of the National Infrastructure Commission, joins Professor Jim Hall to explore the vision and practicalities of providing infrastructure systems that meets society’s goals.
In this presentation, Professor John Vucetich & Professor David MacDonald, will examine how the terms “ecosystem health” and “endangered species” are underdetermined to the point of being increasingly problematic for advancing real-world conservation Many real-world conservation issues are also treated as negotiations between those who are for and against conservation, where the effort is either discovering a win-win outcome or the assertion of political power for some particular win-lose outcome. These hyper-political environments distract from steep ethical trade-offs that rise from the inevitable conflicts about four basic goals: conservation, social justice, animal welfare, and increased agricultural production. The best outcomes almost certainly require that more of society’s leaders become more facile with the ethical dimensions of these trade-offs.
In conversation with Charles Godfray, Martin Rees will explore how the global experience of the COVID-19 pandemic might change the way societies and policymakers grapple with the major challenges of the 21st century.
Economists Paul Collier and John Kay discuss their book, Greed is Dead, with Sir Charles Godfray Throughout history, successful societies have created institutions which channel both competition and co-operation to achieve complex goals of general benefit.
These institutions make the difference between societies that thrive and those paralysed by discord, the difference between prosperous and poor economies. In their 2020 book, Greed is Dead, the leading economists Paul Collier and John Kay argue that extreme individualism has today weakened co-operation and polarised our politics, and call for a reaffirmation of the values of mutuality across the social, political and business spheres.
In conversation with Charles Godfray, the authors will develop this argument and explore how the experience of the global pandemic may affect how societies and policymakers view the balance between individualism and mutuality.
Economists Paul Collier and John Kay discuss their book, Greed is Dead, with Sir Charles Godfray Throughout history, successful societies have created institutions which channel both competition and co-operation to achieve complex goals of general benefit.
These institutions make the difference between societies that thrive and those paralysed by discord, the difference between prosperous and poor economies. In their 2020 book, Greed is Dead, the leading economists Paul Collier and John Kay argue that extreme individualism has today weakened co-operation and polarised our politics, and call for a reaffirmation of the values of mutuality across the social, political and business spheres.
In conversation with Charles Godfray, the authors will develop this argument and explore how the experience of the global pandemic may affect how societies and policymakers view the balance between individualism and mutuality.
Join Nick Eyre and Steve Smith for a discussion on a renewable energy, energy efficiency and carbon emissions. The combustion of fossil fuels is responsible for the most greenhouse gas emissions, particularly in industrialised countries.
Systemic change in energy systems is therefore a critical component of any net-zero agenda. It is a huge global challenge, but recent developments give cause for optimism that a Green Industrial Revolution is possible.
Join Professor Nick Eyre, Lead Researcher, Oxford Martin Programme on Integrating Renewable Energy, where he will discuss with Dr Steve Smith, Executive Director of Oxford Net Zero, how the declining costs of renewable electricity mean they can provide cheap mitigation, as well as enabling major improvements in energy efficiency, so that the total amount of energy that will need to be decarbonised is much lower than often projected.
Join Nick Eyre and Steve Smith for a discussion on a renewable energy, energy efficiency and carbon emissions. The combustion of fossil fuels is responsible for the most greenhouse gas emissions, particularly in industrialised countries.
Systemic change in energy systems is therefore a critical component of any net-zero agenda. It is a huge global challenge, but recent developments give cause for optimism that a Green Industrial Revolution is possible.
Join Professor Nick Eyre, Lead Researcher, Oxford Martin Programme on Integrating Renewable Energy, where he will discuss with Dr Steve Smith, Executive Director of Oxford Net Zero, how the declining costs of renewable electricity mean they can provide cheap mitigation, as well as enabling major improvements in energy efficiency, so that the total amount of energy that will need to be decarbonised is much lower than often projected.
The first discussion in the Oxford Net Zero Series, hosted by the Oxford Martin School, hones in on the fundamental motivation of the research programme: ‘Why net zero? Join the Oxford Net Zero Initiative’s Research Director, Professor Sam Fankhauser; Director, Professor Myles Allen; Net Zero Policy Engagement Fellow, Kaya Axelsson as they discuss with the Chair, Executive Director. Dr Steve Smith, the meaning of the word ‘net’ in net zero, reviewing what is needed to mitigate global warming, as and before we fully phase out activities that generate greenhouse gas emissions.
The discussion will explore the framing opportunities and challenges that the term ‘net-zero’ offers for science, policy, and advocacy informing effective climate action, as well as the innovation required at scale to achieve the global goal.
The first discussion in the Oxford Net Zero Series, hosted by the Oxford Martin School, hones in on the fundamental motivation of the research programme: ‘Why net zero? Join the Oxford Net Zero Initiative’s Research Director, Professor Sam Fankhauser; Director, Professor Myles Allen; Net Zero Policy Engagement Fellow, Kaya Axelsson as they discuss with the Chair, Executive Director. Dr Steve Smith, the meaning of the word ‘net’ in net zero, reviewing what is needed to mitigate global warming, as and before we fully phase out activities that generate greenhouse gas emissions.
The discussion will explore the framing opportunities and challenges that the term ‘net-zero’ offers for science, policy, and advocacy informing effective climate action, as well as the innovation required at scale to achieve the global goal.
Why is it important to understand the 3-D structures of protein, why are they difficult to construct, and what is the nature of AlphaFold’s advance? Why is this so exciting and what further advances in medicine and the other biosciences may result? On the 30th November it was announced that the Artificial Intelligence computer programme AlphaFold had made a decisive breakthrough in the determination of the 3-D structures of proteins.
The announcement was immediately hailed as one of the major scientific advances of the decade. To find out why, join a conversation between Yvonne Jones, Director, Cancer Research UK Receptor Structure Research Group, Professor Phil Biggin, Professor of Computational Biochemistry, and Charles Godfray, Director, Oxford Martin School, who will explore these fascinating issues.
Professor Gina Neff discusses artificial intelligence and data work, and the ethical and social implications of integrating these tools into organisations. What happens when new artificial intelligence (AI) tools are integrated into organisations around the world?
For example, digital medicine promises to combine emerging and novel sources of data and new analysis techniques like AI and machine learning to improve diagnosis, care delivery and condition management. But healthcare workers find themselves at the frontlines of figuring out new ways to care for patients through, with - and sometimes despite - their data. Paradoxically, new data-intensive tasks required to make AI work are often seen as of secondary importance. Gina calls these tasks data work, and her team studied how data work is changing in Danish & US hospitals (Moller, Bossen, Pine, Nielsen and Neff, forthcoming ACM Interactions).
Based on critical data studies and organisational ethnography, this talk will argue that while advances in AI have sparked scholarly and public attention to the challenges of the ethical design of technologies, less attention has been focused on the requirements for their ethical use. Unfortunately, this means that the hidden talents and secret logics that fuel successful AI projects are undervalued and successful AI projects continue to be seen as technological, not social, accomplishments.
In this talk Professor Gina Neff, Oxford Internet Institute and Professor Ian Goldin, Oxford Martin School, will examine publicly known “failures” of AI systems to show how this gap between design and use creates dangerous oversights and to develop a framework to predict where and how these oversights emerge. The resulting framework can help scholars and practitioners to query AI tools to show who and whose goals are being achieved or promised through, what structured performance using what division of labour, under whose control and at whose expense. In this way, data work becomes an analytical lens on the power of social institutions for shaping technologies-in-practice.
Professor Gina Neff discusses artificial intelligence and data work, and the ethical and social implications of integrating these tools into organisations. What happens when new artificial intelligence (AI) tools are integrated into organisations around the world?
For example, digital medicine promises to combine emerging and novel sources of data and new analysis techniques like AI and machine learning to improve diagnosis, care delivery and condition management. But healthcare workers find themselves at the frontlines of figuring out new ways to care for patients through, with - and sometimes despite - their data. Paradoxically, new data-intensive tasks required to make AI work are often seen as of secondary importance. Gina calls these tasks data work, and her team studied how data work is changing in Danish & US hospitals (Moller, Bossen, Pine, Nielsen and Neff, forthcoming ACM Interactions).
Based on critical data studies and organisational ethnography, this talk will argue that while advances in AI have sparked scholarly and public attention to the challenges of the ethical design of technologies, less attention has been focused on the requirements for their ethical use. Unfortunately, this means that the hidden talents and secret logics that fuel successful AI projects are undervalued and successful AI projects continue to be seen as technological, not social, accomplishments.
In this talk Professor Gina Neff, Oxford Internet Institute and Professor Ian Goldin, Oxford Martin School, will examine publicly known “failures” of AI systems to show how this gap between design and use creates dangerous oversights and to develop a framework to predict where and how these oversights emerge. The resulting framework can help scholars and practitioners to query AI tools to show who and whose goals are being achieved or promised through, what structured performance using what division of labour, under whose control and at whose expense. In this way, data work becomes an analytical lens on the power of social institutions for shaping technologies-in-practice.
Prof Susan Jebb and Sir Charles Godfray discuss the possible implications of the pandemic on health policy and tackling obesity. The current covid-19 pandemic has focussed attention on the variability in personal risk of serious illness. After age and ethnicity, one of the most important factors associated with developing serious covid complications, requiring admission to hospital or ICU, is being overweight.
Excess weight has long been known to be a risk factor for ill-health, though governments have rarely encouraged weight loss, and have even been cautious about interventions which may help to prevent obesity developing, for fear of accusations of ‘nannying’ or because of opposition by the food industry. However covid-19 seems to have sparked a notable change. In the United Kingdom, the Prime Minister, who acknowledges he is overweight, suffered complications from covid-19, and since his recovery has launched a new government plan to tackle obesity. This offers more support to people trying to lose weight and promises much greater action to curb unhealthy eating habits.
Professor Susan Jebb is a nutrition scientist with a special interest in designing and testing public health interventions to prevent and treat obesity. In this conversation, we shall explore the policy options available to governments and other bodies to tackle obesity and ask whether, as we emerge from the pandemic, there will be a new focus on the benefits of a healthy body weight.
Prof Susan Jebb and Sir Charles Godfray discuss the possible implications of the pandemic on health policy and tackling obesity. The current covid-19 pandemic has focussed attention on the variability in personal risk of serious illness. After age and ethnicity, one of the most important factors associated with developing serious covid complications, requiring admission to hospital or ICU, is being overweight.
Excess weight has long been known to be a risk factor for ill-health, though governments have rarely encouraged weight loss, and have even been cautious about interventions which may help to prevent obesity developing, for fear of accusations of ‘nannying’ or because of opposition by the food industry. However covid-19 seems to have sparked a notable change. In the United Kingdom, the Prime Minister, who acknowledges he is overweight, suffered complications from covid-19, and since his recovery has launched a new government plan to tackle obesity. This offers more support to people trying to lose weight and promises much greater action to curb unhealthy eating habits.
Professor Susan Jebb is a nutrition scientist with a special interest in designing and testing public health interventions to prevent and treat obesity. In this conversation, we shall explore the policy options available to governments and other bodies to tackle obesity and ask whether, as we emerge from the pandemic, there will be a new focus on the benefits of a healthy body weight.
Join Professor Chas Bountra, Professor of Translational Medicine and Professor Sir Charles Godfray as they discuss how the healthcare system has had to adapt due to the Covid-19 pandemic and what this means in the future.
Professor Jeff Sachs discusses his new book 'The Ages of Globalization' with Professor Ian Goldin. We are justified to say that we are living through a new age of globalisation, which Professor Jeff Sachs calls the Digital Age. The hugely disruptive changes were already with us before Covid-19, but now we’ve been hurled head-first into the new age.
It is marked by enormous geopolitical, technological, and environmental disruptions, posing great risks as well as opportunities. To understand the Digital Age better, it is enormously valuable to gain a historical perspective.
Professor Jeff Sachs' new book The Ages of Globalization and this talk, explores the interactions of technology, geography, and institutions throughout human history, describing seven ages of globalisation and the nature of societal change from one age to the next.
Professor Jeff Sachs discusses his new book 'The Ages of Globalization' with Professor Ian Goldin. We are justified to say that we are living through a new age of globalisation, which Professor Jeff Sachs calls the Digital Age. The hugely disruptive changes were already with us before Covid-19, but now we’ve been hurled head-first into the new age.
It is marked by enormous geopolitical, technological, and environmental disruptions, posing great risks as well as opportunities. To understand the Digital Age better, it is enormously valuable to gain a historical perspective.
Professor Jeff Sachs' new book The Ages of Globalization and this talk, explores the interactions of technology, geography, and institutions throughout human history, describing seven ages of globalisation and the nature of societal change from one age to the next.
Christophe Fraser of Oxford’s Big Data Institute, who advises the UK’s NHS COVID-19 Tracing app, and Prof Oliver Pybus discuss the opportunities and challenges of successfully applying new technologies to pandemics past, present, and future. The COVID-19 pandemic has become a defining event of the 21st century.
New technologies such as ubiquitous smartphones and virus genome sequencing offer powerful new ways to understand virus transmission and to tackle the problem of epidemic spread. But can those new tools be deployed fast enough to make a real difference to public health? And can we balance the need for privacy with the life-saving benefits of understanding how transmission occurs?
Christophe Fraser of Oxford’s Big Data Institute, who advises the UK’s NHS COVID-19 Tracing app, and Prof Oliver Pybus discuss the opportunities and challenges of successfully applying new technologies to pandemics past, present, and future. The COVID-19 pandemic has become a defining event of the 21st century.
New technologies such as ubiquitous smartphones and virus genome sequencing offer powerful new ways to understand virus transmission and to tackle the problem of epidemic spread. But can those new tools be deployed fast enough to make a real difference to public health? And can we balance the need for privacy with the life-saving benefits of understanding how transmission occurs?
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in unprecedented disruptions to urban mobility systems across the globe yet also presented unique opportunities for people to drive less, walk/cycle more and reduce carbon emissions. Join Professor Tim Schwanen (Director of the Transport Studies Unit and Lead Researcher on the Oxford Martin Programme on Informal Cities), Dr Jennie Middleton (Senior Research Fellow in Mobilities and Human Geography in the Transport Studies Unit, University of Oxford) and Professor Jim Hall (Professor of Climate and Environmental Risk, Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford) as they discuss post-pandemic mobility futures in relation to the re-imagining of transport systems across different geographical scales and contexts.
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in unprecedented disruptions to urban mobility systems across the globe yet also presented unique opportunities for people to drive less, walk/cycle more and reduce carbon emissions. Join Professor Tim Schwanen (Director of the Transport Studies Unit and Lead Researcher on the Oxford Martin Programme on Informal Cities), Dr Jennie Middleton (Senior Research Fellow in Mobilities and Human Geography in the Transport Studies Unit, University of Oxford) and Professor Jim Hall (Professor of Climate and Environmental Risk, Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford) as they discuss post-pandemic mobility futures in relation to the re-imagining of transport systems across different geographical scales and contexts.
Professor Ian Goldin, Professor of Globalisation and Development at Oxford University, discusses his new book 'Terra Incognita: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years' Expert in globalisation and development, Professor Ian Goldin uses state-of-the-art maps to show humanity’s impact on the planet and demonstrate how we can save it and thrive as a species. He has traced the paths of peoples, cities, wars, climates and technologies on a global scale in his new book Terra Incognita: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years, which he co-authored with Robert Muggah.
In this book talk he will demonstrate the impact of climate change and rises in sea level on cities around the world, the truth about immigration, the future of population growth, trends in health and education, and the realities of inequality and how to end it.
Professor Ian Goldin, Professor of Globalisation and Development at Oxford University, discusses his new book 'Terra Incognita: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years' Expert in globalisation and development, Professor Ian Goldin uses state-of-the-art maps to show humanity’s impact on the planet and demonstrate how we can save it and thrive as a species. He has traced the paths of peoples, cities, wars, climates and technologies on a global scale in his new book Terra Incognita: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years, which he co-authored with Robert Muggah.
In this book talk he will demonstrate the impact of climate change and rises in sea level on cities around the world, the truth about immigration, the future of population growth, trends in health and education, and the realities of inequality and how to end it.
Dr Julia Giese, Bank of England, discusses the impact of Covid-19 on the financial system and how banks can play their part in economic recovery. Date 14 October 2020, 12:30pm - 1:30pm
Location Online
Event Recording:
COVID-19 has caused a global collapse in activity and loss of jobs that is probably unprecedented in its scale and speed.
Small and large businesses across every country in the world have had to close their doors to customers and employees. The sharp accompanying decrease in firms’ revenues and households’ incomes will result in the first global recession since 2009. It will also present the global financial system with its largest stress event since at least the global financial crisis.
Dr Julia Giese, Bank of England, and Professor Cameron Hepburn, INET Oxford, will discuss that banks are now part of the solution, rather than part of the problem, thanks to regulatory and institutional reforms over the past decade. Heeding the lessons from the Global Financial Crisis has paid dividends. They will outline some early lessons from the COVID-19 crisis for the financial system going forward.
This talk is in conjunction with The Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford and the Oxford Review of Economic Policy.
Professor Sarah Smith, Professor Almudena Sevilla and Professor Cameron Hepburn discuss the gender division of childcare during the covid-19 pandemic, and the impact of this on welfare and employment. The nature and scale of the shocks to the demand for, and the supply of, home childcare during the COVID-19 pandemic provide a unique opportunity to increase our understanding of the division of home labour and the determinants of specialisation within the household.
Real-time data was collected on daily lives to document the impact of measures to control COVID-19 on UK families with children under the age of 12. This documented that these families have been doing the equivalent of a working week in childcare, with mothers bearing most of the burden.
The additional hours of childcare done by women are less sensitive to their employment than they are for men, leaving many women juggling work and (a lot more) childcare, with likely adverse effects on their mental health and future careers. However, some households, those in which men have not been working, have taken greater steps towards an equal allocation, offering the prospect of sharing the burden of childcare more equally in the future.
Join Professor Sarah Smith, Professor of Economics from the University of Bristol, Professor Almudena Sevilla, Professor in Economics and Public Policy at UCL, and Professor Cameron Hepburn where they will discuss the implications of these findings and what the future will hold.
This talk is in conjunction with The Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford and the Oxford Review of Economic Policy.
Carissa Véliz discusses her new book 'Privacy is Power', focusing on the importance of understanding how our data is used and how we can protect our privacy. Have you ever been denied insurance, a loan, or a job? Have you had your credit card number stolen? Do you have to wait too long when you call customer service? You might have the data economy to thank for all that and more.
Digital technology is stealing our personal data and with it our power to make free choices. To reclaim that power, and our democracy, we must take back control of our personal data. Surveillance is undermining equality. We are being treated differently on the basis of our data. But what can we do?
Join the author of Privacy is Power: Why and How You Should Take Back Control of Your Data, Carissa Véliz and Professor Rasmus Nielsen, Lead Researcher on the Oxford Martin Programme on Misinformation, Science and Media, as they discuss the need to understand the power of data better, how we can start protecting our privacy and how we need regulation. It is time to pull the plug on the surveillance economy.
Carissa Véliz discusses her new book 'Privacy is Power', focusing on the importance of understanding how our data is used and how we can protect our privacy. Have you ever been denied insurance, a loan, or a job? Have you had your credit card number stolen? Do you have to wait too long when you call customer service? You might have the data economy to thank for all that and more.
Digital technology is stealing our personal data and with it our power to make free choices. To reclaim that power, and our democracy, we must take back control of our personal data. Surveillance is undermining equality. We are being treated differently on the basis of our data. But what can we do?
Join the author of Privacy is Power: Why and How You Should Take Back Control of Your Data, Carissa Véliz and Professor Rasmus Nielsen, Lead Researcher on the Oxford Martin Programme on Misinformation, Science and Media, as they discuss the need to understand the power of data better, how we can start protecting our privacy and how we need regulation. It is time to pull the plug on the surveillance economy.
Professor E.J. Milner-Gulland and Professor Sir Charles Godfray discuss our relationship with nature, how it relates to the Covid-19 pandemic, and what we need to do differently in the future. The COVID-19 pandemic has affected both wildlife and our relationship to it.
This includes calls to ban the wildlife trade, highlighting the relationship between conservation and public health, and what became of the “2020 biodiversity super-year”.
Join Professor E.J. Milner-Gulland, Lead Researcher of the Oxford Martin Programme on the Illegal Wildlife Trade and Professor Sir Charles Godfray, Director of the Oxford Martin School as they discuss how wider economic shocks have affected the wildlife trade, particularly in Africa, and how to fulfil the bold targets for nature recovery (in the UK and globally). And how can Oxford contribute, both practically through its operations and through research and educational activities.
In this recorded talk, Professor Doyne Farmer and Maria del Rio-Chanona talk about their new paper on supply and demand shocks, and the impacts on society, resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic is having an unprecedented impact on societies around the world.
As governments mandate social distancing practices and instruct non-essential businesses to close to slow the spread of the outbreak, there is significant uncertainty about the effect such measures will have on lives and livelihoods. While demand for specific sectors such as healthcare has skyrocketed in recent months, other sectors such as air transportation and tourism have seen demand for their services evaporate. At the same time, many sectors are experiencing issues on the supply-side, as governments curtail the activities of non-essential industries.
Which industries will suffer most from demand-side or supply-side shocks resulting from the pandemic? Which workers are most of risk of unemployment or reduced wage income? Who will be the winners and losers?
Professor Doyne Farmer and Maria del Rio-Chanona will talk about their recent paper which estimated these shocks would threaten around 22% of the US economy's GDP, jeopardise 24% of jobs and reduce total wage income by 17% - while the potential impacts are a multiple of what was experienced during the global financial crisis, and perhaps comparable to the Great Depression. Aggressive fiscal and monetary policies are needed to minimise the impact of these shocks but the avoidance of endangering public health must be the priority.
This talk is in conjunction with The Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford and the Oxford Review of Economic Policy.
In this recorded talk, Professor Doyne Farmer and Maria del Rio-Chanona talk about their new paper on supply and demand shocks, and the impacts on society, resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic is having an unprecedented impact on societies around the world.
As governments mandate social distancing practices and instruct non-essential businesses to close to slow the spread of the outbreak, there is significant uncertainty about the effect such measures will have on lives and livelihoods. While demand for specific sectors such as healthcare has skyrocketed in recent months, other sectors such as air transportation and tourism have seen demand for their services evaporate. At the same time, many sectors are experiencing issues on the supply-side, as governments curtail the activities of non-essential industries.
Which industries will suffer most from demand-side or supply-side shocks resulting from the pandemic? Which workers are most of risk of unemployment or reduced wage income? Who will be the winners and losers?
Professor Doyne Farmer and Maria del Rio-Chanona will talk about their recent paper which estimated these shocks would threaten around 22% of the US economy's GDP, jeopardise 24% of jobs and reduce total wage income by 17% - while the potential impacts are a multiple of what was experienced during the global financial crisis, and perhaps comparable to the Great Depression. Aggressive fiscal and monetary policies are needed to minimise the impact of these shocks but the avoidance of endangering public health must be the priority.
This talk is in conjunction with The Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford and the Oxford Review of Economic Policy.
In this talk, Professor Chris Adam, Professor of Development Economics looks beyond the public health aspects of the pandemic to examine the medium-term macroeconomic adjustment challenge confronting domestic policy-makers and international donors. When the Covid-19 pandemic emerged, most of sub‑Saharan Africa went into lockdown. What happens next for the pandemic across Africa remains uncertain, but the combination of domestic lockdowns and the spill-over from the global recession means immediate and severe economic hardship.
Prof Chris Adam will discuss epidemiological and macroeconomic models to calibrate the scale of the combined shock to a representative low-income African economy and to show how alternative policy options for slowing transmission of Covid-19 impact on public revenue, and on GDP in the short run, and hence shape the path to recovery. Noting that the first lockdown, however costly, does not by itself eliminate the likelihood of a re-emergence of the epidemic, he will then lay out the agenda for key macroeconomic and public finance policies to sustain recovery, growth, and poverty reduction in sub-Saharan Africa.
This talk is in partnership with The Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford and the Oxford Review of Economic Policy.
Professor David Vines, Professor of Economics at INET Oxford, discusses the need for international cooperation to support emerging economies after the covid-19 crisis. The Covid crisis has caused the greatest collapse in economic activity since 1720. Some advanced countries have mounted a massive fiscal response, both to pay for disease-fighting action and to preserve the incomes of firms and workers until the economic recovery is underway.
But there are many emerging market economies which have been be prevented from doing what is needed by their high existing levels of public debt and - especially - by the external financial constraints which they face.
Professor David Vines, Professor of Economics at INET Oxford, discusses that there is a need for international cooperation to allow such countries to undertake the kind of massive fiscal response that all countries now need, and that many advanced countries have been able to carry out. So far such cooperation has been notably lacking; the contrast with what happened in the wake of the global financial crisis in 2008 is very striking.
The necessary cooperation needs to be led by the Group of Twenty, or G20, just as happened in 2008-9 since the G20 brings together the leaders of the world’s most important economies. This cooperation must also involve a promise of international financial support from the International Monetary Fund since otherwise international financial markets might take fright at the large budget deficits and current account deficits which will emerge, creating fiscal crises and currency crises and so causing such expansionary policies which need to be brought to an end.
Professor David Vines, Professor of Economics at INET Oxford, discusses the need for international cooperation to support emerging economies after the covid-19 crisis. The Covid crisis has caused the greatest collapse in economic activity since 1720. Some advanced countries have mounted a massive fiscal response, both to pay for disease-fighting action and to preserve the incomes of firms and workers until the economic recovery is underway.
But there are many emerging market economies which have been be prevented from doing what is needed by their high existing levels of public debt and - especially - by the external financial constraints which they face.
Professor David Vines, Professor of Economics at INET Oxford, discusses that there is a need for international cooperation to allow such countries to undertake the kind of massive fiscal response that all countries now need, and that many advanced countries have been able to carry out. So far such cooperation has been notably lacking; the contrast with what happened in the wake of the global financial crisis in 2008 is very striking.
The necessary cooperation needs to be led by the Group of Twenty, or G20, just as happened in 2008-9 since the G20 brings together the leaders of the world’s most important economies. This cooperation must also involve a promise of international financial support from the International Monetary Fund since otherwise international financial markets might take fright at the large budget deficits and current account deficits which will emerge, creating fiscal crises and currency crises and so causing such expansionary policies which need to be brought to an end.
Professor Beata Javorcik, Chief Economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, discusses the recent developments in international trade and the link between trade finance and resilience of trade flows ready for a post-COVID world
Professor Beata Javorcik, Chief Economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, discusses the recent developments in international trade and the link between trade finance and resilience of trade flows ready for a post-COVID world
Phil Howard, author of Lie Machines and Nicola Aitken, Policy Manager at Full Fact, discuss the implications of fake news and misinformation. In the age of COVID-19, the lie machine is working to undermine trust in institutions like the World Health Organization.
They are pushing a narrative that scientists and experts should not be trusted. And this has worrying implications for global health.
Join us online as Professor Phil Howard, author of Lie Machines: How to Save Democracy from Troll Armies, Deceitful Robots, Junk News Operations, and Political Operatives and Nicola Aitken, Policy Manager at Full Fact, discuss the implications, power and effectiveness of these lie machines and how we can utilise them or shut them down.
Paul Clarke, Ocado's Chief Technology Officer, will focus on the disruptive ingredients and recipes at the heart of Ocado's ongoing journey of self-disruption and reinvention.
For this year's James Martin Memorial Lecture, Sir Paul Nurse will consider some of the fundamental ideas of biology with the aim of identifying principles that define living organisms.
For this year's James Martin Memorial Lecture, Sir Paul Nurse will consider some of the fundamental ideas of biology with the aim of identifying principles that define living organisms.
Can every doctor understand health statistics? Gerd Gigerenzer will describe the efforts towards this goal, a few successes, but also the steadfast forces that undermine doctors’ ability to understand and act on evidence.
Can every doctor understand health statistics? Gerd Gigerenzer will describe the efforts towards this goal, a few successes, but also the steadfast forces that undermine doctors’ ability to understand and act on evidence.
Globally, renewable energy has a foot in the door. But significant challenges remain. Will we be able to execute on the rapid deployment of zero carbon energy required to meet a 1.5C future? This presentation highlights the major challenges and provides some early insights on how we might tackle these significant societal issues.
Professor Hall will share experiences of establishing long-term plans for sustainable infrastructure in many countries around the world. One estimate suggests that $2.3trillion was invested in infrastructure worldwide last year.
That vast investment has provided roads, power plants, mobile phone networks, dams and recycling plants. Whether those investments have been sustainable is questionable.
As well as providing essential services that people need, infrastructure too often locks in carbon emissions, fragments habitats and opens them up for exploitation, appropriates land and exacerbates inequalities. In many respects, choices about infrastructure investment are a remarkable point of leverage, when the future course of development is set, literally, in concrete.Too often these decisions are subject to political patronage, rent seeking and worse.
This lecture will examine the many impacts that infrastructure can have on sustainable development, for better or for worse.
Lord Sumption will discuss the impact on our constitution and political system of the referendum of 2016 and its aftermath.
Daniel Susskind discusses ideas from his new book 'A World Without Work' New technologies have always provoked panic about workers being replaced by machines.In the past, such fears have been misplaced, and many economists maintain that they remain so today. Yet in A World Without Work, Daniel Susskind shows why this time really is different. Advances in artificial intelligence mean that all kinds of jobs are increasingly at risk.
Susskind will argue that machines no longer need to reason like us in order to outperform us. Increasingly, tasks that used to be beyond the capability of computers - from diagnosing illnesses to drafting legal contracts - are now within their reach. The threat of technological unemployment is real. So how can we all thrive in a world with less work? Susskind will remind us that technological progress could bring about unprecedented prosperity, solving one of mankind's oldest problems: making sure that everyone has enough to live on. The challenge will be to distribute this prosperity fairly, constrain the burgeoning power of Big Tech, and provide meaning in a world where work is no longer the centre of our lives.
Tapio Schneider discusses the influence of clouds on climate, and how advances in the modelling of clouds can help us predict our climate future more accurately.
William bird discusses how healthcare focused on communities and acitve lifestyles can lead to greater wellbeing. We are entering the fourth revolution of healthcare.
The first revolution was Public Health with sanitation, cleaner air and better housing. The second is medical healthcare with the advancement of diagnostics and treatment with a focus on disease cure. The third is personalised health, through individual knowledge, technology, behaviour change and precision medicine.
However, these revolutions have left three major problems unresolved; unsustainable healthcare, rising health inequalities and climate change driven by unsustainable living.
So, we enter the fourth revolution in healthcare which builds on the previous three. This is based on communities rather than individuals, supporting a sustainable active lifestyle, eating local produce and using culture, art and contact with nature to create purpose and connections to each other, leading to greater resilience and wellbeing. It is a revolution when Smart Cities become central to the delivery of health and when advanced technology becomes almost invisible encouraging a lifestyle closer rather than further from nature.
In this talk Dr Bird will explain how we are already delivering this future and how biological changes such as chronic inflammation, epigenetics, mitochondrial dysfunction and telomere shortening can provide the scientific link between wellbeing and disease.
William bird discusses how healthcare focused on communities and acitve lifestyles can lead to greater wellbeing. We are entering the fourth revolution of healthcare.
The first revolution was Public Health with sanitation, cleaner air and better housing. The second is medical healthcare with the advancement of diagnostics and treatment with a focus on disease cure. The third is personalised health, through individual knowledge, technology, behaviour change and precision medicine.
However, these revolutions have left three major problems unresolved; unsustainable healthcare, rising health inequalities and climate change driven by unsustainable living.
So, we enter the fourth revolution in healthcare which builds on the previous three. This is based on communities rather than individuals, supporting a sustainable active lifestyle, eating local produce and using culture, art and contact with nature to create purpose and connections to each other, leading to greater resilience and wellbeing. It is a revolution when Smart Cities become central to the delivery of health and when advanced technology becomes almost invisible encouraging a lifestyle closer rather than further from nature.
In this talk Dr Bird will explain how we are already delivering this future and how biological changes such as chronic inflammation, epigenetics, mitochondrial dysfunction and telomere shortening can provide the scientific link between wellbeing and disease.
William bird discusses how healthcare focused on communities and acitve lifestyles can lead to greater wellbeing. We are entering the fourth revolution of healthcare.
The first revolution was Public Health with sanitation, cleaner air and better housing. The second is medical healthcare with the advancement of diagnostics and treatment with a focus on disease cure. The third is personalised health, through individual knowledge, technology, behaviour change and precision medicine.
However, these revolutions have left three major problems unresolved; unsustainable healthcare, rising health inequalities and climate change driven by unsustainable living.
So, we enter the fourth revolution in healthcare which builds on the previous three. This is based on communities rather than individuals, supporting a sustainable active lifestyle, eating local produce and using culture, art and contact with nature to create purpose and connections to each other, leading to greater resilience and wellbeing. It is a revolution when Smart Cities become central to the delivery of health and when advanced technology becomes almost invisible encouraging a lifestyle closer rather than further from nature.
In this talk Dr Bird will explain how we are already delivering this future and how biological changes such as chronic inflammation, epigenetics, mitochondrial dysfunction and telomere shortening can provide the scientific link between wellbeing and disease.
Data-driven micro-targeted campaigns have become a key part of political strategy. As personal and societal data becomes more accessible, we need to understand how it can be used and whether it is relevant to regulate political candidates' access to data.
Data-driven micro-targeted campaigns have become a key part of political strategy. As personal and societal data becomes more accessible, we need to understand how it can be used and whether it is relevant to regulate political candidates' access to data.
Carl Frey discusses his book 'The Technology Trap' In this book talk the Author, Carl Benedikt Frey, will discuss how the Industrial Revolution was a defining moment in history, but how few grasped its enormous consequences at the time. Now that we are in the midst of another technological revolution, how can the lessons of the past can help us to more effectively face the present?
Carl Frey discusses his book 'The Technology Trap' In this book talk the Author, Carl Benedikt Frey, will discuss how the Industrial Revolution was a defining moment in history, but how few grasped its enormous consequences at the time. Now that we are in the midst of another technological revolution, how can the lessons of the past can help us to more effectively face the present?
Carl Frey discusses his book 'The Technology Trap' In this book talk the Author, Carl Benedikt Frey, will discuss how the Industrial Revolution was a defining moment in history, but how few grasped its enormous consequences at the time. Now that we are in the midst of another technological revolution, how can the lessons of the past can help us to more effectively face the present?
Robin Cohen discusses migration throughout history and in the present day. Migration is present at the dawn of human history - the phenomena of hunting and gathering, seeking seasonal pasture and nomadism being as old as human social organisation itself.
The flight from natural disasters, adverse climatic changes, famine, and territorial aggression by other communities or other species were also common occurrences.
But if migration is as old as the hills, why is it now so politically sensitive? Why do migrants leave? Where do they go, in what numbers and for what reasons? Do migrants represent a threat to the social and political order? Are they none-the-less necessary to provide labour, develop their home countries, increase consumer demand and generate wealth? Can migration be stopped? One of Britain's leading migration scholars, Robin Cohen, will probe these issues in this talk.
Robin Cohen discusses migration throughout history and in the present day. Migration is present at the dawn of human history - the phenomena of hunting and gathering, seeking seasonal pasture and nomadism being as old as human social organisation itself.
The flight from natural disasters, adverse climatic changes, famine, and territorial aggression by other communities or other species were also common occurrences.
But if migration is as old as the hills, why is it now so politically sensitive? Why do migrants leave? Where do they go, in what numbers and for what reasons? Do migrants represent a threat to the social and political order? Are they none-the-less necessary to provide labour, develop their home countries, increase consumer demand and generate wealth? Can migration be stopped? One of Britain's leading migration scholars, Robin Cohen, will probe these issues in this talk.
Robin Cohen discusses migration throughout history and in the present day. Migration is present at the dawn of human history - the phenomena of hunting and gathering, seeking seasonal pasture and nomadism being as old as human social organisation itself.
The flight from natural disasters, adverse climatic changes, famine, and territorial aggression by other communities or other species were also common occurrences.
But if migration is as old as the hills, why is it now so politically sensitive? Why do migrants leave? Where do they go, in what numbers and for what reasons? Do migrants represent a threat to the social and political order? Are they none-the-less necessary to provide labour, develop their home countries, increase consumer demand and generate wealth? Can migration be stopped? One of Britain's leading migration scholars, Robin Cohen, will probe these issues in this talk.
The President of the Rockefeller Foundation discusses the need for new solutions for energy transformation and economic development. We cannot end poverty without ending energy poverty. Ever since the world’s first power plants whirred to life in 1882, we have seen how electricity is the lynchpin for development in all of its forms.
Manufacturing and industrial productivity, agriculture and food security, nutrition, hygiene, water, public health, education, even community engagement, in other words, daily life in a modern economy, demand access to reliable energy.
And yet despite significant progress over nearly 140 years, more than 800 million people around the world live without access to electricity, and hundreds of millions more struggle with unreliable or unaffordable service. Families are deprived of the means to labour productively and their quality of life and status in extreme poverty goes unchanged.
We need urgently to fast-track sustainable power solutions, investments, and partnerships across the globe to catalyze an energy transformation and accelerate sustainable, reliable and modern electrification for economic development.
The President of the Rockefeller Foundation discusses the need for new solutions for energy transformation and economic development. We cannot end poverty without ending energy poverty. Ever since the world’s first power plants whirred to life in 1882, we have seen how electricity is the lynchpin for development in all of its forms.
Manufacturing and industrial productivity, agriculture and food security, nutrition, hygiene, water, public health, education, even community engagement, in other words, daily life in a modern economy, demand access to reliable energy.
And yet despite significant progress over nearly 140 years, more than 800 million people around the world live without access to electricity, and hundreds of millions more struggle with unreliable or unaffordable service. Families are deprived of the means to labour productively and their quality of life and status in extreme poverty goes unchanged.
We need urgently to fast-track sustainable power solutions, investments, and partnerships across the globe to catalyze an energy transformation and accelerate sustainable, reliable and modern electrification for economic development.
The President of the Rockefeller Foundation discusses the need for new solutions for energy transformation and economic development. We cannot end poverty without ending energy poverty. Ever since the world’s first power plants whirred to life in 1882, we have seen how electricity is the lynchpin for development in all of its forms.
Manufacturing and industrial productivity, agriculture and food security, nutrition, hygiene, water, public health, education, even community engagement, in other words, daily life in a modern economy, demand access to reliable energy.
And yet despite significant progress over nearly 140 years, more than 800 million people around the world live without access to electricity, and hundreds of millions more struggle with unreliable or unaffordable service. Families are deprived of the means to labour productively and their quality of life and status in extreme poverty goes unchanged.
We need urgently to fast-track sustainable power solutions, investments, and partnerships across the globe to catalyze an energy transformation and accelerate sustainable, reliable and modern electrification for economic development.
Prof Beinhocker will argue that by changing the ideologies, narratives, and memes that govern our economic system, we can create the political space required to rapidly transform to a sustainable and just economic system. The biosphere and econosphere are deeply interlinked and both are in crisis. Industrial, fossil-fuel based capitalism delivered major increases in living standards from the mid-18th through late-20th centuries, but at the cost of widespread ecosystem destruction, planetary climate change, and a variety of economic injustices.
Furthermore, over the past 40 years, the gains of growth have flowed almost exclusively to the top 10%, fuelling populist anger across many countries, endangering both democracy and global action on climate change.
This talk will argue that underlying the current dominant model of capitalism are a set of theories and ideologies that are outdated, unscientific, and morally unsound. New foundations can be built from modern understandings of human behaviour, complex systems science, and broad moral principles. By changing the ideologies, narratives, and memes that govern our economic system, we can create the political space required for the policies and actions required to rapidly transform to a sustainable and just economic system.
Prof Beinhocker will argue that by changing the ideologies, narratives, and memes that govern our economic system, we can create the political space required to rapidly transform to a sustainable and just economic system. The biosphere and econosphere are deeply interlinked and both are in crisis. Industrial, fossil-fuel based capitalism delivered major increases in living standards from the mid-18th through late-20th centuries, but at the cost of widespread ecosystem destruction, planetary climate change, and a variety of economic injustices.
Furthermore, over the past 40 years, the gains of growth have flowed almost exclusively to the top 10%, fuelling populist anger across many countries, endangering both democracy and global action on climate change.
This talk will argue that underlying the current dominant model of capitalism are a set of theories and ideologies that are outdated, unscientific, and morally unsound. New foundations can be built from modern understandings of human behaviour, complex systems science, and broad moral principles. By changing the ideologies, narratives, and memes that govern our economic system, we can create the political space required for the policies and actions required to rapidly transform to a sustainable and just economic system.
Barbara Finamore discusses whether China will take the lead in saving our planet from environmental catastrophe. Now that Trump has turned the United States into a global climate outcast, will China take the lead in saving our planet from environmental catastrophe? Many signs point to yes. China, the world's largest carbon emitter, is leading a global clean energy revolution, phasing out coal consumption and leading the development of a global system of green finance.
But as leading China environmental expert and author of Will China Save the Planet? Barbara Finamore will explain in this talk, it is anything but easy. The fundamental economic and political challenges that China faces in addressing its domestic environmental crisis threaten to derail its low-carbon energy transition. Yet there is reason for hope. China's leaders understand that transforming the world's second largest economy from one dependent on highly polluting heavy industry to one focused on clean energy, services and innovation is essential, not only to the future of the planet, but to China's own prosperity.
We will also hear from respondent Radhika Khosla, Research Director at the Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development, Somerville College.
Professor Sir Paul Collier and Professor Colin Mayer CBE will share the latest thinking and research into the future of capitalism and the corporation to understand how business might be changed to make it work better for society. The speakers will bring together their new books, The Future of Capitalism: Facing The New Anxieties and Prosperity: Better Business Makes the Greater Good, alongside the British Academy's Future of the Corporation programme research to pose serious questions of our economic system.
Professor Sir Paul Collier and Professor Colin Mayer CBE will share the latest thinking and research into the future of capitalism and the corporation to understand how business might be changed to make it work better for society. The speakers will bring together their new books, The Future of Capitalism: Facing The New Anxieties and Prosperity: Better Business Makes the Greater Good, alongside the British Academy's Future of the Corporation programme research to pose serious questions of our economic system.
Professor Sir Paul Collier and Professor Colin Mayer CBE will share the latest thinking and research into the future of capitalism and the corporation to understand how business might be changed to make it work better for society. The speakers will bring together their new books, The Future of Capitalism: Facing The New Anxieties and Prosperity: Better Business Makes the Greater Good, alongside the British Academy's Future of the Corporation programme research to pose serious questions of our economic system.
Prof Danny Dorling discusses the idea that that humanity is slowing down in almost everything that we do, and what this means for our future. Date 30 May 2019, 5:00pm - 6:00pm
Location Lecture Theatre, Oxford Martin School 34 Broad Street (corner of Holywell and Catte Streets), Oxford, OX1 3BD
Event Recording:
In Origin of Species, Charles Darwin described how a population explosion occurs and called the time of population explosion “ favourable seasons", he was not to know it, but such circumstances arose for his own species at around the time of his own birth...
However, the favourable seasons for human population growth were not experienced favourably, with times of great social dislocation from small scale enclosure to global colonisation. Now those seasons are over, we have experienced the first ever sustained slowdown in the rate of global human population growth. This has been the case for at least one human generation. However, we are not just slowing down in terms of how many children we have, but in almost everything else we do, other than in the rise in global temperatures that we are recording and that we have to live with. It can be argued that there is even a slowdown in such unexpected areas as debt, publishing, and in the total amount useful information being produced.
If this is true - that humanity is slowing down in almost everything that we do – what does this mean? What measurements suggest that slowdown is true? And if so much is still rising, albeit at slower and slower rates - is that such a great change? Finally how might the slowdown impact on economic thought. In many ways economics was the science of the great acceleration; a science that makes most sense when markets are expanding and demand is rising. What kind of an economics is needed in a world where enormous and accelerating growth has stopped being the normality?
Is competition in the digital economy desirable? Does it currently exist? Is it possible? Is there anything policy can do? This talk addresses all of these questions and presents the recommendations of the Digital Competition Expert Panel which was chaired by Jason Furman and recently presented its recommendations to the government.
Professor David Battisti, The Tamaki Endowed Chair of Atmospheric Sciences, will be talking about global climate sensitivity controlling regional warming uncertainty and its role in impacting on human health, particularly heat stress. This is a joint event with the Oxford Martin School and the Oxford Climate Research Network (OCRN)
Professor Doyne Farmer will discuss the constraints of current economic models and propose complexity economics as a solution. Economics is in crisis. On one hand, behavioural economics is now well-established, but on the other hand, most economics models are still based on rational expectations with constraints, called “frictions”. The standard program adds more and more constraints to rationality in hopes that this will approximate real behaviour, but this may never work. It is increasingly clear that heterogeneity (the fact that people and institutions are diverse) is essential to understand problems such as inequality. There is a major effort to address this challenge, but the models that do this are technically complicated and rapidly become intractable as they become more realistic. Finally, there is a fundamental challenge due to the fact that we have very little historical data available to fit models for a complicated and evolving economy.
Complexity economics offers solutions to these problems. It advocates modelling behaviour in terms of heuristics and myopic reasoning, as observed in behavioural experiments. It advocates the use of simulations, making it much easier to incorporate heterogeneity in a tractable manner. Finally, it advocates using highly granular data, that accurately captures heterogeneity, to fit the models. Professor Doyne Farmer will present examples where this approach has had success, including applications to technology forecasting, economic growth and climate change, and present a vision of what it can do in the future.
Carlos Lopes will deliver an overview of the critical development issues facing the African continent today. Carlos will talk about a blueprint of policies to address issues, and an intense, heartfelt meditation on the meaning of economic development in the age of democratic doubts, identity crises, global fears and threatening issues of sustainability.
The Paris Agreement was a seminal moment in the world's struggle to fight climate change, but Christiana believes that the climate agreement was just a staging post in what remains a long, hard process. So what are the next steps? The Paris Agreement, adopted in December 2015, was a seminal moment in the world's struggle to fight climate change. 197 countries agreed to limit the rise in global average temperature to “well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C. But Christiana, who led those global climate negotiations as Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, says the climate agreement was just a staging post in what remains a long, hard process. So what are the next steps?
At a time of heightened political tension and policy confusion about the refugee crisis, this lecture explores why record numbers of people are fleeing their homes; what conditions they are living in; and what should be done to help them. Rt Hon David Miliband will make the case that support for refugees is a global public good, which requires reform of international policy. He will also argue that winning the argument for supporting refugees is vital to the moral standing of western societies which constructed the international order after World War 2.
Nick Eyre and Myles Allen give a talk for the Oxford Martin School on climate change and the IPCC report. One of the key objectives of the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), completed in 2014, was to provide a comprehensive description of the science of climate change and options for adaptation and mitigation for negotiators preparing for the Paris Conference in 2015. IPCC authors Myles Allen and Nick Eyre will explain the IPCC process, and ask whether this model of a technical panel giving “policy relevant, not policy prescriptive” advice to governments is still working. They will highlight some key findings, such as the increased level of confidence that human influence is the dominant cause of the warming observed since the mid-20th-century, the importance of cumulative carbon dioxide emissions, the challenges of emission reductions, but also the multiple mitigation pathways still open for achieving the goal of limiting warming to 2oC. They will also discuss some of the things the IPCC does not do, such as specifically attributing blame for observed climate change impacts, and ask what the options are for the IPCC going forward.
Dr Nathalie Seddon, Director of the Biodiversity Institute, gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School. The future of biodiversity conservation is under increasing threat from both climate change and human impact. Dr Nathalie Seddon, Director of the Biodiversity Institute, will look at how rapid growth of climate change affects our ecosystems, how species’ will be forced to adapt to survive, and how we can reduce the effects of climate change on our planet.
Sir John Beddington, Senior Adviser at the Oxford Martin School, gives a talk on climate change Some five years ago Sir John Beddington, Senior Adviser at the Oxford Martin School, raised the concept of 'The Perfect Storm' in which the issues of food, water and energy security needed to be addressed at the same time as mitigating and adapting to climate change. In this seminar he highlights changes that have occurred since then and the progress made and challenges that are currently faced.
Sir John Beddington, Senior Adviser at the Oxford Martin School, gives a talk on climate change Some five years ago Sir John Beddington, Senior Adviser at the Oxford Martin School, raised the concept of 'The Perfect Storm' in which the issues of food, water and energy security needed to be addressed at the same time as mitigating and adapting to climate change. In this seminar he highlights changes that have occurred since then and the progress made and challenges that are currently faced.
Professor Gideon Henderson, Professor of Earth Sciences, and Professor David Marshall, Professor of Physical Oceanography, will explore the role of oceans in climate change. How are oceans affected by our rapidly changing climate? What can they tell us about the processes controlling climate change? And what role do they play in driving climate?
In this seminar Dr Rob Bellamy, James Martin Fellow at the Institute for Science, Innovation and Society, will explore how and why people disagree about how to tackle climate change. What hope then is there for a global political agreement in Paris 2015?
In this talk Professor Tim Palmer CBE, Co-Director of the Programme on Modelling and Predicting Climate, gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School. Tim Palmer will address three related questions. Firstly, what are the physical reasons why predictions of climate change are necessarily uncertain? Secondly, how can we communicate this uncertainty in a simple but rigorous way to those policy makers for whom uncertainty quantification may seem an unnecessary complication. Finally, what is needed to reduce uncertainty about future climate change? For the latter, I will argue that the sort of inspiration and ambition that led to the Large Hadron Collider is now needed for the development of climate-change science.
John Kampfner and Katrine Marçal discuss the growing gap between rich and poor and its implications for society, chaired by Professor Ian Goldin. This roundtable is part of the FT Weekend Oxford Literary Festival 2015, the Oxford Martin School is the Festival Ideas Partner Is it morally justified to allow the creation of a 'super rich' that leave the rest behind? Is the growing gap between rich and poor actually holding back wider economic growth and financial wellbeing? Could it be a cause of social unrest? And what can we do to address the gap between rich and poor? This panel event is one of a series of roundtable talks and audience question time hosted by the Oxford Martin School.
Three authors with recent books on Africa discuss the future of the continent and answer questions from the audience under the watchful eye of the director of the Oxford Martin School, Professor Ian Goldin. Martin Meredith, Jonny Steinberg and Tom Burgis will discuss what the future holds for African states. How can the continent deal with failing government and corruption and with war and a constant flow of refugees? How far is Africa a victim of its past, and is there a new financial colonialism holding it back? What can the rest of the world do to help Africa to grow and prosper in peace?
In this new Oxford talk, Garry Kasparov, Senior Visiting Fellow at the Oxford Martin School, turns his attention to the rapidly evolving relationship between humans and technology. In this new talk, Garry Kasparov turns his attention to the rapidly evolving relationship between humans and technology. He will explore the impact of technology on human development – how it can enhance, limit or possibly even endanger the human race. Kasparov will consider the possibilities, limitations and risks of this ever-changing field of potential, looking at a wide range of developments, from nano-sensors to the prospect of artificial intelligence. He will also address the issues surrounding data and privacy, offering his perspective on whether potential breakthroughs and advantages are worth the risk to privacy. He will examine the opposing views of those who fear the risks and those who seem only to embrace the upside of new generations of technology. In what promises to be a lively and wide-ranging talk, Garry Kasparov brings his unique perspective to a set of issues that are hotly debated and constantly in the headlines
Professor Chris Lintott, Professor of Astrophysics, University of Oxford and presenter of the BBC’s Sky at Night will talk about the history and the science of the voyage. Professor Ian Goldin, Director, Oxford Martin School and Chris will discuss the implications and politics of Europe’s mission to study a comet that is three hundred million miles away. On 12th November 2014, after a 10 year journey, the Rosetta spacecraft's lander Philae touched down on the surface of the comet 67P, also known as Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The robotic European Space Agency lander not only took images from the comet’s surface, the first images in history, but obtained data that was sent back to be analysed. This data will be used to determine the composition of the surface of the comet. But what does this mean? And what implications does it have?
Yadvinder Malhi, Director of the Oxford Centre ofr Tropical Forests, gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School. We live in a new epoch, the Anthropocene, the Age of Us, of which climate change is just one aspect. The defining feature of this age is that sum of human activity (how many we are and what we are doing) has become large compared to the natural processes of the biosphere. The atmospheric waste products of our activity being the main driver of climate change. How can we measure how “large” we are, and how has our impact on the planet varied throughout human history?
Vlatko Vedral, Co-=Direct oof the Oxford Martin Programme on Bio-Inspired Quantum Technologies, gives a talk for theOxford Martin School. Quantum mechanics is commonly said to be a theory of microscopic things: molecules, atoms, subatomic particles. Nearly all physicists, though, think it applies to everything, no matter what the size. The reason its distinctive features tend to be hidden is not a simple matter of scale. Over the past few years experimentalists have seen quantum effects in a growing number of macroscopic systems. The quintessential quantum effect, entanglement, can even occur in large systems as well as warm ones - including living organisms - even though molecular jiggling might be expected to disrupt entanglement.
Professor Seth Lloyd, Principal Investigator in the Research Laboratory of Electronics (RLE) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School. Over the past decade, experimental evidence has accumulated that photosynthetic organisms are using quantum mechanics in a sophisticated fashion to attain high energy transport efficiency. This talk shows how this high efficienty arises from the interplay between coherence, decoherence, and static disorder
Baroness Helena Kennedy QC gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School on women's rights. The past century has seen huge progress in women's rights, but inequality persists globally. Recent high-profile incidents of violence against women in India, continuing severe restrictions on the personal and working lives of women in Saudi Arabia, draconian punishments and the practice of genital mutilation demonstrate the extent to which women are still deemed second-class citizens in many countries and cultures.
Baroness Helena Kennedy QC gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School on women's rights. The past century has seen huge progress in women's rights, but inequality persists globally. Recent high-profile incidents of violence against women in India, continuing severe restrictions on the personal and working lives of women in Saudi Arabia, draconian punishments and the practice of genital mutilation demonstrate the extent to which women are still deemed second-class citizens in many countries and cultures.
Professor David Vines gives a talk onthe financial system. Financial firms were once organisations which helped their clients to do well, and earned fees from doing so. They have become organisations which look for people from whom to make money. As a result, people who work in finance are now very different from doctors; and they are no longer trusted. How did this happen? What can we do to make financial corporations, once again, institutions that are useful to society? Professor Vines, Director of Ethics and Economics at INET Oxford, will provide some answers to these questions in his talk, and will provide particular examples of what needs to be done.
David Clifton, Institute of Biomedical Engineering, gives a talk for Oxford Martin School.
Professor Ian Goldin gives a talk on globalization and systemic risk. Globalisation has brought us vast benefits including growth in incomes, education, innovation and connectivity. Professor Ian Goldin, Director of the Oxford Martin School, argues that it also has the potential to destabilise our societies. In The Butterfly Defect: How globalisation creates systemic risks, and what to do about it, he and co-author Mike Mariathasan, Assistant Professor of Finance at the University of Vienna, argue that the recent financial crisis is an example of the risks that the world will face in the coming decades. The risks spread across supply chains, pandemics, infrastructure, ecology, climate change, economics and politics. Unless these risks are addressed, says Goldin, they could lead to greater protectionism, xenophobia, nationalism and to deglobalisation, rising conflict and slower growth.
Charles Godfray, Ian Goldin, Sarah Harper, Toby Ord and Yadvinder Malhi discuss whether the planet is full. The panel will discuss the whether our planet can continue to support a growing population estimated to reach 10 billion people by the middle of the century?
Mike Rayner, Susan Jebb and Tara Garnett give a talk about food and feeding the population. Non-fat, low-fat, saturated fat, trans fats, healthy fats - in an era where we seem to be constantly bombarded with often conflicting messages about our diets, is all this information actually making us any healthier? How can we cut through media hysteria and make wise choices about the food we eat, and what impact do our consumption habits have, not just on our own health but that of the planet?
Andrew Dilnot, David Coleman, Francesco Billari, Sarah Harper and Wolfgang Lutz give a talk about world population. The future of global development as well as the end of world population growth in the 21st century will crucially depend on further progress in education, particularly of girls. Almost universally, better educated women have fewer children, have healthier children and are in better heath themselves. Broad based secondary education has been shown to be a key driver of economic growth, of improving governance and democracy and of enhancing the adaptive capacity to climate change. Professor Wolfgang Lutz of IIASA (International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Austria) and Founding Director of the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital will (together with co-authors) present the new OUP book “World Population and Human Capital in the 21st Century” which provides the broadest availably scientific synthesis of what is known about the drivers of population and education in all countries of the world.
Dr John Frater, Principal Investigator, Institute for Emerging Infections and Dr Ellie Barnes, Principal Investigator, Institute for Emerging Infections.
Professor Terry Dwyer, Executive Director, The George Institute for Global Health and Dr Kazem Rahimi, Deputy Director, The George Institute for Global Health.
Dr Javier Lezaun and Professor Chas Bountra give a talk about drug discovery. Dr Javier Lezaun, Co-Director, Institute for Science, Innovation and Society, Oxford Martin School and James Martin Lecturer in Science and Technology Governance and Professor Chas Bountra, Chief Scientist (SGC), Professor of Translational Medicine, Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Oxford
Professor Susan Lea, Professor Christoph Tang, Professor Jeffrey Almond and Dr Ian Feavers discuss strategies for vaccines for the 21st century. Vaccines have saved an estimated 500 million lives around the world since Edward Jenner discovered how to prevent smallpox infection in 1796. But a successful vaccine roll-out is about more than just medicine; it encompasses engineering, economics, policy, government and even transport infrastructure. More than a decade into the 21st century, and with a new outbreak of the Ebola virus claiming thousands of lives in Africa, does a successful strategy for creating and delivering new vaccines require a whole new approach?
Professor Susan Lea, Professor Christoph Tang, Professor Jeffrey Almond and Dr Ian Feavers discuss strategies for vaccines for the 21st century. Vaccines have saved an estimated 500 million lives around the world since Edward Jenner discovered how to prevent smallpox infection in 1796. But a successful vaccine roll-out is about more than just medicine; it encompasses engineering, economics, policy, government and even transport infrastructure. More than a decade into the 21st century, and with a new outbreak of the Ebola virus claiming thousands of lives in Africa, does a successful strategy for creating and delivering new vaccines require a whole new approach?
From Neolithic burials to Mozart's Requiem and the novels of Martin Amis, humans have fashioned cultural responses to the inevitability of each individual's demise. But what does science have to say about death? In a stimulating panel discussion, scientists and writers debate the impact of future advances in science and technology on our understanding of the end.
The Innovation Enigma - Is the current growth crisis a result of decades of technological stagnation in a risk-averse society? A dynamic Oxford Union debate about innovation and the coming technological deficit involving Garry Kasparov, 13th world chess champion, writer and political activist; Peter Thiel, technology entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist; Professor Kenneth Rogoff, Thomas D. Cabot Professor of Public Policy and Professor of Economics at Harvard University; and Mark Shuttleworth, technology entrepreneur and founder of the Ubuntu project.
With Dr James Martin, Founder, Oxford Martin School. This is the first time in Earth's history that humanity that can study its situation and devise powerful ways to deal with the problems. Our future could be magnificent, but time is short. In our near future there is a need for extreme paradigm shifts, diverse in nature, and for which we are almost totally unprepared. This 'Jubillee' lecture celebrates 60 years since Dr Martin's matriculation from the University of Oxford
With Elon Musk, CEO and Product Architect of Tesla Motors and the CEO/CTO of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX). Elon Musk, the Founder of Tesla Motors and SpaceX, and Chairman of SolarCity, speaks from his own experiences at the forefront of technology and innovation. This inspirational Oxford Martin School presentation at the Sheldonian Theatre covers space travel, electric vehicles and solar energy.
With Professor Paul Klenerman Principal Investigator, Institute for Emerging Infections. Paul Klenerman demonstrates the way our immune systems work and discusses the best way to boost our natural defences in an effort to fight infection from Hep C and HIV. Dr Bennett Foddy, Deputy Director, Institute for Science and Ethics, addresses the ethical dilemmas which can arise from the process of clinical trials.
With Professor Liam Dolan and Professor Jane Langdale, Co-Directors, Plants for the 21st Century Institute. As we struggle to feed the world's growing population is it ethically wrong not to use all the tools at our disposal to help increase food production? Liam Dolan and Jane Langdale explore the possibilities and benefits that could be derived from using scientific advancement to enhance agricultural production. Professor Julian Savulescu, Director of the Institute for Science and Ethics, questions the ethical issues involved.
With Professor Myles Allen, Co-Director, Oxford Martin Programme on Resource Stewardship. You can show people all the evidence in the world about climate change, but if the policy debate is framed in an intractable way, it won't make any difference. And that's the problem. As climate modelling and scientific projections improve how much will people's behaviour change over the coming decades?
Remote controlled and autonomous robotic weapons are bringing new levels of complexity to modern warfare. It's when such robots are designed as lethal weapons that the threshold for moral justification gets higher.
With Kary Kasparov, world chess champion, writer and political activist. The world we live in now is very different from the one that was imagined 50 years ago. Past decades foresaw a future of flying cars and supersonic jets, but commercial air travel is slower in 2013 than it was in 1976. For years we were assured that we would have abundant clean and cheap energy; instead we have record fossil fuel prices, oil spills, and nuclear meltdowns. From poverty rates to superbugs, one thing is certain: this is not the future we were promised. How did we get so far off course from the era of radical tech innovation and ambitious exploration? Why did our culture retreat toward risk-aversion and security? And how can we revive the spirit of innovation, and help bring about its promise of positive transformational change and far-reaching societal benefits?
With Kary Kasparov, world chess champion, writer and political activist. The world we live in now is very different from the one that was imagined 50 years ago. Past decades foresaw a future of flying cars and supersonic jets, but commercial air travel is slower in 2013 than it was in 1976. For years we were assured that we would have abundant clean and cheap energy; instead we have record fossil fuel prices, oil spills, and nuclear meltdowns. From poverty rates to superbugs, one thing is certain: this is not the future we were promised. How did we get so far off course from the era of radical tech innovation and ambitious exploration? Why did our culture retreat toward risk-aversion and security? And how can we revive the spirit of innovation, and help bring about its promise of positive transformational change and far-reaching societal benefits?
Larry Brilliant, President of the Skoll Global Threats Fund, gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School. In our interconnected world the possibilities for a deadly virus to spread rapidly are frightening. According to Dr Larry Brilliant, the modernity which is creating and causing the rapid spread of viruses, through international travel and global food supply chains, could actually provide us with the solutions to their spread.
William H. Janeway CBE, Senior Advisor and Managing Director at Warburg Pincus, gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School. The innovation economy begins with discovery and culminates in speculation. Over some 250 years, economic growth has been driven by successive processes of trial and error: upstream exercises in research and invention and downstream experiments in exploiting the new economic space opened by innovation. Drawing on his professional experiences, William H. Janeway will provide an accessible pathway to appreciate the dynamics of the innovation economy. He will combine personal reflections from a career spanning forty years in venture capital, with the development of an original theory of the role of asset bubbles in financing technological innovation and of the role of the state in playing an enabling role in the innovation process. Today, with the state frozen as an economic actor and access to the public equity markets only open to a minority, the innovation economy is stalled; learning these lessons from this talk will contribute to its renewal.
Parag Khanna and Ayesha Khanna; Directors of The Hybrid Reality Institute, gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School public lecture series. With Professor Ian Goldin; Director, Oxford Martin Institute. The Information Age is giving way to the Hybrid Age, mankind's fifth major era of socio-technical relations. What distinguishes the Hybrid Age from previous periods is two-fold: the rapidly merging combinations of technologies with each other, and our increasing integration with technology. Together these trends portend decades of continuous disruption to our lives in the biological, social, economic, political, educational and other domains. In this lecture, Ayesha and Parag Khanna will discuss the main characteristics of the Hybrid Age, elaborating on the notion of human-technology co-evolution and the framework of geo-technology for interpreting historical change. Particular attention will be given to manifestations such as social robotics, the virtual economy, and smart cities. They will also present numerous scenarios for social, economic and geopolitical disruptions that might occur in the coming decades.
Professor Thomas Homer-Dixon gives a talk on Dehumanization for the Oxford Martin School Public Lectures series. Introduced by Professor Ian Goldin. Dehumanization is arguably a defining feature of the most brutal acts of human violence, such as saturation bombardment of civilian populations, terrorist attacks on urban centers, intense battlefield combat, and genocide. I propose a psychological explanation of this phenomenon that uses a catastrophe manifold to describe a set of psychological states in an individual's mind and the possible pathways of movement between these states. The manifold exists in a three-dimensional phase space defined by the variables identity, justice, and structural constraint. It specifies five hypotheses about the causes and dynamics of dehumanization. Taken together, these hypotheses represent an overarching theory of the nonlinear collapse of identification at the level of the individual.
Panel discussion on whether Globalisation can benefit the poor with Alex Gennie, Ian Goldin, Rushanara Ali MP, James Drummond and Nick Gowing. Globalisation is bound in a complex relationship with poverty. Its forces are powerful and can act to either destroy or radically improve the economic position of areas in development. Despite this, the opportunities that the phenomenon presents for development are largely underexplored and underexploited.
Dr James Martin, Founder of the Oxford Martin School and founder of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. the largest nongovernmental organization in the world devoted exclusively to research and training to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
Distinguished Public Lecture. Globalization has created a more interconnected, interdependent and complex world than ever witnessed before. Whilst this openness and connectivity has brought enormous benefits, it has also increased our vulnerability and exposure to global shocks, such as the recent financial crisis. Balancing these dimensions brings significant challenges at the global, regional and local levels. As we face some of the biggest challenges of the 21st century, how equipped are global governance structures to coordinate and address issues such as climate change, trade tensions, food security and economic uncertainty? How do we resolve the inevitable strains that exist between global and national priorities in such debates? In this distinguished lecture, Mr Pascal Lamy, Director-General of the World Trade Organization, offers his perspectives on these critical issues from his distinguished career as a French political adviser, a businessman and as former European Commissioner for Trade.
Sachs argues that for the U.S. to regain sound fiscal health the country must also reform its politics. The lecture is immediately followed by a panel discussion with: Professor Valpy FitzGerald, Department of International Development, Professor Ian Goldin, Oxford Martin School (chair), Professor Peter Tufano, Said Business School, Professor Adrian Wood, Department of International Development, Professor Sir Adam Roberts, Centre for International Studies (Please note Prof Sir Adam Roberts is replacing Prof Ngaire Woods)
Sachs argues that for the U.S. to regain sound fiscal health the country must also reform its politics. The lecture is immediately followed by a panel discussion with: Professor Valpy FitzGerald, Department of International Development, Professor Ian Goldin, Oxford Martin School (chair), Professor Peter Tufano, Said Business School, Professor Adrian Wood, Department of International Development, Professor Sir Adam Roberts, Centre for International Studies (Please note Prof Sir Adam Roberts is replacing Prof Ngaire Woods)
Dr Jill Tarter, Director, Center for SETI Research, SETI Institute gives a talk for the Oxford Martin School Seminar Series.
Professor Clive Hamilton delivers a critique of the consequentialist approach to the ethics of geoengineering, the approach that deploys assessment of costs and benefits in a risk framework to justify climatic intervention. Professor Hamilton argues that there is a strong case for preferring the natural, and that the unique and highly threatening character of global warming renders the standard approach to the ethics of climate change unsustainable. Moreover, the unstated metaphysical assumption of conventional ethical, economic and policy thinking - modernity's idea of the autonomous human subject analysing and acting on an inert external world - is the basis for the kind of "technological thinking" that lies at the heart of the climate crisis. Technological thinking both projects a systems framework onto the natural world and frames it as a catalogue of resources for the benefit of humans. Recent discoveries by Earth system science itself - the arrival of the Anthropocene, the prevalence of non-linearities, and the deep complexity of the earth's processes - hint at the inborn flaws in this kind of thinking. The grip of technological thinking explains why it has been so difficult for us to heed the warnings of climate science and why the idea of using technology to take control of the earth's atmosphere is immediately appealing. Professor Clive Hamilton is a Visiting Academic, Department of Philosophy, and Senior Visiting Research Associate, Oxford University Centre for the Environment. He is Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics (CAPPE) and holds the newly created Vice-Chancellor's Chair at Charles Sturt University, Australia. He was the Founder and for 14 years the Executive Director of The Australia Institute, a public interest think tank. He is well known in Australia as a public intellectual and for his contributions to public policy debate. His extensive publications include writings on climate change policy, overconsumption, welfare policy and the effects of commercialisation. Recent publications include The Freedom Paradox: Towards a post-secular ethics and Requiem for a Species: Why we resist the truth about climate change.
Mass media serve vital roles in communication processes between science, policy and the public, and often stitch together perceptions, intentions, considerations, and actions regarding climate change. This talk will touch on salient and swirling contextual factors as well as competing journalistic pressures and norms that contribute to how issues, events and information have often become climate 'news'.
Bishop and Green led a discussion based on their recent book, "The Road From Ruin: A New Capitalism for a Big Society". Together, they will take a look at what set us on the road to the recent financial crisis, whilst also highlighting the signs to guide us back to prosperity. Matthew Bishop is US Business Editor and New York Bureau Chief of The Economist. Michael Green is a leading independent economist and writer.
The recent economic rise of China and India has attracted a great deal of attention--and justifiably so. Together, the two countries account for one-fifth of the global economy and are projected to represent a full third of the world's income by 2025. Yet, many of the views regarding China and India's market reforms and high growth have been tendentious, exaggerated, or oversimplified. This talk by leading economist Professor Bardhan will explore the challenges that both countries must overcome to become true leaders in the international economy. Bardhan's latest book 'Awakening Giants, Feet of Clay' investigates China's and India's economic reforms, each nation's pattern and composition of growth, and the problems afflicting their agricultural, industrial, infrastructural, and financial sectors. His talk will consider how these factors affect poverty, inequality, and environment, how political factors shape each country's pattern of burgeoning capitalism, and how significant poverty reduction in both countries is mainly due to domestic factors--not global integration, as most would believe. Pranab Bardhan is professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley. His books include Scarcity, Conflicts, and Cooperation.
Part of the School's intergrative seminar series. Delivered by Professor Patricia Hirl Longstaff, James Martin Senior Visiting Fellow, Professor, Syracuse University, Research Associate, Harvard Program on Information Resources Policy. Climate change, economic globalization, and many new levels of communication have all made many human, biological and technical systems more unpredictable. This has been called The New Normal: a time of higher uncertainty, with fast and strong disruptions in many systems. This is affecting technical systems, biological systems, economic systems, and human organizations. This has increased interest in resilience, a strategy that is often seen in systems that must operate under high uncertainty. Professor Longstaff will discuss some of the attributes of resilience that is seen in many systems and how resilience can fail. She has received funding for her interdisciplinary work from the US National Science Foundation. She has applied these concepts to community planning, human/technical systems, and business organizations. She is currently writing about the role of trust and blame in human systems that must adapt to new realities in their environments.
Dr Kenneth Richards, James Martin Senior Visiting Fellow on how carbon capture and storage (CCS) provides a potentially promising approach to mitigating carbon dioxide emissions. However, as with virtually all major new technologies, deployment will require careful consideration of a number of issues - including geology, property rights, transactions costs, politics, and legislative strategy. This discussion will illustrate how multiple fields of study have been integrated to synthesize a practical solution in the United States.
Galaxy Zoo PI and James Martin Fellow Chris Lintott will review the technologies available to researchers seeking to rescue themselves from drowning in data by recruiting the help of tens or even hundreds of thousands of volunteers. As well as our own Zooniverse suite of projects (which now includes climate science and papyrology), Lintott will highlight other successful examples including the protein folding game, fold.it, and even an example of collaborative mathematics.
Thomas F. Homer-Dixon, CIGI Chair of Global Systems, Balsillie School of International Affairs; full Professor, Faculty of Arts and Faculty of Environment, University of Waterloo on Climate Shocks: Turning Crisis into Opportunity. Climate policy is gridlocked nationally and globally, with virtually no chance of a breakthrough under current conditions. Policy makers need to accept that societies will not make drastic changes to address climate change until a climate crisis hits. The recent financial crisis showed that when powerful special interests have convinced much of the public that what they are doing is not dangerous, only a disaster that discredits those interests will provide an opportunity for comprehensive policy change.
Special seminar from the James Martin 21st Century School: Climate change and marine ecosystems: have dangerous changes already begun? The Earth's ocean is central to the conditions experienced on our planet, regulating its atmosphere, climate and biology. Recent evidence, however, suggests that the physical and chemical conditions within the ocean are changing in ways that are rapidly moving outside those experienced for millions of years with major changes to ocean temperature, acidity, sea ice extent, sea level, and storm intensity. These changes are impacting the biological components the ocean, including an array of important microbial systems. Observed changes so far include decreased ocean productivity, altered food web dynamics, declining abundances of habitat forming species such as oysters, mangroves and corals, species range shifts, and an increased incidence of disease and invasion by exotic species. These changes to the marine biosphere are also beginning to amplify changes within major nutrient cycles, adding to impacts driven by other human activities such as coastal land use and overfishing. As we continue to push carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, there is also growing uncertainty as to the risks associated with passing non-linear triggers and tipping points. This talk will examine the totality of changes occurring in the world's oceans as result of anthropogenic climate change, and will explore the consequences for the biological systems that are otherwise crucial for healthy oceans and their many human dependents. Ove Hoegh-Guldberg is Professor and Director, Global Change Institute, University of Queensland.
Paul Collier, Oxford Professor and author of The Bottom Billion, launched a discussion based on his latest publication, The Plundered Planet. Building on his work in developing countries and the poorest populations, Collier argued for proper stewardship of natural assets as a matter of planetary urgency. His arguments charted a course between unchecked profiteering on the one hand, and environmental romanticism on the other to offer realistic and sustainable solutions to these dauntingly complex issues.
Lessons from Financial Crises: Paradigm Failure and the Future of Financial Regulation. In October, George Soros delivered a week-long series of lectures at the Central European University in Budapest discussing his latest thinking on economics and politics, and the way forward out of the current financial crisis. Soros argued that while the magnitude of the credit and leverage problem faced today is greater than in the Great Depression, the artificial life support given to the financial system has been successful. However, Soros believes that the recovery may run out of steam and sees a possibility for a "double-dip" in the next year. At this event, George Soros will lead a panel discussion to reflect on some of the key ideas that he put forward in those lectures. He will particularly invite discussion among both the panellists and the audience to engage with his ideas and understand the alternative they represent when compared with traditional economic theory.
Geoengineering the climate: Science, Governance and Uncertainty: The Royal Society Study - John Shepherd (NOCS). The climate change we are experiencing now is caused by an increase in greenhouse gases due to human activities, including burning fossil fuels, agriculture and deforestation. There is now widespread belief that a global warming of greater than 2C above pre-industrial levels would be dangerous and should therefore be avoided. However, despite growing concerns over climate change, global CO2 emissions have continued to climb. This has led some to suggest more radical 'Geoengineering' alternatives to conventional mitigation via reductions in CO2 emissions. Geoengineering is deliberate intervention in the climate system to counteract man-made global warming. There are two main classes of geoengineering; direct carbon dioxide removal, and solar radiation management, which aims to cool the planet by reflecting more sunlight out to space. This talk will summarise the findings of a recent review of Geoengineering carried-out by the UK Royal Society discussing the climate effects, costs, risks, and research and governance needs for each approach.
Distinguished Public Lecture: The end of business as usual by Dr Mohamed El-Erian, Co-CIO of PIMCO. In the wake of last year's financial crisis, businesses, economists, policy makers and analysts around the world are asking if the events of 2008 mean the end of business as usual for the global financial system. Dr Mohamed El-Erian, Co-CIO of PIMCO, the world's biggest bond fund, and one of the world's most respected economic analysts, certainly thinks that it does.
Achieving an end-state of "zero" has emerged as an important policy goal for a number of 21st Century challenges. The most prominent example is the "Global Zero" campaign to eliminate nuclear weapons. To stand any chance of getting near to zero, nuclear weapons must be marginalised in military and security doctrines. That means creating international norms and, if feasible, agreements that until nuclear weapons are universally prohibited by treaty, their use will be treated as a crime against humanity. Dr Johnson considers how the problems of doctrine and use could be addressed.
Professor Lord Nicholas Stern, a world renowned economist and leading authority on climate change, came to the 21st Century School on Thursday 7 May to give a lecture about his "Blueprint for a Safer Planet". Professor Lord Nicholas Stern, a world renowned economist and leading authority on climate change, came to the 21st Century School on Thursday 7 May to give a lecture about his "Blueprint for a Safer Planet". Lord Stern made headlines in 2006 with the publication of the influential Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change and the launch of his most recent publication "Blueprint for a Safer Planet", on which this lecture was based has also received attention from around the world. Further substantial global warming is now unavoidable and the risks to the natural world, the economy and our everyday lives are immense. Approximately 800 people heard Lord Stern explain his vision for a global deal to manage these risks and how the way we live in the next thirty years - how we invest, use energy, organise transport and manage forests - will determine whether these risks become realities.
Speaking at the Vice-Chancellor's Open Lecture, Dr Ian Goldin asked: Are the world's leading thinkers anticipating the risks and opportunities of the 21st century, or will humanity be overtaken by its own medical, technological and scientific successes?
Dr Ian Goldin provides an overview of the work of the James Martin 21st Century School and looks at the challenges facing humanity in the 21st Century.
What is science for, what good does it do and should it do good? In this lecture, Sulston and Harris will attempt to identify some of the most urgent ethical and regulatory problems raised by contemporary science, and suggest some possible solutions. They will discuss some key cutting edge scientific problems, and debate how we can assess their impact. Where do the significant ethical and regulatory dilemmas for science lie? Are we worrying about the right things? They will also address the crucial issue of international or "global" co-ordination at the level of regulation. What happens when research is illegal - criminalised in some jurisdictions and permitted in others or when products or services are freely available in some countries and denied to the citizens of others? Is harmonization necessary or can we live with a plurality of regulatory environments? Finally, they will raise the question of who owns science. They will suggest that scientific co-operation - the freedom of science to operate across frontiers, regulatory boundaries and share information freely between scientists and institutions - carries with it certain responsibilities. They will argue that equity and morality require open access and benefit sharing. And they will suggest what such benefit sharing might amount to. Professor Sir John Sulston is a Nobel Prize winner and Chair of the University of Manchester's Institute of Science, Ethics and Innovation, a new research institute focusing on the ethical questions raised by science and technology in the 21st century. Professor John Harris is the Lord David Alliance Professor of Bioethics, and research director at the University of Manchester's Institute of Science, Ethics and Innovation. Professor Richard Dawkins is Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford.
The global financial crisis reflects a failure of global economic governance. The failure of America's regulatory system has not only ramifications for the American economy, but for the global economy. It is clear that the banks' risk management systems could not even protect their own shareholders, let alone the well-being of the global economy. What went wrong? Where did the global financial regulators fail? What can we do to minimize the downturn? And what, if anything, can we do to prevent a recurrence? What are the lessons for global governance in the 21st Century? Joseph E. Stiglitz is University Professor at Columbia University in New York and Chair of Columbia University's Committee on Global Thought. He is also the co-founder and Executive Director of the Initiative for Policy Dialogue at Columbia. In 2001, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics for his analyses of markets with asymmetric information. Stiglitz helped create a new branch of economics, "The Economics of Information," exploring the consequences of information asymmetries and pioneering such pivotal concepts as adverse selection and moral hazard, which have now become standard tools not only of theorists, but of policy analysts. His work has helped explain the circumstances in which markets do not work well, and how selective government intervention can improve their performance. Recognized around the world as a leading economic educator, he has written textbooks that have been translated into more than a dozen languages. He founded one of the leading economics journals, The Journal of Economic Perspectives. His book, Globalization and Its Discontents, (W.W. Norton June 2001) has been translated into 35 languages and has sold more than one million copies worldwide. Most recently, he has written The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict with Linda J. Bilmes, published by WW Norton in March 2008.
In the second of the Distinguished Public Lecture Series run by the James Martin 21st Century School, Dr Craig Venter will discuss his work at the J Craig Venter Institute and its implications for the future of our culture, society and science. The Institute's projects include developing new understanding of human disease at the DNA level, running the Sorcerer II Global Ocean Sampling Expedition to understand microbial diversity in the world's oceans, and finding new ways of tackling environmental issues, especially the production of new biological sources of energy. One of its many goals is to engineer microbes that can produce biological sources of fuel. Dr Venter and his team believe that genomics is the field of science that has the power to transform the world around us.
Professor Sir Nicholas Stern, HM Treasury: The economics of climate change Introduced by: Dr John Hood, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford. Chaired by: Dr Ian Goldin, Director of the James Martin 21st Century School.