Dervis, Stiglitz, Papandreou, Anderson, Soros, Svejnar

Registration filled up in minutes after Columbia announced its latest World Leaders Forum event, a distinguished panel charged with discussing the future of Europe after the ongoing crisis. Audacious alliterator Artur Renault wrote a report:

In my short time at Columbia so far, no list of speakers for a World Leaders Forum event held as much recognition or excitement as this one, as it contained George Papandreou, George Soros, Joseph Stiglitz, Kemal Derviş, Anne Anderson, and Jan Svejnar; individually all the panelists would have been worth watching, but together they were just too good to miss.

The event was held in Low Library’s monumental rotunda, and the number of press members there was a testament to the importance of this panel. Even PrezBo’s opening speech, usually long and reverential to the guest, was cut short. He barely spoke a paragraph before he passed the authority of the debate to Jan Svejnar, professor of global political economy and director of the Center on Global Economic Governance and moderator of the panel.

Svejnar announced the panel’s structure: each of the panelists would express their opinions for 10 minutes; then, they would be given a chance to react to the other panelists; finally, the floor would be open to questions from the audience. The panel turned out to be an incredibly informative and insightful experience since all of the speakers were very passionate about the issue and, obviously, very knowledgeable on the subject.

But what did the they actually say?

George Papandreou

The latest in the World Leaders Forum The annual Silver Lecture at SIPA featured former Prime Minister of Greece George Papandreou, who served a turbulent term from October 2009 until his resignation in November 2011.  Last night in the Altschul Auditorium, Bwog’s resident Greek Alexandra Svokos got frustrated.

The last time I asked my grandfather, who lives in Piraeus (featured in Plato’s Symposium!), how everything was, he responded “not too bad, there are fewer people protesting now.”  Like any Greek studying economics, I’m angry at a lot of people in the fatherland–especially those directly involved in the economy–and Papandreou is unlucky enough to be at the front.  Papandreou did not drive Greece into the mud.  He was the one who hopped in the driver’s seat and said “I think we’re stuck.”  Rather than pushing the country out of the ditch, though, he kept hitting the gas pedal and hoping this time we’d move.

Papandreou opened with anecdotes about Greece as they emerged from dictatorship in ’74.  He emphasized his family’s involvement–his father was prime minister in the 80s and 90s and his grandfather served the same position before the junta.  This set up a theme of fighting for democracy.  He discussed a need to understand each other and be patient. Papandreou believes that Greece remained in crisis for so long because of prejudices and xenophobia across Europe; Greece needs to fight for dignity and respect.

Papandreou addressed three “myths” about the Euro Crisis. First, Greece needed reform in addition to austerity measures.  Next, this was not a “lazy” Greek problem, but a European problem.  ”Wouldn’t it be easy if zorba dancing and ouzo drinking was the problem?”  Finally, Papandreou maintained that Greece has been living up to its promises and that the nation is now in better condition than it’s been “since joining the European Union” — that sure is some pointed wording.

Fun comes when audience ask questions

The latest event in the World Leaders Forum series featured Song Sang-Hyun, President of the International Criminal Court, speaking on the history and structure of the ICC. We sent our atrociously amateur reporter Artur Renault to watch what went down.

The lecture about one of the world’s most ambitious judicial projects took place in the main room in Casa Italiana, which features a large stage covered in allusions to Rome, the birthplace of many legal concepts that influence the ICC. This seemed appropriate. The room was crowded with journalists and grad students and human rights majors who know a lot more about the ICC than I do, but I was eager to learn. We sat as Prezbo stood up and delivered a short introduction, describing the ICC from its creation by the Rome Statute (which you may know because it protects your Facebook rights) to its current challenges in Kenya.

The crowd could instantly notice Song’s friendly presence and good humor when the judge joked that, while he considers New York his third home (after Seoul and The Hague), in the city his heart resides at NYU because he taught there some time ago.

The serious part after the jump.

Le house d’opera

In the latest World Leaders Forum, cohosted by Maison Francaise and the School of the Arts, Antonin Baudry, Cultural Counselor in the French Embassy in the U.S., and recently resigned National Endowment of the Arts Chairman Rocco Landesman, in his final public appearance in the position, discussed their respective country’s relations between the government and the arts.  Arts Aficionado Alexandra Svokos listened in.

It’s no big secret that arts in France are much more publicly supported than in the US.  Rocco Landesman, speaking freely in light of his resignation, made this immediately clear when asked about government funding for the arts, saying, “one more time before I leave: it’s pathetic.”  The budget for the NEA is $150 million, he explained, while in France the arts budget is $9 billion–which would be merely significant…if the countries were the same size.

Given the straight facts, one would think that Antonin Baudry would sit back and arrogantly shrug for the rest of the talk.  But, of course, Baudry had his own complaints to make.  Really driving home the point that the grass is always greener on the other side, Baudry insisted that France would be better with more private funding, that Americans excel in.  Baudry works in the United States for French culture.  Despite having significant public funding, many of France’s major cultural institutions need private donations–Versailles, for instance, gets 25% of its budget from private donations–and much of those donations actually come from America.

There are pros and cons to the state of the arts and state for both countries.  At this point, though, France seems to be winning.  Landesman pointed out that having a majority of funding coming from private entities is extremely volatile, especially during recessions.  As soon as the last one hit the US, donations immediately disappeared.  According to Landesman, American arts are thrown into the system of free enterprise market, with people believing that if something’s worth doing, it’ll get funded.

Moreover, government support is indicative of a nation’s values.  By not supporting the arts, the government indicates that they are not a necessity.  Landesman has theories for why America has a “fundamental, visceral distrust of the arts.”  Mainly, it is because we keep a “cowboy mentality,” telling us to be emotionless and unaesthetic, thus creating a prejudice against the arts, which are believed to be “a little bit gay.”

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All I had was a cell phone.

The most recent World Leaders Forum event was a debate between the economic advisers of each of this year’s candidates to the presidency. Perpetual pseudoeconomist Artur Renault attended and wrote:

When I told a friend from outside of school that I was going to watch a debate between Obama’s and Romney’s economic advisers, he knew how it would play out. “It’s gonna be ‘Spend.’ ‘No, save.’ ‘No no no, SPEND!’ ‘You don’t understand, SAVE.’” I laughed and thought this probably would be right. But this seemed like the closest thing to a presidential debate that would come on campus this year.

Of course, this meant that the World Leaders Forum registration turned into the Hunger Games once again, causing the server to crash and many people to be unable to to register for the popular event. Therefore, the group that watched this debate was a large one, and the line outside was even larger.

Click for some on the actual debate.

PrezBo doesn’t put Daw Suu Kyi under house arrest but still makes her feel at home

Last Saturday, Nobel Prize winning Burmese politician Daw Aung San Suu Kyi spoke to a packed crowd of students, suits, and journalists in the Low Library Rotunda as part of the 2012 World Leaders Forum.  Suu Kyi emerged from house arrest in 2010 to resume her leadership of Burma’s National League for Democracy (NLD) and won election to the country’s parliament in 2012. World Leader Lover Mark Gorenstein listened as Daw Suu Kyi’s unique blend of humility and charisma, peppered with the occasional bit of situational humor, held the audience in rapt attention.

PrezBo delivered the opening remarks, flaunting his own authority with the claim that, “democratic change is not only possible, but inevitable.” Our elder statesman then proceeded to hand Suu Kyi a rose on behalf of Václav Havel, a one time artist-in-residence of the university who had hoped to present the opposition leader with a flower before his recent death. This gesture was well received by the aging-yet-elegant leader and enabled the audience to voice their content (and perhaps rouse themselves awake from a weekend-morning torpor) with a round of vigorous applause.

Ann Curry, who moderated the discussion, noted that the event had been fully booked 34 minutes after registration opened. Demand for a prized ticket sent enough traffic to the university servers to temporarily crash the authentication portal, leading to much confusion and complaint among those who were unable to snag a spot.

“You are our present as well as our future,” Suu Kyi reminded both the students comprising the audience and their peers across the globe. She outlined a vision of Burma rooted in the ideals of democracy and the transformational potentials of education, repeatedly emphasizing the role of the youth in her homeland’s progress.

Read about Daw Suu Kyi’s influences and her advice for you

Bucket List represents the unbelievable intellectual privilege we enjoy as Columbia students. We do our very best to bring to your attention important guest lecturers and special events on campus. As always, feel free to mention any events we may have missed in the comments section (and/or mock our typos) and we’ll add them. Our recommendations for this week are below and the full list is after the jump.

Recommended

• World Leaders Forum: “The Islamic World in the New Century” Monday, September 24 3:30 pm – 4:30 pm, Low Rotunda, Ekmeleddin Ihasangolu, Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (registration required)
• World Leaders Forum: “A Future Without HIV/AIDS: Dream or Reality” Thursday, September 27 12:00 pm – 1:30 pm, Low Library Rotunda, Linda Fried, Ray Suarez, Anthony Fauci, Eric Goosby, Michel Sidibé, Wafaa El-Sadr (registration required)
• World Leaders Forum: “Her Excellency Madam Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of the Republic of Liberia” Thursday, September 27 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm, Low Rotunda, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (registration required)
• “Creative Writing Lecture Series: Sheila Heti” Thursday, September 27 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm, Dodge Hall, Sheila Heti

Bucket List represents the unbelievable intellectual privilege we enjoy as Columbia students. We do our very best to bring to your attention important guest lecturers and special events on campus. As always, feel free to mention any events we may have missed in the comments section and we’ll add them. Our recommendations for this week are below and the full list is after the jump.

Recommended

• “A Few (Un)scientific Thoughts on Backlash” Wednesday, September 19 4:10 pm – 5:00 pm, 614 Schermerhorn Hall, Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers, Blink, the Tipping Point, and writer for the New Yorker (Psychology)
• ”Politics of Change [part of the 2012 Program on Indian Economic Policies Conference]” Thursday, September 20, 7:00 pm – 9:00pm, IAB 1501, India politicians Salman Khurshid (Minister of Law and Justice), N K Singh (Member of Indian Parliament), and Arun Jaitley (Leader of Opposition in the Upper House of Parliament), registration required
• “World Leaders Forum: A Discussion Featuring Daw Aung San Suu Kyi” Saturday, September 22, 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm, Low Rotunda, Nobel Peace Prize Recipient and prominent Burmese political activist Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, moderated by Ann Curry—Registration will open on September 19 at 10:00 am. (more…)

Bucket List represents the unbelievable intellectual privilege we enjoy as Columbia students. We do our very best to bring to your attention important guest lecturers and special events on campus. Our recommendations for this week are below and the full list is after the jump.

Recommended

• “Address by Ban Ki-Moon” Monday, April 2, 5:00 pm, Low Rotunda, Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations (World Leaders Forum, registration required—may be full)
• “Does the Brain’s Wiring Make Us Who We Are?” Monday, April 2, 6:30 pm — 8:30 pm, Havemeyer 309, Sebastian Seung (vs.) Anthony Movshon (Neuroscience)
• “Generation Iraq: Journalists Confront America’s War” Wednesday, April 4, 6:00 pm — 7:30 pm, J-School World Room, Ashley Gilberston, Amy Goodman, Sarah Stillman, Peter van Agtmael (J-School)
• “University Lecture with Wafaa El-Sadr, MD, MPH, MPA” Thursday, April 5, 6:00 pm, Low Rotunda, Wafaa El-Sadr (Registration required, World Leaders Forum)
• “Carceral Politics in Palestine and Beyond: Gender, Vulnerability, Prison” Thursday, April 5, 6:00 pm — 8:00 pm, IAB 1501, Judith Butler, Angela Davis, Mai Masri, Lena Meari (SIPA)

Thursday evening the World Leaders Forum hosted US Attorney General Eric Holder, who defended the Department of Justice’s policies on the financial industry, affirmed affirmative action, and gave attendees the opportunity to compare his impressive mustache to PrezBo’s hair. Government Guru Brit Byrd reports:

Thinking of PrezBo

As PrezBo’s introductory comments waxed even more glistening than his own silvery mane, it became clear that Thursday’s World Leaders Forum event was going to be a bit different. The speaker of the hour, US Attorney General Eric Holder (CC ’73, Law ’76) was clearly at ease at his alma mater, and he gave what amounted to a stump speech on the Department of Justice’s (DoJ) efforts against financial crime. The speech was confident, delivered via teleprompter, and rather boring in comparison to the chummy Q&A with PrezBo that followed.

Referring to the Attorney General by his first name, PrezBo began by asking the most sensible follow-up to the speech’s talking points: what about the widespread perception that most, if not all, of the perpetrators of the financial crisis have been unpunished? Holder responded by saying he does not know why the DoJ’s efforts “have not set in to the American conscience.” Reregulation, he reiterated, is a step in the right direction, citing the frustrating reality that some of the most abusive practices that led to the crisis were not, in fact, illegal. As he would go on to repeat, sometimes “morally reprehensible” is not synonymous with “criminal.”

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This morning presents another opportunity to see a leading figure in world affairs. You might not exactly understand what it is that this person does, and you might not pay a whole lot of attention to what they’re saying, but you can definitely tell your parents that you actually can’t talk right now because you’re about to go hear an address by the Attorney General of the United States, and spend the rest of the evening feeling a hell of a lot less provincial than the average unwashed collegiate.

Or maybe you really care what the chief lawyer of the US government has to say! Either way, if you want in, you must be in front of a computer by 9:57 this morning and start hitting that Register button as fast as you can. Eric H. Holder, Jr., the Attorney General of the United States will be speaking in Low this Thursday at 6:00 p.m., on the topic of the efforts to combat financial fraud by the Department of Justice. Those with superior fine motor skills can try their luck for an invitation here.

Thursday evening, the World Leaders Forum hosted its second-ever artist for a lecture. Issac Julien, famous in the art-world for his unique films and installations, gave a talk about his work and the mediums through which he expresses himself. Art School Dropout Briana Last eagerly sat through Julien’s musings and provides you with this latest LectureHop.

For a few Columbians, the excitement of Thursday night stemmed from their eagerness to make the trek to Miller Theatre to hear Isaac Julien discuss his most recent installations and the messages he hopes to get across through various media.

Installation artist, filmmaker, and Mellon Visiting Artist & Thinker at the School of the Arts, Julien is only the second artist to have been invited to a World Leader’s Forum (the first was invited to speak at last year’s Forum). He described this as significant, as “artists are also interested in looking at these questions of how the world comes to this point.”

Julien is known for his breaking down of artistic and cultural barriers. He uses film, dance, photography, music, theatre, painting, and sculpture to tell his stories. At the same time, he utilizes unexplored images, language, and myths—fiction and nonfiction—to describe events.

Miller Theatre was far from full when Julien began speaking, and audience members began to file out as the artist waxed poetic about his own work in an often overly verbose and intellectual manner. Despite what sometimes came across as trying and heady attempts to make sense of his artwork, the pieces he displayed were ultimately moving anyway for their aesthetic beauty and the messages they conveyed.

The audience had the opportunity to watch excerpts from his installations “Western Union: Small Boats” and his most recent “TEN THOUSAND WAVES”. Both pieces focused on who “gets lost in globalization” and the untranslatability of languages on a deeper narrative level.

It was clear that Julien thinks carefully about his work, perhaps a bit too carefully for the audience members who took early leave. But his exploration of using entirely different “ethnographic frames” to understand the world and the role of aesthetics, “to move beyond the expediency of news,” as he called it, is innovative and fresh, and was a welcome addition to the typical Thursday night.

Julien via Wikimedia Commons

Jed and his fellow Columbians, dressed to impress, sitting eagerly in the lecture hall waiting for Al-Madani to begin.

There’s nothing that delights Bwog more than to show off the extensive vocabulary we’ve accumulated in our years sitting through Gulati lectures. And by that, we mean Art History lectures and Creative Writing seminars. But one of our newest (and bestest) staff members, Econ Enthusiast and Vocabulary Purveyor Extraordinaire Jed Bush, hopped over to the Islamic Banking lecture at the World Leaders Forum, and translated a few of the biggest words for us. 

Greed, for lack of a better, uh… cliché, is good. That’s how it’s understood, at least, in the world of Western finance.

So as Dr. Ahmad Mohamed Ali Al-Madani spoke on the benefits Islamic Banking can bring to western markets, the recent financial crisis was at the forefront of the discussion. Jeffery Sachs handled the introductions for Dr. Al-Madani, briefly discussing their partnership in efforts to combat global poverty through the Millennium Villages and Drylands Iniative programs.

Al-Madani has been front and center at the Islamic Development Bank, having been its president for all but two years of its existence, since 1975. The Bank has 56 member nations, with a combined 1.5 billion people encompassing nearly 20% of the world’s population, and retains a AAA credit rating with the main rating agencies.  Yet despite the impressive resume, Al-Madani’s proposals were surprisingly rudimentary and underdeveloped when it came to their application in the western world of finance.

When Al-Madani took to the podium, he began by discussing some alarming facts regarding the 2008 financial crisis.  It singlehandedly wiped out “30% of the world’s gross output,” he said, creating rising unemployment rates around the globe and bringing growth to a halt in most corners of the world.  Most troubling about the financial crisis is that, as funds are being diverted towards kick-starting economic growth in domestic markets, many funds devoted to fighting poverty have been the first to be slashed—undermining years of work and further increasing the suffering of the poor and disadvantaged. However, he then abrubtly veered from discussing humanitarian efforts and dived into the issue of debt in western markets. Because that’s what really matters.

Read more of this LectureHop after the jump.

"You criticize the president, and nothing happens to you. You mistreat your dog, and you go to jail. Very interesting country."

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa is a polarizing figure—he brought political stability to a country that had cycled through eight leaders in just ten years, but his record on free speech remains spotty at best, which has not endeared him to PrezBo. Bwog Daily Editor and resident expert on 21st century socialism, Jed Bush, reports on a World Leaders Forum discussion of freedom of the press in Ecuador.

President Bollinger (an old hand at this free speech stuff) opened the event praising Correa as a popular social reformer, noting the marked increase in the standard of living in Ecuador as well as improvements to infrastructure during his presidency. He then went on the attack, calling into question the censorship of the Ecuadorian press and the many human rights complaints that have been lodged against Ecuador. Correa smiled and shrugged at the various plaudits and accusations thrown his way, but quickly fired back once he took the stage. “Mr. President Bollinger, you’re wrong,” Correa announced, denying the accusation that it is illegal in Ecuador for the media to criticize the government.

That key distinction between “opinion” and “lie” was a recurring theme in Correa’s speech, which argued that the media may have opposing views, but “lies” are not tolerated and should be punished with jail time. Citing the American Convention on Human Rights signed in San José, he noted that in Latin America, every citizen, public or private, is entitled to their dignity and honor. His infamous lawsuit against Ecuador’s largest newspaper for libel, he explained, was not about censorship of the press, but protecting the rights and dignity of public officials and the upholding of common law. He acknowledged that slander is not punished by jail time in the United States, but emphatically denounced the idea that the United States should set the moral compass for the world, garnering enthusiastic applause from the audience.
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An anonymous tipster sent us such a goofy and curt chronicle of yesterday’s scheduled event, we thought it was too good not to share…

Man of mystery

President of Haiti Michel Martelly did not arrive to speak at his scheduled WLF event. Around 3 pm, half hour after event [was] scheduled to start, introductions and comments by Jeff Sachs and Earth Institute director for Haiti cut off by Bollinger saying President would not arrive, [and that] they had hoped foreign minister would arrive, but didn’t. Many people leave.

Jeff Sachs continues fielding questions about Haitian recovery and development.

Around fifteen minutes later, foreign minister arrives and gives speech while Jeff Sachs and ambassador to Haiti/Fugees member Wyclef Jean, stand behind him. Speech focuses on bringing investment to Haiti. Wyclef Jean then summarizes minister’s speech and talks about how he used to sneak into Columbia dorms as a teenager. Jean and Sachs hug awkwardly after Jean calls him ”the original rock star.” Foreign Minister then talks about the last time he was at Columbia, 1971, when he came down from Boston and partied.

Foreign minister then fields a few questions about Haitian agriculture and court system, as well as investigation of former president Duvalier before Sachs says that he needs to wrap up the event.

Haitian president via Wikimedia