Special Side Event “Quad Roundtable” at the Riga Conference 2020

Special Side Event “Quad Roundtable” at the Riga Conference 2020

Session the Quad Group, AIWS Social Contract and solutions for world peace and security

Speakers:

Governor Michael Dukakis, Chairman of the Boston Global Forum (US),

Defense State Minister Yasuhide Nakayama (Japan),

Senator Kimberley Kitching, Chair of Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Reference Committee (Australia),

Ambassador P.S Raghavan, Chairman of the National Security Advisory Board (India)

Moderator: Mr Sandis Šrāders, LATO’s Board Member

Theme: The Quad Group, AIWS Social Contract and solutions for world peace and security

The Quad Roundtable is a special side event of the Riga Conference 2020, Session Quad Roundtable” the Quad Group, AIWS Social Contract and solutions for world peace and security”, co-organized by the Latvian Transatlantic Organisation (LATO) and the Boston Global Forum.

Time and date: 2:30 pm – 4:00 pm (Riga time), November 12, 2020 , Virtual Roundtable.

Concept notes:

The Quadrilateral Initiative – informally named the Quad – first began in May 2007 with a meeting between the US, Japan, India and Australia in the Philippine capital Manila.

The informal grouping, championed by Japan’s then prime minister Shinzo Abe, was viewed by analysts as an attempt to step up co-operation in the face of a rapidly rising China.

Prime Minister Suga told reporters he would seek to “promote a free and open Indo-Pacific” and also “build stable relations with neighbouring countries including China and Russia”.

So when Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo greeted each other in front of a bank of American and Japanese flags on October 6, 2020 in Tokyo, they exchanged what was surely the longest fist bump in their nations’ seven-decade alliance, a nearly 15-second joining of knuckles.

US State Secretary Pompeo’s remarks on October 6 evening, he said that the Quad’s members needed to protect their people from China’s “exploitation, corruption and coercion,” and he blamed China for a cover-up of the initial coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan. A statement about Mr. Pompeo’s meeting with the Australian foreign minister, Marise Payne, described their discussions of “China’s malign activity in the region.”

On 16-18, September, the World Leadership Alliance-Club de Madrid and the Boston Global Forum co-organized the Policy Lab “Transatlantic Approaches on Digital Governance: A New Social Contract in the Age of AI”, in which presidents, prime ministers, distinguished thinkers, and scholars discussed the Social Contract for the AI Age, and saw it as significant standards for world politics and economy in the 21st century.

How can the Quad Group support and maintain peace and security? What is the role of each member?

How can the Quad contribute to peace and security in the European, Atlantic, and Baltic regions?

How can democratic governments support and use the Social Contract for the AI Age as standards for international relations and for peace and security?

How can democratic governments recognize and implement the Social Contract for the AI Age?

                                   Agenda

14:30   Opening Remarks, Mr Sandis Šrāders, LATO’s Board Member

14:35   Presenter, Professor Nazli Choucri

14:40   Keynote Speech of Governor Michael Dukakis

15:00   Keynote Speech of State Minister Yasuhide Nakayama

15:20   Keynote Speech of Senator Kimberley Kitching

15:40   Keynote Speech of Ambassador P.S Raghavan

16:00   Q&A, Moderator by Mr Sandis Šrāders,

16:25   Concluding, Mr Sandis Šrāders

16:30   Thank you and next steps, Mr. Nguyen Anh Tuan

Riga Time

Bios of Keynote Speakers:

Michael Stanley Dukakis

Chairman of The Michael Dukakis Institute for Leadership and Innovation;

Co-Founder and Chairman of The Boston Global Forum;

Co-founder of AIWS.net and the AIWS City

Co-Author of Social Contract for the AI Age

The three-term Governor of Massachusetts and the 1988 Democratic nominee for President of the United States, Distinguished Professor of Northeastern University and UCLA 

Michael Stanley Dukakis culminates a half-century career dedicated to public service, political leadership, fostering the careers of young leaders, and scholarly achievement.

Together with Nguyen Anh Tuan, this former Massachusetts governor, has established The Boston Global Forum as a globally recognized think tank noted for developing peaceful solutions to some of the world’s most contentious issues.

Kimberley Kitching

  • Senator for Victoria
  • Parliament of Australia, Co-chair of Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC),
  • Shadow Assistant Minister for Government Accountability
    Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate
  • Chair, Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee

Before being sworn in as a Senator in November 2016, Kimberley practised as a lawyer, worked as a manager in several private companies in information technology and human resources, was a senior adviser to the Treasurer of Victoria and the Victorian Minister for Industry, Trade, Major Projects and Information Technology, was a Melbourne City Councillor and the General Manager of the Health Workers Union in Victoria where she helped restore good governance and financial strength.

Yasuhide Nakayama

  • State Minister of Defense, Japan
  • Mentor of AIWS.net

Yasuhide Nakayama is a Japanese politician representing the Liberal Democratic Party, elected in December 2012 as a member of the House of Representatives of Japan and was re-elected in the December 2015 and 2017 elections. Mr Nakayama is the current State Minister for Defense in the Japanese cabinet.

Career

  • Secretary to the Minister of Construction
  • Advertising Agency Employee
  • State Minister for Foreign Affairs
  • Parliamentary Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs
  • Director, Committee on Economy, Trade and Industry, HR
  • Chief Director, Special Committee on North Korean Abduction and Other Issues, HR
  • Director, Committee on Security, HR
  • Director, Public Speeches Division, LDP
  • Director-General, Information Bureau, LDP
  • Chief Secretary, Research Commission on Security, LDP

Ambassador P.S. Raghavan

Ambassador Raghavan is Chairman of the National Security Advisory Board, which advises India’s National Security Council on strategic and security issues.

As a career diplomat, he has served as India’s Ambassador to Russia, Czech Republic and Ireland. He had other diplomatic assignments in USSR, Poland, UK, Vietnam and South Africa.

He was an advisor to the Prime Minister of India (2000-2004) on foreign affairs, defence, national security, nuclear energy and space.

He founded, and was the first head of, the Development Partnership Administration, which coordinates India’s economic partnership programmes abroad, with an annual budget of over US$ 1.5 billion.

He was Chief Coordinator of the BRICS Summit in New Delhi (2012). From 2012 to January 2014, he was Special Envoy of Government of India to Sudan and South Sudan.

Bio of the Moderator:

Mr Sandis Šrāders

Board Member of the Latvian Transatlantic Organisation

Dr. Sandis Šrāders is a Fellow and Lecturer in Russian Military and Strategic Studies at the Baltic Defence College (Tartu, Estonia). His research interests cover such areas as American foreign policy, small states and international political economy, and transatlantic relations. Dr. Šrāders has assumed a variety of different roles. He has
served as Secretary-General and now holds the position of the member of the board of the Latvian Transatlantic Organisation. Until 2014 and further assumed the role of Board Member of LATO since 2014. He has been a project coordinator for the German Marshall Fund of the United States in the Baltic States (2013-2015). In this capacity he
was responsible for the accumulation of intellectual capital for the Latvian Presidency at the Council of the EU in 2015 by selecting experts, organising meetings and leading the final publication that addresses the EU’s Eastern Partnership. One of his more recent positions was Director of Strategic Projects, Sales and Advertising at Latvijas
Radio (2018-2020). He is the author of the recent (2020) book “Small Baltic States and the Euro-Atlantic Security Community”.

Bio of the Presenter:

Nazli Choucri

Board Member of the Boston Global Forum
Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

Nazli Choucri is a Boston Global Forum board member and Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Her work is in the area of international relations, most notably on sources and consequences of international conflict and violence. Professor Choucri is the architect and Director of the Global System for Sustainable Development (GSSD), a multi-lingual web-based knowledge networking system focusing on the multi-dimensionality of sustainability. As Principal Investigator of an MIT-Harvard multi-year project on Explorations in Cyber International Relations, she directed a multi-disciplinary and multi-method research initiative. She is Editor of the MIT Press Series on Global Environmental Accord and, formerly, General Editor of the International Political Science Review. She also previously served as the Associate Director of MIT’s Technology and Development Program.

The author of eleven books and over 120 articles, Dr. Choucri is a member of the European Academy of Sciences. She has been involved in research or advisory work for national and international agencies, and for a number of countries, notably Algeria, Canada, Colombia, Egypt, France, Germany, Greece, Honduras, Japan, Kuwait, Mexico, Pakistan, Qatar, Sudan, Switzerland, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Yemen. She served two terms as President of the Scientific Advisory Committee of UNESCO’s Management of Social Transformation (MOST) Program.

Happy Birthday to Governor Michael Dukakis

Happy Birthday to Governor Michael Dukakis

A very happy 87th birthday November 3, 2020 to Governor Michael Dukakis, Chairman of the Boston Global Forum, and Michael Dukakis Institute, Co-founder of AIWS.net and AIWS City, Co-author of the Social Contract for the AI Age. It is a great honor of the Boston Global Forum and we wish Chairman of the Boston Global Forum many more years of health and happiness.

Governor Michael Dukakis presented the World Leader Cybersecurity Award to Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves at the Loeb House, Harvard University, on Global Cybersecurity Day, December 12, 2017.

David Lovejoy

David Lovejoy

David Lovejoy’s international journey seamlessly weaves his North American roots with extensive experiences in Asia. This worldly perspective underpinned his success as a tour guide in Myanmar, Vietnam, and Japan, where he championed mutual understanding and cultural appreciation. An MBA graduate from the University of British Columbia, David’s leadership capabilities shone as the Vice President of the university’s consulting club. There, he played an instrumental role in assisting local charities and SMEs to bolster efficiency, expand their reach, and secure crucial funding. Recognized for his outstanding contributions, David was honored with the Excellence in Leadership Award from the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade. Committed to fostering the next generation of leaders, David mentors students for career development and is a founding member of TEC Canada’s peer mentoring group. His vision culminated in establishing Horizon Search, a groundbreaking platform that embodies his dedication to global collaboration and innovative thought exchange.

Joseph Caristena

Joseph Caristena

With over 20 years of experience of capacity building at all Government levels, Joseph Caristena is a specialist in building the required and necessary “Aqui Culturelle” and “AI Ecosystem” for the new paradigms of the III millennium, helping teams to give priority on what really matters and understand what needs to be done and avoiding to reinvent the wheel and converting complexity into simple concepts.

He worked successfully with many “Government Information Agencies” always focused in bringing these environments to the next level not only with the adoption of the best workflow automated pipeline digital architectures, but also explaining the importance of the taxonomy of knowledge.

As EU DG NEAR TAIEX expert focused on “Capacity Building”, Joseph Caristena gives technical assistance for information exchange to trigger and accelerate the “cultural harmonization process” required between nations to better understand each other’s national identity.

Joseph Caristena as a well experienced worldwide speaker designed and updated an experimental LIVE cross-disciplinary authentic narration technique called “Ekphrases” which is an ancient mind journey experience to strengthen and empower social intercultural dialogue, social perception and to reduce at the same time social distance.

This research is important because emotions play a crucial role in the processing of all kind of media content perception (artworks included), and specifically, in the enjoyment and experience associated with them.

There is a wide spectrum of emotions and sensations occurring in response to the perceived aesthetic appeal of stimuli determined by a cultural performance (which must not be considered only as an art performance performed by artists, but also as a human interaction like a simple discussion).

The Mediterranean Basin has been the cradle of world civilization since the first settlements. Today in our turbolent age, history recalls the Mediterranean cultural heritage to play a crucial role in promoting dialogue and intercultural understanding.

Joseph Caristena is a performer and a worldwide keynote speaker of social innovation, digital transformation and planetary transition.

Planetary transformation and transition are the next threat of human kind.

We must not repeat in Space the same mistakes done on Earth.

Rethink the way you think!

Akiko Kawai

Akiko Kawai

Akiko Kawai is an entrepreneur thriving at the intersection of politics and business.

After earning her MPA from The Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University in 2014, Akiko joined the International Political Team at PSB Research (formerly Penn Schoen Berland), where she contributed to election strategies in various countries and supported lobbying efforts in Washington D.C.

Leveraging this experience, Akiko founded a Tokyo-based political marketing firm, where she serves as CEO. Through polling and strategy development, she is bringing fresh perspectives to Japan’s political landscape. Simultaneously, she established a global nonprofit organization dedicated to “Tea Diplomacy”. As a member of ANCSSC, a UN alliance, this organization promotes cultural exchange across multiple countries including the United States, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates.

Furthermore, Akiko serves as an overseas expansion advisor for the Nagoya Chamber of Commerce and Industry, supporting regional businesses in their globalization efforts. As an accomplished amateur violinist, she often incorporates her musical talent into her diplomatic endeavors, fostering international understanding through the universal language of music.