by Editor | Oct 31, 2021 | News
Speaking at Club de Madrid’s Policy Dialog “Rethinking Democracy” on October 27, 2021, Professor Thomas Patterson, Harvard University, co-founder of the Boston Global Forum, Distinguished Contributor of Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment, highlighted the Social Contract for the AI Age and concepts in the book as fundamentals for democracy in the digital era.
Aleksander Kwasniewski, former President of Poland, claimed that “after the collapse of the USSR, we thought that ‘the End of History’ was here but China offers a real alternative that for many is more appealing than democracy. In China we have a real competitor”.
In this line, Derek Mitchell, President of the National Democratic Institute, urged that “We need to understand how China works at home and abroad”. At the same time, he stated that the decline in the quality of democracy “is a practical challenge, not a theoretical one. We need to ensure democracy delivers”.
Democracy is no longer a matter of voting every 4 years and then exercising a mandate until the next election. “We need new schemes of representation, a more liquid democracy”, said Former PM of Belgium Yves Leterme.
Former PM of the Netherlands Jan Peter Balkenende, emphasised democratic culture: “Democracy is not the majority winning and dominating, but rather the majority taking care of the minority”.
Former Vice President of Costa Rica Casas-Zamora also encouraged democratic innovation in terms of representation: “The basic setups of democracy have been around for 100 years. It is time to rethink it. It is time to be bold, embrace innovation and reform. We need to come up with new institutions and new types of deliberation”.
Speakers demanded of the upcoming Democracy Summit convened by U.S. President, Joe Biden, to make a categorical defence of democracy. Activists expressed the need for democracies to become more proactive in defending such systems internally and externally.
by Editor | Oct 31, 2021 | News
On October 28, 2021, to promote and support UNESCO Media and Information Literacy Week, Boston Global Forum organized the Roundtable “Global Enlightenment Education solve misinformation and disinformation”. Mr. Ramu Damodaran, the first Chief of United Nations Academic Impact and Co-Chair of the United Nations Centennial Initiative, was the moderator of the Roundtable.
Prime Minister Zlatko Lagumdzija, member of Club de Madrid, one of Coordinators of Global Alliance for Digital Governance raised:
In last two years, Boston Global Forum and Club de Madrid, and UN Academic Impact as well, collaborated especially in the context of putting together the Social Contract for the AI Age, putting efforts together as an alliance of like-minded people and entities to do something that will cause to get artificial intelligence, an issue of artificial intelligence, closer to what the purpose of every technology is supposed to be, which is, basically speaking, for progress and prosperity of the human being.
In that context, Boston Global Forum participated a lot in Club de Madrid Policy Dialogue that was dealing with an issue of we think in major topics of democracy.
To solve disinformation and misinformation practically, we build the new information ecosystem that has to be built as a result of the technological developments and prospects of democracy that we want to build.
Professor David Silbersweig, Harvard University, Board Member of Global Enlightenment Education Program, introduced the Global Enlightenment Education Program as an important part of AI World Society and the United Nations Centennial Initiative, and said:
The increased powers that technology gives it and the increased powers of the nation states and bad actors are small groups and the vulnerability of the population to mass manipulation on a scale and with an acceleration that is enabled by the technology so the solutions need to be technologically enabled and need to be informed by our latest understanding.
by Editor | Oct 31, 2021 | News
Distinguished Contributors of Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment and Coordinators of Global Alliance for Digital Governance Paul Nemitz and Professor Thomas Patterson spoke at the Policy Dialog 2021. They brought ideas from discussions in building Global Law and Accord on AI and Digital.
“Technology, well-framed with legal instruments, will be conducive to democracy. We found that with radio -used by Nazis first, then regulated and a factor for democracy, and with TV). TV and Radio needed rules to be good for democracy. It’s time to do it with the internet and AI”, said Paul Nemitz, Principal Advisor, Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers at the European Commission.
Participants reflected on the nature and potential development of democracy, its institutions and mechanisms. “You need a state, rule of law and democracy. And we need to find a balance between state and individual freedom. We also need a system in which a majority cannot impose its will on a minority”, said Alexander Stubb, the former Prime Minister of Finland.
Ricardo Lagos, former president of Chile, noted how politics today are “much more horizontal” thanks to platforms and technologies by which politicians are able to directly communicate with citizens. “Politicians could have more established institutions to listen to the people and learn their demands”, he said.
Anna-Lena von Hodenburg, the CEO of HateAid, said that leaving platforms to self-regulate does not work to address the floods of disinformation and hate speech online driving polarisation. We need balanced regulation instead. Von Hodenburg called for more rights for users and transparency from platforms.
Regarding new information technologies, Derek Mitchell, President of National Democratic Institute stated that “The digital will kill democracy. Our inability to fight the disinformation battle is daunting. Without a strong information basis to build consensus, democracy cannot succeed”.’
by Editor | Oct 31, 2021 | Event Updates
Boston Global Forum partnered with Club de Madrid in organizing the Policy Dialog “Rethinking Democracy”
CdM again partnered with the Boston Global Forum, its renowned scholars and the Global Alliance for Digital Governance, which serve to coordinate distinguished leaders, strategists, thinkers, and innovators, the creation of a Global Law and Accord on AI and Digital, and contribute concepts for mechanisms with strong enforcement potentials.
In the Opening Remarks at the Policy Dialog 2021, President of CdM Danilo Turk stressed:
“In a field where so much is yet to come, we are convinced that international cooperation for Artificial Intelligence and digital technologies is an opportunity to write the rules together. The Framework for AI International Accord, a part of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”, presented at CdM-BGF Policy Lab September 2021 is a significant start for this goal.”
In the Policy Dialog, Gordon Brown, the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom highlighted nationalism as a key ideology distorting democratic governance. “People need to work together to solve problems. If we fail to do so, democracy suffers. One ill of democracy we can’t ignore is that we are facing political nationalism, which is a dominant ideology today”, Brown added.
Laura Chinchilla, former president of Costa Ricca, said that education is the number one factor shaping a generation of democratic citizens. “Educating people on democratic values can really make a difference. We should emphasise civic education in our solutions”, Chinchilla stated. Likewise, Gordon Brown highlighted a growing individualism in citizens’ perception of democratic rights: “There is a missed connection that your rights depend on other people having rights as well”, said the former Prime Minister.
“Democracy is also about prosperity. People need to eat. Supporting elections is not enough to defend democracy nowadays” said Emma Jeblaoui, the President of the International Institute in Human Development. Regarding the experience in Tunisia, Jeblaoui expressed that “democracy support is not only about giving money. It’s also about following up on the reforms and not only sending a cheque and visiting once a year for a group photo.”
Concluding of the 3-days of rich and wide discussions of the Policy Dialog 2021: To succeed in the global fight against authoritarianism, democracies are required to ensure that information ecosystems support safe, healthy, and fully functioning societies. Citizens and public interest should be at the core of all decision‐making.
by Editor | Oct 24, 2021 | News
Ramu Damodaran, the first Chief of United Nations Academic Impact (2010-2021), Co-Chair of the United Nations Centennial Initiative
In a phrase later paraphrased by, and hence often misattributed to, Dag Hammarskjold, Henry Cabot Lodge said of the then new United Nations that it would not “bring us to heaven, but might save us from hell.” As we observe the organization’s 76th anniversary on October 24, perceptions of both hell and heaven have become more proximate, the impact of the pandemic, or personal escape from it, a measuring rod, shaping also the ecumenical “Our Common Agenda” authored by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres last month as a moral, as much as political, compass for our common future.
Drawing upon rich sources, including a global conversation launched in 2020 that aggregated responses from 1.5 million people, the report builds upon Guterres’s determination that the 75th anniversary of the United Nations be opportunity to shape the future rather than celebrate the past, an idea that informed the Boston Global Forum’s own United Nations Centennial Initiative, looking at how the world would be in 2045, the moment the Organization reached a hundred years. Central to both the “Common Agenda” and our effort is the imperative of a new social contract, one Guterres defines as “between governments and their people and within societies so as to rebuild trust and embrace a comprehensive vision of human rights”, and one which we, in the specific context of our age of artificial intelligence (AI), see based upon “dialogue, tolerance, learning and understanding on key principles and practices for an agreement among members of society for shared social benefit.”
We see the shape of such agreement leading to the United Nations extending international human rights standards to AI (contributing to the “comprehensive vision” Guterres suggests), adopting a convention on the use of AI and establishing a specialized UN agency on AI. We have at least two precedents to draw upon, including the very first resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, Resolution 1/1 of January 1946.
The four months between the signing of the UN Charter by its original members, on June 26,1945, and the formal launch of the Organization, on October 24, were punctuated by an event unforeseen when the Charter was drafted, the use of atomic weapons in August. That inspired the resolution “to deal with the problems raised by the discovery of atomic energy” and its creation of the UN Atomic Energy Commission with an objective to use atomic energy only for peaceful purposes. While there were certainly infirmities and evasions in the resolution, including the placement of the Commission under the authority of the Security Council rather than General Assembly, and its dissolution within a few years, it did set the pace for the International Atomic Energy Agency to emerge and, more immediately, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons which entered into force for its signatories in February this year.
A second precedent is the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), charged with the implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention with its unique provision for on-site inspections of operational chemical weapons destruction facilities as well as “challenge” inspections of use or production of chemical weapons alleged, with provision of verifiable proof, by one or more States against another. Worth noting is that although it has a working relationship with the United Nations, OPCW is not itself a UN body.
Both a Social Contract for the AI age and an alliance or compact for digital governance can be fashioned by nations within the forums of the United Nations or outside, as the precedents of IAEA and OPCW show. Our preference, given the leadership of the Secretary-General, would be the former; it is odd that, in 2021, matters relating to AI are dispersed among UN entities as disparate as its Conference on Disarmament, its Inter-regional Crime and Justice Research Institute and the International Telecommunications Union. Sound and swift multilateral action can inspire creative academic, scientific and civil society endeavors, including the emergence of an AI “World Society” (AIWS) and of AIWS Cities, urban centers for innovation and reflection, both of which we suggest in our own report.
As we repair our world and our lives, the moment is opportune. As Derek Walcott, the Nobel literature laureate who taught at Boston University for a number of years reminded us, when you “break a vase, the love that reassembles the fragments is stronger than that love which took its symmetry for granted when it was whole.” Let’s seize that strength.
by Editor | Oct 24, 2021 | News
Harvard Professor Thomas Patterson, co-founder of the Boston Global Forum, will present key concepts of the Age of Global Enlightenment from Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment at the World Leadership Alliance – Club de Madrid’s Policy Dialog 2021:
17:00 – 18:30 CET / 11:00 – 12:30 EST
PLENARY SESSION II, The power of technology, leadership and citizen´s resilience
Democracies all over the world are facing similar challenges. This session is devoted to reflecting on three powerful tools to protect and prepare our democracies for the future: digital democracy, responsible leadership and citizen´s resilience. Pan Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
Panelists will propose policy recommendations that help define strategies to foster this kind of technology, leadership and citizenship to rebuild trust in democracy.
- Dalia Grybauskaitė,President of Lithuania (2009-2019) and Member of CdM
- Paul Nemitz,Principal Advisor, Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers, European Commission
- Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya,Leader of Democratic Belarus and a human rights activist
- Tania Bruguera,Cuban Artist and Activist
- Thomas Patterson,Research Director of the Michael Dukakis Institute for Leadership and Innovation; Harvard Kennedy School, Boston Global Forum
Session facilitated by Peter Loewen, Professor, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy
Link: https://rethinking-democracy.vconnect.tv/register/#signup
by Editor | Oct 24, 2021 | News
3:30 PM – 4:30 PM EST, Oct 28, 2021
Moderator: Ramu Damodaran, first Chief of United Nations Academic Impact, co-chair of the United Nations Centennial Initiative
Speakers: Prime Minister Zlatko Lagumdzija, Harvard Professor David Silbersweig
The moderator and speakers will present and discuss on how Global Enlightenment Education Program of the United Nations Centennial Initiative will contribute to solve the issues of misinformation and disinformation.
This is the first side event to Club de Madrid’s Policy Dialog 2021 “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
The United Nations came into being in 1945 as a cerebral, as much as political, innovation, the very first resolution of its General Assembly, in the January of 1946, was on the “problems arising from the discovery of atomic energy.” 75 years later, in the January of 2021, Governor Michael Dukakis announced the “Artificial Intelligence International Accord Initiative” whose goal he described as “to stimulate a global conversation that will make sure AI is used responsibly by governments and the private sector around the world.” It is precisely conversations of that nature that can nurture an era of global enlightenment as we approach the United Nations centennial in less than a quarter century. An era that can shape a world governed by international law and the exercise of international as much as individual, and indeed intellectual, responsibility where the creativity and innovation of the human person work to shape a world worthy of our times just as surely as that world works to foster and further, in the phrase of the United Nations Charter, the “dignity and worth“ of that human person.
In preparation for that transition and achievement, the Boston Global Forum (BGF) and Club de Madrid are choreographing a series of interviews with eminent thinkers on “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment” as side events of their joint Policy Dialogue 2021. These will be telecast by major media in Vietnam and in New York and will be accessible on the BGF website.
From Oct 27, 2021 to December 12, 2021:
Format: discussion with selected speakers of CdM Policy Dialog 2021, or distinguished leaders, thinkers, strategists, innovators about Rethinking Democracy
Title of Series: Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment
Topics:
- Global Enlightenment Education to solve Disinformation, Misinformation
- New innovation ecosystems for community innovation economy
- Smart democracy
- AIWS City and Flagship cities in the Age of Global Enlightenment
Moderators: Ramu Damodaran, Professor Thomas Patterson, Professor David Silbersweig, Professor Nazli Choucri
Other side events:
Global Enlightenment Education at UNESCO Global Media and Information Literacy Week 2021
3:30 PM – 4:30 PM EST, Oct 28, 2021
Moderator: Ramu Damodaran,
Speakers: Prime Minister Zlatko Lagumdzija, Harvard Professor David Silbersweig
Building Nha Trang Khanh Hoa in becoming a flagship area in the Age of Global Enlightenment
7:00 AM – 8:30 AM, EST, October 29, 2021
by Editor | Oct 24, 2021 | News
The Framework of Global Laws and Accord on AI and Digital and Global Alliance for Digital Governance were introduced and discussed at the conference “Law and Governance in the Age of AI”, co-organized by Vietnam National University (VNU) and IFI on October 21, 2021.
Scholars of the School of Law, Vietnam National University were pleased to contribute to the initiative of Boston Global Forum, to build the Age of Global Enlightenment.
Presentation
Keynote on Social Contract on the Age of AI and Review on the Book “Remaking the World Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
Moderator:
Mr. Nguyễn Anh Tuấn, CEO of The Boston Global Forum (BGF), co-founder of the AIWS City (AIWS.city); Founder, CEO, and Editor-in-Chief of VietNamNet (1997-2011)
Fundamentals of International Law on AI and Digital
Mr. Paul Nemitz, Principal Advisor in the Directorate General for Justice and Consumers, European Commission
Law and governance: a comparative Study on Asian national policies and Strategies
Mr. Đặng Minh Tuấn, Deputy Head of the Constitutional and Administrative Law Department, School of Law, VNU
The Use of AI in Civil Justice System: Perspectives and Challenges for Access to Justice
Mrs. Nguyễn Thị Bích Thảo, Deputy Head of Civil Law Department, School of Law, VNU
The social credit system in china: a state governance system and its adverse impact on human rights
Mr. Nguyễn Văn Quân, School of Law, VNU
Secretary: Mrs. Vu Thi My Le, IFI
by Editor | Oct 24, 2021 | Event Updates
7:00 am – 8:30 am, EST, October 29, 2021
Organizers: Boston Global Forum and Club de Madrid
This is s special side event to Club de Madrid’s Policy Dialog 2021
Moderator:
Thomas Patterson, Co-founder of the Boston Global Forum, Harvard professor, Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
Keynote Speakers:
Governor Michael Dukakis, Co-founder and Chair of the Boston Global Forum, Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
Nguyen Hai Ninh, Chief of Party of Nha Trang Khanh Hoa
Panelists:
Nguyen Tan Tuan, Governor of Nha Trang Khanh Hoa
Ho Van Mung, Chief of Party of Nha Trang City
Alex Sandy Pentland, MIT professor, Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
John Quelch, Co-founder of the Boston Global Forum, Harvard Business School professor
Prime Minister Zlatko Lagumdzija, Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
President Vaira Vike-Freiberga, President of Club de Madrid (2014-2020), Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
David Silbersweig, Harvard Professor, BGF Board Member
David Bray, the top “24 Americans Who Are Changing the World” under 40
Nguyen Anh Tuan, Co-founder and CEO of the Boston Global Forum, Co-Author of the Book “Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment”
