The Launch of a Global Conversation

Despite being on the road this week, the Internationalist would like to highlight the release of a report (PDF) summarizing the conclusions of the inaugural session of the Council of Councils (CoC), held March 12-13, 2012. Hosted by the Council on Foreign Relations, the first-ever session of the CoC included a meeting of twenty major foreign policy think tanks from nineteen different countries. The CoC also included two keynote speeches from Robert B. Zoellick, president of the World Bank, and Robert D. Hormats, U.S. undersecretary for economic growth, energy, and the environment.

Why, one might ask, launch such a remarkably “multilateral,” albeit complex, undertaking?

Let’s leave it to my boss, CFR President Richard N. Haass, to best explain the dual significance and relevance of launching the CoC.  He writes, “The defining foreign policy challenges of the twenty-first century are global in nature. The Council of Councils draws on the best thinking from around the world to assess emerging threats and opportunities and formulate responses to them.”

At its core, the conference allowed representatives hailing from numerous influential countries to engage in exhaustive discussions—and often spirited debate—concerning major global governance challenges, trends, as well as, of course, opportunities.

The inaugural CoC meeting addressed four critical themes:

Again, a brief but comprehensive rapporteur’s report going into far greater detail about each of these themes, as well as other important COC topics, has been posted online. Other than providing a window into the first CoC, the document offers a glimpse as to some of the most important areas of harmony and discord regarding pressing global governance issues.

The Council on Foreign Relations’ International Institutions and Global Governance program, in conjunction with other valued CoC partners, looks forward to iterating the CoC in 2013 through a plenary meeting as well as groundbreaking regional meetings held across the world.

With any luck, this innovative and unprecedented partnership including so many of the world’s leading foreign policy think tanks, will help provide pragmatic policy options for the development of institutions capable of addressing the critical global governance challenges of the twenty-first century.