“The aim of this project is ambitious and urgent: to launch a new reform effort for the global security system in 2009 ... For the global system is in serious trouble. It is simply not capable of solving the challenges of today. You all know the list: terrorism, non-proliferation, climate change, pandemics, failing states ... None can be solved by a single government acting alone.”
-- Javier Solana, MGI Advisory Group Member
Project Summary >> (PDF)
Project Directors
Ambassador Carlos Pascual is vice president and director of the Foreign Policy Studies Program at the Brookings Institution. Mr. Pascual joined Brookings after a 23 year career in the United States Department of State, National Security Council (NSC), and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). His immediate previous position was Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization at the United States Department of State. Prior to serving as Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization, Mr. Pascual was Coordinator for U.S. Assistance to Europe and Eurasia. From October 2000-August 2003, Mr. Pascual served as U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine. During his time at the NSC, Mr. Pascual served first as Director for Russian, Ukrainian and Eurasian Affairs, and then as Special Assistant to the President and NSC Senior Director for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia. Prior to his work at the NSC, Mr. Pascual held several positions at USAID.
Bruce Jones is a Senior Fellow and Co-Director of the Center on International Cooperation (CIC) at New York University and leads research on the evolution of multilateral security institutions and on the UN. In 2003-04, Dr. Jones served as Deputy Research Director for the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. In 2004-05, he served as deputy to the Special Advisor to the Secretary-General, and supported the Assistant-Secretary-General for Strategic Planning on negotiations on security issues during the ‘In Larger Freedom’ reform effort. During this period he also served as Acting Secretary of the Secretary-General’s Policy Committee. From 2002-2004, as Deputy Director of CIC, Dr. Jones undertook research on US and UN security policy, as well as research and evaluations commissioned by the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations and the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. From 2000-2002, Dr. Jones served as the Chief of Staff to the United Nations' Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process. Previously, Dr. Jones was a member of the UN's Advance Mission in Kosovo and of the planning team for the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor. He has been a lecturer at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School and at New York University. He is the author of Evolving Models of Peacekeeping; Peacemaking in Rwanda: The Dynamics of Failure; of The UN and post-crisis aid: towards a more political economy and several articles on the Middle East, Central Africa, and UN post-conflict, transitional authority, and humanitarian operations.
Stephen J. Stedman is a senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) and Freeman Spogli Institute (FSI), and is director of the Ford Dorsey Program in International Policy Studies at Stanford University. In 2003-2004 Professor Stedman was Research Director of the United Nations High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. In 2005 he served as Assistant Secretary General and Special Advisor to the Secretary General of the United Nations, with responsibility for working with governments to adopt the Panel’s recommendations on strengthening collective security and for implementing key changes within the United Nations Secretariat, including the creation of a Peacebuilding Support Office, a Counter Terrorism Task Force, and a Policy Committee that acts as a cabinet to the Secretary General. Professor Stedman is a leading expert on civil wars and conflict management. His recent books include Ending Civil Wars, which examines the determinants of successful implementation of peace agreements, and Refugee Manipulation, which studies how warring parties and states attempt to manipulate the international refugee regime.
Project Update
May 2009 >> (PDF)
Recent EventsIn June 2008, MGI briefed policymakers in Washington, D.C. on the Project’s preliminary recommendations. MGI Co-Directors conducted dialogue sessions with national media, representatives and staffers on Capitol Hill, Washington-based MGI Advisory Group members, and foreign policy advisors from both of the U.S. Presidential Campaigns. The purpose of these sessions was to obtain early feedback on MGI’s findings and to begin to generate momentum around the Project’s plan for action. These U.S.-based consultations will continue in the fall of 2008 as the Project seeks to inject a vision for international cooperation onto the agenda of a new U.S. administration in 2009.
Throughout the spring of 2008, MGI carried out international consultations and briefings in Mexico City, Paris, Brussels, Helsinki, and Beijing as part of its continued efforts to both gather international input and build global consensus around an effort to revitalize the international security system. Sessions included briefings on MGI’s climate change and energy security recommendations to French officials, a presentation to the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme, and a series of meetings in Beijing with government officials, party leaders, policymakers, scholars, students, and private sector representatives. In May, the Finnish Institute of International Affairs hosted a MGI session in Helsinki with representatives from Nordic and Baltic states.
In February 2008, MGI conducted briefings in London to engage UK stakeholders. Sessions included a meeting with UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband, a workshop on MGI’s climate change recommendations hosted by the Institute for Public Policy Research, a roundtable at the Center for European Reform, and meetings with journalists. In addition, MGI made a panel presentation at the U.S.-Islamic World Forum in Doha where participants discussed regional priorities in the Middle East for strengthening international cooperation.
Late in 2007, MGI Co-Directors also traveled to Tokyo, Japan, and Delhi, India to gather input from experts, government officials, and private sector and non-governmental representatives on the Project’s recommendations. The project consulted with Latin American Ambassadors in Washington D.C., hosted a roundtable with experts from the Wall Street finance community in New York City, and held sessions on threat-specific recommendations with field leaders. The Center on International Security and Cooperation also hosted a conference with experts and international policymakers in October of 2007.
Looking AheadWith the completion of an MGI Plan for Action Report, the Project’s book, and a series of policy briefs, MGI’s ambitious domestic and international outreach effort will continue in earnest in the summer and fall of 2008. MGI's capstone Advisory Group Meeting will take place this July in Berlin, Germany in cooperation with the Bertelsmann Foundation. The session will gather senior officials of key international organizations, high-level governmental officials from influential nations, and members of the Project's Advisory Group to set an agenda ahead on three key global threats: climate change, nuclear proliferation, and regional instability and internal conflict.
In the fall of 2008, MGI will focus on building domestic constituencies for the Project’s recommendations, convening policy dialogues in Washington D.C. and New York City, as well as at universities and think tanks in other cities across the country. MGI findings will be distributed to members of Congress and the Executive Branch, as well as to U.S. Presidential Candidates and their staff. MGI will also target the new UN Secretary General and the Secretariat staff as an additional audience for institutional reform recommendations. The project will hold dialogue sessions with United Nations Permanent Representatives in New York, as well as with Ambassadors and embassy staff in Washington D.C. A series of regional launches in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and Europe targeting regional policymakers and issue experts are planned to follow in 2009. MGI will also continue a speaker series dialogue to highlight key issues on the global agenda.
Advisory Group MeetingsOver the past year, MGI’s international and U.S. Advisory Group members have gathered together with policymakers and influential leaders from around the world to discuss how to strengthen international cooperation to address today’s most urgent security threats. The final and capstone MGI Advisory Group meeting will be held in Berlin in July. Details and highlights of previous Advisory Group meetings are provided below:
MGI, with the generous support of the Finnish government in partnership with the Ditchley Foundation, held its fourth Advisory Group meeting at Ditchley Park in Oxfordshire, England on February 13-14th, 2008. This gathering brought together Advisory Group members with top European policymakers and provided a forum for the MGI Project Co-Directors to present and receive feedback on MGI’s recommendations across six key threat areas: nuclear proliferation, civil strife and regional conflict, climate change, global poverty, threats to biological security, and terrorism. The dialogue focused on MGI’s ambitious proposal for an expanded and reconceptualized G8 - a new G16 – to create opportunities for pre-negotiation and for forging cooperative arrangements between major and emerging powers. Meeting participants also discussed the role a new U.S. administration must play in shaping this global agenda.
MGI, in partnership with the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, held its third Advisory Group meeting in Singapore on December 9-10th, 2007. The session brought MGI Advisory Group members together with regional experts and policymakers from across Asia to discuss their priorities, challenges, and opportunities for a strengthened multilateral security system. In particular, the session focused on international cooperation to address nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament, global climate change, and energy security. Participants also discussed regional security arrangements in Asia. The goal of the session was to ensure perspectives from Asia, home to many of the world’s emerging powers, were incorporated into MGI’s final recommendations.
MGI convened its second Advisory Group meeting in New York City on October 1, 2007. The session included the introduction of “responsible sovereignty” as a potential animating principle for a strengthened multilateral security system. Participants discussed how this principle might be applied to design a multilateral response to the threat of global climate change and explored how multilateralism could be employed to address the “hard cases,” such as a possible role for the United Nations in Iraq and the need for an effective regional architecture to respond to crises in the Middle East. A lunch panel with Samuel Berger and Thomas Pickering, chaired by Javier Solana, focused on “The U.S. and Multilateralism: Problems and Prospects.” Over 50 PermReps and UN officials were in attendance.
On June 11, 2007 MGI held its first Advisory Group meeting at The Brookings Institution in Washington D.C.. As the inaugural meeting, the session gathered a large cross-section of MGI’s U.S. and International Advisory Groups. Participants affirmed that the current international system is not adequate to respond to today’s global security challenges. While recognizing the ambitiousness of the MGI Project, participants underscored that a comprehensive vision of multilateral reform must be realized to address today's threats.
MGI Staff
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The Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Avenue NW
Washington D.C. 20036
Fax: 202.797.6003 |
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Holly Benner
Assistant MGI Project Director
202.741.6560
hbenner@brookings.edu |
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Jessie Duncan
MGI Research Assistant
202.797.6233
jduncan@brookings.edu |
Center for International Cooperation, New York University
418 Lafayatte Street, Suite 543
New York, New York 10003
Fax: 212.995.4706 |
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Catherine Bellamy
Associate Director
212.998.3690
cbellamy@nyu.edu |
Richard Gowan
Associate Director
212.998.3686
richard.gowan@nyu.edu |
Andrew Hart
Assistant to Bruce Jones
212.992.9649
andrew.hart@nyu.edu |
Center for International Security and Cooperation, Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-6165
Fax: 650.723.0089 |
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Kate Chadwick
Assistant to Steve Stedman
650.725.8641
kchadwick@stanford.edu |
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