CIGI Campus, Public Art

The Peace of Westphalia began

Münster, Germany – October, 1648

This series of peace treaties was signed between May and October of 1648. It ended the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) and the Eighty Years' War (1568-1648), and established the principles of national sovereignty and the non-interference of one nation-state in the affairs of another.

The French Revolution commenced

Paris, France – 1789

The Paris Peace Conference convened

Paris, France – January, 1919

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted

Paris, France – December, 1948

The International Committee of the Red Cross convened

Geneva, Switzerland – February, 1863

The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade signed

Geneva, Switzerland – April, 1947

The first Hague Conventions adopted

The Hague, Netherlands – July, 1899

The Hague Conventions are a group of international treaties that established the first agreements on the laws of war and war crimes. Along with the Geneva Conventions, these were a model for the establishment of international law.

The Bretton Woods Conference convened

Bretton Woods, US – July, 1944

Forty-four nations met at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to develop a new system of international monetary management. The Bretton Woods agreements established the International Monetary Fund and led to the creation of the World Bank.

The Organization of American States formed

Bogotá, Colombia – April, 1948

The Ninth International Conference of American States formalized inter-American cooperation with the adoption of the Charter of the Organization of American States, the American Treaty on Pacific Settlement (the Pact of Bogotá), the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man (the world's first general human rights instrument) and the Economic Agreement of Bogotá (the latter never entered into force).

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization created

Washington, DC – April, 1949

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is an alliance of 26 countries in Europe and North America. Established by the North Atlantic Treaty to ensure peace and security in the North Atlantic region through the principle of collective defence, NATO was the first peacetime intergovernmental military alliance since 1778.

The Organisation of African Unity created

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – May, 1963

The OAU was the first transnational body in Africa to promote solidarity throughout the continent while creating a unified African voice on the world stage. Since 2002, it has been known as the African Union.

The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons signed

New York, US – March, 1970

The treaty to limit nuclear proliferation was signed in 1970 by 189 states, including five with nuclear arsenals: the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, China and France. More countries have ratified this treaty than any other arms-limitation agreement.

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea signed

Montego Bay, Jamaica – December, 1982

With this convention, representatives of more than 160 sovereign states established national rights and obligations relating to navigation, pollution, resource extraction and other uses of the seas and oceans. It set ocean boundaries and created an innovative legal regime for controlling mineral resource exploitation in deep seabed areas beyond national jurisdictions.

The United Nations Rio Earth Summit held

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – June, 1992

More than 100 heads of state met in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, for the first international Earth Summit, convened to address urgent problems of environmental protection and socio-economic development. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, signed by 154 nations, attempted to address greenhouse gas emissions. Subsequent meetings led to the legally binding 1997 Kyoto Protocol.

The European Union established through the Treaty of Maastricht

Maastricht, Netherlands – February, 1992

The European Union was formed as the first complex supranational state with a single market and common currency system. It allows the free movement of people, goods, services and capital for its member states. The EU has grown from the original six founding states (France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Belgium) to 27 countries in 2011.

The Centre for International Governance Innovation founded

Waterloo, Canada – July, 2001

Incorporated on July 30, 2001, and officially named The Centre for International Governance Innovation a year later, CIGI is an independent, non-partisan think tank addressing the most pressing problems in global governance. In its first decade, CIGI helped develop the idea for a G20 leaders’ level summit, and has built the CIGI Campus as a hub of education, research and analysis for governance innovation in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

The International Criminal Court created

Rome, Italy – July, 2002

The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court is the treaty which established the ICC as the first international tribunal where crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression can be prosecuted, when states are unable or unwilling to try the accused. By mid-2011, the court had indicted more than two dozen people after opening investigations in several countries.