WATERLOO — Former prime minister Paul Martin and Nobel Prize winning economics professor Paul Krugman will be among the luminaries coming to Waterloo this weekend for a conference on the impacts of the global economic crisis and what is needed for recovery and economic governance in the future.
The conference is a major annual event hosted by the Centre for International Governance Innovation in Waterloo, which brings together experts from around the world every fall to talk about global challenges.
The economic crisis is the focus of this year’s conference, titled Toward a Global New Deal. It starts on Friday, Oct. 2 and continues to Sunday, Oct. 4, with about 200 experts from around the world in attendance.
The conference will begin by looking at the impact of the current global economic crisis on global finance, trade and investment, as well as on food security, poverty and environmental challenges. Participants will talk about the ability of various governance systems to manage globalization and what the policy priorities should be.
The conference participants will then go on to debate the shifting role of the state in economic governance, policy coordination and the long-term impact of the policy reactions to the crisis.
Jagdish Bhagwati, a Columbia University professor and senior fellow in International Economics at the Council on Foreign Relations, will give a keynote address as the conference kicks off on Friday night. A well-known advocate of free trade, he has held numerous posts, including being a special adviser to the United Nations on globalization issues and an external adviser to the World Trade Organization.
On Saturday morning, former prime minister Paul Martin will give a keynote address, which will be followed by panel discussions on global trade and investment regimes, as well as the impact of the crisis on poverty and food security.
On Saturday afternoon, global economic experts from Oxford and Harvard Universities and from institutes in Canada and Brazil will discuss where the global economic recovery will come from.
The Saturday events will be capped off with a keynote speech by Paul Krugman, a professor of economics and international affairs from Princeton University who was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics Science for his analysis of trade patterns and location of economic activity.
On Sunday morning, Roberto Mangabeira Unger from Harvard Law School, regarded as one of the world’s leading social thinkers, will deliver a keynote address. That will be followed by panel discussions on systemic risks and the future of global economic leadership.
The conference will conclude on Sunday afternoon with a brainstorming session where participants will deliberate questions in a media-moderated plenary session with Steve Paikin, anchor of TVO’s The Agenda.
For more information about the conference, fees and registration, visit www.cigi09.org.