Geopolitisk indvirkning speakers

Why organisations work with Hugo Dixon Direct access to the thinking behind the Ukraine Reparations Loan, a $300bn policy proposal he co-authored that has been endorsed at European Commission level. A founder’s view of financial commentary as a business: he built Breakingviews from a 350-word format into a global Reuters franchise and sold it for £13m. Two decades of senior FT and Reuters editorial perspective on European banking, sovereign debt, and macro risk, applied to the questions boards are actually asking now. A track record of converting analysis into political action, through InFacts and the People’s Vote campaign, that few commentators of his standing can match. Biography highlights Founder of Breakingviews; sold to Reuters in 2009 for £13m. Editor-at-Large / Commentator-at-Large, Reuters. Co-author, with Lee Buchheit and Daleep Singh, of the Ukraine Reparations Loan plan, endorsed by Ursula von der Leyen in her 2025 State of the Union. Former Head of Lex, Financial Times, after 13 years on the paper; began career at The Economist. Business Journalist of the Year (British Press Awards), 2000 and 2008; Decade of Excellence Award, 2008. Author, The Penguin Guide to Finance (Penguin). Biography The Ukraine Reparations Loan, the proposal to channel roughly $300bn of frozen Russian sovereign assets into Ukraine’s reconstruction without an outright seizure, was endorsed by Ursula von der Leyen in her 2025 State of the Union. Hugo Dixon is one of its three principal architects, with the sovereign debt lawyer Lee Buchheit and the economist Daleep Singh. That work sits at the seam he has occupied for two decades: where financial structure meets geopolitical decision. After thirteen years at the Financial Times, latterly as Head of Lex, Dixon left in 1999 to co-found Breakingviews, a financial commentary business he sold to Reuters in 2009 for £13m and continued to edit until 2012. He now writes as Reuters’ Commentator-at-Large, with a focus on Europe, Russia, sovereign assets, and the EU’s macro choices. He was twice named Business Journalist of the Year at the British Press Awards and won the Decade of Excellence Award in 2008. He is the author of The Penguin Guide to Finance. Dixon also has a record of translating analysis into political infrastructure. He founded and edited InFacts, the fact-based campaign against Brexit, and was a co-founder and leader of the People’s Vote campaign. For boards weighing geopolitical exposure, EU policy direction, or the financial mechanics of supporting Ukraine, he offers the rare combination of an insider’s grasp of the instruments and an operator’s grasp of what moves in Brussels. Key speaking topics Russia, Ukraine and the frozen sovereign assets question The EU’s macro and policy direction European banking and sovereign debt Brexit and UK-EU relations Financial markets and capital allocation Geopolitical risk for boards Ideal for Boards and audit committees with exposure to Russia, sanctions, or EU policy shifts CFOs and treasurers tracking sovereign debt and frozen-asset developments Senior teams in banking, asset management, and insurance with European footprints Foundations, policy institutions, and corporate affairs leaders working on Ukraine reconstruction Audience outcomes A clear read of where the frozen Russian assets debate is heading and what the realistic European pathways look like. Sharper framing of EU policy direction post the 2024 to 2026 political cycle and what it implies for capital and regulation. An informed view of UK-EU relations beyond the headlines, drawn from the inside of the Brexit fight. Connections between geopolitical decisions and concrete financial mechanisms that most macro talks leave abstract.

Why organisations work with Ian Dunt He explains the mechanics of UK government, not the gossip: how a bill actually becomes law, where civil service capacity sits, why a policy lands or stalls. Useful to any team pricing regulatory or political exposure. His book How Westminster Works… and Why It Doesn’t became a Sunday Times bestseller and is used as a reference text by people who work in and around Parliament. That is a stronger credibility signal than a television appearance count. He brings a second, distinct intellectual track on liberalism, populism and the condition of democratic institutions, drawn from How To Be A Liberal and the Origin Story podcast. Boards thinking about long-horizon political risk get more than a UK briefing. He writes and speaks for decision-makers, not commentators. The register is direct, argued, commercially relevant, and stays away from partisan theatre. Biography highlights Columnist for The i Paper, one of the UK’s main daily political columns. Former editor of politics.co.uk, the long-running UK politics analysis site. Author of How Westminster Works… and Why It Doesn’t (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2023), a Sunday Times bestseller. Author of How To Be A Liberal (Canbury, 2020) and Brexit: What the Hell Happens Now? (Canbury, 2016). Co-host of Origin Story with Dorian Lynskey, and a founding voice on Oh God, What Now? and The Bunker, all Podmasters productions. Appointed chair of the editorial board of New Humanist magazine in 2025. Biography Most UK political coverage describes the weather over Westminster. Dunt describes the building. How Westminster Works… and Why It Doesn’t, published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson in 2023 and an immediate Sunday Times bestseller, walked readers through the actual wiring: Number 10, the Cabinet Office, the civil service, the Commons, the Lords, the party machines, and the specific failure points in each. That is the unusual thing about him as a political voice. The subject is institutions, not personalities. Before the book, a long editorship of politics.co.uk gave him the beat, and a column at The i Paper gave him the public platform he still uses. He writes in plain, argued English, not lobby shorthand, which is part of why the book crossed over from political readers to the general ones. The second strand of his work sits further back from the news cycle. How To Be A Liberal, published by Canbury in 2020, is a history of liberal thought and a defence of it against nationalism and authoritarian revival. Origin Story, co-hosted with the journalist Dorian Lynskey on Podmasters, takes that same method, trace an idea to its root, then show what it has become, across subjects from neoliberalism to conspiracy theory. It is the part of his work that serious boards find most useful when the question is not what happens next week but what kind of political environment the organisation will be operating in for the next decade. In 2025 he was appointed chair of the editorial board of New Humanist, the 140-year-old rationalist magazine, which sits comfortably inside that longer-arc intellectual project. Key speaking topics UK politics and Westminster governance Political and regulatory risk for business UK-EU relations after Brexit Populism and the condition of democratic institutions Liberalism, public reason, and the information environment Media disruption and misinformation Ideal for Boards, executive teams and public affairs leads exposed to UK regulatory and political risk. Risk, compliance and government relations functions inside multinationals operating in the UK and Europe. Investor and membership audiences who want a serious read on Westminster rather than a news recap. Audience outcomes A working mental model of how UK government actually produces decisions, and where it breaks. Sharper judgement on which political stories matter commercially and which are noise. A clearer view of where populist politics is driving institutional change across Europe and the UK. An informed frame for conversations with policymakers, regulators and own-government-relations teams.

Why organisations work with Ian Goldin He predicted in The Butterfly Defect (2014) that a pandemic would be the most likely cause of the next global financial shock, six years before COVID. Boards looking for genuine foresight on systemic risk treat that record as evidence, not branding. He forecasts growth prospects across regions, including the US, Europe, China, and Asia, and across sectors such as manufacturing, banking, and AI. Asset allocators, central banks, and multinational boards use that view to stress-test capital and operating decisions over a five to fifteen year horizon. Few speakers carry both operating and academic authority on globalisation: Vice President of the World Bank, Chief Executive of the Development Bank of Southern Africa, and Founding Director of the Oxford Martin School. His work translates directly into capital and policy decisions on geoeconomics, supply chains, urbanisation, and the impact of AI on jobs and development. These are the live questions on most international boards heading into the late 2020s. He moderates and facilitates as well as keynotes. Clients including J.P. Morgan and pharmaceutical and legal industry events have used him to open and connect multi-day programmes, shape agendas, and chair leadership conversations on top of delivering the headline keynote. Biography highlights Vice President of the World Bank (2003-2006) and Director of Development Policy (2001-2003). Chief Executive of the Development Bank of Southern Africa (1996-2001), advising President Nelson Mandela. Founding Director of the Oxford Martin School (2006-2016), establishing 45 research programmes and over 500 affiliated academics. Professor of Globalisation and Development, University of Oxford, and Professorial Fellow at Balliol College. Author of 25 books including The Butterfly Defect (Princeton, 2014), Age of the City (Bloomsbury, 2023, FT Best Books of 2023), and The Shortest History of Migration (Old Street, 2024). Writer and presenter of three BBC documentary series, including After the Crash and The Pandemic that Changed the World, and the BBC Analysis The Death of Globalisation (2023). Biography In 2014, The Butterfly Defect argued that the next major global financial shock was most likely to come from a pandemic running through the connective tissue of globalisation. Six years later, COVID proved the case. The book, written with Mike Mariathasan and published by Princeton, was Ian Goldin’s clearest statement of a thesis he had been building for two decades: globalisation has produced extraordinary gains and a new class of systemic risk that institutions are not yet built to manage. That argument carries weight because of where it comes from. Goldin was Vice President of the World Bank and, before that, Chief Executive of the Development Bank of Southern Africa, where he advised President Nelson Mandela through the early post-apartheid years. He was Principal Economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and a Programme Director at the OECD in Paris. The institutions sit behind the books. At Oxford, he founded the Oxford Martin School in 2006 and ran it for a decade, building 45 research programmes across more than 100 disciplines. He now leads three Oxford Martin programmes on technological and economic change, the future of work, and the future of development. His books, 25 in total, run from Exceptional People on migration to Age of the City on urban futures, with The Shortest History of Migration arriving in 2024. What boards and governments use him for is harder than topic coverage. It is the ability to connect migration, AI, climate, and supply chain stress into a coherent picture of where capital, talent, and political risk are moving over a five to fifteen year horizon, with the operational scars to know which policy moves actually land. Key speaking topics Economic growth prospects across countries, regions, and sectors Geopolitics, geoeconomics, and the fracturing rules-based order Systemic risk and globalisation AI, jobs, and the future of work The future of cities and urbanisation Long-horizon scenarios and crisis recovery Migration and demographic change Ideal for Boards and executive committees of multinationals navigating geopolitical exposure, supply chain risk, and growth divergence across regions. Government, central bank, and multilateral audiences setting policy on development, AI, and climate. Investor and asset-allocator forums sizing long-horizon risk across regions and sectors. CSOs, heads of strategy, and CFOs responsible for capital decisions under macro and political uncertainty. Audience outcomes A clearer reading of how today’s shocks connect: pandemics, AI, migration, climate, and political fracture as one system. Specific arguments and evidence boards can use when stress-testing strategy against the next decade of global change. A sharper view of how growth prospects diverge across regions and sectors, and what that means for capital allocation, supply chains, and talent strategy. Confidence to challenge assumptions baked into long-range plans, sourced from someone who has run the institutions setting global policy.

Why organisations work with Ida Kymmer Brings a working knowledge of how the same technologies are deployed in commercial, defence, and peacebuilding contexts, so leaders see the full surface area of a decision rather than one face of it. Founder of House of PeaceTech, the ecosystem platform connecting investors, startups, governments, and NGOs working on conflict prevention and recovery technology, which gives clients access to a network most strategy advisors cannot reach. Has shaped immersive technology programmes for BMW, H&M, Clinique, and Shiseido during her tenure at Journee, so the perspective is built on real brand deployment, not theory. Active across MENA, Korea, and the Nordics through Infinite Reality, Hub71, and Vinnova, giving organisations a read on emerging technology adoption beyond the usual US and Western European frame. Publishes Tech for War and Peace weekly, so the analysis a client receives is built from continuous primary research, not refreshed every booking cycle. Biography highlights Director of Business, MENA at Infinite Reality Founder of House of PeaceTech, the ecosystem platform for technology in conflict prevention and recovery Former Director of Global Affairs at Journee, working with BMW, H&M, Clinique, and Shiseido Author of Tech for War and Peace, a weekly newsletter on defence, conflict, and peacebuilding technology Master of Arts in Peace and Conflict Studies Startup judge for Vinnova (Sweden) and Hub71 (Abu Dhabi); speaking record at World Economic Forum, SXSW, Gitex, TechBBQ, and Deloitte Innovation Day Biography Emerging technology rarely arrives with a clean use case. The same systems that power immersive retail can be repurposed for surveillance, defence, or disinformation. Most advisors look at one face of that surface. Few look at all of them. Ida Kymmer’s work sits across the commercial, defence, and peacebuilding applications of the same technologies. She holds a Master of Arts in Peace and Conflict Studies and founded House of PeaceTech, an ecosystem platform connecting investors, startups, governments, and NGOs working on conflict prevention and recovery. Her weekly newsletter, Tech for War and Peace, tracks how defence-adjacent technologies move between sectors. Her commercial credibility is built on deployment, not theory. As Director of Global Affairs at Journee from 2021 to 2023, she shaped immersive technology programmes for BMW, H&M, Clinique, and Shiseido. She now serves as Director of Business, MENA at Infinite Reality, and judges startups for Sweden’s Vinnova and Abu Dhabi’s Hub71. The geographic and linguistic range matters here. She has lived in nine countries, speaks five languages, and reads emerging technology adoption from Seoul, the Gulf, and the Nordics as fluently as from Silicon Valley. Boards in any of those markets get a perspective that the usual American or Western European advisory pool does not provide. Key speaking topics Emerging technology and innovation strategy Defence and peace technology Immersive technology and commerce Disinformation and information integrity Sustainability and the green transition Korean innovation systems and soft power MENA technology ecosystems Ideal for Boards and executive teams making frontier technology investment or deployment decisions Chief innovation, strategy, and digital officers in consumer brands, automotive, and luxury Government, defence, and policy audiences engaging with dual-use technology Sustainability and ESG leads scrutinising green-transition supply chains Audience outcomes A clearer map of how a single technology operates across commercial, defence, and humanitarian use cases Specific examples of immersive technology deployment from named global brands A working view of innovation ecosystems in Korea, MENA, and the Nordics Sharper questions to put to internal teams on dual-use exposure, supply chain ethics, and emerging technology partnerships

Why organisations work with Ingo Zamperoni His understanding of US political polarisation is not academic. His American wife’s family includes Trump supporters – a dynamic he documented in the 2020 ARD film “Trump, meine amerikanische Familie und ich.” He has experienced the internal fault lines of American society from within a family, not as an observer from a distance. As an active anchor of Tagesthemen – Germany’s most-watched evening news programme – he offers current, institutionally grounded analysis. Organisations are not engaging a former journalist reflecting on what he once covered; they are engaging someone who continues to frame global events for a mass audience every week. His two Ullstein Verlag books on the US advance a specific, citable argument – that Europe systematically misreads America, and that correcting this misreading is a strategic necessity. That argument gives his presentations intellectual backbone that panel commentary rarely achieves. His Honorary Professorship at the Hochschule der Medien Stuttgart, where he teaches critical interviewing and political broadcast journalism, signals analytical rigour and a commitment to standards – a differentiator from media personalities who speak about journalism without continuing to practise it at the highest level. Biography highlights Main anchor of ARD’s Tagesthemen, Germany’s most-watched evening news programme, since October 2016 ARD Washington D.C. correspondent 2014-2016, covering US politics, the 2016 presidential campaign, and transatlantic affairs Author of “Fremdes Land Amerika” (Ullstein Verlag, 2016, bestseller) and “Anderland – Die USA unter Trump, ein Schadensbericht” (Ullstein Verlag, 2018) Honorary Professor at the Hochschule der Medien (HdM) Stuttgart, appointed January 2022 by unanimous senate vote Fulbright scholarship alumnus; Master’s degree from Boston University; studied American studies, law, and history at the University of Konstanz and in Berlin Anchor of ARD Nachtmagazin (2007-2013); host of ARD programme “Die 100 – Was Deutschland bewegt” ARD documentary “Trump, meine amerikanische Familie und ich” (2020), examining US political polarisation through direct family experience Biography ARD’s Tagesthemen is the evening news programme that Germany’s senior decision-makers rely on to interpret global affairs. Ingo Zamperoni has been one of its anchors since 2016, returning from two years as the network’s Washington correspondent at the moment US politics turned in a direction that European observers were not equipped to understand. He came back with a specific position: that Europe’s assumptions about America had stopped being accurate, and that the consequences of this misreading were serious. That position runs through both his books. “Fremdes Land Amerika” (Ullstein Verlag, 2016), which became a bestseller, made the case that the transatlantic relationship rests on European projections rather than American realities. “Anderland” (Ullstein Verlag, 2018) argued that Trump was not a cause of American division but a symptom of structural fractures that predated him and would outlast him. These are not dispatches from the road. They are attempts to replace a failing European frame with something more accurate. His authority is personal as well as analytical. His American wife’s family includes Trump supporters – a dynamic he documented in the 2020 ARD film “Trump, meine amerikanische Familie und ich.” Where most European commentators analyse the US political divide from the outside, Zamperoni has navigated it inside a family. That gives his analysis a texture that briefings and geopolitical reports rarely achieve. Appointed Honorary Professor at the Hochschule der Medien Stuttgart in 2022, he teaches critical interviewing and political broadcast journalism to the next generation of German journalists. He is a practitioner who has been asked to codify the standards of his practice – a distinction that matters when boards and leadership teams need geopolitical analysis they can actually use. Key speaking topics US politics and political polarisation Transatlantic relations and the US-Europe strategic partnership Geopolitics and the shifting global order Political communication and narrative in democracies Media credibility, public trust, and information quality Democracy under pressure: institutional resilience and the populist challenge Ideal for Senior leadership teams and boards with significant US or transatlantic business exposure Corporate strategy and political risk functions navigating US policy uncertainty Institutional, financial, or public-sector audiences requiring credible geopolitical framing Conference programmes focused on global affairs, political risk, or the future of the transatlantic relationship Audience outcomes A clearer framework for understanding what is structurally driving US politics, beyond the daily news cycle Concrete context for the fault lines in American society and what they mean for the transatlantic relationship over the medium term A more calibrated understanding of how political narratives are constructed in the US and why European coverage of America often misses the underlying dynamics Sharper awareness of the assumptions about the US that European organisations bring to their strategic decisions – and where those assumptions are no longer reliable

Why organisations work with Ingrid Betancourt Lived authority on operating under conditions no executive training can simulate: six and a half years in captivity, then a return to public life, politics, and scholarship. A first-hand account of how identity, values, and decision-making hold up when external structure is stripped away, told without sentimentality. Credibility across two worlds senior audiences rarely hear combined: frontline political leadership in a fragile democracy and sustained reflection on human dignity from inside a research fellowship at Oxford. The Prince of Asturias Award for Concord and the French Legion of Honour signal an argument about freedom and human rights that serious international audiences already recognise. A voice on resilience that does not traffic in motivational language: the material is concrete, specific, and consequential. Biography highlights Former Colombian senator (1998-2002) and two-time presidential candidate, first in 2002 and again in 2022. Held hostage by FARC for more than six years after her abduction on 23 February 2002; released on 2 July 2008 in Operation Jaque. Laureate of the 2008 Prince of Asturias Award for Concord, awarded by the Princess of Asturias Foundation. Appointed to the French Legion of Honour following her release. Author of Even Silence Has an End (2010), a New York Times bestselling memoir, and The Blue Line (Penguin Press, 2016), a novel set during Argentina’s Dirty War. Research Fellow in Theology at Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford; DPhil in Theology awarded by the University of Oxford in 2023. Biography On 23 February 2002, a presidential candidate walked into FARC-controlled territory in southern Colombia and did not come out for six and a half years. That candidate was Ingrid Betancourt, then a sitting Colombian senator who had built her political career on a direct challenge to institutional corruption. Her release in July 2008, through the Colombian military intelligence operation known as Operation Jaque, returned her to a public life she had to rebuild in full view of an international audience. The 2008 Prince of Asturias Award for Concord and her appointment to the French Legion of Honour recognised not the ordeal, but the argument she had begun to make about democracy, dignity, and the conditions under which human freedom survives. What she has produced since is a body of work that takes that argument seriously. Her memoir Even Silence Has an End became a New York Times bestseller. Her novel The Blue Line, published by Penguin Press, examined political violence in Argentina. In 2023 the University of Oxford awarded her a DPhil in Theology for a thesis on the concept of the non-person in the writings of the liberation theologian Gustavo Gutierrez, and she now holds a research fellowship at Harris Manchester College. For senior audiences, the relevance is practical. Leadership in normal conditions rewards competence and pattern recognition. Leadership when the structure breaks, when the information is hostile, when the horizon is no longer yours to set, rewards something else: a clear sense of what will not be traded, and the discipline to hold it. That is the ground Betancourt speaks from, and very few working speakers can speak from it with her authority. Key speaking topics Resilience and decision-making under extreme pressure Leadership when institutions and information fail Human dignity and democratic values Ethical conduct in high-stakes environments Freedom, captivity, and the inner life of leaders Political courage and anti-corruption Reconciliation after violent conflict Ideal for Board, CEO, and executive committee offsites focused on resilience and crisis leadership Leadership development programmes addressing judgement under sustained pressure International affairs, human rights, and public policy forums Values-led leadership summits at universities and foundations Audience outcomes A sharper sense of which commitments a leader needs to name before a crisis, not during one A concrete account of what resilience looks like when it is not a slogan A more honest reading of how authority, dignity, and ethical conduct interact when external structure disappears A frame for thinking about freedom and human rights that senior audiences can take into policy and strategy conversations Material for their own reflection on leadership character that does not rely on motivational abstraction

Why organisations work with Ivan Rogers He was in the room. As UK Ambassador to the EU from 2013 to 2017 and Cameron’s Chief EU Adviser before that, he led the UK side of the pre-referendum renegotiation and the opening phase of Brexit. He has worked every side of the Brussels-London axis: HM Treasury, Chef de Cabinet inside the European Commission, Principal Private Secretary to Tony Blair, and senior public sector roles at Citigroup and Barclays Capital. His analysis has shaped the serious public record on Brexit, including the book 9 Lessons in Brexit and set-piece lectures at UCL, Cambridge and Glasgow that are now standard reading for political economists. He briefs on what actually happens in negotiations, not on slogans. Boards leave with a clearer view of timelines, trade-offs and the realistic range of outcomes on regulation, trade and political alignment. KCMG in the 2016 Honours for services to British, European and International Policy, and a seat on the Council of the European Council on Foreign Relations, give his reading of the field independent credibility. Biography highlights UK Permanent Representative to the European Union, 2013 to 2017. Prime Minister’s Adviser on Europe and Global Issues, and UK Sherpa to the G8 and G20, 2011 to 2013. Principal Private Secretary to Prime Minister Tony Blair, 2003 to 2006. Chef de Cabinet to European Commission Vice-President Sir Leon Brittan; Director of European Strategy and Policy at HM Treasury. Head of UK Public Sector Group, Citigroup; Head of Public Sector Industry Group UK and Ireland, Barclays Capital. Author of 9 Lessons in Brexit (Short Books, 2019); KCMG, 2016; Council member, European Council on Foreign Relations. Biography Few people alive have seen the UK-EU relationship from as many vantage points. Ivan Rogers has served inside HM Treasury, inside the European Commission as Chef de Cabinet to Sir Leon Brittan, inside Number 10 as Principal Private Secretary to Tony Blair, and in Brussels as Britain’s Permanent Representative to the EU from 2013 until his resignation in January 2017. That sequence matters for a reason. Most commentary on Europe is written by people who have read the treaties. Rogers drafted the cables. He ran the UK side of Cameron’s pre-referendum renegotiation, prepared three Prime Ministers for summits as the UK’s G8 and G20 Sherpa, and was the senior British official in the first phase of the Article 50 machinery before he stepped down. Since leaving government he has become one of the most cited independent voices on Brexit and UK-EU relations. His book 9 Lessons in Brexit, set-piece lectures at UCL, Cambridge, Glasgow and the Institute of International and European Affairs, and podcast work with the European Council on Foreign Relations are built on the same discipline: strip out the politics, map the institutional machinery, tell the reader what is actually going to happen. For boards, that means usable judgement on trade terms, regulatory divergence, the Northern Ireland settlement, the Labour government’s posture toward Brussels, and the wider geopolitical setting in which all of this now sits. He was knighted KCMG in 2016 for services to British, European and International Policy. Key speaking topics UK-EU relations and the post-Brexit settlement Geopolitical and political risk for boards European regulation, trade and market access Government-business interface and Whitehall decision-making Negotiation inside complex multilateral institutions Scenario planning for UK and European political risk Ideal for Board and executive audiences in regulated industries exposed to UK-EU divergence, especially financial services, energy, pharma and manufacturing. Strategy, public affairs and government relations leaders calibrating political risk over a three to ten year horizon. Investors, law firms and advisory houses whose clients need a senior, independent read on UK and European policy direction. Audience outcomes A sharper read on where UK-EU relations are actually heading, stripped of political signalling. A practical sense of how Brussels, Whitehall and Number 10 make decisions under pressure, and where the leverage sits. A clearer view of the regulatory and trade fault lines that matter most to the audience’s sector. Questions answered by someone who has sat at the table with Commission Presidents, Prime Ministers and Chancellors.

Why organisations work with Jaap de Hoop Scheffer Five years running NATO through Afghanistan, the 2008 Bucharest summit, Russia-Georgia, and the alliance’s 60th-anniversary reset. Few living speakers can describe transatlantic decision-making from the chair. Direct line of sight into the machinery that shapes risk for multinationals: defence spending, sanctions architecture, Article 5, enlargement politics, EU-US friction. Dutch Foreign Minister during the Iraq War and OSCE Chair in 2003. He has operated at the national capital level and the multilateral level on the same files. Chaired the Netherlands’ Advisory Council on International Affairs for seven years, meaning his read on policy is current, not retrospective. Holds the Pieter Kooijmans Chair at Leiden and sits with the Trilateral Commission, Friends of Europe, and the European Leadership Network. The analysis is anchored in live institutional conversation, not memoir. Biography highlights 11th Secretary General of NATO, 2004 to 2009, and Chair of the North Atlantic Council. Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, 2002 to 2003, and OSCE Chairman-in-Office during the Dutch chairmanship. Leader of the Christian Democratic Appeal, 1997 to 2001; Member of the House of Representatives, 1986 to 2002. Pieter Kooijmans Chair for Peace, Law and Security, Leiden University, from 2009; Distinguished Fellow, Leiden University College The Hague. Chair of the Advisory Council on International Affairs (AIV), 2014 to 2021; Minister of State of the Netherlands from 2018. Non-executive Director, Air France-KLM, 2011 to 2020; Trustee, Friends of Europe; European Group of the Trilateral Commission. Biography NATO took on the lead security role in Afghanistan in October 2006 under a Secretary General who had started the job two years earlier with a fractured alliance and a disputed war in Iraq still on the table. That was de Hoop Scheffer’s first decisive test at the head of the North Atlantic Council, and it set the pattern for how he ran the alliance through Bucharest, the Russia-Georgia war, and the 60th-anniversary summit. Before NATO he was Dutch Foreign Minister under Jan Peter Balkenende and Chairman-in-Office of the OSCE in the Netherlands’ 2003 chairmanship. That sequence, national capital to multilateral chair to alliance lead, is what gives his reading of geopolitics its weight: he has operated at each level on the same files, and made calls at each level that had consequences for the others. The post-NATO work has kept him inside the policy conversation rather than above it. He holds the Pieter Kooijmans Chair for Peace, Law and Security at Leiden University, chaired the Advisory Council on International Affairs for the Dutch government from 2014 to 2021, and sits with the Trilateral Commission’s European Group, Friends of Europe, and the European Leadership Network. He served as a non-executive director at Air France-KLM for nearly a decade, which is where the geopolitical view meets the board agenda in practice. What boards get is a former alliance chief who can map a specific decision, a specific summit, a specific red line, onto the risk exposure a company is carrying today. In 2018 he was granted the honorary title of Minister of State, a recognition reserved in the Netherlands for senior former officials whose judgement the state continues to draw on. Key speaking topics Transatlantic security and the future of NATO European defence, enlargement, and the Russia question Geopolitical risk for multinational business Afghanistan, intervention, and the lessons for alliances Multilateral diplomacy and the G7/OSCE system EU-US relations and the Indo-Pacific pivot Ideal for Boards and audit committees pricing geopolitical and sanctions exposure into strategy CEOs and executive teams in defence, aerospace, energy, and critical infrastructure Government affairs, political risk, and corporate security leaders Investor and shareholder forums needing a senior read on alliance and policy direction Audience outcomes A sharper map of where transatlantic security policy is heading and what moves it A direct account of how NATO decisions are made, from someone who made them Concrete read on Russia, Ukraine, enlargement, and the European defence build-out Named risks and inflection points a board can carry into its next strategy review Confidence in distinguishing signal from noise in a daily news cycle dominated by geopolitics

Why organisations work with Jacques Attali He built one of the institutions that defined the post-Cold War economic settlement. As founding president of the EBRD, he carries direct experience of structuring capital flows into a continent in political transition, the kind of frame few living economists can offer. A decade as special adviser to President Mitterrand and Sherpa for two G7 summits gives him an inside view of how heads of state actually make decisions under pressure, useful to any board navigating government exposure. His futures work, particularly A Brief History of the Future, sets out a coherent scenario framework (hyperempire, hyperconflict, hyperdemocracy) that boards can use as a long-range planning lens rather than as a single forecast. He has chaired two French government commissions on growth, one for Sarkozy and a positive economy report for Hollande, with proposals that fed directly into national reform agendas. The work is operational, not theoretical. Founder of Action Against Hunger, the EUREKA technology programme and Positive Planet. He has built and run institutions, not only written about them. Biography highlights Founding President, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 1991 to 1993. Special adviser to President Francois Mitterrand, 1981 to 1991; G7 Sherpa for the Paris (1982) and Arche de la Defense (1989) summits. Chair, Commission for the Liberation of French Growth (Sarkozy, 2007 to 2008); author of the Positive Economy report (Hollande, 2013). Author of more than 80 books, including Noise: The Political Economy of Music, A Brief History of the Future and Verbatim, in 22 languages. Founder of Action Against Hunger (1979), the EUREKA European technology programme (1984) and Positive Planet (1998). Named one of Foreign Policy magazine’s Top 100 Global Thinkers (2009); graduate of the Ecole Polytechnique, Sciences Po, the Ecole des Mines and ENA; doctorate in economics. Biography The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development opened its doors in London in April 1991 with a mandate no institution had attempted before: channel Western capital into countries leaving state socialism without recreating the conditions that had broken them. Jacques Attali designed it and ran it for its first two years. The institution is still operating, with more than seventy countries of operations and shareholders today, which is the most useful evidence of the architecture he chose. Before the EBRD, ten years inside the Elysee under Francois Mitterrand. Attali was special adviser to the president from 1981 to 1991, sat in the cabinet meetings and the bilateral meetings with foreign heads of state, and served as France’s Sherpa at the G7 summits in Paris in 1982 and at the Arche de la Defense in 1989. The work he has done since, two growth commissions for two French presidents and consulting with governments and large companies through Attali & Associates, is built on that operating exposure to how state and economy actually intersect. The intellectual output runs alongside. Eighty-plus books, translated into twenty-two languages, with Noise: The Political Economy of Music (1977) and A Brief History of the Future (2006) the most widely cited. The futures work matters commercially because it gives boards a framework. The hyperempire, hyperconflict and hyperdemocracy scenarios in A Brief History of the Future are now nearly twenty years old, which is the right test of long-range writing. The frame still holds against the geopolitics of the present decade. He has also built things outside government. Action Against Hunger (1979), still one of the major humanitarian organisations operating in famine zones. The EUREKA technology programme (1984), the European R&D collaboration that, among other outputs, produced the standards work behind the MP3 format. Positive Planet (1998), the microfinance non-profit now active across more than 80 countries. Foreign Policy magazine named him among its Top 100 Global Thinkers in 2009. Key speaking topics Geopolitical risk and the next world order The future of Europe and European competitiveness Long-range scenarios and strategic foresight Global economic transformation The future of finance and microfinance Positive economy and intergenerational responsibility Globalisation and its commercial consequences Ideal for Boards and executive committees of multinationals with material exposure to European and emerging-market policy shifts Chief strategy officers and corporate development teams working on long-range scenario planning Bank and asset management leadership groups exposed to sovereign and geopolitical risk Government and intergovernmental audiences working on growth, innovation and reform agendas Audience outcomes A longer historical frame for the current geopolitical realignment, anchored in firsthand experience of the post-1989 settlement. A working scenario lens, hyperempire, hyperconflict and hyperdemocracy, that senior teams can apply to their own strategy review. A sharper read on Europe’s commercial position relative to the US and China, from someone who has helped design European institutions. A serious account of how heads of state actually reach decisions, useful for executives operating across government interfaces.

Why organisations work with James Chau He runs the room when the speakers are Angela Merkel, Justin Trudeau, Jack Ma or Bill Gates. Very few moderators on the circuit have repeated reps at that level of principal. As President of the China-United States Exchange Foundation, he sits inside the working architecture of US-China dialogue rather than commenting on it from the sidelines. His credential stack on global health is institutional, not rhetorical: WHO Goodwill Ambassador for the SDGs, and China’s first UNAIDS National Goodwill Ambassador. The China Current gives him a live interview record with Kofi Annan, Muhammad Yunus, Jimmy Carter, Christine Lagarde, Ban Ki-moon and Jane Goodall. The editorial muscle is current, not historic. He reads a room built from heads of state, Nobel laureates and corporate chiefs the way a senior editor reads copy. The diplomatic temperature of a session is managed in real time. Biography highlights President, China-United States Exchange Foundation (CUSEF), Hong Kong. World Health Organization Goodwill Ambassador for Sustainable Development Goals and Health (appointed 2016). First UNAIDS National Goodwill Ambassador for China (appointed 2009). Host of The China Current, a global-affairs interview and storytelling platform. Former main English-language news anchor at China Central Television; guest presenter, BBC World News. World Economic Forum Young Global Leader; U.S. National Press Foundation Fellow; Harvard Kennedy School executive education. Biography The room was Angela Merkel, Justin Trudeau, Jack Ma, Laura Bush. James Chau was chairing. That is the kind of session he has been asked to run for more than a decade, and the reason organisations book him is not broadcast gloss. It is the ability to keep a hard conversation productive when the participants are principals with careful positions. Chau is President of the China-United States Exchange Foundation, a Hong Kong-based NGO that convenes official-track and track-two dialogue between the two countries. The role places him inside the working machinery of one of the most consequential bilateral relationships in the world, not adjacent to it. That access shapes how he chairs: he knows where the lines are, and when to press. Before CUSEF, he spent years as the main English-language news anchor at China Central Television and a guest presenter on BBC World News. The interview record from The China Current, his own platform, runs through Kofi Annan, Muhammad Yunus, Jimmy Carter, Bill Gates, Christine Lagarde, Jane Goodall and Ban Ki-moon. His work on global health is formal: WHO Goodwill Ambassador for the Sustainable Development Goals and Health since 2016, and China’s first UNAIDS National Goodwill Ambassador from 2009. He was educated at Cambridge, King’s College London and the Royal Academy of Music, with executive education at Harvard Kennedy School. For a corporate summit, a multilateral plenary, an awards evening or a closed-room dialogue where the speakers are sensitive and the questions matter, Chau is a moderator whose standing is set by the company he keeps on stage. Key speaking topics US-China relations Global health and the Sustainable Development Goals China and the global economy International development and multilateralism Media, storytelling and public diplomacy High-level event hosting and moderation Ideal for Global summits and multilateral convenings where the principals on stage are heads of state, Nobel laureates or Fortune 100 chief executives CEO and board dialogues on China strategy, US-China risk and global health policy Awards ceremonies and flagship corporate events where a broadcast-grade host is required Foundations, NGOs and policy institutes working on the SDGs, HIV/AIDS and global public health Audience outcomes A sharper read of where the US-China relationship actually sits, from someone inside the dialogue A working framing of how global health policy, the SDGs and corporate strategy intersect A session that keeps pace and holds weight when the speakers are senior and the brief is sensitive A clearer view of how China is reported, mis-reported, and understood in international media

Why organisations work with James K. Galbraith A measurement record that competitors cannot match: the University of Texas Inequality Project produces global pay inequality datasets used by researchers and institutions where conventional household surveys and tax data fall short. Hands-on policy experience that maps directly to corporate strategy questions on China, Europe and US industrial policy, including a four-year stint as chief technical adviser on macroeconomic reform to China’s State Planning Commission. Co-winner of the 2014 Leontief Prize alongside Angus Deaton, an award that signals first-rank standing in the economics of inequality and welfare measurement. A clear, unhedged position on where mainstream macroeconomics fails, set out in books published by Oxford University Press, Simon and Schuster, Yale University Press, and University of Chicago Press, which gives audiences something to engage with rather than a survey of consensus views. Direct line of sight into US economic policy debates through regular columns at Project Syndicate, The Nation, and American Affairs, and former service as Executive Director of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress. Biography highlights Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair in Government/Business Relations, LBJ School of Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin. Director, University of Texas Inequality Project; Senior Scholar, Levy Economics Institute of Bard College. Co-winner, 2014 Leontief Prize (with Angus Deaton); Veblen-Commons Award, 2020. Elected to the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, the Russian Academy of Sciences, and the Lisbon Academy of Sciences. Former Executive Director, Joint Economic Committee of the US Congress; chief technical adviser, macroeconomic reform, China State Planning Commission, 1993 to 1997. Author of Inequality and Instability (Oxford), The End of Normal (Simon and Schuster), Welcome to the Poisoned Chalice (Yale), and Entropy Economics with Jing Chen (Chicago, 2025); The Power to Destroy forthcoming from Chicago in 2026. Biography Most macroeconomic commentary still treats inequality as a side effect of growth. The University of Texas Inequality Project, which Galbraith has directed for over two decades, treats it as a measurable feature of the system itself. Using UNIDO industrial payroll data and Theil decomposition, the project produces a global picture of pay inequality that often diverges from headline tax and survey data, and that has shaped how serious analysts read crises in Europe, the US and China. Galbraith holds the Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair at the LBJ School of Public Affairs in Austin and is a Senior Scholar at the Levy Economics Institute. The 2014 Leontief Prize, shared with Angus Deaton, and the 2020 Veblen-Commons Award place him in the small group of economists whose work on distribution is recognised across both mainstream and heterodox traditions. Election to the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Lisbon Academy of Sciences confirms the international weight of the research. The credentials sit on top of policy experience that few academic economists can claim. Galbraith ran the Joint Economic Committee of the US Congress in the early 1980s and served as chief technical adviser on macroeconomic reform to China’s State Planning Commission from 1993 to 1997. He has written closely on the eurozone crisis, including Welcome to the Poisoned Chalice from Yale University Press, and on the structural drivers of slower US growth in The End of Normal. Recent work pushes harder against the foundations of the discipline. Entropy Economics, co-authored with Jing Chen and published by the University of Chicago Press in 2025, rebuilds value and production theory on physical and biological grounds rather than on equilibrium. The Power to Destroy, due from Chicago in 2026, argues that obsolete economic ideas have shaped a generation of US policy, and that what comes next depends on which ideas governments choose to operate by. Key speaking topics Global inequality and the measurement of distributional change Macroeconomic policy after the end of cheap money US industrial policy and the political economy of decline The eurozone, austerity, and the future of European integration China’s growth model and macroeconomic adjustment Financial instability and the limits of mainstream macroeconomics Post-equilibrium economics and the foundations of value Ideal for Boards and investment committees making capital allocation decisions under macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty CFOs, chief economists, and heads of strategy at financial institutions, asset managers, and multinationals with material US, Chinese, or European exposure Policy-facing audiences in central banks, finance ministries, multilateral institutions, and think tanks Senior leadership programmes seeking a substantive economist rather than a forecaster Audience outcomes A clearer view of how inequality and financial instability now shape macroeconomic outcomes, not just social ones A working frame for reading US, European and Chinese policy moves as parts of a single shifting system An informed scepticism toward conventional growth and inflation narratives, grounded in the data Galbraith’s team produces A direct argument about where mainstream economics is failing capital allocators and what alternative frameworks offer Sharper questions to bring back to internal economists, strategy teams and risk committees

Why organisations work with James Rubin He has been the public face of U.S. foreign policy in two administrations, from the Kosovo war under Clinton to the Ukraine war under Biden, and can speak to how the machinery of American power actually operates when pressure is on. From November 2022 to December 2024 he ran the U.S. Global Engagement Center, coordinating the federal response to Russian and Chinese disinformation, including the intelligence-led exposure of Kremlin operations in Latin America and Africa. He was senior adviser and spokesman to Madeleine Albright at both the United Nations and the State Department, giving him a rare continuous view of how Washington handles allies, adversaries and crisis communications. He has reported the same terrain from the other side of the camera as anchor of Sky News’ World News Tonight and as a Sunday Times foreign affairs columnist, which lets him translate Washington for non-U.S. audiences without jargon. As Commissioner of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and Chair of International Policy and Strategy at Ballard Partners, he has worked on the business side of geopolitical risk, not only the policy side. Biography highlights U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs and State Department Spokesman, 1997 to 2000, under Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Special Envoy and Coordinator, U.S. State Department Global Engagement Center, November 2022 to December 2024, leading U.S. efforts against Russian and Chinese information warfare. Recipient of the State Department’s Distinguished Service Award, 2000. Anchor, Sky News World News Tonight, 2005 to 2006; weekly foreign affairs columnist, The Sunday Times of London. Visiting Professor of International Relations, London School of Economics; adjunct professor, Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs; Scholar in Residence, Oxford University Rothermere American Institute. Senior national security adviser to John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign and chief foreign policy spokesman for General Wesley Clark’s 2004 campaign. Biography U.S. foreign policy is rarely decided in the rooms people assume. It is shaped in briefings, in coalition calls, in the narrow space between what a Secretary of State can say in public and what the intelligence picture actually shows. Rubin has worked that space for three decades, first as spokesman and senior adviser to Madeleine Albright at the United Nations and the State Department, and most recently as the Biden administration’s point person on Russian and Chinese information warfare. The Clinton-era role is the one he is best known for. As Assistant Secretary of State and State Department Spokesman from 1997 to 2000, he was the daily voice of U.S. policy during the Kosovo war and served as a special negotiator on the demobilisation of the Kosovo Liberation Army. The State Department gave him its Distinguished Service Award in 2000. Between 2022 and 2024 he ran the Global Engagement Center, coordinating the U.S. government’s response to Kremlin and Chinese propaganda. Under his watch, the Center worked with the intelligence community to publicly expose Russian disinformation operations in Latin America and Africa, a different register of foreign policy work from the podium briefings of the 1990s and closer to the information battlefields that now sit on corporate risk registers. Outside government he has anchored Sky News’ World News Tonight, written a weekly foreign affairs column for The Sunday Times of London, taught at the London School of Economics and Columbia, and held a scholar in residence post at Oxford’s Rothermere American Institute. He has also served as a Commissioner of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and now chairs international policy and strategy at Ballard Partners in Washington, working directly on how policy reaches business. Key speaking topics U.S. foreign policy and presidential decision-making Great-power competition with Russia and China Information warfare and state-backed disinformation Transatlantic relations and the war in Ukraine Diplomacy, national security and crisis communications Middle East policy and the post-October 7 landscape Ideal for Boards and executive committees pricing geopolitical risk into strategy, capital allocation or expansion decisions Chief Communications Officers, Chief Risk Officers and General Counsel preparing for disinformation, sanctions exposure or state-linked information operations Investor, client and leadership summits where a senior U.S. foreign policy principal is required Government affairs, policy and ESG teams navigating U.S.-Europe-China alignment Audience outcomes A sharper read on how Washington is likely to act on Russia, China, the Middle East and Europe over the next phase of U.S. policy A working mental model for how state-backed disinformation is produced, amplified and exposed, drawn from the person who most recently ran the U.S. counter-effort A clearer view of where corporate exposure to political risk is concentrated and what early indicators to watch A direct, on-the-record sense of how senior U.S. policymakers weigh allies, adversaries and public opinion in real time