Core Issues in Globalization:

The Center’s programs and activities are organized around a body

of inquiry that forms the core of our thinking and research on the
challenges presented by globalization. These galvanizing issues
provide the context within which we contribute to the generation
and diffusion of ideas toward minimizing globalization’s downsides
and maximizing its benign effects.

Global governance for peace and security

Foreign policy role of key international players

Global economic governance

International cooperation for development

Strengthening the multilateral trading system

Protecting shared environmental resources

Global health issues

Key factors for inclusion in globalization

Extracting lessons from national or regional experiences

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Global governance for peace and security:

For good reason, one of the oldest applications of international

cooperation is found in the area of peace and security. Yet, it is
obvious that existing multilateral arrangements to control
international violence are not appropriate to deal with present or
foreseeable conflicts and threats. An international environment
characterized by conflict and violence would end up undermining, or
even reversing, globalization, as occurred previously prior to the
second World War. Consequently, the Center will work to support
the generation of ideas to improve global collaboration for peace
and security.

Foreign policy role of key international players:

The strategies and policies of the major geopolitical actors affect the
whole structure of international relations. Consequently, the Center
will embark in foreign policy discussions exploring the choices,
demands, and options as well as the internal and external forces
acting upon major players such as the U.S. and the EU as they
develop their policies.
Global economic governance:

The painfully acquired awareness of the need for an international

rules-based framework is what led to building the existing
multilateral system, a system that has made important
contributions to the unprecedented progress and economic growth
that many countries have enjoyed since the end of the Second
World War. Yet, the challenges of globalization today cannot
adequately be handled by a system that was designed largely for
the world of more than half a century ago. For a range of common
problems the world has no formal institutional mechanism to ensure
that voices representing all relevant domains are heard in the
discussion, nor is there an instrument or procedure commonly
agreed upon for deciding who does what. The Center aims to
contribute to the discussion of how to fill the existing gaps in global
economic governance.

International cooperation for development:

Aid retains an important role in helping to initiate development in

poor countries and also to help in coping with humanitarian crises.
By way of example, it was estimated a few years ago that meeting
the Millennium Development Goals alone would require an extra 50
billion dollars per year of official development assistance. Some
significant pledges of additional assistance toward this end were
made around the time of the UN Conference in Monterrey on
Financing for Development by important donors like the U.S. and
the EU; however, significant gaps remain both with respect to the
amounts of aid required and with respect to the institutional
mechanisms needed to transfer and allocate the resources so as to
maximize their development impact. The Center will seek to be
involved in discussions pertinent to filling those gaps.
Strengthening the multilateral trading system:

All serious analysis shows that further trade liberalization in goods

and services would bring about significant economic benefits for
both developed and developing countries. This expectation is at the
root of the present WTO Doha Development Round. As it has in the
previous two academic years, the Center will be actively engaged in
pursuing proposals to make the Doha Round succeed and to further
improve the rules-based multilateral trading system.

International cooperation for protecting shared environmental

resources:

Climate change, transnational pollution spillovers and overfishing

are chief examples of problems that cannot be solved by one
country acting alone. Rather, it is collective action, in some cases on
a world-wide scale, that would be required to overcome these and
other environmental challenges. Yet the community of nations has
frequently failed to put in place adequate mechanisms to do the job
of protecting the global natural commons, a circumstance recently
illustrated when it took so long for the Kyoto Protocol on climate
change to be ratified and put into effect; and at the time of
ratification, there were notable absences. The Center will contribute
to seeking viable alternative responses to address this and other
global environmental problems

Global health:

The risk of a rapid spread of communicable diseases is another

downside of modern globalization which also requires international
cooperation in order to be addressed properly. The Center will seek
to support the generation of ideas to improve the control of
communicable diseases at the global level.

Key factors for inclusion in globalization:

Although it is usually true that “one size does not fit all,” there is
also the valid presumption that there are some policy-dependent
factors that will make it more likely for people, communities and
countries to engage successfully in the global market economy.
Helping to identify those factors will also be a defining criteria for
the Center’s future activities.

Extracting lessons from national or regional experiences:

There is great variance among national and regional experiences

with regard to their successful participation in globalization. The
Center intends to participate in reviewing cases of both failed and
successful “globalizers” with the aim to extract relevant policy
conclusions. Looking, for example, at the experiences of China, Latin
America and Sub-Saharan Africa would prove particularly
illuminating.