Solutions to Global Turbulence: Peace, Prosperity, and Freedom

Uses structured discussions to identify practical solutions for peacebuilding, applying the GPO framework to current crises, as set out in the Vision for a Global Peace Offensive and the Call for Action, co-signed by WAAS, EASA, Alma Mater Europaea University, and a growing network of academic and civil society partners.

Panelists

• Kailash Satyarthi — Nobel Peace Prize Laureate (2014); Founder, Satyarthi Movement for Global Compassion; FWAAS
• Garry Jacobs — President & CEO, WAAS; Editor, Cadmus
• Klaus Mainzer — President, European Academy of Sciences & Arts (EASA)
• Ludvik Toplak — President, Alma Mater Europaea University, Slovenia; Trustee, WAAS
• Aleksander Zidanšek — WAAS VP (Science & Technology)
• Charlotte Ørnemark — Owner & Founder, CoConsult Collaborative Consulting
• Goran Bandov — Professor of International Relations and Diplomacy, University of Zagreb; FWAAS
• Janani Ramanathan — Secretary General, WAAS
• Luka Martin Tomažič — Lead Researcher, Global Peace Offensive Center; AMEU Vice-rector

Examines how science, technology and green innovation can serve as practical instruments of peace and human security — building trust between nations while avoiding the risk of weaponization — and how sustainable innovation can advance the Global Peace Offensive and Earth-Humanity Coalition's goals.

Panelists

• Klaus Mainzer — President, European Academy of Sciences & Arts (EASA); FWAAS
• Moneef Zou'bi — Science Advisor, InterAction Council; Trustee, WAAS
• Natisha Dukhi — Senior Research Specialist, Human Sciences Research Council
• Ioannis Liritzis — Professor, Chuzhou University; VP, European Academy of Sciences and Arts; FWAAS
• Jana Ilieva — Full Professor of Law and Secretary General, University of Skopje; FWAAS
• Nebojša Nešković — FWAAS; Full Member, The Club of Rome
• Donato Kiniger-Passigli — VP (Social Sciences and Humanities), WAAS

Examines opportunities for education as the foundation for lasting peace — curricula and pedagogy that equip the next generation with the competencies to build a prosperous, peaceful civilization. Covers partnerships such as UNESCO-MOST BRIDGES, the Earth-Humanity Coalition, and the Global Peace Education Network.

Panelists

• Ludvik Toplak — President, Alma Mater Europaea University, Slovenia
• Donato Kiniger-Passigli — VP (Social Sciences and Humanities), WAAS
• Vesna Škare Ožbolt — Former Minister of Justice, Croatia (2003–2006)
• Carlos Alvarez Pereira — Secretary General, Club of Rome; FWAAS
• Goran Bandov — Professor of International Relations and Diplomacy, University of Zagreb; FWAAS
• Aleksander Zidanšek — WAAS VP (Science & Technology)

Covers a wide range of topics relevant to the conference's main themes, specifically addressing solutions identified in the WAAS@65 report with emphasis on strategies to address the turbulence.

Panelists

• Frank Dixon — Founder, Systems Change Investing; FWAAS
• Rza Aliyev — Secretary General, Nizami Ganjavi International Center; AFWAAS
• Cynthia Diane Clayton — Independent Scholar and Speaker; Author, Compass of Hope
• Matthew Chodkowski — Founding Director, The Institute for Postindustrial Leadership
• Ash Pachauri — Co-Founder & Senior Mentor, POP Movement; AFWAAS

Studies the mechanisms driving the erosion of democracy — electoral systems, media capture, plutocratic financing — and evidence-based strategies to reverse backsliding toward autocracy and plutocracy, including Security Council veto reform and alternative multilateral financing.

Panelists

• Francis O'Donnell — Former SMOM Ambassador (2009–2013); FWAAS
• Paul Revay — Former European Director, Trilateral Commission (1981–2017)
• Andreas Bummel — Co-founder & Executive Director, Democracy Without Borders; FWAAS
• Augusto Lopez-Claros — Executive Director, Global Governance Forum
• Isabella Bunn — Research Fellow in Governance and Global Ethics, University of Oxford; Trustee, WAAS

No state can achieve lasting nuclear security alone — unilateral security is self-defeating. Discusses how common security, sought together with others rather than against them, can be made operational as a possible replacement for deterrence.

Panelists

• Jim Clark — Founder & Executive Chairman, The Bridge Era Institute
• Ivo Josipović — President of Croatia (2010–2015); Trustee, WAAS (tbc)
• Alyn Ware — Founder, Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament (PNND); FWAAS
• Deepshikha Kumari Vijh — Executive Director, The Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy
• Arthur Duforest — Disarmament and Conflict Prevention Consultant, Inter-Parliamentary Union; JFWAAS

Explores ways to strengthen global consensus around ethical principles as the foundation for cooperation. The Human Security for All (HS4A) campaign reframes the prosperity agenda around everyday vulnerabilities, discussing new investment, governance and measurement frameworks.

Panelists

• Alberto Zucconi — President, Person-Centered Approach Institute & WUC; Chair of the Board, WAAS
• Kehkashan Basu — Founder, Green Hope Foundation, JFWAAS
• Phoebe Koundouri — Professor, Athens Univ. of Economics & Business and Univ. of Cambridge; Trustee, WAAS
• Isabella Bunn — Research Fellow in Governance and Global Ethics, University of Oxford; Trustee, WAAS

Shines a light on understanding the root causes of global turbulence and promoting creative inter-disciplinary solutions. Introduces the planetary arts manifesto, explores the historical context of the Arts within WAAS, and outlines how the Arts mobilizes youth leaders and serves as a tool for diplomacy.

Panelists

• Grant Schreiber — General Manager, WAAS
• Lorenzo Rodriguez — Project Manager, Planetary Arts Movement; JFWAAS
• Jude Currivan — Planetary Arts Movement Steering Committee Member; Co-founder, WholeWorld-View; FWAAS
• Gordon Fuller — Future Communities Planetary Arts Movement Network Coordinator; Chief Visionary, FullervisionAI
• Evangelia Savvidou — Planetary Arts Youth Ambassador; JFWAAS
• Samuel Lopez-Lago — Planetary Arts Youth Ambassador; AFWAAS
• Dora Damjanovic — Diplomacy and International Relations Professional; Planetary Arts Movement

Explores how a more integrated and anticipatory approach to risk leads to better-informed decision-making at all levels. Examines three requirements: continuous risk awareness, systemic and holistically integrated understanding of risk, and enhancing the quality of risk information itself.

Panelists

• Cristina Elena Popa-Tache — Strategic Governance & Legal Foresight Specialist; EXTRA Steering Committee
• Ortwin Renn — Director emeritus, Research Institute for Sustainability at GFZ Helmholtz Centre Potsdam (RIFS); FWAAS
• Kiriti Prasad Choudhury — Digital Transformation & IT Compliance Professional; EXTRA; AFWAAS
• Lorenzo Rodriguez — EXTRA Research and Project Officer; JFWAAS
• Ana Maria Paraschiv — Founder, Ubuntu World; Steering Committee Member, EXTRA; FWAAS
• Stefan Brunnhuber — Medical Director, Diakonie Kliniken Zschadraß; Trustee, WAAS

Explores the scope for creating a global economic boom through investing in the assets that address global issues — a world investment plan ranging from climate mitigation and adaptation, through universal education, financial inclusion and affordable housing, to biodiversity as the planetary life-support system.

Panelists

• Edward Braham — Chair, M&G plc, Charities Aid Foundation and The Lord Mayor's Appeal; HM Treasury Non-Executive
• Caroline Flammer — Professor of Economics, Columbia SIPA
• Massamba Thioye — UN Principal Consultant, UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub, UNFCCC
• Lucy Parker — Senior Advisor, Brunswick Group; Co-founder, Brunswick Sustainable Business

Focuses on strengthening science advisory capacities in governments, creating formal science-policymaker dialogue channels, integrating foresight into decision-making, and the vision of a science-policy-society platform for structured public deliberation.

Panelists

• Denis Naughten — Research to Policy Strategist, InnoSphere Consulting; FWAAS
• Paul Arthur Berkman — Professor; ISC Fellow; Affiliated Faculty, Science Diplomacy Center, Inc. & Harvard Law School; FWAAS
• Nebojša Nešković — FWAAS; Full Member, The Club of Rome
• Jelel Ezzine — Founding Chairholder, UNESCO Chair on STI Policy; FWAAS
• Aleksander Zidanšek — WAAS VP (Science & Technology)

Explores the possibilities of using AI to address global turbulence, covering challenges across decision-making, education and the future of work.

Panelists

• Gary Shapiro — Executive Chair, Consumer Technology Association (CTA); FWAAS
• Garry Jacobs — President & CEO, WAAS; Editor, Cadmus
• Klaus Mainzer — President, European Academy of Sciences & Arts (EASA); FWAAS

Explores an integrated policy and investment framework for decarbonisation, biodiversity protection and circular economy development — combined with early warning systems, risk insurance, nature-based adaptation and the Public Peace Offensive for Climate.

Panelists

• Anders Wijkman — Honorary President, Club of Rome; Member, International Resource Panel (IRP); FWAAS
• Nicolaos Theodossiou — Professor, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki; Chair, UN SDSN Black Sea; FWAAS
• Paul Shrivastava — Co-President, Club of Rome; Professor, Pennsylvania State University
• Amanda Ellis — Former New Zealand Deputy Secretary for International Development; Trustee, WAAS
• Jinfeng Zhou — President, World Academy of Sustainable Development & Chinese Association of the CoR; FWAAS

Presents concrete strategies for full employment and reduced inequality: AI-based lifelong reskilling; working-time reduction and productivity sharing; technology dividend and fair taxation of automation; active labour-market policies; care economy expansion; living wages and collective bargaining; universal social protection; job guarantee and basic income.

Panelists

• Grigoris Zarotiadis — Professor, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki; FWAAS
• Randall Wray — Professor of Economics, Bard College; Senior Scholar, Levy Economics Institute
• Carol Carter — Founder & CEO, GlobalMindED; FWAAS
• Yao Ouyang — Qiushi Distinguished Professor, Zhejiang University; FWAAS
• SS Sreejith — CEO, Global Institute of Integral Management Studies, Kochi, India; FWAAS

Examines technology as a civilizational-scale structural force, raising questions of who controls it, digital colonialism, and the colonization of the mind. Proposes conscious global governance of technology — ethics-by-design, adaptive foresight, inclusivity of the Global South, alignment with the SDGs — and emerging technologies as global commons.

Panelists

• Gustavo Merino — Director, Division for Social Policies and Inclusion, Sciences Sector, UNESCO
• Mariana Bozesan — President, AQAL Capital; FWAAS; Member, Club of Rome
• Mariana Todorova — Member, AGI Panel of the UN Council of Presidents of the General Assembly; FWAAS
• Daljeet Singh Gahle — Director of International Affairs, Sunup Fusion Technologies; FWAAS
• Georgios Theodoropoulos — Chair Professor, Dept. of Computer Science & Engineering, SUSTech; FWAAS

Asks how education can become an antidote to social turbulence. Presents the World University Consortium human-centered model, the HS4A education initiative, the AI-powered future, and the potential of global higher education to ensure peace, human security and sustainable development.

Panelists

• Antonio Freitas — Provost for Research and Graduate Studies, FGV, Brazil; FWAAS
• Devakanni Subramaniam — CEO, SpellBee International Foundation for Human Excellence; FWAAS
• Stephen Yong-Seung Park — Professor of Human Resource Management and Dean, Kyung Hee University; FWAAS
• David Weinberg — CEO, Global Peace Education Network, Inc.

Covers three interrelated WAAS projects on reducing distortions in democracy, markets and media through transparency, inclusivity and accountability, drawing on the Global Baku Forum 2026 discussion on balancing social power.

Panelists

• Jonathan Miller — Director, Force for Good; Trustee, WAAS
• Ken Shibusawa — Founder & CEO, Shibusawa and Company, Inc.
• Petra Kuenkel — Visionary Author; System Scientist; Club of Rome; Founder, Collective Leadership Institute; FWAAS
• Garry Jacobs — President & CEO, WAAS; Editor, Cadmus
• Kingsley Abbott — International Human Rights Lawyer; Director, Institute of Commonwealth Studies

Explores the numerous ways AI can be harnessed for education, employment and lifelong learning for all — accounting for the speed of progress that endangers job security while opening new avenues for learning and working more humanistically.

Panelists

• Francesco Marmolejo — Higher Education President, Qatar Foundation; FWAAS
• Kanimozhi Ganesan — Senior Researcher, Mother's Service Society; Dean, Conscious Management Institute
• Erika Twani — CEO, Learning One to One Foundation
• Piero Dominici — Scientific Director of CHAOS; UNESCO Inclusive Policy Lab Expert; FWAAS

Studies the structural limits of rational thinking — disciplinary silos, cognitive bias, heuristics, zero-sum frameworks — and remedies for the moral crisis underpinning global turbulence; proposes an AI-Assisted Symbiotic Leadership Decision-Making System and ways to leverage AI to elevate human intelligence.

Panelists

• Ketan Patel — Executive Director and Trustee, WAAS; Chair, Force for Good
• Lawrence Ford — Founder and CEO, Conscious Capital; FWAAS
• Türker Kılıç — Professor of Neurosurgery, School of Medicine, Istinye University; WAAS Trustee (tbc)
• Janani Ramanathan — Secretary General, WAAS

Examines what leaders need to understand to be effective in an age of rapid change, complexity and global turbulence — including how to help students understand their mission and values, use technology as a tool rather than a crutch, and measure the competencies needed for human-centered education at scale.

Panelists

• Irina Bokova — Former DG UNESCO; FWAAS
• Peter Galbraith — Diplomat, Policy Advisor; Former US Ambassador and Senior UN Official; FWAAS
• Katalin Bogyay — President, UNA-Hungary; 36th President of the UNESCO General Conference; FWAAS (tbc)
• Ivan Simonovic — Permanent Representative of Croatia to the United Nations; Chairperson, UN Peace Building Commission; FWAAS

Studies ways of overcoming cognitive biases and explores new approaches to help students learn and think freely in an age of information overload and manipulation.

Panelists

• Annika Rao-Monari — Founder & CEO, CleeAI
• Waqas Ahmed — Executive Director, Khalili Foundation; Founding Faculty, London Interdisciplinary School
• Jerome Glenn — CEO, The Millennium Project; FWAAS
• Elena Mustakova — Evolutionary psychologist; IntegraLight Transdisciplinary Institute; Trustee, WAAS

Draws together the insights, solution directions and commitments from across all four days into a closing synthesis of the WAAS@66 Summit.

Panelists

• Garry Jacobs — President & CEO, WAAS; Editor, Cadmus
• Ketan Patel — Executive Director and Trustee, WAAS; Chair, Force for Good
• Aleksander Zidanšek — WAAS VP (Science & Technology)
• Isabella Bunn — Research Fellow in Governance and Global Ethics, University of Oxford; Trustee, WAAS