Spring 2012 | Public lectures and events | Video

Contributor(s): Professor Yezid Sayigh | The construction of authoritarian power in Arab states over past decades has enmeshed national armies in political, economic, and social structures and dynamics. Democratic transition therefore implicates constitutional debates about the nature of the state with renegotiation of the role and status of the military. Yezid Sayigh is a senior associate at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, where his work focuses on the future political role of Arab armies, the resistance and reinvention of authoritarian regimes, and the Israel-Palestine conflict and peace process.

Contributor(s): Jean-Michel Severino, Martin Wolf | Two economic experts discuss the state of the world economy after the eurozone financial crisis. Jean Michel Severino is inspector general at the French Ministry of Finance. Martin Wolf is a journalist at the Financial Times.

Contributor(s): Liam Byrne MP | As we enter the year of the Beveridge Report's 70th Anniversary, Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Liam Byrne MP, sets out Labour's case for welfare reform. Liam Byrne is Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, and Coordinator of Labour's policy review. Elected in 2004, Liam held several ministerial positions in the Labour Government before becoming Chief Secretary to the Treasury in 2009. Before entering politics Liam co-founded the eCommerce business egsgroup.com, and worked as a banker with NM Rothschilds. He was a Fulbright scholar at the Harvard Business School where he took his MBA with honours.

Contributor(s): Philip Coggan | The world is drowning in debt. Greece is on the verge of default. In Britain, the coalition government is pushing through an austerity programme in the face of economic weakness. The US government almost shut down in August because of a dispute over the size of government debt. Our latest crisis may seem to have started in 2007, with the collapse of the American housing market. But as Philip Coggan shows in this new book, Paper Promises: Money, Debt and the new World Order which he will talk about in this lecture, the crisis is part of an age-old battle between creditors and borrowers. And that battle has been fought over the nature of money. Creditors always want sound money to ensure that they are paid back in full; borrowers want easy money to reduce the burden of repaying their debts. Money was once linked to gold, a commodity in limited supply; now central banks can create it with the click of a computer mouse. Time and again, this cycle has resulted in financial and economic crises. In the 1930s, countries abandoned the gold standard in the face of the Great Depression. In the 1970s, they abandoned the system of fixed exchange rates and ushered in a period of paper money. The results have been a long series of asset bubbles, from dotcom stocks to housing, and the elevation of the financial sector to economic dominance. The current crisis not only pits creditors against debtors, but taxpayers against public sector workers, young against old and the western world against Asia. As in the 1930s and 1970s, a new monetary system will emerge; the rules for which will likely be set by the world's rising economic power, China. Philip Coggan was a Financial Times journalist for over twenty years, including spells as a Lex columnist, personal finance editor and investment editor, and is now the Buttonwood columnist of The Economist. In 2009, he was awarded the title of Senior Financial Journalist in the Harold Wincott awards and was voted Best Communicator at the Business Journalist of the Year Awards. Philip Coggan is the author of the business classic, The Money Machine.

Contributor(s): Professor Atila Eralp, Professor Richard Gillespie, Dr Sharon Pardo | This roundtable on 'EU Foreign Policy after Lisbon: The View from the Mediterranean' looks at how the EU is perceived as a foreign policy actor in its southern neighbourhood. Professor Atila Eralp is from the Middle East Technical University, Ankara; Professor Richard Gillespie is from the University of Liverpool and Dr Sharon Pardo is from Ben Gurion University. Professor Karen E Smith is from LSE.

Contributor(s): Bronwyn Curtis, Dr Jon Danielsson, Professor Robert Wade | LSE Arts are pleased to host a very special screening of the highly anticipated film Margin Call| based on the financial crash – starring Kevin Spacey, Jeremy Irons, Demi Moore, Zachary Quinto, Paul Bettany and Stanley Tucci and released in UK cinemas on 13 January. Reviewed by The New York Times as "an extraordinary feat of filmmaking", Margin Call is a thriller that revolves around the key people at an investment bank over a 24-hour period during the early stages of the financial crisis. When entry-level analyst Peter Sullivan (Zachary Quinto) unlocks information that could prove to be the downfall of an investment firm, a roller-coaster ride ensues as decisions both financial and moral catapult the lives of all involved to the brink of disaster. This podcast comprises the introduction and panel discussion that followed the screening. Bronwyn Curtis is Executive Editor and Senior Advisor at HSBC and is co-sponsor of the Balance group. She is also Chairman of the Society of Business Economists, a board member of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, the Council at the London School of Economics and the Advisory Board at Imperial College Business School, as well as a member of The Times newspaper's Shadow Monetary Policy Committee. Previously, Bronwyn was Head of European Broadcasting and Managing Editor at Bloomberg. Her other senior roles include Global Head of Currency and Fixed Income Strategy at Deutsche Bank and Chief Economist at Nomura International. She has also worked for the World Bank and the United Nations on commodity based projects in Africa, LATAM and Asia. Dr Jon Danielsson is a Reader in the Finance Department at LSE. Professor Robert Wade is a Professor in the International Development department at LSE.

Contributor(s): Dr Lino Cardarelli | After the Arab Spring, lasting political change in North Africa will require sustained regional cooperation to promote economic integration and efficient and accountable governance. What should a bold plan of action look like? Lino Cardarelli is Senior Deputy Secretary General for Project Funding Coordination and Business Development SMEs in the Secretariat of the Union for the Mediterranean, a position he has held since 2010. From March to June 2011 has also covered the position of Acting Secretary General in the Secretariat of the Union for the Mediterranean. Since his return from Baghdad mid-2005, Lino Cardarelli is serving in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as expert and coordinator of the Italian economic initiatives in the Middle East and Gulf Countries. Before that, during 2004, he had the position as deputy Senior Advisor in Government Authority of Iraq (in Baghdad) where he had also the position at the PMO (Program Management Office) and IRMO (Iraqi Reconstruction Management Office) as coordinator of Donors Countries project, Special Assistant and deputy to the Executive Director Dave Nash. With more than 30 years of International experience working in Africa, Middle East, Latin America, USA and European Countries, he was involved in the management of companies producing and marketing in heavy and specialty chemicals, pharmaceutical, engineering constructions, textiles, machine tools and in the financing of significant projects and the acquisition of companies. Prior to that, he was Chief Financial Officer, General Manager and Managing Director of Montedison Group, one of the leaders in world in chemicals and pharmaceuticals. While in this position he acted as Executive President in the related companies Incas Bonna Spa and Cedar Trading S.A. and as Executive Director of Erbamont and Ausimont. Lino Cardarelli graduated in Economics at the University of Parma (Italy) and attended a semester at the London School of Economics and Political Science (London), at the La Sorbonne (Paris) and at the Salzburg Seminar in American Studies (Salzburg, Austria). He holds a specialization at the Harvard Business School (Boston) in Strategic Finance and has a degree in Business Development at the IMEDE University in Lausanne (Switzerland).

Contributor(s): Mario Monti | Mario Monti is Italian Prime Minister and Minister of the Economy and Finance, positions he has held since 16 November 2011. He was President of Bocconi University, Milan, from 1994 to November 2011, when, upon his request, he was suspended from his functions as President of Bocconi for the duration of his mandate as President of the Council of Ministers. He was also European chairman of the Trilateral Commission and honorary president of Bruegel, the European think-tank he launched in 2005. He is the author of the report to the President of the European Commission on "A new strategy for the single market" (May 2010). As the EU-appointed coordinator for the electricity interconnection between France and Spain, he brokered an agreement between the two heads of governments in June 2008. He was a member of the Attali Committee on economic growth in France, set up by President Sarkozy (2007-2008). He was for ten years a member of the European Commission, in charge of the Internal market, Financial services and Tax policy (1995-1999), then of Competition policy (1999-2004). In addition to a number of high-profile cases (e.g. GE/Honeywell, Microsoft, the German Landesbanken), he introduced radical modernisation reforms of EU antitrust and merger control and led, with the US authorities, the creation of the International Competition Network (ICN). Born in Varese, Italy, in 1943, he graduated from Bocconi University and did graduate studies at Yale University. Prior to joining the European Commission, he had been professor of economics and rector at Bocconi University.

Contributor(s): Dr Guy Dammann | Everyone admits that there is no fact of the matter about aesthetic judgements. Nonetheless, constantly referring to artistic taste as 'relative' limits the power of art to change us. Guy Dammann is the music critic of the Times Literary Supplement, and a critic and commentator for the Guardian.

Contributor(s): Wadah Khanfar | The recent elections in Tunisia and Egypt have brought Islamist parties to power, a pattern that may very well repeat itself as uprisings turn to elections across the Arab world. In the west, this phenomenon has led to a debate about the 'problem' of the rise of political Islam. In the Arab world, too, there has been mounting tension between Islamists and secularists. As the Arab uprisings began, Wadah Khanfar, a former foreign correspondent in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, was the top executive at Al Jazeera, arguably the leading media source as the protests have unfolded, until he resigned in September 2011. As a former newsman and now CEO of Integral Media Strategies, Khanfar is in touch with some of the greatest thinkers and influential leaders and activists in the Middle East today and will reflect on what he sees as a necessary and long overdue debate about the rise of political Islam and where, politically and economically, he sees the region shifting as the rise continues. Wadah Khanfar is CEO of Integral Media Strategies and the former director general of the Al Jazeera Network. He began his career with the network in 1997, covering some of the world's key political zones, including South Africa, Afghanistan and Iraq. He was appointed the chief of the Baghdad bureau, and later as the network's managing director. In 2006, he became Al Jazeera's director general. During his 8-year tenure at the helm, the network transformed from a single channel into a media network including Al Jazeera Arabic, Al Jazeera English, Al Jazeera Documentary and the Al Jazeera Center for Studies. During this period, the Arab world witnessed historic transformation including Arab Awakening. Khanfar, who resigned from the network in September 2011, has been named as one of Foreign Policy's Top 100 global thinkers of 2011 as well as one of Fast Company's 'Most Creative People in Business' of the year. Khanfar has a diverse academic background with post-graduate studies in Philosophy, African Studies, and International Politics. Charlie Beckett is director of POLIS.