SPP Dean Wolfgang Reinicke speaks at Singapore Conference
SPP Dean Wolfgang Reinicke contributed to an international conference in Singapore on November 19-20, 2012. The conference with the title Global Economic Governance in Asia: Through the Looking Glass of the European Sovereign Debt Crisis was hosted by the Centre on Asia and Globalisation at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.
Wolfgang Reinicke gave a presentation on “Promoting Innovation in Global Governance. Why the existing system has failed. Thinking about sources and conditions for innovating global governance”. The presentation is based on a co-authored paper with Thorsten Benner.
The paper argues that we need to go beyond the usual laundry list of reform suggestions: how to change the procedures and composition of global institutions, how to enhance legitimacy and representation in global fora. No doubt these are all important concerns that require attention. And yet we have and continue to fail making any significant progress in these domains while the context is getting ever more challenging as crises become more frequent and power is shifting. The paper argues that it is important to focus on the meta-level and outline a broader framework for thinking about innovation in global governance. Is it sufficient to merely think about adaptation and reform as we have over and over again? Or have we reached a critical macro structural juncture where transformation can and should no longer be excluded? The paper proceeds in two steps: first, it details why the present system needs innovation of a deeper kind. Second, it begins to explore how we can think about innovation and improving the conditions for innovation in global governance to occur. The paper will be revised for publication in an edited volume in 2013.
Other speakers of the conference include Huang Jing (Professor & Director, Centre on Asia and Globalisation, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy), Petr Blizkovsky (Director Economic and Regional Affairs, General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union), Alexander N. Chumakov (Professor, Finance University under the Government of the Russian Federation) and Giles Merritt (Secretary General, Friends of Europe, Brussels).