Event - Lowy Lecture Series: Security and the tectonic shifts in Asian geopolitics - Jean-Marie Guéhenno

The Lowy Institute is pleased to host an event with Jean-Marie Guéhenno, on Friday, 20 February, to discuss security and the tectonic shifts in Asian geopolitics.

Although the recent peaceful democratic transitions in Indonesia and Sri Lanka point to the very real progress towards more inclusive politics in Asia, the counter-currents in places like Thailand and Bangladesh show that the international community would be unwise to become complacent. The increasing power and reach of radical movements in the Middle East show how easily conflicts like Afghanistan and Pakistan can metastasise across vulnerable and excluded communities. The growing power and confidence of China and India is ushering a new era of geopolitical competition in Asia, but they also bring new resources and new thinking to the fight for global and regional security.

Jean-Marie Guéhenno is President & CEO of the International Crisis Group.

Prior to assuming his post at the International Crisis Group, Mr Guéhenno was the Arnold Saltzman Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia University and the director of its centre for international conflict resolution (School of International and Public Affairs). He is also a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution.

In 2012, he was appointed deputy joint special envoy of the United Nations and the Arab League for Syria. He left that position to chair the commission appointed by President François Hollande to review the French Defense and national security posture. Between 2000 and 2008, he served as the United Nations’ Under Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations. A former French diplomat, he held the position of Chairman of the Institut des Hautes Études de Défense Nationale between 1998 and 2000, and served as director of the French policy planning staff and as ambassador to the Western European Union.

Mr Guéhenno has been active on several boards, including the board of the International Crisis Group and the board of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, of which he became the chairman at the end of 2010. Mr Guéhenno is an Officer of the ‘Légion d’honneur’ and a Commander of the ‘Bundesverdienstkreuz’ of Germany.