Sponsored by Hill & Knowlton

Thursday 30 November, 3.30pm to 7pm

Venue: Hill & Knowlton, 20 Soho Square, London W1A 1PR

The Foreign Policy Centre recently hosted a seminar and reception entitled: "Redefining Multilateralism: The Commonwealth as a Catalyst for Change?" The event was addressed by John Battle MP, Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Overseas Development and Rt Hon Donald McKinnon, Secretary General of the Commonwealth.

This spring the Prime Minister made a series of landmark speeches on foreign policy, one of which was hosted by the Foreign Policy Centre in March. You may recall that in his third speech held at Georgetown University, Washington DC in May 2006 the Prime Minister suggested that:

"There is a "hopeless mismatch" between the global challenges we face and the global institutions available to confront them,[…] now is the moment for reconciliation in the international community around a unifying agenda for global action."

Today there are a number of obstacles to promoting international co-operation. From the indefinite suspension of the Doha Development Round, to developing a reformed United Nations system which meets the challenges of the 21st century and beyond. We witness the crisis in the International Monetary Fund and the growing irrelevance of the Work Bank in meeting today's global development concerns. The seminar explored how the world's second largest international association can best position itself to advocate a response commensurate with the global threat to multilateralism.

The Commonwealth holds a unique position in today's global institutional architecture, with a membership of 53 states, comprising over 1.8 billion inhabitants (or 33 per cent of the world's population). Economically, the Commonwealth has annual GDP growth rate of approximately 7%, including thirteen of the fastest growing world economies. Through this seminar we hope to identify how the Commonwealth can best provoke change by redefining multilateralism.

The event was kindly sponsored by Hill and Knowlton and was held at their offices at 20 Soho Square, London W1A 1PR.

Download speeches from the event - John Battle MP and Don McKinnon (80 kilobyte PDF; need help viewing PDFs?)