Before working at Chatham House he worked for the organization the Disablement Income Group which campaigned on behalf of disabled people and offered advice on financial matters. He also worked for John Denham, Member of Parliament, and for the Labour Party in the run up to the 1997 UK general election. He has also worked in the private sector for stockbroker Wood Mackenzie and for the banking group County Nat West.

Interview

Jay Friedel:  Why don’t we start by hearing a little bit about yourself? Introduce yourself, your organization and what role Chatham House plays within the broader environment of Think Tanks in your country.

Keith Burnet: My name is Keith Burnet. I’m the communications director at Chatham House. Chatham House is a think tank that was founded in 1920 to promote global dialogue between nations and we pretty much have the same mission today as we did then. We are independent of government, although we work closely with the UK foreign office and the G20 governments and other governments around the world. Our analysis is fully independent.

Jay Friedel: Now, this conference obviously is under Chatham House rule. Could you comment a little bit about what role that could be having on the conference and the possible benefits there?

Keith Burnet: I think the benefit of using the Chatham House rule for a conference like this is that the participants are free to share the information and the topics that we discuss, the insights, the ideas, and so on, but the identity of the speakers and that of other participants remains anonymous, so the ideas could get out there, and if you want to say something a little bit controversial or something that you may not say if it was fully on the records, then the Chatham House rule allows you to do that.

Jay Friedel: Have you been in other meetings without this rule and noticed the difference that there is, in fact, a freer dialogue under the Chatham House rule?

Keith Burnet: Categorically, I would say there is a freer dialogue under the Chatham House rule. People just feel more relaxed about making comments and sharing ideas.

Jay Friedel: Now, you mentioned that Chatham House is independent. It sounds like everyone is independent. So what’s your definition of that? And do you think that the variation of definition of that is good or bad for think tanks in general.

Keith Burnet: Our definition of independence is that our analysis, the outcome of our research, the findings, the conclusions, and so on, is not affected in anyway by the funders. Of course we need funders, whether that’s funding from governments or foundations or individuals or corporate organizations, but they come into the agreement with us on the understanding that the conclusions we come up with, they may not necessarily like or agree with. But the conclusions will be ours and ours alone, and that for us, is one of the key factors of our independence.

Jay Friedel: For the health of the community worldwide, is it okay that there are different definitions of independence, or even of think tanks, generally, there seems to be a wide variety of answers to that question. What is a think tank? What is the role of a think tank?

Keith Burnet: There are definitely a huge variety, a wide variation in definitions of independence, the way think tanks operate, and the way they’re funded. It is possible to be funded by a government and yet to have a large degree of autonomy and independence. It’s certainly not for, I think, one organization to dictate to the others how they’re funded, how they’re set up. So I would say that there are interesting differences and you work with those differences. And there are different contexts as well within each country and I think that’s fine. I think that’s what makes a conference like this all the more interesting.

Jay Friedel:  Well speaking of this conference, it is my understanding that this a fairly new idea- the bringing together of experts from the G20 countries- so I’m wondering, do you see this as an emerging trend? Do you expect to see more conferences like this one? And what role do you think that can play in the global dialogue?

Keith Burnet: I think that the sharing of ideas between experts, between think tanks is absolutely crucial. In a sense that’s what my organization Chatham House is all about. And to bring experts together from G20, from the think tanks is crucial. And I think it will only benefit each organization that participated because the sharing of ideas in this way is vital to, you know, in this world where – especially in my field in communications-  the horizon just comes at you so rapidly all the time to step back, to think, to share, to discuss is a very positive step.

Jay Friedel: Was there anything in particular that you’ll be taking away from this conference, something that you learned or anything like that?

Keith Burnet: I’ve learned a lot. But obviously I learned a lot of it under the Chatham House Rule so I may not share too much of it. But I think that just the general sharing of experiences and knowing that we’re all facing in one way or another, similar challenges-not everybody- but to a large degree, whether it’s in communications or funding or as we discussed independence, just the general direction of travel, how we find solutions or how we help the governments find solutions to the big issues in the world. I think that a platform to discuss those things is a way forward and so I would envisage that if a conference like this takes place again, then it would definitely be in the interest of something my organization to participate.

Jay Friedel: You mentioned the fast pace of communications and I’m wondering, governments obviously operate under a fast pace as well and they’re always meeting deadlines and making decisions. How does that pace compare to the pace of think tank and where can the think tanks help the government when those policy makers are making decisions on the spot all the time?

Keith Burnet: I think it’s essential that think tanks can react quickly to the needs of governments and so on, can feed into situations and developments as they change, and they are changing rapidly and governments do need to respond quickly and act quickly. However, it’s probably- certainly for my organization- more important that we’re able to take the medium to long term view that the analysis that we provide is not affected unduly by the need to react today, whether it’s to a new story or to a crisis in government, it’s crucial that we are able to steer, wherever possible, governments to take a medium to long term view.

Jay Friedel: What about the competitors in this market- lawyers, other types of analysts? How do think tanks keep themselves relevant in this increasingly competitive market?

Keith Burnet: It is definitely an increasingly competitive market. And as we’ve found in the UK, universities, consultancies, all sorts of organizations are operating in the space that others used to operate in. and there’s a convergence, but for Chatham House, the distinct output is that we work across themes and different types of study. So our research teams work on four strands and its’ the mixing of those strands and the moving away from studying,  for example a region or a country specifically, to studying how the economy of that country is affected the environment,  how it’s security, and how all of those strands interplay and interact.

Claudia Calvin, Ph.D.,

In her public sector career she also served as Advisor to the Office of Mexico City´s Major, to the Interior Ministry and to the Senate of the Republic. In the private sector, she has been consultant for the WWF Mexico and for the Environmental Management & Decentralization Project (PROMAD) developed by the World Bank and ERI Consultants, among others. She also worked in the Mexico Bureau of The Miami Herald and Los Angeles Times. She has lectured at the Universidad Iberoamericana, the Autonomous University of Querétaro, the University of the Americas and the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico (ITAM) and has been Visiting Researcher at Georgetown University. B.A. in International Relations, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). M.A.  in International Journalism, University of Southern California (USC). PhD in Social Sciences with specialization in Political Science, Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO)

MP3:

Claudia Calvin: My name is Claudia Calvin, I’m the Executive Director of COMEXI, the Mexican Council on Foreign Affairs, or El Consejo Mexicano de Asuntos Internacionales in Spanish, and this is the first think tank devoted to the analysis of foreign policy and international relations from Mexico, and what we’re working on is basically analyzing the way in which Mexico should participate in international arena and the impact of international relations on Mexico.

Jay Friedel: How has that message been getting out? How does the media feel about the emphasis on foreign relations, if any?

Claudia Calvin: You’re talking about the Mexican media? Well, international relations and international affairs are not at the top of the agenda in the Mexican media, and right now we’re going through an electoral process, talking about this specific moment, and so the local issues regarding the candidates and the elections are the basic right now.

Jay Friedel: OK, and that, I assume, makes it hard to get international affairs, from your perspective, emphasized.

Claudia Calvin: Yes, of course.

Jay Friedel: Is there any work being done to change that at all?

Claudia Calvin: Of course, that’s part of our job. We are trying to be in contact with the media workers, with journalists, with editors, and some of our members. Part of our membership, part of our editors are part of our COMEXI membership, so the specialists in international relations have a way of pushing forward their ideas in writing and making them public, and we work on that, too. We also work strongly on social media and we have a very active program to make these things public and use new ways of communication to push forward international issues and relevant topics.

Jay Friedel: So how about participation in a conference like this, do you think that draws attention to the growing emphasis on globalization, foreign affairs, international interaction?

Claudia Calvin: Specifically in the case of Mexico it will grab attention to the specialized persons devoted to the analysis of these things, diplomats, academics, and policymakers, devoted to this issue.  The challenge is to make some of these issues public, but it’s not easy [unclear].

Jay Friedel: Is that part of the role essentially, operating between academia and policymakers? Do you think this conference can help achieve that?

Claudia Calvin: I don’t know the conference per se, but the things that were debated are a good point to begin analyzing new ways and understanding what problems are common between think tanks around the world, what can we do, what are the particularities, what can we change, what can we use to our advantage. As I said I don’t know about the conference per se but it gives us excellent input to think about.

Jay Friedel So you in particular have found it helpful to learn from other organizations?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: It can be really helpful to hear how we share problems, and once again understand that think tanks respond to the different particularities of the countries and the political contexts. So we cannot put a benchmark, but we share common things, and I guess each one must solve the problems according to their specific, local social, economic and political context.  

Jay Friedel: What about the different interpretations of the definition of a think tank, what they’re supposed to do, and what a “think tanker” is supposed to do? There are many different opinions presented here, how does that diversity influence international cooperation?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: As an institution you have objectives, you have a mission you have a program, a platform of action, and it’s like the countries, each country is different and that doesn’t imply that collaboration is impossible, and so diversity can enrich collaboration with each part putting something different with the other strengthening, what one has, the other doesn’t, and so they can probably make a synergy to collaborate on work.

Jay Friedel: Would you hope to see a conference like this in the future? Would you like to see a trend of the experts from the G20 countries get together like this?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: I think it would be great if some of the same participants actually come to the next one, it would be great to follow up and see what has happened, what has changed. I know the framing exclusively of G20 countries would be the only way to analyze and see the way we participate. We can talk about the G20 but we can also think about other think tanks involved in specific international or global issues. I understand the G20 is really important- Mexico is participating and sharing its presence at the G20 here, but in future years there will be other topics and other relevant global affairs that might put us together to think.

Jay Friedel: We’ve gone from G7 to G8 to G20, do you think it will expand or the G20 inviting outsiders to participate.

CLAUDIA CALVIN: I hope it doesn’t keep expanding, or we’ll end up inviting the United Nations! [unclear] United Nations a think tank conference if we keep on growing. I guess we’ll have to see if the objectives are fulfilled.

Jay Friedel: What about as far as the rising or emerging powers are concerned, as far as they have more influence relative to the Anglo-Saxon tradition, do you think that will change the way these interactions occur, change the way that people think about think tanks?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: I think that should impact and change there are many ways of understanding the world, not only the Anglo-Saxon or the West’s vision of the world. Latin America has a vision, Asia has a vision, and rather than being something to worry about we should try to see what these differences can bring together and how we can create and negotiate a consensus, and new issues of interest and relevance for everyone.

Jay Friedel: How can think tanks encourage their government s to take such a brotherly attitude about it?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: Well that’s the challenge and that’s the work we do, to try not only to influence policy but the agenda-setting process, so that will be part of the process.

Jay Friedel: Do you think that personal connections made here could trickle into the respective governments and increase governmental cooperation?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: That could be, if we set up a common agenda or decide to create collaboration among the participant think tanks we could work together in pushing forward specific agendas that might be of common interests for our governments and think tanks and our people.

Jay Friedel: So would that be collaborative and coinciding national agendas, or are you referencing potentially these think tanks pursuing a global agenda?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: I’m talking about the think tanks, right, we are representatives of our think tanks, not as government representatives.

Jay Friedel: Right, right, so my question is: as think tank cooperation increases would you like to see one of the products be maybe a publication of some sort of a global agenda from a think tank perspective to try to influence countries?

CLAUDIA CALVIN: That would be great and was something we did in Mexico, we organized the Think 20 as I mentioned the other day, and that’s exactly what we did. We organized this meeting of think tanks with persons that had been participating and analyzing Think 20 for a few years, that were experts on this, and we got together directly with the Mexican sherpa and she stayed with us the whole day and a half of meetings and sessions following all Chatham House rules and the conclusions were presented to the sherpa and she incorporated the proposals of the think tanks. So that’s a very good way in which one can see the way in which we can impact policy making.

Jay Friedel: Do you think that’s an event or a phenomenon in isolation or do you see a trend toward global policy setting?

CLAUDIA CALVIN:  I would love to see that this is a trend in global policy setting. Every day what we see around the world in our countries is the fact that policymaking needs to be open. Policymaking has been closed traditionally, historically, but what we see are more actors with new means of participating and making themselves heard. Think tanks are one among the many social and political actors that participate in the local and international agenda. Epistemic communities have existed ever since, you have seen lots of ways in which epistemic communities have participated in the Mediterranean, to create the Washington Consensus, at the beginning of the century to create the Society of Unions, La Asociada de las Uniones, so there have always been specialists around power, [unclear] the ideas have always been surrounded. We’re humans and that is part of history.

Melissa H. Conley Tyler, J.D., was appointed National Executive Director of the Australian Institute of International Affairs in 2006. She is a lawyer and specialist in conflict resolution, including negotiation, mediation and peace education. She was previously Program Manager of the International Conflict Resolution Centre at the University of Melbourne and Senior Fellow of Melbourne Law School. She has an international profile in conflict resolution including membership of the Editorial Board of the Conflict Resolution Quarterly.

In 2008 Ms Conley Tyler was selected as one of the nation’s 1,000 “best and brightest” to participate in the Australia 2020 Summit convened by the Prime Minister to discuss future challenges facing Australia. Later in 2008 she was selected by the Fletcher Alumni Association of Washington D.C. to receive its Young Alumni Award for most outstanding graduate of the Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy under 40. She is a member of the International Advisory Council of the U.S. Center for Citizen Diplomacy.During six and a half years with the AIIA, she has edited 37 publications, organised 50 policy events, overseen dramatic growth in youth engagement and built stronger relations with other institutes of international affairs worldwide. Her recent research includes book chapters on Australian foreign policy-making and Australia’s role in G20 and publications on public diplomacy and Australia as a middle power.

With more than 15 years’ experience working in community organisations in Australia, South Africa and the U.S.A., Ms Conley Tyler has a strong interest in non-profit management. She has served on the Board of Directors of the Charities Aid Foundation Australia, one of Australia’s largest grant-givers, and the Committee of Management of the Victorian Foundation for Survivors of Torture. She is listed in Routledge’s Who’s Who in International Affairs and International Who’s Who of Women.

Jay Friedel: Please start by introducing yourself please. Name organization, country

Melisa Conley Tyler: My name is Melisa Conley Tyler. I’m the director of the Australian institute of international affairs.

Jay Friedel: And why don’t you start by talking about the role of think tanks in Australia, and where your organization fits within that environment.

Melisa Conley Tyler:  Well we are probably one of the oldest in Australia. We were established in 1924 as branch of Chatham house out of London. In our early years, we were quite instrumental in trying to promote a independent foreign policy in Australia rather than the imperial policy. We became independent in 1933 and since then I think have been influential in a range of debates around Australia having engagement with Asia in the sense of trying to involve the public in foreign policy making. Our basic mission is promoting public understanding and interest in International Affairs. We do that in a range of ways. We have seven branches all around Australia, around 200 events a year, we publish the Australian journal of International Affairs which is a very highly ranked academic publication, as well as a range of pamphlets and information for the general public and we work a lot with young people. So we have a youth program of careers fairs, schools programs, internships, youth publications, young professional networks as a way of trying to engage young people in International issues.

Jay Friedel: Now we’ve heard a lot about the supply the think tank provides and the demand the readers want, or policy makers. So what’s your take on that, where’s the balance to strike? How much should we be pushing an agenda and how much should we be responding to the information the government asks for?

Melisa Conley Tyler: I would say to do your job well you should do both. We think of ourselves as having multiple audiences. We work both with the general public and trying to have an informed debate within Australian society, and we also work with policy makers directly, and of course they have different needs. So we would say that in many ways we are a knowledge broker between information that’s being produced and the audiences that need that information. Now they may or may not know that they need that information, so in that sense you don’t just want to respond to what people think they want, you have to look more broadly and say, what are the big issues. So for the institute, we ourselves have in our constitution that we may never express an opinion on any in international affairs. We do not have an agenda or an ideology, we see ourselves as a platform for debate. Our job is to take the issue of the time and try to get together the best thinking package and put it in a way that it can get to the people who need it in a [unclear] of time in a mode that they’re going to respond to. That means ourselves that we don’t push a particular view, but we do have an [unclear]. And so one of the very important things we have to do is think, what are the topics on which discussion is needed. Not that I know what the answer is, I don’t know what the answer is, we’re never going to have the opinion, but what we can say is what are the topics we should be looking at right now.

Jay Friedel: Now, obviously we can’t predict the future, so what extent do you think the predictive ability of think tanks should be improved? I mean no one was talking about the desire for human dignity and the end of almost monarchs in the Middle East before the Arab Spring. Those conversation started after to a large extent, in terms of what ramifications that would have for the region.

Melisa Conley Tyler: I think I probably disagree with [unclear] on that, I think a lot of people were discussing many of these issues. These were certainly part of the debate amongst organizations that have been involved in democracy promotion and civil society and good governance all round the world. What I think we’re very bad at is working at exactly when something will happen. And I just think that that’s an unreasonable aim for anyone to set. Intelligence services which are exceptionally well funded are also not particularly good at this because it’s hard. But you can say, what’s a good example, I remember talking to a former Australian ambassador to Saud Arabia, he’d been stationed there 25 years ago and he can take you through the analysis of why the Saudi regime is fundamentally unstable and is just bound the fall eventually, and it was true 25 years ago and it’s still true today. Now what is the thing that might catalyze an underlying condition? So you might say in Tunisia for example, yes we’ve had all of these issues, yes there are all of these problems, are you really going to predict that it’s one fruit merchant and one police officer showing disrespect that is the thing that’s going to be the catalyzer? No, of course, you’re not. So I think it’s actually an unfair standard to try and hold anyone to. From the institute’s perspective, I would say we know and accept that sort of predictive ability isn’t something that we should be aiming for. What we focus a lot on is capacity. So if you think, for example like Australia, we tend to have to take the world as we find it. We are wonderful activists [unclear] but we’re not a great power. We cannot change the whole shape of the world, we have to respond to the world and to developments as they occur. That means for us that having a massive grand strategy isn’t necessarily what we should be focusing on. What we should be focusing on is our capacity as a nation to deal with changes as they occur. So that means for example, investing in our foreign service, investing in our universities, investing the intellectual capacity to respond to events as they occur. And that’s a little bit different than thinking about what precisely is going to happen, I think that’s a much more useful place to be working.

Jay Friedel: Now lastly, [unclear] toward the conference itself, it’s my understanding that gathering experts from the G20 countries is a pretty novel idea, so I’m curious, to what extend to do you think demonstrates an emerging trend, that in the future we’ll see more meetings like this and what role do you think conferences like this can play?

Melisa Conley Tyler: I think that it’s an immensely valuable thing. There have been some attempts, so for example the [unclear] institute in international affairs was involved in a smaller event trying to get together institutes in international affairs from G20 countries, we met with 5 of the middle and emerging powers because we thought we had a lot in common to talk about. But something on this scale is fabulous and a real benefit. I think G20 as an architecture will be a fascinating thing, from Australia’s perspective we are 100% behind it. It gives us a seat at the big table In a way that we just wouldn’t have otherwise. If the G20 was not successful, it were replaced by some other decision making process, Australia almost certainly wouldn’t be involved, so we have a great stake in G20’s success and being set to succeed. So the Australian government has been very very positive about the process, it’s put a lot of effort into it and Australia will be hosting the 2014 G20 summit, so we will have a very strong role there. So perhaps that may be something that come out of this event, perhaps the host country when Australia does it might invite all of the G20 think tanks to come and join us in Australia, which I think would be a wonderful thing to come out of the gathering that we’ve had these past 2 days.

Jay Friedel: Ok, thank you so much that was fantastic.

Dennis DeTurck, Ph.D., 

As dean of the College, Dr. DeTurck has responsibility for undergraduate curricula, programs, and students in all departments and nondepartmental programs in the School of Arts and Sciences. He directs the College Office, together with its staff of advisors, and works with the Dean of SAS on planning and priorities for undergraduate education in the arts and sciences at Penn.

Celso Castro

Castro has written extensively on the military in Brazilian history and society. His books include: O espírito militar (1990, 2nd ed. 2004), Os militares e a República (1995), A invenção do Exército brasileiro (2002), and Antropologia dos militares (2009). He also organized a series of eight books about the military in post-1964 Brazilian history including the trilogy: Visões do golpe (1994), Os anos de chumbo (1994) and A volta aos quartéis (1995), published by the ed. Relume-Dumará, together with Gláucio Soares and Maria Celina D’Araujo; and Ernesto Geisel (1997) and Militares e política na Nova República (2000), together with Maria Celina D’Araujo.

Professor Castro’s recent research has focused on cultural theory and the study of tourism from a social science perspective. He organized two books on the topic: Franz Boas – Antropologia cultural (Zahar, 2004) and Evolucionismo cultural (Zahar, 2005) and co-authored a book with Bianca Freire-Medeiros about the history of tourism in Rio de Janeiro. Castro currently teaches graduate and undergraduate courses at FGV and is the director of a book series on the social sciences by Zahar Editors.

Brigadier-General Rumel Dahiya

Expertise: Net Assessment, India’s Defence and Security Policies, West Asia

Education: MSc and MPhil in Defence and Security Studies, MSc in Disaster Mitigation, Post Graduate Diploma in Human Rights.

Background: Brig Rumel Dahiya, SM (Retd) is Deputy Director General at the Institute of Defence Studies & Analyses. He is also Coordinator of the Military Affairs Cluster and Managing Editor of the Journal of Defence Studies.

Brig. Dahiya is an Indian Army veteran with extensive command and staff experience spanning 32 years, including in counter-insurgency operations. He previously served as a Defence Attache to Turkey, Syria and Lebanon, and with the Indian Military Training Team in Bhutan. He also served with Military Operations Directorate of the Indian Army and Net Assessment Directorate at Integrated Defence Staff. Brig. Dahiya is a graduate of the National Defence College and Defence Services Staff College. He was awarded the Sword of Honour and Gold Medal at the Indian Military Academy at his commissioning.

Select Publications: Faulty Manpower Policy in Indian Armed Forces: Time for Action, IDSA Issue Brief, June 13, 2011; Changing Face of Turkey, Strategic Analysis, January 2011; Edited book titled “Asia 2030: The Unfolding Future”, 2010; Modernization of Infantry in India, Journal of Defence Studies, July 2010.