Autumn 2015 | Public lectures and events | Audio and pdf London School of Economics and Political Science

Contributor(s): Zoe Konstantopoulou | Greece is at the forefront of questions connecting human rights protection, debt and austerity. Zoe Konstantopoulou will share her insights on the fight to secure social rights. Zoe Konstantopoulou (@ZoeKonstant) was President of the Greek Parliament and a politician of the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA), and is a practicing lawyer. She was elected to the post of President on 6 February 2015 with a record number of 235 out of 300 votes, making her the youngest Speaker in the history of the Hellenic Parliament. As Speaker, she worked to expose the truth around the debt and human crises in Greece. She holds a law degree from the University of Athens, a Master’s in Law from Columbia University with a focus on International Law, Human Rights and Criminal Law and a DEA from the University of Paris 1 (Panthéon la Sorbonne) in European Criminal Law and Criminal Policy in Europe. In her legal practice she is active in the fields of criminal law and human rights. She is a member of the Athens and New York Bars. Margot Salomon (@Margot_Salomon) is associate professor in the Centre for the Study of Human Rights and Department of Law. The Centre for the Study of Human Rights at LSE (@LSEHumanRights) is a trans-disciplinary centre of excellence for international academic research, teaching and critical scholarship on human rights. LSE Law (@lselaw) is an integral part of the School's mission, plays a major role in policy debates & in the education of lawyers and law teachers from around the world.

Contributor(s): Professor David Harvey | David Harvey's politicised work on geography, social theory, urban political economy and capitalism has shaped academic debate for decades. He is one of the most cited social scientists in the world, and his works have been translated into multiple languages. Here, Harvey joins a panel of experts to explore his ideas - and alternative views. David Harvey (@profdavidharvey) is Distinguished Professor of Anthropology & Geography at The Graduate Center, City University of New York. Michael Storper (@michaelstorper) is Professor of Economic Geography at LSE, and holds Professorships at Sciences-Po and UCLA. Jane Wills is Professor of Human Geography, Queen Mary, University of London. Murray Low is Associate Professor of Human Geography in the LSE Department of Geography & Environment. The LSE Department of Geography & Environment (@LSEGeography) is a centre of international academic excellence in economic, urban and development geography, environmental social science and climate change.

Contributor(s): Anote Tong | Kiribati is in the front line of climate change. Despite Kiribati's best efforts at mitigation, relocation of its people may be the only long term option as the physical fabric of the country becomes uninhabitable. Anote Tong has been President of Kiribati since 2003, and steps down at the end of 2015 after meeting the term limits prescribed by the Kiribati Constitution. Climate change has been the defining issue of his Presidency. President Tong is an alumnus of the London School of Economics and Political Science. Robin Mansell (@REMVAN) is LSE Deputy Director and Provost and Professor of New Media and the Internet in the Department of Media and Communication.

Contributor(s): Professor Oriana Bandiera, Mushtaque Chowdhury, Professor Esther Duflo, Anna Minj, Muhammad Musa, Desmond Swayne | Can extreme poverty be eliminated through programmes targeting the world’s ultra-poor? The panel will discuss the merits of so called graduation approaches. Oriana Bandiera is a Professor of Economics at the LSE and the Director of STICERD. Mushtaque Chowdhury is Vice-Chairperson, BRAC. Esther Duflo is the Abdul Latif Jameel Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics at MIT. Anna Minj is Director of the Targeting the Ultra Poor Programme, BRAC. Muhammad Musa, Executive Director, BRAC. Desmond Swayne is Minister of State at DFID. Robin Burgess is a Professor of Economics at LSE and Director of the IGC. The International Growth Centre (@The_IGC) aims to promote sustainable growth in developing countries by providing demand-led policy advice based on frontier research. Based at LSE and in partnership with Oxford University, the IGC is initiated and funded by DFID. BRAC (@BRACworld) is a global leader in creating opportunity for the world’s poor.

Contributor(s): Professor Ian Morris | 20,000 years ago, ‘international relations’ meant interactions between tiny foraging bands; now it means a global system. Philippe Roman Chair Ian Morris explains how the growth of the international system and the shifts of power within it are linked to geography and energy extraction. In tracing this story, Professor Morris asks: Why were the world’s greatest powers concentrated in western Eurasia until about AD 500? Why did they shift to East Asia until AD 1750? Why did they return to the shores of the North Atlantic? And where will they go next? Ian Morris is Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at LSE IDEAS for 2015-16. Michael Cox is Director of LSE IDEAS. LSE IDEAS (@LSEIDEAS) is a foreign policy think-tank within LSE's Institute for Global Affairs.

Contributor(s): Tim Judah | Veteran war reporter and Economist correspondent Tim Judah explores the impact of the ongoing conflict on the inhabitants of Ukraine. His new book is In Wartime: Stories from Ukraine. Tim Judah (@timjudah1) writes for the New York Review of Books and the Economist, most recently on the situation in Ukraine. In his career he has covered the aftermath of communism in Romania and Bulgaria and the war in Yugoslavia for The Times and the Economist. His most recent books are Kosovo: What Everyone Needs to Know and The Serbs: History, Myth and the Destruction of Yugoslavia. Robert Cooper is a Visiting Senior Fellow at LSE IDEAS. He was educated at Oxford and joined the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1970. Since then Mr Cooper has worked at various British Embassies abroad and since mid-2002 he has been working on behalf of the EU. The International Relations Department at LSE (@LSEIRDept) is now in its 87th year, making it one of the oldest as well as largest in the world.