Land Society - The Ninth Whitehall Lecture
Land Society - The Ninth Whitehall Lecture
The Cambridge University Land Society welcomes students, alumni and their guests to join them for their ninth Whitehall lecture - "Did Covid Kill the Climate? How Democracies Fail in a Time of Crisis" given by David Runciman FBA, Professor of Politics, University of Cambridge.
Professor Runciman’s important and timely lecture will be followed by a Panel Discussion moderated by Bronwen Maddox, Director, Lord Sainsbury’s Institute for Government. Distinguished panellists will be joining from Berlin, Washington, Gothenburg and Cambridge. - "Democracies remain good at putting off the evil day"..."I genuinely think 2020 is scary"
“If ever we need a strong signal from world leaders, for people like you, that we are going to solve this, then this is now” …“Real success can only come if there is a change in our societies and in our economics and in our politics” – Sir David Attenborough
This Whitehall Lecture comes at a critical time in world affairs with major fires raging across North America and Australia; world-wide flooding; unprecedented melting of ice-caps; a pandemic of global proportions killing over 1 million people and over 33 million cases and both rising. We are experiencing the greatest economic crisis of most of our lifetimes and in the free democratic world of government, an unprecedented crisis of leadership, a growing threat of authoritarianism and failing democracies.
The Lecture will be followed by a Panel Discussion
Panel Moderator:
- Bronwen Maddox, Director of Lord Sainsbury’s Institute for Government
Panel:
- Edward Luce, Financial Times US national editor in Washington DC, journalist, and writer - "People are afraid that doing something about global warming will make them poorer"… "Humanity is facing three serious threats: a crisis of governance, the return of great-power competition and global warming. In the next ten years we will need to find political solutions to all three."
- Julian Allwood, Professor of Engineering, University of Cambridge; Head of the Use Less Group Fellow of St Catharine’s - "We cannot rely on technological innovation to solve the climate crisis."
- Mark Leonard, Director of the European Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin - "Europeans want change, but they are scared of it. They realise the status quo is unsustainable but they are frightened that reforms will hurt them."
- Dr. Marina Povitkina, Centre for Collective Action research, University of Gothenburg, Sweden - "I find that democratic governments only perform well if their quality of government is high. If quality of government is low, democracies do no better and at times do even worse than authoritarian regimes."
Booking information
If you would like to attend this online event, please book using the link below.
For all enquiries and to book a stand, please contact the Land Society.