🗣 On December 11, 2023, the Valdai Discussion Club hosted an expert discussion, titled “The young generation in an era of change: A dialogue between Russian and African NGOs”.

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🇷🇺🌍 Russian-African Cooperation: In Search of a Youth Format

On December 11, 2023, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion titled “The Young Generation in an Era of Change: Dialogue Between the Civil Societies of Russia and Africa”. The moderator was Oleg Barabanov, programme director of the Valdai Club. 

💬 Pavel Shevtsov, deputy head of Rossotrudnichestvo, emphasised that Russia, when working with foreign audiences, should first of seek to work with young people, who in the near future will become decision-makers, shaping the foreign policy of their countries. He called graduates of Soviet and Russian universities in Africa the “golden fund” of Russia. “The future belongs to the African continent, we are one hundred percent sure of this. This is a continent that is gaining strength,” Shevtsov added.

💬 Andrei Avetisyan, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Russia to the Republic of Tanzania, called the issue of the role of youth in Russian-African interaction extremely timely and relevant. In his opinion, African countries now face the problem of gaining economic independence. Neither their former European metropolises nor the United States are interested in these countries' development, and they are trying to impose their agenda on them. African youth play an important role in this fight and are becoming increasingly active. Ties in the educational sphere are extremely important, but it is also necessary to develop business and cultural ties, focusing on youth, Avetisyan noted.

💬 The issue of civil society interaction has been brewing in the international field for some time now, and the geopolitical events that have led to a new paradigm of relations have only increased its relevance, said Natalia Zaiser, Chair of the Board of the African Business Initiative Union. She considers mutual low awareness to be an important problem. “The Russian-African agenda is still dominated by a situation where there’s a lack of knowledge both on the Russian side about the African continent and in Africa about Russia,” she noted, adding that Russian-African relations should be perceived as “a two-way street.”

💬 Andrei Maslov, director of the Centre for African Studies at the National Research University Higher School of Economics, noted that the Soviet Union had a good experience interacting with Africa, but the USSR worked practically without competitors, because the West was not ready to train African personnel in such numbers. Now Russia is encountering fierce competition, and this means that it will not be possible to use the quantitative factor; it is necessary to train the best, those who will occupy leading positions in their countries.

💬 Leonid Protsenko, Associate Professor of the Department of Psychology of Personality Development at Moscow Pedagogical State University, examined the topic of discussion from a theoretical perspective. He pointed out that strategic vectors for working with youth have not yet been set in Russia. “When a strategy is blurred, there are a lot of different tactics that don’t lead to much movement,” he explained. It is necessary to create conditions, motivation, and prerequisites for exploring other regions. After this, conditions can be created for the interaction of communities and space for the next level of exchange.

https://valdaiclub.com/events/posts/articles/russian-african-cooperation-in-search-of-a-youth-format/

#Norms_and_Values #Africa #society

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🇪🇺 The Ukrainian crisis itself was, to a certain extent, the result of the fact that the continental Europe has lost all ability to be strategically independent.

This occurred as part of a gradual process that combined the consequences of the events of the middle of the last century and the failure of attempts to build a genuine political union on the basis of European integration, combining this with the expansion of the membership and the creation of a common economic policy through financial instruments within the Eurozone.

The actual position of Europeans in world politics is increasingly consistent with how we might see it in terms of abstract assessments of the relationship with the United States and their ability to act independently, Valdai Club Programme Director Timofei Bordachev writes.

https://valdaiclub.com/a/highlights/consequences-of-europe-s-strategic-failure/

#Asia_and_Eurasia #EU #Europe

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📆 ANNOUNCEMENT: On December 19, 2023 at 12:00 noon, the Valdai Club will host an expert discussion dedicated to Russia's chairmanship of BRICS in 2024 together with the presentation of the new Valdai Club report, titled " Global Inequality: Will the BRICS Countries Succeed in ‘Steering’ the Global Economy?"

The BRICS association has moved to a new stage of its development. Its expansion by inviting Argentina, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, the UAE, Egypt and Iran into the community opens the way to the gradual creation of a different world system. It may not be based on the antagonistic principles of the balance of power or a zero-sum game, but on qualitatively different approaches.

The countries of the world majority are increasingly showing themselves as independent subjects of international relations, freeing themselves from the influence of former metropolises and insisting on independent development. The BRICS can become for them a prototype of a new international architecture, free from the influence of Western coalitions.

In 2024, Russia will chair the new BRICS+ format. The key event of the Russian presidency will obviously be the meeting of heads of state, the BRICS summit, which will be held in Kazan. Before the summit in South Africa, 23 countries announced their desire to join the community.

❓Should we expect decisions on further expansion next year?
❓Which states can be called the main contenders for joining BRICS?
❓What are the prospects for deepening integration and institutionalising the association?
❓What are Russia’s priorities as chair?
❓Will new settlement mechanisms outside the Western financial infrastructure be discussed?
❓How will the confrontation between Russia and the West affect the BRICS summit?

Participants in the discussion will try to answer these and other questions.

🎙️ Speakers:

🇷🇺 Maria Apanovich, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Demographic and Migration Policy, MGIMO, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia

🇿🇦 Nirmala Dorasamy, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Public Management and Economics, Durban University of Technology, South Africa 

🇪🇬 Sherif Ged, Chairman of the Egyptian Alumni Association (Egypt)

🇮🇷 Manoochehr Moradi, Senior expert, IPIS; Former ambassador of Iran in Ukraine (2018-2022)

Moderator:

🗣 Oleg Barabanov, programme director of the Valdai Discussion Club

https://valdaiclub.com/events/announcements/valdai-club-to-discuss-russia-s-chairmanship-of-brics/

Working languages: Russian, English.

ℹ️ Information for the media: Dear journalists, to be accredited for the event, please fill out the form on our website. If you have any questions about the event, call +79269307763. 

Links to the live broadcast of the open sessions will be posted on all online platforms of the Valdai Club: on the website, X (formerly Twitter), VKontakte, Telegram and Dzen.

#Norms_and_Values #valdai_report #BRICS

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🎥 LIVE: at 12:00 noon, the Valdai Club will host an expert discussion dedicated to Russia's chairmanship of BRICS in 2024 together with the presentation of the new Valdai Club report, titled " Global Inequality: Will the BRICS Countries Succeed in ‘Steering’ the Global Economy?"

https://vk.com/video-214192832_456239155

#Norms_and_Values #valdai_report #BRICS

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🗣 On December 19, 2023, the Valdai Discussion Club hosted an expert discussion dedicated to Russia's chairmanship of BRICS in 2024 together with the presentation of the new Valdai Club report, titled "Global Inequality: Will the BRICS Countries Succeed in ‘Steering’ the Global Economy?"

📷 Photo gallery

🎥 Video

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🗺️ BRICS: Together Against Inequality

On December 19, 2023, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion dedicated to Russia’s chairmanship of the BRICS in 2024, together with the presentation of a new Valdai Club report titled “Global Inequality: Will the BRICS Countries Succeed in ‘Steering’ the Global Economy?” The moderator was Oleg Barabanov, programme director of the Club.

💬 Co-author of the report Maria Apanovich, associate professor at the department of regional management and national policy at the Odintsovo branch of MGIMO University, briefly presented the main theses of the work. She pointed out that socio-economic inequality is caused by four groups of factors. This is inequality in the incomes earned in the white and shadow economies, inequality in access to social benefits, inequality in the territorial distribution of benefits, and gender inequality. “We were interested in how BRICS- or BRICS+ helps countries and how, thanks to this type of cooperation, it is possible to level out the socio-economic problems that currently exist in these countries,” Apanovich emphasized. According to her, closer cooperation within the commonwealth should allow countries to better use their strengths.

💬 Report co-author Nirmala Dorasamy, Professor at the Department of Public Management and Economics at the Durban University of Technology in South Africa, noted that the BRICS and BRICS+ countries have sufficient potential to ensure global influence, but even between these countries there is a noticeably large degree of inequality in human development index terms. Solving this problem would give the association more influence and sustainability. “Only then we will be able to speak from some unified point of view,” she believes. This requires a more structured, formal approach and consolidation of positions, despite differences.

💬 Sherif Ged, Chairman of the Egyptian Association of Alumni of Soviet Universities, spoke about his view of BRICS in Egypt, which will join the organisation on January 1, 2024. He noted that Egypt is actively developing relations in various fields with many BRICS countries, and primarily with Moscow. Russia is perceived in Egypt as a long-standing and reliable partner, ready for fair and equal interaction, for which Western countries are often not ready. Egyptians are confident that membership in BRICS will contribute to the development of the Egyptian economy, Ged said.

💬 Manoochehr Moradi, senior expert at the Iranian Institute of Political and International Studies and Iranian Ambassador to Ukraine (2018–2022), believes that BRICS plays an important role in solving many global problems and the expansion of the group is in the interests of the Global South. The BRICS countries have gained significant global weight and their GDP has exceeded that of the G7, he emphasized. He called reducing the importance of the dollar in the world an important issue, since the dollar in the hands of the United States is turning into a destructive instrument for the economies of other countries. Moradi understands the course towards Iran's accession to BRICS as the course towards development and an innovative approach chosen by the country.

https://valdaiclub.com/events/posts/articles/brics-together-against-inequality/

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🗺️ BRICS countries are among the largest in the world by territory. Moreover, 15 countries applied for BRICS membership.

Especially for the presentation of a new Valdai Club report “Global Inequality: Will the BRICS Countries Succeed in ‘Steering’ the Global Economy,” we created an infographic on BRICS.

#valdai_infogaphics #BRICS

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🇨🇩🇷🇼 On December 20, 2023, if nothing extraordinary happens, presidential elections will be held in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Unfortunately, the presence of UN peacekeeping forces in itself entails a security threat. The example of Rwanda and other countries speaks for itself.

Today, the forces of the East African Community and the UN peacekeeping forces, in our opinion, should leave the DRC and give way to the forces of the Community of Southern African Countries, Valence Maniragena writes.

https://valdaiclub.com/a/highlights/rwandan-context-for-the-dr-congo-elections/

#Norms_and_Values #Africa #DRC #Rwanda #neocolonialism

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🌍 Since the year 2020, eight governments in francophone Africa have been overthrown by the military, adding up to a disturbing trend of coups in the continent.

To put it into context, since the 1950s there has been a total of 486 coup attempts; 214 of these attempted coups have taken place in Africa, out of which 106 have been successful.

Beyond the statistics, however, two questions often emerge with regards to the coups.

1️⃣The first question is whether these coups are a result of internal failures, especially of governance institutions within these countries, or a consequence of an international system that is increasingly becoming illiberal. Perhaps even more disturbing is whether these coups are as a result of both internal and external factors.

2️⃣ The second question is whether these coups are capable of providing solutions to the challenges facing the people in the countries where they have been carried out. The justification for this question stems from the pronouncements of coup leaders themselves. There is no doubt that anyone or any institution that promises to rapidly address these problems is likely to get the support of the people.

The recent coups in West Africa are not likely to spread beyond the region, given their unique historical and foreign relations. It, however, finds that should the new governments fail to urgently fulfil their promises, the search for alternative leadership is likely to commence, Israel Nyaburi Nyadera writes.

https://valdaiclub.com/a/highlights/hope-amidst-uncertainty-reflections/

#Norms_and_Values #coups #Africa

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