Join Thomas Hale, Professor in Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, Adam Day, Head of UN University Centre for Policy Research in Geneva, and Michèle Griffin, Director of the Common Agenda/Summit of the Future team, United Nations, as they discuss Day’s newest book The Forever Crisis.
Today’s polycrisis means we are locked in perpetual battle against risks that feel one step ahead of us. Whether the accelerating impacts of climate change, newly emerging deadly viruses, fast-spreading wars, or artificial general intelligence, our responses are slow and often poorly fit to the problem. The Forever Crisis offers an innovative approach to global governance in an era of interrelated planetary challenges. It argues that the complexity of today’s risks requires a complex, adaptive response. Drawing from complex systems like ant colonies, central nervous systems, galaxies, and markets, The Forever Crisis offers concrete, actionable proposals for evolving our global governance system. It provides scholars and policymakers with a dynamic approach to addressing the systemic risks facing the planet today and tomorrow.
The volume will be essential reading for public policymakers, NGOs and think tanks, foreign policy experts, government officials, and global decision-makers.
Speaker Biographies
Adam Day is Head of UN University Centre for Policy Research in Geneva. He co-led the Secretariat of the UN High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism and supported the Secretary-General’s Our Common Agenda report. He previously served as Senior Political Advisor to the UN peace operation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and in UN operations in Sudan, South Sudan, and the Middle East. A former human rights lawyer, Adam worked for Human Rights Watch, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and Open Society Justice Initiative in Cambodia. Amongst many publications on complexity, Adam’s previous book, States of Disorder, applies complexity thinking to UN state-building.
Michèle Griffin is the Director of the Common Agenda/Summit of the Future team at the United Nations. In a career spanning more than 25 years at the United Nations, Michèle Griffin has served as a senior policy advisor and director of policy planning to successive Secretaries-General.
Previously, Griffin coordinated many of the Secretary General’s signature initiatives, including COVID-19 policy and the Call for Action on Human Rights. Prior to this, she served for ten years in the UN’s Department of Political Affairs, where she set up and ran the UN Mediation Support Unit, aiding peace processes around the world. Griffin has served as an adjunct professor at Columbia University and has lectured and published widely on UN matters. She received her BA in European studies from Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, and her master’s degree in international relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
