News & Blogs

Latest news and views from NZCGS experts and contributors.

Climate Challenge 2020:

by Dr Kennedy Graham | Dec 15, 2019 | Director

I was recently invited to talk to a consultancy firm about my take on the climate challenge facing both our world and our country, now that New Zealand’s Zero Carbon Act is in force, and as the UN’s latest COP writhes in interminable stalemate – 25th version. I was...

Earth Trusteeship:

by Klaus Bosselmann Klaus Bosselmann | Dec 13, 2019 | Board

At the opening speech for last year’s Climate Week at the United Nations in New York, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern presented the Maori concept of kaitiakitanga as the key for combating climate change. She explained it in this way: "It means guardianship. But not...

Multilateralism –

by Fraser Cameron | Dec 7, 2019 | International Advisory Panel

If you were to read the speeches and articles of Chinese leaders you might conclude there was no country on Earth more committed to multilateralism. Certainly, China has benefited enormously from the rules-based, international system established after 1945. How...

The University in the Global Age:

by Prof Chris Gallavin | Dec 6, 2019 | Board

Last year I had the privilege of travelling around the US as an Eisenhower International Fellow. The experience was the most amazing of my professional career. In this column, I outline my Fellowship project - Global University 2.0 Let me convey what I see as the...

How to Prevent Genocide?

by Abbas Nazari | Dec 3, 2019 | Young Global Scholars Group

The best conflict is one that doesn’t happen. This blog argues that the best global approach (short of a full-fledged military intervention) to prevent a potential conflict from developing into all-out conflict is early intervention. The blog analyses a counterfactual...

The new omnipotence:

by Chris Williams | Nov 29, 2019 | International Advisory Panel

What is the oldest organisation within the UN? What is missing from Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’? What fuels the richest organisations in the world? Is the digital revolution an opportunity, or a threat, to the emergent global community? While reading this on a...

Individual Rights and State Responsibilities:

by Ramesh Thakur | Nov 29, 2019 | Board

The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) principle recalibrated the relationship among and between peoples, states and the international community. State sovereignty comes with responsibilities, domestic and international, along with privileges. Citizenship confers rights...

Multilateralism & the Rules-based Order:

by Dr Kennedy Graham | Nov 27, 2019 | Director

Yesterday I attended MFAT’s annual Beeby Colloquium on International Law. Having had the privilege of working closely with Chris back in the ‘80s, it is quite a moving experience to attend these events. It is also, equally, an annual highlight in terms of...

Strengthening Multilateralism:

by Dr Kennedy Graham | Nov 12, 2019 | Director

My first column (9 Oct.) noted the ‘bipolar mind-set’ discernible among national leaders at the UN General Assembly debates in recent years. An ‘intellectual rivalry’ was playing out between two apparent doctrines – ‘patriotism’ and ‘universalism’. Both address the...

Global Security and UN Peacekeeping:

by Dr Kennedy Graham | Oct 28, 2019 | Director

Jayden van Leeuwen’s column on UN peacekeeping and its accounting to the global community raises some important issues that thematically fall within the Centre’s global security programme. Jayden addresses the problem of sexual abuse by personnel in UN peacekeeping...