THE STATE OF THE UNION – 6 May 2021
Master of Ceremony Sasha Vakulina
09:00-09:30 (CEST)
Welcome: Renaud Dehousse
Opening Address: Europe in a Changing World
Ursula von der Leyen 
Video Recording
09:35-10:30 (CEST)
GEOPOLITICS
Europe at a time of great power competition
Moderator:
Brigid Laffan
Speakers:
Norbert Röttgen,
Xinquan Tu,
Leslie Vinjamuri
FRINGE EVENT
Alliances for better protecting the rule of law and civic space in the EU
Moderator:
Valerie Hopkins
Speakers:
Adam Bodnar,
Gwendoline Delbos Corfield,
Márta Pardavi,
Laurent Pech
10:35-11:35 (CEST)
STRATEGIC AUTONOMY
Quo Vadis European foreign policy? A decade of the European External Action Service
Moderator:
Alexander Stubb
Speakers:
Michael Peel,
Stefano Sannino, Daniela Schwarzer
CLIMATE
How to marry the EU’s climate ambition with its preference for open markets
Moderator:
Jos Delbeke
Speakers:
Susanne Droege,
Billy Pizer,
Vangelis Vitalis
FRINGE EVENT
EU-African digital partnership in a changing world
Moderator:
Andrea Castagna
Speakers:
Dorothy Gordon, Onica N. Makwakwa, Bjorn Richter, Zuzana Sladkova
11:40-12:20 (CEST)
MULTILATERALISM
The global battle over data
Introduction:
Giacomo Calzolari
Conversation between:
Margrethe Vestager and Meabh Mc Mahon
followed by Q&A with:
Francisco de Abreu Duarte, Martina Ferracane and Philip Hanspach
FRINGE EVENT
The role of modal shift in achieving transport decarbonisation objectives
Moderator:
Juan Montero
Speakers:
Matthias Finger,
Walter Goetz,
Piia Karjalainen,
Alberto Mazzola,
12:30-13:25 (CEST)
PUBLIC HEALTH
Conversation between:
José Manuel Barroso and Giorgia Giovanetti
Africa-EU after COVID-19 – Let’s start with vaccines
Moderator:
Giorgia Giovannetti
Speakers:
Jane Kabubo-Mariara, Stefano Manservisi, Vera Songwe
PUBLIC HEALTH
Ethics and efficiency in vaccine distribution
Moderator:
Ellen M. Immergut
Speakers:
Amanda Glassman, Sandy Tubeuf,
Arnout van de Rijt
FRINGE EVENT
EU, China and US on their way to carbon neutrality: will their implementation strategies converge?
Moderator:
Simone Borghesi,
Jos Delbeke
Speakers:
Suzi Kerr,
Duan Maosheng,
Vicky Pollard
14:45-14:50 (CEST)
14:50-15:50 (CEST)
GEOPOLITICS
Introduction:
Marco Del Panta
Conversation between:
Edi Rama and Marta Dassù
Is the soft power of the EU in the neighbouring regions still effective?
Moderator:
Marta Dassù
Speakers:
David McAllister, Meltem Müftüler-Baç, Edi Rama, Ivan Vejvoda
PEACE AND HUMAN RIGHTS
The EU as a human rights promoting peace mediator?
Moderator:
Sarah Nouwen
Speakers:
Barney Afako, Federica Mogherini, Katia Papagianni, Ayşe Cihan Sultanoğlu
FRINGE EVENT
80 Years on – is the Ventotene Manifesto still relevant for today’s Europe?
Moderator:
Eric Jozsef
Speakers:
Jonas Brendebach,
Silvia Costa,
Pier Virgilio Dastoli, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul
16:00-16:50 (CEST)
PEACE AND HUMAN RIGHTS
EU sanctions: what’s their place in the world?
Moderator:
Neha Jain
Speakers:
Betty Bigombe, Emanuela-Chiara Gillard, Mairead McGuinness
GEOPOLITICS
Equal and effective partners? The future of EU-Africa and EU-Turkey cooperation
on migration and refugee protection
Moderator:
Martin Ruhs
Speakers:
Francisco André, Abdelhak Bassou, Cathryn Costello, Kemal Kirişci
FRINGE EVENT
The social contract in Europe after the pandemic, will the pendulum swing back?
Moderator:
Peter Gumbel
Host:
Sven Smit
Speakers:
Diane Coyle,
Jacques van den Broek
16:55-17:50 (CEST)
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Promises and challenges of Artificial Intelligence post COVID-19
Conversation between Mariya Gabriel and Madeleine de Cock Buning
Development: competitive innovation in human centric AI
Moderator:
Madeleine de Cock Buning
Speakers:
Dominik Bösl, Joanna Bryson, Mariya Gabriel, Andrea Renda, Andrew Wyckoff
GLOBAL ECONOMY
Global tax coordination: is there hope?
Moderator:
Philipp Genschel
Speakers:
Ioana Petrescu, Thomas Rixen, Pascal Saint-Amans
FRINGE EVENT
Engaging Iran – European and transatlantic perspectives on the JCPOA and security in the Gulf
Moderator:
Paolo Magri,
Luigi Narbone
Opening Remarks:
Marina Sereni
Speakers:
Joost Hiltermann, Seyed Mohammad-Kazem Sajadpour, Marina Sereni, Barbara Slavin,
17:55-18:50 (CEST)
GLOBAL ECONOMY
Who will pay for the global recovery – and how?
Moderator:
George Papaconstantinou
Speakers:
Laurence Boone, Lee Buchheit, Jan Mischke
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Video overview of state of tech: Paul Verschure Deployment:
competitive innovation in human centric AI
Moderator:
Madeleine de Cock Buning
Speakers:
Urs Gasser, Miguel Poiares Maduro, Sandra Wachter
FRINGE EVENT
Trends and shifts in global governance and the role of the EU
Moderator:
Gaby Umbach
Speakers:
Jim Cloos,
Florence Gaub,
Andrea Renda,
Anthony Teasdale
18:55-19:45 (CEST)
PEACE AND HUMAN RIGHTS
Delivering on UN@75: towards a reinvigorated multilateralism for the future we want
Moderator:
Alexandre Stutzmann
Speakers:
Isabelle Durant,
Cristina Gallach Figueras,
Natalie Samarasinghe, Volker Türk
MULTILATERALISM
Addressing international spillover effects of subsidy programmes
Moderator:
Bernard Hoekman
Speakers:
Simon Evenett, Caroline Freund, Pierre Regibeau
FRINGE EVENT
Banking on values in the European Union
Moderator:
Khalid Azizuddin
Speakers:
Simona Bonafè, Mauro Meggiolaro, Elisa Giuliani, Daniel Sorrosal
19:50-20:40 (CEST)
MULTILATERALISM
Regulating the global digital economy: What role for international cooperation?
Moderator: Giacomo Calzolari
Speakers:
Vincenzo Amendola,
Cristina Caffarra, Ziyang David Fan, Andreas Schwab, Marietje Schaake, Andreas Schwab
FRINGE EVENT
The Geopolitics of EU Enlargement and Democracy
Moderator:
Ivan Vejvoda
Speakers:
Ioannis Armakolas,
Srdjan Cvijic,
Judy Dempsey,
Teresa Reiter
20:45 – 21:15 (CEST)
FRINGE EVENT
‘Please unmute yourself’ – How to amplify European voices?
Moderator:
Leszek Jazdzewski
Speakers:
Soundous Boualam, Assya Kavrakova,
Petar Markovic, Kalypso Nicolaidis
THE STATE OF THE UNION – 7 May 2021
09:20-09:30 (CEST)
09:35-10:25 (CEST)
CLIMATE
A new impetus for global climate action?
Introduction: Jos Delbeke
Moderator: Pilita Clark
Speaker:
Frans Timmermans
10:30-11:05 (CEST)
MULTILATERALISM
Introduction by Bernard Hoekman
Conversation between Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and Sasha Vakulina, followed by Q&A with Martina Ferracane
11:10-11:55 (CEST)
STRATEGIC AUTONOMY
What is the future of global value chains?
Introduction by George Papaconstantinou
Moderator: Peggy Hollinger, FT
Speakers: Richard Baldwin, Thierry Breton
12:00-12:30 (CEST)
GLOBAL ECONOMY
Conversation between Christine Lagarde and George Papaconstantinou
12:35-13:05 (CEST)
THE STATE OF THE UNION LECTURE
New world, new rules: Can Europe rise to the challenge? by Jean Pisani-Ferry
13:10– 13:40 (CEST)
14:05-14:55 (CEST)
GEOPOLITICS
How can democracies join forces to combat disinformation and other foreign interferences?
Moderator : Pietro Ducci
Speakers : Raphaël Glucksmann, Kuniko Inoguchi, Alina Polyakova
15:00-15:30 (CEST)
PUBLIC HEALTH
How did the COVID-19 pandemic change citizens’ attitudes towards the EU, towards national governments and towards each other?
In collaboration with YouGov
Presenters: Philipp Genschel, Mohamed Nasr and Anton Hemerijck
15:35-16:15 (CEST)
CLIMATE
Introduction: Jos Delbeke
Conversation between Werner Hoyer and Sasha Vakulina
16:15-17:05 (CEST)
GLOBAL ECONOMY
“Is Europe Falling Behind in the Global Digital Economy?”
Conversation between Professor Bengt Holmström and Alexander Stubb, followed by Q&A with STG students: Weiming Huang, Melina Nitschker, Zakaria Al Shmaly, Hieu T. Nguyen, Linda Zeilina
17:10-17:30 (CEST)