Generation Next Europe's Futures Conference
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GENERATION NEXT EUROPE’S FUTURES CONFERENCE SPEAKERS’ BIOGRAPHIES Rosa Balfour Péter Árvai Senior Transatlantic Co-Founder and CEO Fellow, GMF / ERSTE Prezi Foundation IWM Fellow Peter has spent the last 10 years building products Rosa Balfour is a Senior Transatlantic Fellow at the that help people make better decisions. As CEO Germany Marshall Fund of the US and a member of and co-founder of Prezi, a fast-growing startup the Steering Committee of WIISBrussels (Women based in San Francisco and Budapest with over In International Security), expert on European 100 million users and 330 employees worldwide. politics, institutions, foreign and security policy, Prezi’s community is challenging the status quo of and international relations. She has researched and how to be understood and remembered in a world published widely on issues relating to European politics that is increasingly crowded with data but lacking and international relations, especially on relations with insight. Prezi’s platforms are speci cally designed the Mediterranean region, Eastern Europe and the to help improve communication and understanding Balkans, EU enlargement, and on the role of human between a presenter and the audience. rights and democracy in international relations. Peter is also very involved with establishing Ms Balfour is a regular commentator and public organizations that promote entrepreneurship and speaker on a variety of Europe-related issues, and diversity in Hungary and beyond. For example, Peter her work is appreciated by a selected audience of is the chairman and co-founder of Bridge Budapest, academics and university students, journalists, an organization that has shared 5 million stories of expert commentators, fellow think tankers and civil inspiration every year. The “We Are Open” initiative, society activists. She is simultaneously engaged in co-founded by Peter, has built a community of nearly several debates, most recently on the role of think- 1000 companies that are now committed to diversity tanks, the future of Europe, civil society activism, and openness in the workplace. the EU’s global role and the rise of populism. Peter has won numerous awards since founding the Ms Balfour’s recent major publications include company, including European Web Entrepreneur of Europe’s trouble makers. The populist challenge to the Year and the Europas European Tech Startups foreign policy, The European External Action Service award for Best Startup Co-Founders. He was ranked and National Foreign Ministries. Convergence or number 14 on the 2017 OUTstanding & Financial Divergence?, Human Rights and Democracy in EU Times Leading LGBT Executives List of 100. Foreign Policy. The cases of Ukraine and Egypt, and What are think tanks for? Policy research in the age In his spare time, Peter enjoys prodding fellow of anti- expertise. colleagues to join him at yoga and meditation classes. Additionally, he’s the go-to cultural Ms Balfour is ERSTE Foundation’s IWM Fellow for translator at Prezi, having lived and worked in Japan, 2018/19 on “Europe’s Futures“ project. Sweden, Hungary, Singapore and US. the Institute for German Studies at the University of Birmingham and at the University of Wroclaw Vladimír Bartovic (Poland). Mr Buras was also Visiting Fellow at the Director, Institute Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik in Berlin. for European Policy EUROPEUM Mr Buras’ recent book Moslems and the other Germans. The Reinvention of the Berlin Republic Vladimír Bartovic is the director of EUROPEUM was published in Polish in 2011. Some of the leading Institute for European Policy. In 2014 he has been outlets such as Politico, The New York Times, World appointed external advisor – a member of the Politics Review, publish his articles, opinion pieces, Group of External Advisors on the EU policies to the interviews and quotes regularly. Minister of Foreign A airs of the Czech Republic. He was a member of the Programme Council of the Mr Buras is ERSTE Foundation’s IWM Fellow for Czech – Polish Forum and a member of the Board of 2018/19 on “Europe’s Futures“ project. Directors of PASOS – Policy Association for an Open Society in 2015-2017. He graduated in international trade and international politics at the University of Economics, Prague, Faculty of International Relations. He also studied at University of Granada, Faculty of Political Science and Sociology. From 2011 Jan Jakub to 2012 he served as a director of Strategic Planning Chromiec and Analysis at the Department of the Ministry Analyst, Bátory of Foreign A airs of the Slovak Republic. He also Foundation/AICE Alumni worked as an editor in the Integrace magazine. He has been lecturing on topical EU issues at the Jan Jakub is an analyst at the ideaForum of the Stefan Institute of Public Administration and the Czech Batory Foundation in Warsaw, where he focuses National Bank. on Poland’s place in European politics and policy. After studying ute, linguistics, management and public policy in Łódź, Mainz, Rotterdam and Berlin, he worked as project manager at the Bertelsmann Foundation in Germany and the US. At the Foundation he was involved in setting up an international rating Piotr Buras agency and oversaw a project on the innovativeness of European Council on the German economy. Jan Jakub is an alumnus of the Foreign Relations/ERSTE German National Academic Foundation and of the Foundation IWM Fellow Foundation of German Business. Piotr Buras is a journalist, author and expert in German and European politics, currently serving as the Head of European Council on Foreign Relation’s Warsaw o ce. Between 2008 and 2012, Mr Buras worked as a columnist and Berlin correspondent for “Gazeta Wyborcza”, the biggest Polish daily. He started his professional career in the late 1990s at the Center for International Relations in Warsaw, one of the rst Polish think tank. He continued his career at He served as the President of the Romanian Senate between December 2008 and November 2011 and Vit Dostál President of the Social Democratic Party, from 2005 Research Director, to 2010. Association for International Affairs (AMO) Between 2012 and 2014, he served as Chairman of the Joint Committee of the Romanian Senate and Vít Dostál is the Director of the AMO Research Chamber of Deputies regarding Romania’s Accession Center. He focuses on Czech foreign and European to the Schengen Area, and as High Representative of policy, Central European cooperation, and Polish the Romanian Government for Strategic Economic foreign and domestic policy. Projects and Public Diplomacy. Between 2008 and 2012 he also served as chairman of the Foreign Policy Vít has worked for AMO since 2006; he is a Committee of the Romanian Senate. member of AMO. He is responsible for the strategic management and fundraising of the AMO Research Previous to his political career, Mircea Geoana had a Center where he coordinates a team of analysts successful diplomatic activity. Appointed Ambassador and fellows and he also manages the publishing Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Romania to the activities of AMO. He is the author and editor of United States of America at age 37, in February 1996, many publications dealing with Czech foreign policy he was the youngest ambassador in the Romanian and Central Europe. He actively represents AMO at diplomatic corps. From 2000 to 2004, Mircea Geoana conferences and in the media. served as Minister of Foreign A airs of Romania. He also served as OSCE Chairman-in-O ce in 2001 and Vít completed a doctoral program on European during 2005 he was the personal representative of Studies at Masaryk University in Brno in 2017 with OSCE Chairman in o ce for Georgia. a dissertation on the “Paradiplomacy of Czech Regions – Regions as Actors of International An alumnus of the Polytechnic Institute and, Relations”. He did study and work internships in respectively, the Law School at the University of Warsaw and Brussels. Bucharest, Mircea Geoana graduated in 1992 the ‘Ecole Nationale d’Administration’ in Paris, France. He graduated in 1999 the World Bank Group Executive Development Program at the Harvard Business School. He holds a PhD in world economy at the Economic Studies Academy of Bucharest. Mircea Geoană President, Aspen Mircea Geoana is author of several books: Institute Romania ‘Romanian foreign policy in the beginning of the XXIth century – The road to Europe and transatlantic Mircea Geoana is the founder and president of world’, ‘America, Europe and Romania’s the Aspen Institute Romania and a prominent modernization: bases for a Romanian societal international public gure. He serves on the model’, ‘The Romanian social model: the way boards of trustees of the Aspen Institute US, Aspen towards a new Romania’, ‘Trust’. Germany and Aspen Italia. He is also Co-chair of Aspen European Strategy Group. Mircea Geoana ran for the Presidency of Romania in 2009. In an unprecedented narrow and contested election, he received 49.6% of the casted ballot. broadcasters. He has written wartime reportage from Afghanistan to Ukraine for the New York Yasen Georgiev Review of Books. Recent work has appeared in the Executive Director, Financial Times Magazine and in 2018 he undertook Economic Policy Institute a major investigative project for the European Bank Sofia/AIR Fellow for Reconstruction and Development. Yasen Georgiev is Executive Director of the He is the author of three books on the Balkans: Economic Policy Institute (EPI) – a Bulgarian The Serbs: History, Myth and the Destruction of non-governmental organization that aims to Yugoslavia, Kosovo: War & Revenge and Kosovo: contribute to utilizing the full potential of the What Everyone Needs to Know. In 2016 his book country by enhancing the competitiveness of its In Wartime: Stories from Ukraine was published. economy and increasing the e ciency of its public In 2009 he was a Senior Visiting Research Fellow institutions. Yasen has been with the EPI since 2006 at LSEE, the South-Eastern-Europe research unit where he was rstly appointed Research Fellow of the European Institute at the London School of and then head of the International Projects and Economics, where he developed the concept of the Programmes unit.