Forging new alignments of influence

Ahead of this year’s COP29 UN Climate Change Conference, we at Wilton Park are continuing our efforts to curate new and non-traditional partnerships and collaboration to unlock faster progress to prevent catastrophic climate change.

Last week in Rome we convened preparations for a groundbreaking initiative bringing together women faith leaders to combat climate change. The new network aims to mobilise faith communities globally, targeting the 80% of the world’s population who belong to faith groups. Working with partners including The Holy See, Islamic Relief, and the Irish and British governments, this project is a great example of how our role as a sort of informal multilateral body, and our global networks and relationships allows us to innovate and convene in novel and potentially powerful new ways.

This flexibility and unique status make us a small but effective, and arguably very contemporary, global actor, with an ability to forge new alignments of influence around major global challenges, at pace, and with discretion.

This is increasingly relevant in a deformalising and fast-moving international system. On climate change in particular, there is far more we could and should be doing, but in a world increasingly distracted by crisis, continuing to innovate and push progress is one key way Wilton Park is contributing to finding global solutions.

Tom Cargill
Chief Executive

British-Spanish Tertulias 2024

The British-Spanish Tertulias is the most important event in the bilateral calendar and is hosted alternately in the UK and Spain.

Meeting annually, Tertulias convenes British and Spanish leaders and experts from government, industry, academia and civil society to share perspectives and consider collaborative ways forward on topical issues of interest to both countries, and of particular relevance to the bilateral relationship.

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Upcoming events

Tailoring Deterrence for the High North

This year, Finland and Sweden joined NATO, ending their neutrality and bringing all five Nordic states into the Alliance.

This shift alters the strategic landscape for both the new members and NATO.

Next month, in Sweden, we will work with the FCDO and the Swedish Defence Research Agency to address the key issues in NATO’s integrated defence in the High North, including nuclear deterrence and Sweden’s full participation in the Alliance.

The aim is to make this an annual event, complementing our existing programme on extended nuclear deterrence.

From commitment to action: refugees’ inclusion in education

There are almost 15.5 million refugee children and youth worldwide. More than half of these children are not in school, deprived of their right to education and the chance of a better future.

In response to this critical challenge, partners at the 2023 Global Refugee Forum committed to the education mega pledge for coordinated action on refugee education, promising financing, technical support and political will for action.

This Wilton Park dialogue will bring together refugee host country governments and international partners to discuss the implementation progress made on the pledge.

Up to 45 officials from the Ministries of Education and national refugee agencies in key countries, along with refugee-led organisations, researchers and think tanks, bilateral and multilateral partners, foundations and members of civil society, will attend.

Advancing the BWC Working Group

Wilton Park has a long track record of work in support of the international treaty on biological weapons (BWC).

In 2022, we convened a meeting in Montreux supporting the BWC’s imminent Review Conference, and an outcome of the latter was the mandating of a Working Group to strengthen the BWC.

In November, we return to Montreux to advance the efforts of the Group, aiming to build consensus ahead of the final Working Group meeting and the Meeting of States Parties in December.

Recent events

Going Further, Faster: towards a global, multi-faith women-led climate action network

Earlier this month, this meeting took place in Italy to launch a new Multi-faith Women-led Climate Action Network.

We were joined by over 50 women climate activists from 15 different countries who, through their organisations, reach more than 73 million women.

Their discussions centred on the potential to work together as agents of change to achieve climate and biodiversity goals and explored their power to mobilise grassroots women of faith to serve as powerhouses of climate action.

Scaling up Early Action beyond 2025

The understanding and application of early warning and early action to mitigate climate-related hazards has advanced significantly. However, there is still much work to be done to embed them as normative approaches.

The Risk-informed Early Action Partnership (REAP) was launched at the United Nations Climate Action Summit in 2019 to address the lack of coherence and complementarity across early warning and early action efforts, and to enable impact at scale through a multi-stakeholder approach connecting the humanitarian, development, and climate communities.

Earlier this month, Wilton Park convened a dialogue where participants reflected on the future trajectory of early warning and early action, balancing the progress of recent years with the urgent need to do more to reduce the impacts of climate-related disasters.

Thought leaders from governments, INGOs, UN agencies, the private sector, and related initiatives, networks and partnerships came together to lay the groundwork for a shared long-term vision for collaboration and cooperation on early warning and early action, and establish a roadmap to success.

Three women experts on biodiversity and inclusion smile at the camera. Text reads: Biodiversity conservation

Latest ideas from Wilton Park

Hear from leading experts as they discuss critical issues at Wilton Park, including biodiversity and inclusion, and the need for global standards in cybersecurity skills.

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New reports

Read our most recent reports, on developing renewable sources for critical minerals, and transformative change for global biodiversity:

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Looking ahead

Successfully harnessing AI in Africa

This high level event in December will convene leaders from government, civil society, and the private sector to discuss how African nations can effectively harness Artificial Intelligence (AI) to drive socioeconomic development, and mitigate the risks of a widening digital divide.

Discussions will explore the transformative potential of AI and cloud technologies for Africa and ask how might AI revolutionise key sectors across the continent.