Students Organize World Leaders Forum

When William W. Burke-White '98 met former Soviet Union president Mikhail Gorbachev at the State of the World Forum in San Francisco last year, they discussed ways to bring young world leaders into a meaningful political and social discourse.

That meeting sowed the seeds for the Global Peace Forum, a conference founded by Burke-White and the Gorbachev Foundation. The Forum is scheduled to take place in Moscow in July 1999 and is being organized by Burke-White and a number of other Harvard students.

The Peace Forum will bring 350 future world leaders to Moscow for seven days when they will learn conflict negotiation skills from prominent current and former political figures.

The tentative speaker list reads like a who's who of international peace advocates. Besides Gorbachev, former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and the Dalai Lama are included in the program.

A search committee of the Harvard Global Peace Project, a student organization of which Burke-White is also the founder and president, will identify areas of the world in strife and will select young leaders from those countries to participate in the conference.

"It is my hope that the delegates can both contribute by their presence and learn by being there," Burke-White said.

"[Delegates] will learn resources to employ in their home countries," he added.

Sessions will address negotiation skills, conflict-resolution seminars and roundtable conferences.

"What we hope to provide for the students is a toolbox to have concrete, substantive outlined alternatives to violent conflict resolution. When people grow up in an environment where they see nothing but violence, it is too easy to fall back into that model," said organizer Joseph J. Geraci '98, who is a Crimson editor.

In an open letter to the Forum, Gorbachev said "the Global Peace Forum is an international dialogue which will provide the skills of conflict resolution and will foster the vision of peace for the next generation of world leaders."

Burke-White has traveled the world over the last year to secure support for the event from members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the Russian State Duma, the State Department, the Gorbachev Foundation and other international centers for foreign policy.

"I conceive of the vision issues of the conference, making sure it happens in a meaningful way," Burke-White said.

Burke-White plans to have two student organizers visit countries selected for the event and conduct rigorous interview processes of all possible participants.

The student interviewers will receive help from organizations such as the State Department, the Red Cross and the Peace Corps before embarking on their journeys to the specified countries.

The Forum's mission, as stated in conference literature, is to select "those who will pick up the mantle of world leadership as we enter the next millennium."

Burke-White has already completed much of the preparations, having met with Carter, Gorbachev and the Dalai Lama on previous occasions to examine the details of the conference.

The total estimated cost of the conference will be over $1 million, according to Burke-White.

Other undergraduate organizers of the conference at Harvard include: Samuel D. Baum '98; Nicholas A. Chavez '98, who is a Crimson editor; William Decherd '01; Jason M. Goldberg '98; Wesley K. Gilchrist '98; Oliver C. Haugen '98; Elena I. Pavlova '99; Laura E. Rosenbaum '00, who is a Crimson editor; Kimberly Song '98; Misasha C. Suzuki '99, and Sheila Warren '98. According to Geraci, dozens of students at schools across the country and around the world have worked on the conference.

In an open letter to the Forum, Gorbachev said "the Global Peace Forum is an international dialogue which will provide the skills of conflict resolution and will foster the vision of peace for the next generation of world leaders."

Burke-White has traveled the world over the last year to secure support for the event from members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the Russian State Duma, the State Department, the Gorbachev Foundation and other international centers for foreign policy.

"I conceive of the vision issues of the conference, making sure it happens in a meaningful way," Burke-White said.

Burke-White plans to have two student organizers visit countries selected for the event and conduct rigorous interview processes of all possible participants.

The student interviewers will receive help from organizations such as the State Department, the Red Cross and the Peace Corps before embarking on their journeys to the specified countries.

The Forum's mission, as stated in conference literature, is to select "those who will pick up the mantle of world leadership as we enter the next millennium."

Burke-White has already completed much of the preparations, having met with Carter, Gorbachev and the Dalai Lama on previous occasions to examine the details of the conference.

The total estimated cost of the conference will be over $1 million, according to Burke-White.

Other undergraduate organizers of the conference at Harvard include: Samuel D. Baum '98; Nicholas A. Chavez '98, who is a Crimson editor; William Decherd '01; Jason M. Goldberg '98; Wesley K. Gilchrist '98; Oliver C. Haugen '98; Elena I. Pavlova '99; Laura E. Rosenbaum '00, who is a Crimson editor; Kimberly Song '98; Misasha C. Suzuki '99, and Sheila Warren '98. According to Geraci, dozens of students at schools across the country and around the world have worked on the conference.