Participants from around the world gathered in May 2016 on Svalbard for the first meeting jointly held by Beijing International Exchange Association Sustainable Development Committee and the Aurora Borealis Foundation to discuss and reflect on some of the most difficult questions our planet faces today - how can we address a world beset by systemic crises; why should we not trust existing systems and institutions; what steps might we take as an interdependent human community?
The program for the gathering on Svalbard from May 11 to 14 was filled with both intellectual and cultural inputs of the highest standards. Svalbard was chosen as the venue as there is no indigenous culture in this northernmost settlement of the planet, and that it formed a perfect backdrop for this high-impact gathering built on a spectacular meeting of minds and nature.
"The Svalbard gathering was very much about words. Listening, discussing, and searching for words to create a new narrative from which we can understand our situation and act to pursue a better world. Given how acute it seems to create change, and how complex the challenges we face are, the words we can come up with may seem inadequate, even banal. Clearly, words alone are not enough to convey the depths of what we are trying to express - it takes music, images, dancing… and action, of course," said Peter Hesseldahl, a participant of the gathering from Denmark and also the author of several books.
Another young leader from Africa, Emmanuel Dennis said "the Svalbard gathering is about a future of which we know nothing, a future that has not yet arrived, but a future about which we talk a great deal. The gathering brings together a requisite diversity of people, who come from all those cultures and values who must be made to live together as humans and with the rest of nature. It cannot be about winning, nor about submission. It has to be about evolution. Svalbard is a learning journey about looking ahead, further down the River of Time. Coming up in May. More to come. Good morning from Magadi Road."
The future is coming, and let's embrace it together.