Opening Ceremony Caux Forum 2021

REPORT

Swiss Perspectives on Peace: Past, Present and Future

05 July 2021

8:30 am GMT (10:30 CEST)

Please note that this event is now over! You can watch the replay and read the full report here.

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This year Initiatives of Change Switzerland is celebrating 75 years of facilitating dialogue and profound encounters at its conference centre in Caux. Through this work it has quietly contributed to building trust across the world’s divides.

Our conference centre in Caux has been one of the key platforms in Switzerland and the world for connecting people who would often not meet, and these encounters have continued online despite the pandemic. We will celebrate the past and also look forward to the challenges facing the world as it emerges from the impacts of the pandemic.

The Caux Forum Online 2021 was launched on 5 July, 8:30 - 10:00 am GMT (10:30 - 12:00 CEST) with a high-level panel on "Swiss Perspectives on Peace: Past, Present and Future", celebrating aspects of what Switzerland has given to the world, referencing the contributions made through Caux.

Read the full report.

Speakers:

Ambassador Patricia Danzi, Director General of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)
Ambassador Thomas Guerber, Director of DCAF - Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance
Christine Beerli, President of Initiatives of Change Switzerland

Moderation:

Rainer Gude, Executive Coordinator of the Geneva Peacebuilding Platform

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Watch the replay of the Opening Ceremony 2021 here.

Photo top: Adrien Giovannelli
Video produced by Visualive Productions

Speakers

Ambassador Patricia Danzi

Director General of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)

Switzerland

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Ambassador Patricia Danzi has been with the International Committee of the Red Cross since 1996, serving as a delegate, with increasing responsibilities, in the Balkans (Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo), Peru, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Angola. At head office, she was appointed Deputy Head of Operations for the Horn of Africa and Political Advisor to the Director of Operations. She served as Head of Operations for America between November 2008 and April 2015 and has been Regional Director for Africa from May 2015 until she assumed the post of director general of the SDC on 1 May 2020. Patricia Danzi studied in Lincoln, Nebraska and in Zurich and holds a master’s degree in agricultural economics, geography and environmental science. She undertook postgraduate work in development studies in Geneva. She speaks seven languages. Born in Switzerland, she is the daughter of a Swiss German secondary school teacher and a Nigerian diplomat and the eldest of six siblings. In her student days she taught mentally challenged children and spent time teaching in a township in South Africa just after Nelson Mandela was elected President. Patricia Danzi represented Switzerland in athletics at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games. She has two adult sons.

Ambassador Thomas Guerber

Director of DCAF - Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance

Switzerland

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Ambassador Thomas Guerber was appointed Director of DCAF - Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance on 24 November 2015 and took up his function on 1 July 2016. He brings to the position extensive experience in multilateral diplomacy and policy development relating to human security, human rights and sustainable development. From 2010 to 2013, Ambassador Guerber was Switzerland’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York. From 2007 to 2010, he worked as a Counsellor for financial, budgetary and institutional issues at Switzerland’s Permanent Mission to the UN in New York. Prior to these assignments, he held various functions within the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs’ Human Security Division, including Head of Section for Peace Policy and Human Security. He entered the Swiss diplomatic service in 1997. Thomas Guerber holds an LL.M. degree in public international law and international economic law from the University of Berne, a master’s degree in European integration and economics from Institute for European Global Studies (Basel) and a master’s degree in history and literature from the University of Basel. Apart from his mother tongue German, he is fluent in English and French. He is married and has two sons.

Christine Beerli

President IofC Switzerland

Switzerland

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Christine Beerli was appointed as the new President of the Council of the Foundation in November 2018. She was the Vice-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). A member of a law firm in Biel, Ms Beerli began her political career on that city's municipal council, where she served from 1980 to 1983. From 1986 to 1991 she was a member of the legislative assembly of the Canton of Bern. In 1991 she was elected to the upper house of the Swiss parliament, where she remained until 2003, chairing the foreign affairs committee (1998-1999) and the committee for social security and health (2000-2001). Ms Beerli chaired the caucus of the Free Democratic Party in Switzerland's federal assembly from 1996 to 2003. She also served on committees dealing with security policy and economic and legal affairs. She retired from politics in 2003. 2006-2017 she headed Swissmedic, the Swiss supervisory authority for therapeutic products. She is former director of the School of Engineering and Information Technology at Bern University of Applied Sciences. In January 2008, Ms Beerli was appointed permanent Vice-President of the ICRC. As such she was a member of the ICRC Assembly – the institution's supreme governing body – as well as the Assembly Council and the Presidency, where she worked closely with the President and deputized for him whenever necessary.

Rainer Gude

Human Library Book

USA / Switzerland

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Rainer Gude is currently on Sabbatical and has just finished a 1100 km walk from Switzerland to Rome. From facilitator, moderator, convenor, public speaker and manager, his many roles all start with a belief in the importance of being the change you want to see in the world. Most recently he was the Executive Coordinator of the Geneva Peacebuilding Platform and Co-Director General of Initiatives of Change (IofC) Switzerland where he oversaw Strategic Partnerships, Programmes and External Relations and helped run the Caux Forum. Rainer also worked with Initiatives of Change International by coordinating the relations with the UN and other International Organizations and missions in Geneva. He holds a Masters in International Affairs from the Graduate Institute of Development and International Studies in Geneva. Before joining IofC, he worked several years in the business and NGO sectors.