A New Era of Geo-Economics: Assessing the Interplay of Economic and Political Risk

From the event website:

Governments and firms are inadequately equipped to deal with risk, and methods to navigate risk and reduce uncertainty require far greater attention from the private sector and policymakers according to speakers at the latest IISS Geo-Economics and Strategy seminar. The event, which explored the interplay of economic and political risk in an increasingly diversified world, was hosted at the IISS-Middle East office in the Kingdom of Bahrain on 24-25 March 2012.

The seminar brought together 46 delegates from 18 countries drawn from business, government and the analytical communities, to address how governments and businesses can develop more sophisticated methods to identify prospective geo-economic and geo-strategic shifts.

Major issues discussed included how economic shifts have altered geopolitical relations and heightened geopolitical tensions; the distinction between ‘shifts’ and ‘shocks’ and the ability of economic shocks — such as those brought about by currency instability, financial crises, commodity shocks and trade wars — to accelerate or decelerate long-term economic shifts and produce strategic change.

Though the seminar was off the record, papers were prepared in advance of each session of the seminar.

Convened with the support of the Bahrain Economic Development Board, the seminar also focused on the future of global governance and multilateralism.