Participant Guide October 26 2024

Participant Guide and Pre-Reads October 26 Draft

Location ..................................................................................................................... 1 Timing ........................................................................................................................ 1 Chatham House Rule and Private Capacity .................................................................. 2 Being fully present ...................................................................................................... 2 Dress code ................................................................................................................. 2 Seating ....................................................................................................................... 2 Challenges ................................................................................................................. 2 Goal ........................................................................................................................... 3 Outputs ...................................................................................................................... 3 Preparation................................................................................................................. 3 Pre-Readings .............................................................................................................. 4

Global Canada and CanWaCH are delighted you will join us in exploring an international issue where Canada could play a consequential role: rethinking international assistance.

Location The reception on the 29th is at the University Club of Montreal, 1201-A Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal. (The “A” means that the entrance is tucked away to the right of the building when you are facing it from the road.)

The event on the 30th is at the Centre Mont-Royal, 2200 Mansfield Street, Montreal.

Timing The reception and cocktail-dinatoire on the 29th is 6:30 – 8:30 pm.

The event on the 30th starts at 8:45 am, with registration and light breakfast from 8:00. We encourage you to arrive early, as one of the pleasures of the day will be meeting with your outstanding fellow participants.

1

Chatham House Rule and Private Capacity To facilitate a safe space for public policy discussion, the event follows the Chatham House rule. As such, participants are free to use the information received, but not to reveal the identity or a]iliation of the person providing the information. Participants are engaging in their private capacity. Any views are their own, rather than that of their organization.

Being fully present This event is a brainstorming, not a conference. To ensure people can focus on the substance during the sessions, we have designed multiple opportunities for interaction with your fantastic fellow participants outside the sessions (including a reception on the 29th, breakfast, lunch with no program, regular breaks, and reception at the end).

Please commit to the full day, staying in the room during the sessions and resisting the urge to chat in the hallways. An additional huge request: please minimize non-essential use of devices during the sessions. While challenging, this results in a much better experience for everyone, and a better final result.

Dress code Business casual, e.g., ties not required.

Seating Seating is open. However: 1. For some sessions, people will be asked to sit by language preference (i.e. English, French Bilingual).

2. If all the chairs in a breakout group (aka Creativity Cluster) are taken, please go to another cluster. They are all important and we would like to ensure an even participation across them.

3. Please, try not to sit exclusively with people from your sector, or that you know well.

Make it a point to reach out to, and sit next to, new people.

Challenges This event is ambitious in both scope and depth. There will be a number of challenges:

2

•

•

Very tight timing: Panels are only 45 minutes long and will cover a lot of material.

During the breakout “Creativity Clusters”, participants will be asked to provide feedback or ideas in about 1 minute. The goal will be bursts of brilliance. The tight timing may be frustrating at times at an individual level, but should result in a much richer, collective experience over the course of the day.

Heterogeneity of backgrounds and of topics: the event will take people out of their echo-chambers. Others in the room will not see the world in the same way or naturally agree on which issues are the most important. Respectful listening to di]erent views (or even world-views) and constructive engagement on areas of disagreement will contribute greatly to the success of the day.

Goal The goal is challenge ourselves to think more boldly in actionable ways: surfacing a menu of potential policy options for consideration by the present or future governments. However, there will be no attempt to craft a facile consensus or to paper over the challenges involved in real leadership. There will be no vote on any of the ideas, nor any claim that the group expressed a collective opinion on any one of them.

Beyond this, an important goal is that participants make new acquaintances with accomplished Canadians who are committed to a better world, and that, collectively, we reconfirm the belief that Canada is able to make a significant di]erence at this critical time.

Outputs 1. There will be a summary, or read-out, of the event within 10 business days; 2. Where some of the ideas have traction, we will examine ways to help move them forward; 3. There will be a report back on the utility of this process, based on feedback from participants, together with recommendations on how to take the process forward.

Preparation There is no formal preparation. It would be useful if you could consider, and possibly jot down, your answers to the following questions, which we will be considering together on the 30th: - Why should Canada invest in international assistance in 2024, with so many other domestic and international priorities?

3

-

What should Canada be trying to accomplish with international assistance? What could we do that is distinctive or truly consequential?

How could we accomplish this? What would we need to change? What should stay the same?

Pre-Readings While none of these documents are essential, participants may find it useful to review the “A Question of Will: Why Aid?” and skim the other documents, diving into the ones they find most intriguing.

A Question of Will: Why Aid? By the Commission on International Development, Chair Lester B. Pearson This 10 page extract from the landmark Partners in Development report remains one of the best summaries of both the moral and the enlightened self-interest case for international assistance, together with caveats on what should be realistically expected.

How is the World Really Doing on the SDGs?

By Homi Kharas and John W. McArthur Argues that: “A properly nuanced assessment of the Sustainable Development Goals can o9er encouragement alongside the sober realism that current conditions demand.”

The Poverty, Prosperity, and Planet Report 2024: Pathways Out of the Polycrisis

By World Bank Released this month, together with a 7 page summary. The World Bank has a mission of ending extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity on a livable planet. This report o]ers the Bank’s first post-pandemic assessment of global progress on this agenda: “the report finds that global poverty reduction has resumed but at a pace slower than before the COVID-19 crisis” Principles for Allocating Finance for Development and Climate Goals

By Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

4

This new study tackles head-on the world’s financing challenge: “As the needs mount, the resources with which to meet them have grown scarcer” and proposes an innovative path forward designing financing to “meet each country where they are”. .

Should a Northern Donor Exist in the 21st Century?

By Nilima Gulrajani, Heba Aly Argues that “a myriad of pressures and stakeholders now impinge on the practice of Northern donorship, which has left it bereft of a strong policy rationale” Minister of International Development - Briefing book July 2023.

By Global A]airs Canada Insights into key development issues, as seen by the responsible department briefing its minister.

Report on Canada’s International Assistance: 2022-2023 The most recent update of the Government of Canada’s results in international national development as reported to Parliament.

5