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Commonwealth Secretariat press release

Former World Bank President James Wolfensohn to deliver Commonwealth Lecture

28 February 2006

The former President of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn, will deliver the Ninth Commonwealth Lecture in London on Thursday 2 March 2006. The lecture will be on the theme: The Future Role of the Commonwealth: A Bridge Between an Emerging Three-Speed World.

In his lecture, Mr Wolfensohn will outline how sweeping changes to the global economy over the next 40 years could produce three distinct but interconnected spheres of varying levels of wealth and development, presenting the Commonwealth with new opportunities but also added challenges. According to Mr Wolfensohn, developed high income countries will form the first tier. They will continue to be some of the wealthiest countries on the planet but may slowly lose their economic dominance to the second group of countries which would include Brazil, China, India and Russia. This second tier will be home to almost half of humanity and could become the new centre of economic power. The third tier will be made up of those countries held back by political, social, and institutional factors. These countries will struggle with widespread poverty but will remain an integral part of the global economy and world social order.

Mr Wolfensohn is expected to explore the role that the Commonwealth, which has members in all three of these tiers, can play using its strengths and influence in the areas of trade, development and governance to restore more balance and equity in the world.

The Commonwealth Lecture is delivered annually and is sponsored by the Commonwealth Foundation in collaboration with the Commonwealth Secretariat, the Royal Commonwealth Society, the Royal Over-Seas League, the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust, the Institute of Commonwealth Studies and the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.

 

Note to Editors:

The 2006 Commonwealth Lecture will be held at the Logan Hall, Institute of Education, University of London, 20 Bedford Way, London WC1 0AL at 6.30 p.m. and it will be followed by a question and answer session.

After he left the World Bank in June 2005, Mr James D Wolfensohn was appointed Special Envoy by the Quartet for the Gaza Disengagement, which comprises the United States Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice; the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavtov; the European Union High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, Javier Solana and United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan.

Mr James D. Wolfensohn was President of the World Bank for 10 years, during which he made sustainable poverty reduction the World Bank Group's overarching mission. Mr Wolfensohn was the third president in the Bank's history to be reappointed for a second five-year term by the Board of Executive Directors.

Prior to joining the World Bank on 1 June 1995, Mr Wolfensohn was an international investment banker with a parallel involvement in development issues and the global environment.

The 2005 Lecture, on the theme The Commonwealth in the 21st Century: Prospects and Challenges was delivered by HE Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Previous lectures have been delivered by Professor Amartya Kumar Sen, then Master of Trinity College, Cambridge (1998); Rt Hon Malcolm Fraser AC, CH, former Prime Minister of Australia (1999); Mr Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary-General (2000); Mrs Graça Machel, President of the Foundation for Community Development in Mozambique (2001); Mary Robinson, then United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (2002); Professor Muhammad Yunus, Managing Director, Grameen Bank (2003) and Rt Hon Jean Chrétien, Former Prime Minister of Canada (2004).

For press invitations and other queries call Mwambu Wanendeya, Communications and Public Affairs Division, Commonwealth Secretariat on + 44 (0) 20 7747 6382.

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