Whenever diplomatic conferences have taken place after a large European war there was one major question: who should be invited to participate in it, and who should not?
This question has presented itself again and again to the former belligerents. Or, in other words and more precisely, why should one party be allowed to participate, and why should they not participate? Are there criteria for narrowing down the number of participants, and conversely for enlarging it? Dr. Stella Ghervas, Visiting Scholar at Harvard University’s Center for European Studies and Senior Fellow at the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme d’Aquitaine in Bordeaux, tries to find some answers on these crucial questions. In her speech, she focuses particularly on the Vienna order and then draws parallels with later moments.
Conference: 200 Years of Conference Diplomacy | From the Congress of Vienna to the G7
On 9 June 1815, the Final Act of the Congress of Vienna was signed. Two hundred years later, on 7 and 8 June 2015, Germany hosted the G7 summit. This coincidence provided a unique occasion to reflect on the past, present and future of conference diplomacy. For this purpose, an international conference with eminent political scientists and historians took place at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin on 8 and 9 June 2015. Researchers as well as political practitioners discussed the lessons of 200 years of multilateral cooperation, in four crucial areas: inclusion, effectiveness, legitimacy, and international order.