Imperative change: catching up with the future

Lera Boroditsky is an Associate Professor of Cognitive Science at UCSD and Editor-in-chief of Frontiers in Cultural Psychology. She previously served on the faculty at MIT and at Stanford. Boroditsky is known for her research relating to cognitive science, specifically in how language affects the way we think and interact with the world.  One of her main research topics focuses on how people with different linguistic backgrounds act and behave when exposed to certain events.  She was named one of 25 Visionaries changing the world by the Utne Reader, and is also a Searle Scholar, a McDonnell scholar, a recipient of an NSF Career award and an APA Distinguished Scientist lecturer.

Geert Cami co-founded Friends of Europe, the action-oriented think tank, which in 2011 launched both its citizen’s platform, Debating Europe and its European Young Leaders Programme. In 2015, Friends of Europe integrated the Security and Defence agenda thinktank. As Secretary General, Geert mainly deals with the strategic development of Friends of Europe, coordinating the work of the high-level Boards involved in the governance of the organisation and chairing the Leadership meetings. He oversees both the financial health and the successful running of the organisation and its flagship initiatives and focuses on the expansion and the activation of Friends of Europe’s vast network of trustees, European young leaders and other senior political, corporate, media and societal contacts and partners throughout the world.

 In 2019, Geert founded TownHall Europe (the Davignon Centre for New Leadership) and in 2020, he co-founded the Africa-Europe Foundation (AEF) in partnership with the Mo Ibrahim Foundation (MIF).

 Geert headed the European conference organising, press relations and publishing company Forum Europe for more than ten years, and managed the revival of one of Belgium’s finest architectural examples of Art Nouveau, after creating La Maison de l’Europe in the prestigious 100-year-old Bibliothèque Solvay.

 At the outset of his career, Geert worked for a few years in the Humanitarian Office of the European Commission as a deputy in the newly set-up information and communications unit. His focus was mainly on raising the profile of the EU’s humanitarian efforts throughout the world, through publications and media initiatives such as exhibitions, television debates or Humanitarian Days in Member States.

 He also worked briefly as a teacher and TV journalist for two music programmes at Belgian public Radio 1.

Prior to her appointment as state secretary, Cristina Gallach was the high commissioner of the Government of Spain for the 2030 Agenda. She previously headed the Equal Opportunities Office of the Council of the European Union in Brussels and has held several positions at the UN, including under-secretary-general, special advisor to the Secretary-General, head of the Department for Public Information and under-secretary general for communications and public information. Gallach has also previously served as head of public relations and spokesperson for the Council of the European Union.

Javier Gándara is Country Director of easyJet in Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands, and was appointed Chairman of the Airlines Association (ALA) in 2017. Prior to joining easyJet, Javier worked as Senior Manager for Operations for Spain and Portugal at FedEX. In 2007, he was named Operations Manager for easyJet in Spain, a title he held before his promotion to Country Director. Gándara works for the sustained growth of easyJet in Spain, which is a key market for the airline.

Ryan Heath is perhaps best known for his role as political editor at POLITICO Europe, where he was responsible for steering coverage on the 2019 European elections. Prior to this role, Heath authored POLITICO’s Brussels Playbook column. Having accumulated over 20 years of experience in network television and radio, Heath has contributed to a diverse range of media outlets, of which the BBC, ABC, Euronews and NBC are inclusive. Possessing skills not limited to journalism, Heath has lectured at the University of Oxford, LSE, Maastricht University and Université libre de Bruxelles.

Dmitri Jegorov is the Deputy Secretary General for Tax and Customs Policy in the Estonian Ministry of Finance. Prior to this, he worked for the Estonian Tax and Customs Board. Jegorov’s positions have included that of head of the tax department as well as Deputy Director General for all core processes ranging from customer service to criminal investigation. Furthermore, Jegorov is a member of the EU High Level Working Party on Taxes and a board member for both the International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS) and Estonia’s e-Residency programme.

Prior to joining Friends of Europe, Dharmendra Kanani was director of policy at the European Foundation Centre (EFC). He was the England director at the Big Lottery Fund, the largest independent funder in the UK and fourth largest in the world. Dharmendra has held senior positions in the public and voluntary sectors and advisor to numerous ministerial policy initiatives across the UK.

*Consultant at Friends of Europe.

As Co-Director of Neon Lake Productions, Samantha Keon has worked on short and feature-length documentaries for online and television broadcast. She has also been involved in commercial projects for charities and businesses both in the UK and Spain, and films that she has co-directed have gone on to be selected and win prizes at festivals across Europe. Samantha is especially drawn to stories which preserve the richness of our cultural heritage in times of increasing globalisation and is also a passionate advocate for mental health awareness. Samantha produced and directed the documentary short Casas Sin Familias, a film which set out to explore the dilemma of locals in Barcelona as they weigh the economic necessity of tourism against the desire to preserve their way of life.

Anne Lise Kjaer is a renowned futurist and entrepreneur. She holds the honorary title of Copenhagen Goodwill Ambassador and was recently appointed as a member of the International Panel of Experts for Singapore’s Urban Development Authority. Anne uses her design background to create clarity out of the trends that hold the key to the future of innovation and business concepts. In 1988 she founded Kjaer Global, a consultancy that seeks to fuel innovation culture by providing organisations with insights on future trends. Built on a holistic framework for balancing ‘people, planet and purpose’ with profit, Kjaer works with a wide variety of organisations, including Amazon, IKEA, the BBC and UNICEF.

Dominique Moïsi is a foreign policy analyst specialising in European affairs, the Middle East and transatlantic relations. In 2016, he was appointed Senior Counselor of the Institut Montaigne, a policy think tank based in Paris in 2000. He was founding Member of the French Institute for International Relations (IFRI), of which he served as Deputy Director and Senior Advisor. As the first recipient of the Pierre Keller Visiting Chair in Government at Harvard University, he has garnered extensive academic experience, teaching at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Sciences Po in Paris, the College of Europe in Warsaw (Natolin) and at King’s College London. He is also a prolific writer, having authored The Geopolitics of Emotion , which has been translated into 26 languages. He regularly features in leading newspapers, publishing a monthly column for Project Syndicate and weekly one for Les Echos (France’s leading economic newspaper). His articles have often appeared in Foreign Affairs and the Financial Times.

Ana Palacio is an international lawyer specialising in international and European Union law. From 1994 to 2002, she was a member of the European Parliament, where she chaired the Legal Affairs and Internal Market as well as the Citizens Rights, Justice and Home Affairs Committees. Ana Palacio served as Minister of Foreign Affairs of Spain (2002-2004) and was a member of the Spanish Parliament (2004-2006) where she chaired the Joint Committee of the two Houses for European Union Affairs. She has been Senior Vice-President and General Counsel of the World Bank Group and Secretary General of ICSID (2006-2008). Palacio has been a member of the Executive Committee and Senior Vice-President for International Affairs of AREVA (2008-2009) and served on the Council of State of Spain (2012-2018).

Grace Perez-Navarro is Deputy Director of the OECD’s Centre for Tax Policy and Administration. She plays a key role in all of the OECD’s tax work including the tax challenges of digitalisation, the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Project, improving international tax cooperation, tackling illicit financial flows, promoting better tax policies and engaging developing countries in OECD tax work. She has led the OECD’s work on bank secrecy, e-commerce, harmful tax practices, money laundering, tax crimes, countering bribery of foreign officials, and strengthening all forms of administrative cooperation between tax authorities. Prior to joining the OECD, she held the title of Special Counsel at the IRS Office of the Associate Chief Counsel.

Building on an extensive background in architecture and history, Stephan Petermann has established himself as a prominent figure in Europe’s arts & culture scene. He has written for the architecture magazine VOLUME and was previously a member of the EU Reflection Group, a ‘wise men’ council established to stimulate thinking around the future of the European Union. Petermann’s most recent artistic endeavour saw him participate in a collaborative project between the Harvard Graduate School of Design and the Chinese Academy for Fine Arts.

Daniel Romero Abreu is the President and Founder of Thinking Heads, a network that connects and positions thought leaders. Thinking Heads has an international reach with delegations in six countries and it is the first strategic consultancy to specialise in the positioning of leaders. Daniel has advised global leaders, CEOs, economists, athletes, writers and thinkers to generate social value. He has given lectures on his methodology to audiences in Spain, the United States, Germany, Saudi Arabia and Guatemala.

Álvaro Salvat the General Manager for Portugal and Spain at Lime, a micro-mobility company offering the rental of scooters and bikes to city dwellers. Having joined the company during its European expansion phase, he played a key role in the company’s market development in the south-west of the continent. Salvat has accumulated over a decade’s experience working in management and conceptual development, holding senior positions at companies focusing on creative design, communications and e-commerce. His ambition is to create more liveable cities by combining a human-centred focus with operational efficiency through innovation.

Edward Strasser heads the Innovation in Politics Awards, a programme he co-founded in a bid to identify and recognise the most ground-breaking political achievements across Europe. With an overall focus on bridge-building projects across the political spectrum, Strasser has initiated several projects, including a press agency for migrant issues. He is also a co-founder of respekt.net, an Internet-based crowdfunding platform for civil society projects. Alongside these projects, he lectures at the University of Vienna’s Department of Communication. He was previously Secretary General of the Austrian Association of Public Relations Professionals and a member of the staff of the Secretary General of the Social Democratic Party in Austria.