On June 7, the conference titled Scientific Diaspora and Education Abroad: a Resource or Lost Investment?, co-organised by Erste Bank, Belgrade Fund for Political Excellence and Group 484, gathered in Belgrade close to a hundred relevant participants, representatives of the state, NGOs, the academia, international organizations, and the media.

The conference aimed at raising public awareness regarding the issue of the highly educated people from Serbia who work or have studied abroad, who are a resource to this country but have not been taken into account in a systematic and sufficient manner. Also, results of a research conducted by the Group 484 on the topic of “brain drain” in Serbia and the national policies dealing with this issue were presented. A separate panel was devoted to the mechanisms for improving a country’s reputation and the ways people educated and/or working abroad can be involved in the activities already implemented by the state, but also in future steps that need to be taken in this area.

The conference gave floor for presenting project proposals that were the end result of the project “Engaging Former UK and US Scholarship Beneficiaries in Improving the Image of Serbia”. This project, implemented by the BFPE and Erste Bank, focused on Serbian students educated abroad and their potential role in improving Serbia’s reputation. During the nine months of implementation, the project involved over 60 students/experts from Serbia educated abroad, who developed 5 project proposals for the improvement of the image of Serbia, based on their own ideas and engagement. Erste Bank announced at the conference that they are willing to finance one of the projects presented (Other Face of Serbia – Week of Serbian Science, Culture and Art at LSE).

The issue of “brain drain/brain gain” attracted significant interest, following the presentation of the preliminary results of the project “Developing “brain gain” Policies in the Western Balkans” done by Group 484, and the experience of a five-year long Brain Gain Programme implemented by the Albanian Government and the UNDP, presented by Bernard Zeneli, the Programme Manager. (This presentation may be downloaded here BGPstrategicBelgradeEdited.pptx.)

As one of the concrete outputs, the first draft of the Conference Conclusions was produced, which is to be submitted to all of the conference participants for comments and amendments and later distributed to all relevant public institutions in Serbia.

The organization of this conference was supported by the Balkan Trust for Democracy, Erste Bank, and the European Fund for the Balkans.

Nearly 600 political leaders, civil society activists, journalists and business leaders meet in Strasbourg, from 28 June to 2 July, at the 5th Summer University for Democracy devoted to The Crisis of Leadership to discuss the developments related to the exercise of power in the time of crisis.

In his opening address Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, declared: Growing unemployment and marginalization lead to people losing their identity and defining themselves in opposition to others. This creates a climate of xenophobia and antipathy against the most vulnerable groups, and provides fertile ground for extremists to spread their message of hatred.

This is what happened before World War II. At the time, political leadership failed, with catastrophic consequences.

We need political leaders who can offer a multicultural society more than talk of fear and sustaining of the status quo. We need leadership that can offer confidence in a liberal democratic society. A society which is rooted in the idea of human rights and sustained by a rational and critical debate.

In order to meet the expectations of their citizens, what are the means and resources available today to governments at local, national and international levels? How can confidence in representatives be restored? How can values such as peace, justice and freedom be disseminated and promoted in non-democratic countries?

These topics were the core of debate in the conferences and workshops of the Summer University for Democracy, presented by experts and personalities from across Europe, Africa, Asia and North America, such as Mr. Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, President of the Parliamentary Assembly, Mr. Vasko Naumovski, Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration of “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”, Mrs. Sylvie Kauffmann, Director of Le Monde, who gave the opening lecture and Mrs. Bianca Jagger Council of Europe Goodwill Ambassador for the fight against the death penalty, Founder and Chair of the Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation. During the course of the week, the participants attended a series of themed conferences and workshops on financial and economic crisis, crisis of politics and democracy, civil resistance, democratization and democratic sustainability.

For the second time, the Summer University is welcomed participants from Africa, who attended the event with the support of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF).