State of the World Forum 2.0

Original State of the World Forum 

Between 1995 – 2000, the State of the World Forum was convened by President Mikhail Gorbachev and a global pantheon of co-chairs, including Secretary of State James Baker, Indian National Congress President Sonia Gandhi, primatologist Jane Goodall, Nobel Laureate Wangari Matthai, South African President Thabo Mbeke, First Lady Jehan Sadat, activist Vandana Shiva, Secretary of State George Shultz, Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz, UN Under Secretary Maurice Strong, CNN founder Ted Turner, Archbishop Desmund Tutu, Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel and Grameen Bank founder Muhammed Yunus. Senator Alan Cranston served as Chairman of the Board, Dr. Jim Garrison served as President.

The mission of the Forum was to discern the “state of the world” at the end of the Cold War and what possibilities there might be for peace in the emerging world order. The Forum distinguished itself as a global brain trust and became one of the most influential conferences of its era, challenging participants to “transform conversations that matter into actions that make a difference.”

Each Fall from 1995 -1999, a five day Forum was convened at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco, culminating at the New York Hilton in September 2000 to coincide with the UN Millennium Summit of Heads of State. Roughly 1,000 people gathered for each Forum, 3,500 for New York, representing a broad range of individuals drawn from sectors as diverse as the new sciences to citizen activism, geo-politics to innovative finance, the nuclear weapons threat to regenerative agriculture, and a host of other issues. It was an extraordinary gathering of Nobel laureates, statespeople, indigenous elders, intellectuals, citizen activists, business executives, scientists, politicians, philosophers, spiritual icons, youth leaders and all manner of creative intelligences from around the world that had a powerful transformational impact. Special sessions were broadcast live via CNN and BBC. 

The State of the World Forum left a lasting imprint on global discourse. The Forum helped mainstream the idea of holistic global problem-solving – addressing political, economic, environmental, social, and spiritual challenges in an integrated way. Many of the themes championed at the Forum such as sustainable development, climate action, nuclear disarmament, interfaith dialogue, digital divide concerns, etc. gained momentum on the world stage in the late 1990s and early 2000s and were eventually reflected in U.N. agendas and civil society campaigns. 

Discussions during the first Forum introduced provocative ideas such as the “20-80 society” – predicting a future where only 20% of the workforce might drive the economy while innovative solutions would be needed to support the rest. The Forum’s emphasis on a “global ethic” and shared values contributed to initiatives like the Earth Charter, launched in 2000 by Maurice Strong and Stephen Rockefeller, among others, and the broader conversations on aligning globalization with the planetary ecology and human flourishing. Participants often carried insights and partnerships from the Forum into their home countries and organizations. 

The State of the World Forum was dedicated to “transforming conversations that matter into actions that make a difference.” This generated many concrete outcomes called strategic initiatives. These included the Global Security Institute with Gorbachev, Senator Cranston, Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and Jonathan Granoff advocating nuclear weapons abolition, a Whole Child Initiative with Jane Goodall and Claire Ryle Garrison focusing on children’s well-being, Global Equal Access with SalesForce.com founder Marc Benioff expanding information access, the Coexistence Initiative with author Bill Ury and philanthropist Alan Slifka advancing intergroup harmony, Ethical Globalization Initiative with Irish President Mary Robinson promoting human rights in development, legislation in the EU Parliament limiting Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals with Euro MP Tom Spencer, and an Emerging Leaders program mentoring young leaders from around the world.​ Networking at the Forum helped inspire youth-oriented conferences such as a Global Peace Forum for young leaders​.

To further these strategic initiatives, the Forum convened conferences in Beijing, Belfast, Belo Horizonte, Brussels, Islamabad, London, Mexico City, Moscow, New Delhi and Washington, DC.

The Forum’s ability to assemble a diverse mix of world leaders, experts and change-makers cemented its global reputation. This convergence of perspectives from politics, business, academia, science, culture and the spiritual realm made the Forum a catalyst for groundbreaking initiatives in international policy, sustainable development, and ethical globalization.

State of the World Forum 2.0

Omni Shoreham hotel, Washington, DC Dec 14-18

The years 2025 – 2030 represent another equally precarious and potentiated moment. In a fundamental sense, the world since the original Forum is getting “better and better, worse and worse, faster and faster.”  There are certainly many indicators that breakthroughs and positive developments are taking place in specific areas. Yet it seems apparent to most observers that the “worse and worse” aspects are gaining momentum such that humanity now teeters precariously on the brink of self destruction. Unprecedented Code Red issues challenge humanity ranging from: 

• escalating extreme weather events and ecological degradation

• increasing threat of nuclear weapons and war

• unrestrained artificial intelligence

• destabilizing geo-strategic rivalries  

• breakdown of global governance infrastructures to solve global crises

• deterioration of human health and well being

• assault on women’s sovereignty and gender expression

• growing mental and emotional challenges among global youth and elderly

• damaging impact of social media on society, politics and culture

• growing disparity between rich and poor

• erosion of human rights and privacy in a time of pervasive surveillance

• unregulated space exploration and exploitation

By all accounts, 2025 - 2030 will be a seminal period in human history. Never before has human survival been so starkly at stake and never before have opportunities for humanity to flourish been so accessible. 

The enormity of our current historical moment provides a unique and compelling opportunity to bring people together at the same level and for the same number of years as the original Forum to take counsel with one another about the magnitude of our historical moment and how we, as a human community, can understand the interrelationships between our diverse challenges and how we can come together to solve them. 

There are several considerations that frame this new endeavor:

• The dominant feeling back in the 1990s was one of hope and optimism at the end of the Cold War, unfortunately dashed by 9/11 and related events. The dominant feeling today is one of bewilderment and a growing inability to understand what is happening anymore, how to connect all the dots in a meaningful way, and what can be done to actually make a real difference in a global situation that seems to be spinning out of control and going from bad to worse. We are confronted by numerous crises simultaneously while suffering from a loss of meaning and an inability to fashion the instruments to solve global problems. A global dialogue designed to connect the dots, create a meaning framework and empower action is critically needed in our world at this time. This is what Forum 2.0 is designed to provide. 

• There are several critical new realities not present in the original Forum but essential to include now. Crucial is the escalating impact of extreme weather events and climate change. This was discussed and predicted at the first Forums and is now a reality. At the first Forum, the US was beginning its unipolar moment. The world is now transitioning from unipolarity to multipolarity, necessitating urgent discussion concerning the architecture of global governance. There is also the new reality of global pandemics, something not really on the agenda back in the 1990s but clearly an issue today. In addition to climate disasters, the most consequential new factors in world affairs are the exponential growth of artificial intelligence and the presence of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) on Earth. Both these challenge humanity in fundamental ways unprecedented in human history. Humanity is teetering on the brink of ecological destruction amidst escalating geostrategic instability while unleashing AI and encountering UAP all at the same time. 

• 2025 Forum is designed as the beginning of a global inquiry and dialogue on these and related matters through 2030, empowered by a range of strategic initiatives. Transforming conversations that matter into actions that make a difference is key to the Forum’s DNA. Already strategic initiatives are underway which will be profiled as things unfold.  

• The organizing entity is the State of the World Forum, operating as a non profit under the aegis of Partnerships for Change, a non profit 501C3 based in California. Ubiquity University serves as management coordinator for finance and administration coordination. 

History is entering a critical passageway. How humanity conceives of itself, our relationship with our planetary ecology and the larger cosmos, and acts accordingly, will determine our fate. Forum 2.0 is designed to honor the crises and the opportunities of our time in an integrated way that inspires generative action by providing both a meaningful framework for human understanding of our hypercomplex world and a pathway to human transformation and flourishing.

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