As the international community faces a period of uncertainty, aggravated by multiple crises and geopolitical conflicts, International Geneva remains a haven for international cooperation and peacebuilding.
In his intervention in front of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Davide Rodogno presented the key role the Geneva Graduate Institute has played in International Geneva from day one, drawing on declarations made at the Institute’s inauguration on 16 September 1927 by William Rappard, founder of the Institute, and Giuseppe Motta, President of the Swiss Confederation:
The Institute will help to reduce mistrust and the influence of age-old prejudices, and will work to make our world a united one, where greater justice, truth and light prevail.
William Rappard
The role of this school will be to subject political issues to scientific scrutiny. There is no truth without independence, nor freedom without critical thinking.
Giuseppe Motta
Anchored in Switzerland while cultivating its global outreach, the Institute has grown over the past 100 years and has become a celebrated academic institution not just for international studies but for the international community overall, in times of peace as well as in the face of the varied geopolitical changes, political crises, social injustices, community isolation, and planetary and existential threats that exist today.
While always demanding academic rigour and championing critical thought, the Institute and its community of academics and international actors continually address these key issues through its programmes, research, publications, and events. The Institute’s fundamental principles of peace, international cooperation, and respect of international law remain at the heart of its actions.
To provide examples of the ways in which the Institute combines its academic interests with community engagement, Davide Rodogno presented the Institute’s various activities and initiatives, including the Fabrique de la paix, the Interdisciplinary Programme’s Applied Research Project (ARP) programme, which is closely knit with Geneva’s International network of international and non-governmental organisations, the Tech Hub, and the Hoffmann Centre for Sustainability.
To end his talk, Davide Rodogno called on the “Esprit de Genève”, evoking Albert Thomas’s call to “never renounce a human cause” and celebrating the role education has to play in his own words: “In a neutral, open Switzerland — a haven of peace and dialogue — we aim to educate bridge-builders and boundary-crossers who are courageous in both their civic engagement and their research, empathetic and caring in their interpersonal relationships, and who foster a form of leadership dedicated to the common good.”