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Ian Goldin    

Director, Oxford University's 21st Century School, Visionary Economist and Former Vice President, The World Bank

Ian Goldin is a leading global thinker and exceptional speaker. After a career which included being CEO of a bank and vice president of the World Bank, he is now at Oxford and serves on a variety of boards. His most recent and widely acclaimed books are Globalisation for Development and Exceptional People. He is the author of two upcoming books, Divided Nations: Why global governance is failing and what we can do about it, and The Butterfly Defect: Globalization and Systemic Risk.

Goldin is the director of the Oxford Universitys Oxford Martin School which aims to provide solutions to some of the great challenges of our time. The School covers the frontiers of physical, environmental and medical science change and as well as population, migration, ageing, food and natural resources and the associated global governance challenges. Goldin is a Professorial Fellow at the Universitys Balliol College.

Goldin previously was at the World Bank, where he served as vice president with wide-ranging responsibilities. These included being a member of the Banks Executive Committee and having responsibility for all major shareholder relations and relations with the UN and other global partners. From 1995 to 2001, Goldin was chief executive and managing director of the Development Bank of Southern Africa. Under his leadership, the Bank was transformed to become commercially independent and the leading agent of infrastructure development in the fourteen countries of Southern Africa, becoming the primary source of finance to over 500 municipalities and developing public private partnerships in the region. During this period, Goldin was an advisor to President Mandela and accompanied him on many state visits. Previously, Goldin worked at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) in London, as principal economist, and prior to that at the OECD Development Centre in Paris, where he directed the Programs on Trade, Environment and Sustainable Development.

Goldin holds a BSc and BA (Hons) degree from the University of Cape Town, a MSc from the London School of Economics, an AMP from INSEAD and an MA and DPhil from the University of Oxford. He has received numerous awards and prizes, and has been knighted (Chevalier) by France and was nominated Global Leader of Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum. He has published over fifty articles and thirteen books, three of the most well-known being The Economics of Sustainable Development (Cambridge University Press), Globalisation for Development (Palgrave MacMillan), which Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz has recommended as "essential reading", and his most recent Exceptional People: How Migration Shaped our World and Will Define our Future (Princeton) which Ned Phelps, Nobel Laureate has said will "will change, if anything, the way governments and organisations view migration policy."

Speech Topics


Ian Goldin is also renowned for addressing the following areas:

  • Economic Development
  • Natural Resources, Water, Agriculture and the Environment
  • Finance and Banking for Development
  • Global Governance

Humanity at the Crossroads

Goldin shows how this could be our best century ever. Or our worst, in which we may even destroy our centuries of progress. Professor Goldin identifies the major opportunities and progress which may be expected in coming years. He then draws out the ethical and social implications raised by the major shifts and advances in society and technology. He considers the public policy issues associated with the threats posed, including by climate change, pandemics and terrorism and identifies the measures necessary to ensure that society ensures that this is a century of shared opportunity, not destruction.

Skills, Education and Immigration

Throughout history, migrants have fueled the engine of human progress. Their movement has sparked innovation, spread ideas, relieved poverty, and laid the foundations for a global economy. Looking to the future, Professor Ian Goldin examines the development of labor markets and the implications for skills, education and immigration which is the subject of his recent book Exceptional People, published by Princeton.

Risk Management

Ian Goldin is a world leading expert on the new forms of systemic risk which he identifies as arising from turbo charged globalisation associated with sharply increased levels of connectivity and technical change. Drawing on his book The Butterfly Defect: Globalization and Systemic Risk, Goldin shows how we need to rethink our understanding of risk and develop new strategies of resilience to prevent cascading shocks overwhelming our businesses and society.

Demography and Finance

Rapid increases in life expectancy and collapsing fertility is changing the nature of society and finance, and has dramatic consequences for economic activity, consumption and savings. A leading figure on the most pressing challenges confronting the world as we move well into the 21st Century, Professor Goldin examines the how population and demography will affect retirement, pensions, health care and other areas that will be drastically effected changes around the globe.

The World In 2020

Ian Goldin has a unique insight into the future. Drawing on the frontiers of research at Oxford and elsewhere, he provides illuminating perspectives on the major changes in society and technology which are likely to take place over coming decades. His presentations focus on the big picture, looking at the implications for businesses, governments and individual choice.

Professor Goldin explains the connection between social and technical change, and draws out the lessons of the past thirty years of unprecedented globalisation. He discusses whether the tidal wave of globalisation will continue and whether past trends are sustainable.

He examines first population and demographic trends, considering the implications for pensions, retirement, dependency and migration patterns to the Year 2050. Next, he considers economic trends, considering whether the current dramatic instability in the market is likely to be a short-term deviation from longer term trends. He considers the rise of Asia and emerging markets, providing perspectives on economic growth and opportunities over the coming 10+ years. The connections between social, technical and economic change and market growth and consumer behaviour are unpacked. Professor Goldin provides fresh insights into the future of computing, biotechnology, nano-technology, genetics and the likely implications of frontier technologies.

Ian Goldin is a leading global thinker on the future. He has extraordinary wide ranging knowledge and an ability to combine the latest in research with insights from the inside of global politics and business.

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