In a panel discussion on February 3 at the Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard faculty members shared their reflections on this year’s annual summit of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Panelists included Dr. Daniel Shapiro of the Harvard Negotiation Project, as well as Kennedy School faculty Charles W. Eliot University Professor Lawrence Summers, Dean David Ellwood, Academic Dean Iris Bohnet, and Executive Dean John Haigh. Dr. Shapiro shared his impressions on the state of the Middle East, based on conversations with senior leadership attending the annual summit. An article summarizing the event can be found here.
Major topics of discussion at this year’s WEF included job creation, Europe’s financial crisis, and growing wealth disparities. The topic of the Middle East and the Arab Spring was also on people’s minds, but it seemed many were unwilling to voice their opinions on this subject publicly. “There were a lot of private conversations on the Middle East, but there seemed to be a fear of openly discussing the topic,” said Dr. Shapiro, faculty associate of the Middle East Negotiation Initiative of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School and faculty member at Harvard Medical School/McLean Hospital. To view a BBC World Debate entitled “Making Peace in the Middle East” that Professor Shapiro took part in as part of the 2010 World Economic Forum, click here.
