Evans will insist that disarmament is achievable: nuclear weapons cannot be ‘uninvented’, but they can be outlawed, as chemical and biological weapons have been.
Gareth Evans describes himself as “a glass half-full kind of person” while acknowledging that anyone optimistic about anything in international affairs “runs the risk of being branded ignorant, incorrigibly naïve or outright demented”. His snapshot of himself might come as surprise given Evans’s career of more than 25 years in grappling with some of the world’s most intractable problems of war in all its terrible guises – from cross-border conflicts in the Gulf to the horrific internal strife that has beset Cambodia, the former Yugoslavia and many African states.
Born just before the end of the Second World War, Evans was educated at Melbourne University (where he studied Law) and Magdalen College, Oxford (PPE). After a career in law, he entered Australian politics, and was a long-serving Cabinet Minister in the Hawke and Keating Labor Governments, including as foreign minister from 1988-1996. He followed that with nearly a decade as president of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, and he is now chancellor of the Australian National University.
Currently in Cambridge as Humanitas Visiting Professor in Statecraft and Diplomacy, and a visiting scholar at Pembroke College, Evans will be giving three public lectures that will tackle profound questions about human behaviour. Recognising our innate capacity for violence (and just how quickly combative situations can escalate), he will examine the major challenges facing the international community in brokering peace and protecting the vulnerable. Overall, his message will be one of optimism, albeit balanced by some powerful caveats.
All three of Gareth Evans’s talks - on May 8, 10 and 13 - will take place at the Mill Lane Lecture Rooms, Cambridge, 5-6.30pm. Open to all, no need to book.
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A symposium 'The Future of Deadly Conflict: Is Optimism Defensible?' will be held on Tuesday 14 May at the Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge.
To register for the symposium and for all details about the lecture series go to http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/2402/
Image: Gareth Evans
Credit: Gareth Evans
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge
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