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Robert Steel Returns as Institute Chairman

In November, the Institute welcomes back Robert K. Steel as chairman of the Board of Trustees. Succeeding William E. Mayer, Steel resumes the role after holding it briefly from September–October 2006, when his appointment as under secretary for domestic finance of the Treasury forced him to postpone his service. In that post, he served as a key advisor to Secretary Hank Paulson and guided the department’s initial response to this year’s financial cri-sis. One of his most notable accom-plishments was his role in helping to engineer JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s purchase of Bear Stearns. On July 9, Steel stepped down as under secretary to become CEO and president of Charlotte, NC-based Wachovia Corporation. Before being appointed under secretary, Steel served as vice chairman of Goldman Sachs and as a senior fel-low at the Center for Business and Government at the John F. Kennedy School of Gov ernment at Harvard University. He has been a trustee of the Institute since 2004.

Real Voices from Africathe story of africa, as aspen Global Leadership network (aGLn) Fellow Ferial Haffajee tells it, is not just one of strife and struggle. It’s also one of family, work, and day-to-day life. With very few outlets giving this multi-dimensional account, haffajee, the editor of africa’s Mail & Guardian newspaper, launched Voices of Africa in 2008 to empower africans to tell their own slice-of-life stories. the new pan-african newspaper and website, which takes submissions from ordinary people across the continent, employs an exclusively african staff to ensure a focus on african voices. as haffajee explained, “What we are trying to do is tell the story of how africa lives, not how she dies.” haffajee is a south africa fellow in the net-work’s africa Leadership Initiative, and Voices of africa was launched as her personal leadership project. For more information on Voices of Africa, visit www.mg.co.za/voices.

Facing Down Agent OrangeMore than 30 years after the end of the Vietnam War, Agent Orange continues to leech into the soil of communities that surround former US bases in Viet-nam, and both Vietnamese and Ameri-can citizens still suffer from exposure to the toxin. The Institute’s Advocacy and Exchange Program on Agent Orange/Dioxin, which promotes broad dialogue between policymakers and civic lead-ers in both countries to find solutions, brought together US business leaders at a DC-based conference on October 30 to discuss what role they might play in addressing these issues. Along with examining business activities and philan-thropic pursuits, attendees also expanded their discussions beyond Agent Orange to look at other legacies of the Vietnam War. For additional information, visit www.aspeninstitute.org/agentorangeprogram.

spotLIGht on t Ibet at annuaL beneFIt

Nearly 400 supporters of the Institute gath-ered in Aspen for the sold-out 15th Annual Summer Celebration Gala on July 25. Held in conjunction with a symposium on Tibet presented by the Institute and the Conser-vancy for Tibetan Art and Culture (see story on page 42), the summer benefit included the presentation of a Global Leadership Award to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and featured speaker Lodi Gyari, the special envoy of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and executive chairman of the International Campaign for Tibet. Institute trustees Margot and Tom Pritzker and Institute friends Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Richard Blum co-chaired the dinner, which raised $500,000 for the Institute. The 16th Annual Summer Celebration Gala will be held on Saturday, August 8, 2009, in Aspen. For more pictures of this year’s event, see page 88.

Returning Board Chairman Robert Steel

AGLN Fellow Ferial Haffajee

Special Envoy Lodi Gyari

Vietnamese Ambassador H.E. Le Cong Phungat a March 2008 roundtable

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PhilanthroPy Seminar aimS for Global imPactIn late July, a small group of leading philanthropists gathered in aspen to examine the role of philanthropy in their lives and to learn how they might give more strate-gically. It was the third annual aspen philanthropy seminar, and this year’s seminar featured former us secretary of state and Institute trustee Madeleine Albright in conversation with Institute Vp for philanthropy and society and Global philanthropy Forum president Jane Wales about the historical shifts that have influenced how gov-ernments incorporate philanthropy into their efforts for peace and justice. Michael Edwards, former director of Governance and Civil society at the Ford Foundation, and Jacqueline Khor, managing director of Imprint Capital advisors and former associate director of program Venture Investments at the Rockefeller Foundation, also held a provocative discussion on philanthropic strategy. the 2009 philanthropy seminar will take place on July 28–31, 2009, in aspen. For information, visitwww.aspeninstitute.org/nspp.

Sen. Chuck Hagel, Obama foreign policy advisor Susan Rice, and former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs R. Nicholas Burns

US Foreign Policy: Are Our Tools Outdated?over five days in august, nearly 60 aspen strategy Group members and work-shop participants took a hard look at the institutions that make up the foreign policy and national security establishment of the united states, asking whether the government is configured for success in today’s complex world. by assessing these instruments and institutions of american power, the strategy group — a high-level, bipartisan body co-chaired by General Brent Scowcroft and Joseph Nye, Jr., former head of the national Intelligence Council — hopes to provide greater context for a new administration on how the us government succeeds and, perhaps more importantly, where it falls down. the report from this meeting will be released in 2009.

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InstItute honoRs peteRson, MayeRBarbara Walters will moderate a conversation with Peter G. Peterson, senior chairman and co-founder of The Blackstone Group, and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright at the Institute’s 25th Annual Awards Dinner on November 6, at the Plaza Hotel ballroom in New York City. This year’s quarter-century celebra-tion will honor Peterson with the Corporate Achievement Award and outgoing Institute Chairman William E. Mayer with the Henry Crown Leadership Award, and will present the first annual John P. McNulty Prize, worth $100,000, to a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network, based on the impact of his or her leadership project. The dinner is co-chaired by Institute trustee Mercedes Bass and her husband, Sid R. Bass, Institute trustee Anne Welsh McNulty, and incoming Board Chairman Robert K. Steel and his wife, Gillian. For more infor-mation, visit www.aspeninstitute.org/awardsdinner.

New Series Highlights DC LeadershipOn October 31, DC Schools Chan-cellor Michelle Rhee talked with Walter Isaacson and an invited group of thought leaders about her bold and often controversial strategy for improving the District’s struggling public school system. It was the sec-ond installment of the Washington Leadership Series, a new program at the Institute’s DC headquarters designed to bring prominent local and national officials, business leaders, scholars, and others together to discuss critical national and international issues through a local lens. DC Mayor Adrian Fenty kicked off the series in February 2008, and the season will end with a late-November appear-ance by new Washington Post Media CEO Katharine Weymouth about her plans for the Post in the rapidly changing media landscape. The invitation-only series is made possible with funding from Institute supporters Michelle Smith and Liz Dubin; it will continue in 2009.

Seven hundred and fifty right arms rose in dramatic arcs toward the ceiling of the Greenwald Pavilion, then dropped, almost in unison, to 750 foreheads. Seven hundred and fifty legs slid forward, then retracted noiselessly. A few more surprisingly synchronized and graceful movements, a few counts of awed silence, and the crowd broke into raucous applause and 750 ear-to-ear grins.

It was opening night of the 2008 Aspen Ideas Festival, and Harman-Eisner Artist-in-Residence Damian Woetzel, freshly retired from a 20-year career as principal dancer at the New York City Ballet, had just taught the audience the opening sequence from George Balanchine’s Serenade. “Watching from the stage as [audience member] Justice Sandra Day O’Connor followed my mini-lesson was pretty memorable,” laughs Woetzel.

Founded in 2006, the Artist-in-Residence program integrates leading artists into the work of the Institute. “The arts entertain us, of course, and that in itself has value,” says Woetzel. “But they also mirror us and show what we have achieved throughout the ages; they are in a sense the chronicle of us. At the Institute, where so much time and energy are spent for betterment of all kinds, the arts can serve as an essential element for both inspiration and education.” Previous artists have included play-wright and actor Anna Deavere Smith, now an Institute trustee; acclaimed classical stage director Stephen Wadsworth; and opera singer Jessye Norman.

During his time at the Institute, Woetzel also offered a special discussion and demonstration on the iconic American

Peterson Mayer Walters Albright

Damian Woetzel at the 2008 Aspen Ideas Festival

choreographer (and his mentor) Jerome Robbins, participated in a Socrates Society seminar, attended late July’s symposium on Tibetan art and culture featuring the Dalai Lama, and even taught a group of Ideas Festival attendees the opening dance number from West Side Story. “It’s impossible to define where learning stops and starts at the Institute,” says Woetzel. “Whether I was talking with Tibetan monks or teaching dance steps, or reading texts by Plato and Thucydides, the whole time was enlightening — and the Ideas Festival is the ultimate banquet of inspiration; I find myself using what I learned there every day.”

To watch Woetzel’s discussion and demonstration on Jerome Robbins, visit www.aifestival.org/ideasfest.

Adrian Fenty

Cultivating the South Pacific’s BestIn summer 2008, the Council of Women World Leaders hosted six highly accomplished women from the south pacific at harvard univer-sity’s Kennedy school of Govern-ment for the third annual emerging Women Leaders program. these Fellows attended an executive edu-cation program, “Leaders in devel-opment,” designed to equip them with the skills to pursue economic reform in their home countries. this year’s distinguished group included Ethel Sigimanu, permanent secre-tary of Ministry of Women, youth and Children’s affairs of solomon Islands; Palanitina Tupuimatagi Toelupe, Ceo of Ministry of health of samoa; Laeimau Tanuvasa-Savea, Ceo of Computer services, Ltd., of samoa; Dominica Abo, executive director of anglicare stopaIds of papua new Guinea; Jennifer Wate, executive director of solomon Islands develop-ment trust of solomon Islands; and Barbara Toiya, programme manager of Voluntary service overseas of papua new Guinea. the Council is currently working with the program’s funder, new Zealand’s international aid and development agency nZaId, to evaluate the program for renewal. prime Minister and Council Member Helen Clark sponsors this program.

aLL the RIGht MoVes 2008 Artist-in-Residence Damian Woetzel

Turning Over A New Leafas of this issue, The Aspen Idea is now printed on fSc-certified paper, a stock that comes from forests that the forest Stewardship council has deemed are managed in an environmentally responsible, socially beneficial, and economically viable way. and the words you are reading were printed in state of the art, environmentally friendly ink with a high renewable-resource content that includes cottonseed, vernonia, sunflower, tung, linseed, and canola oils in addition to soy.

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New Commission Tackles Communicationat its first convening last June in Washington, dC, the Knight Commission on the Information needs of Communities in a democracy became the first major national initiative of its type in more than 40 years. the goal of the Commission, a collaboration between the Institute’s Communications and soci-ety program and the John s. and James L. Knight Foundation, “is to articulate the information needs of communities in the united states; determine where we are today; and propose public policy that will encourage solutions,” says Alberto Ibarguen, president and Ceo of the John s. and James L. Knight Foundation. Led by co-chairs former us solicitor General Ted Olson and Google Vice president Marissa Mayer, Commission members — including former Los Angeles Times editor John Carroll, naaCp president-elect Benjamin Jealous, and nike Foundation Managing director Lisa MacCallum — addressed the integration of technology, the future of community information, economic sustainability, and the changing media landscape at this first meeting. over the next few months, the Commission will hold three public hearings across the country and joint commission meetings, where it will listen to ideas and testimony from citizens, leaders, and government officials in various communities and on the Internet. For more information on the commission, visit www.knightcomm.org.

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… and in DCAt the US Chamber of Commerce’s Washington, DC, headquarters on October 14, Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad promoted private sector investment in Palestinian businesses as a cru-cial piece of the peace-making puzzle. The Pales-tinian Business and Investment Forum, convened by the US-Palestinian Partnership and the US Chamber of Commerce, also featured Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Robert M. Kimmitt, Deputy Secretary of Commerce John J. Sullivan, General Jim Jones, and UPP Co-Chairs Case Foundation CEO Jean Case and American Task Force on Palestine Presi-dent Ziad Asali. Ventures presented at the event included some of the top job-creation projects exhibited in May at the Palestine Invest-ment Conference in Bethlehem.

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Thinking Globally in DCIn its spring 2008 season, the Washington, DC-based Aspen Roundtable Series fea-tured some of the area’s most prominent authors and foreign policy experts. David Rothkopf, visiting scholar at the Carn-egie Endowment for International Peace, talked about his most recent publication, Superclass: The Global Power Elite and the World They Are Making. Institute trustee and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright fielded questions about her latest book, Memo to the President Elect: How We Can Restore America’s Reputation and Leadership; and Washington Post foreign affairs reporter Robin Wright discussed the challenges that the US faces in estab-lishing stability in the Middle East. To kick off the fall chapter of the series, the Institute hosted US Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy James Glass-man, Stuart Rothenberg of the Rothenberg Political Report, and Amy Walter, editor in chief of National Journal’s The Hotline.

Steady Growth in Palestine A mere year after the summer 2007 launch of the Institute’s Middle East Investment Initiative, its loan guarantee program has already signed on six partner banks and helped secure 29 loans worth an average of $188,448 each. These loans, estimated to generate 311 new jobs, aid regular Palestinians, such as the dairy farmer who — thanks to a loan that allowed him to increase his herd by almost 50 percent and purchase much-needed equipment — can now supply milk, yogurt, and other food to local consumers. The Initiative, headed up by Berl Bernhard, is a collaboration among the Institute, the Overseas Private Invest-ment Corporation, and the Palestinian Investment Fund, and is dedicated to creating a more prosperous economic, political, and socially secure future for Palestinians.

Women Learn Leadership First-Handthere is no better way to study the intersection of gender and leader-ship than to observe influential policymakers in action. that’s why the Council of Women World Lead-ers’ Fellowship program — cre-ated to prepare women and men for effective leadership — sent female graduate students from harvard and Columbia to spend the summer in government bureaus, philanthropic foundations, and policy institutions in 2008. through placements at the oscar arias Foundation for peace and human progress in san Jose, Costa Rica; the Women’s Leadership program at the World economic Forum; and the albright Group in Washington, dC, among others, the Fellows gained a deeper understanding of the issues, including gender policy concerns, facing leaders. the Coun-cil plans to expand the program by incorporating a third university and initiating a student Fellows pro-gram focused on women leaders in public health.

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hope Runs high in bethlehemAddressing a crowd of more than 1,500 at the first-ever Palestine Investment Con-ference, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad announced that some $1.4 billion in deals involving Palestinian businesses had been generated at the historic event. Held May 21–23, 2008, in Bethlehem, the conference, which was established to help create jobs and stimulate the Palestinian economy, highlighted opportunities in the

financial, agriculture, ICT, infrastructure, manufacturing, and tourism sectors. Work by the Institute’s US-Palestinian Partnership helped bring companies like Cisco, Intel, Marriott, and Coca-Cola to the table. Palestin-ian President Mahmoud Abbas spoke to the group, and UPP Chairman and Institute CEO Walter Isaacson, along with Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Robert M. Kimmitt, led a high-level US delegation to the event. Booz Allen Hamilton provided pro bono support.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas

Salam Fayyad and Condoleezza Rice

The Washington Post’s Robin Wright

Do judges have the expertise to rule on national security issues and electoral disputes? And do they even have the authority to do so? These were just two of the many tough questions that a diverse group of international judges and scholars debated during the recent seminar, “In Times of Crisis, Can We Trust the Courts?” jointly held by the Institute’s Justice and Society Program and the Foundation for Law, Justice, and Society (affiliated with Oxford University) in Aspen in July. Notable participants included Justice Rosalie Abella of the Canadian Supreme Court; British scholars A.W. Brian Simpson, Dan Butt, and Denis Galligan; former US congressman and federal judge Abner Mikva; ACLU Legal Director Steve Shapiro; and General Joseph Hoar (ret.). Their dialogue will lead to several policy papers, available in December on the Foundation’s website, www.fljs.org.

Crisis and the Courts

LeadInG ChanGe, one sIp at a tIMe

to Central america Leadership Initia-tive Fellow Luis Miguel Castillo, vice president of the Central american beverage Corporation, hope for Guatemala’s poor may come in a bottle. For his leadership project — a requirement for all aspen Global Leadership network members — he has spearheaded the development of a nutritious, low-cost beverage to be sold all over Guatemala, where mal-nutrition rates are among the world’s highest. the drink is being formu-lated for the nutritional needs of both children (ages 3 to 15) and pregnant women, and the company is working hard to lower production costs (the goal is a retail price of approximately 1.5 Guatemalan Quetzales, or about 18 cents) and to minimize the prod-uct’s environmental impact by using returnable glass bottles. Castillo plans to have the juice-based drink ready for production in early 2009, and he intends initially to distribute about 50,000 cases a month in Gua-temala, ideally creating a business model that can be replicated in other countries. the Global alliance for Improved nutrition and the Interna-tional development bank are part-ners in the effort.

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Condoleezza Rice, Walter Isaacson, and trustees Berl Bernhard, and Bill Mayer

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The Institute and National Geographic will join forces for a second time in Aspen March 25–28, 2009, for the Aspen Environment Forum. The public Forum will fea-ture 100-plus speakers — environmental scientists, econo-mists, scholars, journalists, policymakers, and business leaders — who will all focus exclusively on energy. Panel discussions and presentations, united under the theme “Powering the Planet: Energy for the Long Run,” will take a critical look at the world’s energy supply and demand, energy extraction and use, the most promising innovation and technologies in the field, energy efficiency and conser-vations, and much more. The three days promise plenty of debate, opportunities to interact with speakers, and action-oriented dialogue. And as they did for the inaugural Forum in 2008, the Institute and National Geographic will team up with the city of Aspen to minimize the event’s environ-mental impact. For more information or to register, visit www.aspenenvironment.org.

The Institute and for a second time in Aspen March 25–28, 2009, for the Aspen Environment Forum. The public Forum will fea-ture 100-plus speakers — environmental scientists, econo-mists, scholars, journalists, policymakers, and business leaders — who will all focus exclusively on energy. Panel discussions and presentations, united under the theme “Powering the Planet: Energy for the Long Run,” will take a critical look at the world’s energy supply and demand, energy extraction and use, the most promising innovation and technologies in the field, energy efficiency and conser-vations, and much more. The three days promise plenty of debate, opportunities to interact with speakers, and action-oriented dialogue. And as they did for the inaugural Forum in 2008, the Institute and up with the city of Aspen to minimize the event’s environ-mental impact. www.aspenenvironment.org

KUDOS FOR GREEN ACTIONThe Aspen Institute Energy and Environment Awards were launched in 2007 by members of the Aspen Global Leadership Network to recognize and reward those making concrete contributions to the innovation, implementation, and communication of energy and environmental solutions. This year, a new award — Visual Art & Design — will join the original set (Corporate Energy Generation, Corporate Energy Efficiency, Government, Individual Thought Leadership, and NGO). “We were thrilled with the response we received in the first year of the awards,” says Henry Crown Fellow Lucy P. Marcus, CEO of Marcus Venture Consulting and a board member of the Awards. “We continue to strive to ensure that the awards draw attention to those acting as leaders, cata-lysts, and educators in addressing energy and environmental problems and solu-tions around the world.” The winners will be honored at a special awards dinner during the Aspen Environment Forum in March 2009. Additional details and last year’s winners can be found at www.aspeneeawards.org.

John Podesta

In the most recent installments of the monthly Alma and Joseph Gildenhorn Book Series, the Institute’s DC headquar-ters hosted a range of prominent authors for a candid discussion and book signing. The spring concluded with talks by histo-rian Sean Wilentz, who detailed the rise of Ronald Reagan in his new book, The Age of Reagan: A History, 1974–2008, and Julia Reed, contributing editor to Newsweek and senior writer at Vogue, who explored char-acters and stories of pre- and post-Katrina New Orleans as revealed in The House on First Street: My New Orleans Story. In

the fall, former Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister Marwan Muasher discussed his latest book, The Arab Center: The Prom-ise of Moderation; Center for American Progress President John Podesta spoke about The Power of Progress: How America’s Progressives Can (Once Again) Save Our Economy, Our Climate, and Our Country; and former George Washington Uni-versity President Stephen Trachtenberganswered questions about Big Man on Campus: A University President Speaks Out on Higher Education. For more infor-mation on the series, contact Bethany Lee at (202) 736-3848.

…and in the Big AppleThe fall season of the Institute’s New York City book talk series launched on Septem-ber 10 at the Yale Club with a tour of The Second World, Parag Khanna’s provocative book examining the growing competition facing the US to shape world order. Lane Greene, international correspondent for The Economist, joined Khanna, a senior research fellow and director of the Global Governance Initiative at the New America Foundation, in conversation. For informa-tion about this series, contact Sarah Rien-hoff at (212) 895-8006.

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Arts & Ideas: Enchantment, Film, and PoliticsNow in its third year, the Insti-tute’s Aspen-based Arts & Ideas series featured a range of top-ics connecting varied art forms with important issues. Iconic documentary filmmaker Ken Burns discussed his distinctive history-as-art approach, while young playwrights talked about taking inspiration from cur-rent affairs in sessions open to the entire community. Societyof Fellows donors were offered exclusive seminars on the theme of enchantment in vari-ous artworks, the storytelling skills of Hans Christian Ander-sen, and political ambition in Shakespeare’s Richard II and Machiavelli’s The Prince. The grand finale of the 2008 series will take place in December: a three-day seminar addressing the Renaissance period and Leonardo da Vinci, the original Renaissance man.

ENVIRONMENT FORUM

takes on energy

T. Boone Pickens

Pickens: no more foreign oilHoping to wean the country of its appe-tite for foreign oil, T. Boone Pickens, the founder and chairman of BP Capital Management, sat down with Institute President and CEO Walter Isaacsonin August to lay out a blueprint to his revolutionary “Pickens Plan.” Under the proposal, which he presented to both Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama prior to the Novem-ber 2008 election, America would move to a natural gas and wind-power market. To watch the full inter -view, visit www.aspeninstitute.org/audiovideo.

Awards Board Member Neil Jacobstein, with Jim Boyd of the California Energy Commission, at the 2007 ceremony

Book Banter in Washington…

The future Paepcke auditorium as seen from the Mayer Patio

The Institute has embarked on a carefully considered renovation of the 45-year-old Walter Paepcke Memorial Building on its Aspen Meadows campus. The aim is to remain true to the plans of its architect, Bauhaus artist Herbert Bayer, while also updating the building to match the Institute’s 21st-century demands. Thanks to major contributions from Leonard and Evelyn Lauder, Stewart andLynda Resnick, and Stefan Edlis and Gael Neeson, an additional donation of $200,000 from Bonnie and Tom McCloskey, and the chairmanship of the fundraising committee by Institute trustee Melva Bucksbaum, the Institute has already surpassed $8 million of the $12 million needed. Construction, which will include an expansion of the auditorium as well as remodels of the library and gallery, is expected to be complete in time for the Institute’s 60th anniversary in 2010.

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Philip Merrill

The World at Wye’s DoorstepIn late 2008 and early 2009, Aspen Wye Fellows (Institute donors in the Chesapeake Bay area) will get a chance to explore the world through diverse discussion-based events. This season at the Institute’s Wye River Campus will begin with a roundtable featuring Henry Crown Fellow John Wood, CEO of Room to Read, and a conversation with Sudanese “Lost Boy” Ishmael Beah about his

memoir, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. And Janu-ary brings Slate politi-cal editor John Dick-erson. Launched in 2006, the Wye Fellows program has already brought a number of international diplo-mats, policy experts, authors, and academ-ics to Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Pre-vious guests have included Institute

trustee Queen Noor of Jordan; Nabil Fahmy, Egypt’s ambassador to the United States; former Secretary of State and Institute trustee Madeleine Albright; Clark Kent Ervin, the first Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security; former Mary-land Lt. Governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend; and oceanographer Sylvia Earle. For more infor-mation about joining the Aspen Wye Fellows, visit www.aspeninstitute.org/aspenwyefellows.

In the Works at Wyethe aspen Wye campus, nestled near the chesapeake bay on maryland’s eastern Shore, will have a brand-new seminar build-ing in the near future thanks to a $1.5 million gift from the merrill family foundation in honor of Philip Merrill, the late Washingto-nian publisher, public servant, and institute trustee. the merrill family Pavilion will be located between the river and houghton houses and, with an outdoor deck area with capacity for 40 people, will provide a glorious setting for outdoor discussions and reflection. the gift will also include a scenic “Western civilization” trail that will meander near the Wye river and include benches and signs featuring significant quotes from lead-ing Western thinkers.

HeALTH OF THe NATiONIn the year leading up to the 2008 election, the Aspen Health Steward-ship Project queried the presidential candidates about their health care plans, analyzed their responses, and released its ten principles for health care reform. The bipartisan initia-tive — co-chaired by former New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman; Mark Ganz, President and CEO of Regence BlueCross

BlueShield; Elizabeth Teisberg, asso-ciate professor of the Darden Gradu-ate School of Business and co-author of Redefining Health Care; and Joe Hogan, former president and CEO of GE Healthcare — found gaps in each of the candidates’ plans, includ-ing a failure to consider fully the role of patients as drivers of their own health. “The stewardship project picks up where the insurance debate leaves off and aims to give Americans the tools they need to take charge of their own health,” said Dr. Michelle McMurry, who leads the Insti-tute’s Health, Biomedical Science, and Society Program. The candi-dates’ full responses and the proj-ect’s ten principles are available at www.aspenhealthstewardship.com.

Ishmael Beah

Christine Todd Whitman

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Building Markets, Building StatesThis fall, the Institute opened its doors to its newest policy program, the Market Building Initiative. Based out of the Institute’s DC headquarters, the program — led by Dr. Ashraf Ghani, former finance minister of Afghanistan and chief advisor to Pres-ident Karzai during the Interim Administration, and Clare Lockhart, UN advisor in Afghanistan and advisor to the Government of Afghanistan during the Transitional Administration — will focus on market creation in weakened states. With an initial application in Afghanistan and a few other countries, the program will eventually provide a scalable framework that can be applied to a range of countries from South Asia to Africa that currently constitute an “arc of crisis” and are at the center of a number of global challenges such as poverty, disease, and terrorism.

Ashraf Ghani

Teaching-quality consultant Charlotte Danielson and Fred Frelow of the Ford Foundation

Helping Teachers and Principals Leadas part of a multi-year push to help school districts and policymakers cultivate more effective teachers and school leaders, the institute’s education & Society Program focused its 2008 summer workshop on teacher development and retention, and leadership by school principals. led by co-chairs Bob Schwartz, academic Dean at the harvard Graduate School of education, and Mike O’Keefe, President of the min-neapolis college of art and Design, the July workshop on the institute’s aspen campus brought executive teams from the atlanta, boston, and Denver school systems together with policy analysts and education leaders for a week of dialogue. Papers inspired by the discussions will be made available at www.aspeninstitute.org/education.

Plans are underway to build a new outdoor pavilion on the Wye River campus.

a chilling effect: Perhaps it was a particularly heated discussion. While lunching with institute ceo Walter Isaacson in the aspen meadows restaurant on a warm summer day, institute friend David Bonderman, founder of texas Pacific Group, decided he’d like to help the institute “chill out” — with a donation that will fund the installation of air conditioning in the meadows reception center just in time for the busy 2009 summer season.M

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Senegal’s Minister of Health Safiatou Thiam with former President of Ireland Mary Robinson

S H A R I N G E x P E R T I S E O N G L O B A L H E A LT H Ethiopia, Mali, Nepal, Senegal, and Sierra Leone became the first participants in the Ministerial Leadership Initiative for Global Health’s technical assistance program. Open to lower- and middle-income countries, the program supports ministers of health and their senior staff by offering them critical data and expertise in the public health field. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Ethiopian Minister of Health, said the project “provides the opportunity to strengthen the Ministry’s capacity by providing top-notch experts.” The program is funded by a four-year, $8.7 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and is a project by the Institute partnership Realizing Rights, the Health Financing Task Force, and the Institute’s Council of Women World Leaders. For updates on each country’s progress, visit www.ministerial-leadership.org.

M c N u lt y P r i z e r e wa r d s i M Pac tAt the 2008 Aspen Ideas Festival, Institute Trustee Anne Welsh McNulty and her children unveiled the five finalists for the inaugural $100,000 John P. McNulty Prize, created to recognize high-impact leadership by members of the Aspen Global Leadership Network. This year’s finalists are Patrick Awuah, who founded Ashesi University in Ghana; Mehrdad Baghai, the creator of High Resolves Initiative, a hands-on educational program in Australia; William Bynum, who established Hope Community Credit Union to serve the “unbanked” of the Mississippi Delta Region; Sylvia Gereda, the author of a special weekly magazine insert edited by teenagers that features cover stories on young community leaders; and Jordan Kassalow, the founder of VisionSpring, which delivers affordable reading glasses to some of the world’s poorest and hardest-to-reach com-munities. A distinguished panel of judges — Virgin Group chairman and philanthropist Sir Richard Branson; Mary Robinson, the first female President of Ireland; and Olara Otunnu, the president of LBL Foundation for Children and former UN Under-Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict — will select the winner, which will be announced in November at the Institute’s annual dinner in New York. For more information, visit www.mcnultyprize.org.

Teach Entrepreneurship, Keep Kids in Schoolexactly two weeks after the 2008

elections, the Institute’s youth entre-

preneurship strategy Group will

release its public policymakers’

action Guide. Focused on find-

ing ways to offer entrepreneur-

ship education to more young

people — which the group sees as

a critical tool to keep kids in school

and to foster success — the guide

will make concrete recommenda-

tions to policymakers on the federal,

state, and local levels. “We know that

entrepreneurship engages urban

children in school, and in a time

of great drop-out rates, we strive

diligently to be part of the solution to

this great threat to our country,” said

Julie Silard Kantor, national Vice

president for the national Founda-

tion for teaching entrepreneurship.

the strategy group is an initiative of

the Institute, the national Founda-

tion for teaching entrepreneurship,

and e*tRade bank.

A New Approach to ending Global PovertyIn 2006, a group of development and business experts began gathering at the Institute, driven by their shared conviction that fostering small (and not-so-small) businesses in developing countries is the key to ending global poverty. Since then, they have supported over 5,600 businesses through the investment of over $450 million and mobilization of $5 billion in additional capital. After their July 2008 convening at the Institute’s Aspen campus, six top global foundations committed to fund the group’s work formally, making the Aspen Network for Development Entrepreneurs an official policy program of the Institute. “We’re trying to build a movement — so that if the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs is born in a developing country, he or she will have the funding and talent to create a world-class busi-ness,” said Andrew Stern, a partner at Dalberg, a global consulting firm focused on development, which partnered with the Institute and the nonprofit Acumen Fund to initiate the project.

Awuah Baghai Bynum Gereda Kassalow

Business Fellowsthanks to seed funding from the fetzer foundation, the institute’s business & Society Program is cre-ating a new fellowship program. rooted in the belief that business can grow in ways that produce both financial results and social well-being, the fellows will consider the role of innovation in leadership and work together to conceive of and execute values-based business plans. the first class will meet in the spring of 2009.

Changing Women’s LivesWhile working to preserve the Binsar forest region near the Indo-Tibetan border at the foot of the Panchachuli Himalayas, India Leadership Initiative fellow Mukti Datta noticed that the region’s women worked under punishing conditions and, at times, lived under the rule of abusive husbands. Searching for a way to empower these women and offer them financial independence, Datta began teaching traditional weaving techniques. Fifteen years later, the program — now called Pancha-chuli Women Weavers and run in conjunction with Institute supporter Dena Kaye — operates in four districts in India and just started a three-year project supported by the government of Uttarakhand to train 1,500 more women. Accord-ing to Datta, women who once “lived lives of monotony, drudgery, and oppression have emerged as a social, political, and economic force to reckon with. They are truly empowered.”

Local Panchachuli women

W I N T E R 2 0 0 8 / 2 0 0 928 T h E A s p E N I d E A

insights&ideas

The Economics of Communications

With the US economy faltering, attendees of the 23rd Annual Communications Policy Conference in Aspen examined how investment in the communications sector might stimulate the economy more broadly. The group, which included FCC Commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate, Entertainment Software Association President and CEO Michael Gallagher, and Cisco Systems’ Robert Pepper, brainstormed a number of ideas, including the creation of “smart grids” — power grids that use state-of-the-art technology to provide more reliable and efficient energy. The recommendations will be summarized in a report by the Institute’s Communications & Society program and made available to the next administra-tion as it begins developing its communications policy.

Henry Crown Fellows Converse Across the CountryExtending the discourse begun in the Aspen Seminar, Henry Crown Fellows in the Chicago area convened this fall for a series of discussions and debates. At a September breakfast — the fourth of its kind organized by Henry Crown Fellow and Ariel Investments Vice Chairman Charlie Bobrinskoy — more than 160 people came together to consider Machiavelli in small group settings moder-ated by ten Chicago-based Fellows (the three preceding breakfasts delved into Aristotle, Plato, Hobbes, and Locke). In an evening exchange in October led by Institute Vice Chairman Lester Crown, Henry Crown Fellow and Ariel Capital Management LLC President and CEO John W. Rogers, and Institute trustee and WomenOnCall.org founder and President Margot Pritzker, Fellows delib-erated about the role of values in philanthropy. In November and December, Fellows in the New York City and Washington, DC, areas will get their chance to join the conversation at their own regional gatherings.

Better securing the HomelandThroughout the past year, gov-ernment offi-cials and home-land security experts met in cities across the country — New Y o r k , L o s Angeles, Chi- c a g o , a n d H o u s t o n — i n roundt ab le s o rganized by the Institute’s Homeland Secu-rity Initiative. Drawing upon thei r exper iences , par t ici -pants — including TSA Federal Security Director Lawrence Fet-ters, Illinois Terrorism Task Force Chairman Michael Chamness, and Erroll Southers of the Uni-versity of Southern California’s Homeland Security Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events — shared best practices, identified gaps in preparedness, and offered recom-mendations. “If the nation is pre-pared to the maximum practical degree for the next 9-11 and Hur-ricane Katrina, we can limit the consequences of such disasters to the minimum possible degree,” said Clark Kent Ervin, first Inspec-tor General of the Department of Homeland Security and Director of the Homeland Security Initia-tive. The final roundtable will be held in New Orleans in Decem-ber, with a report for the next administration following in 2009. The series is supported by a grant from the Ford Foundation, as well as funding by the Rockefeller Foundation, the McCormick Foundation, and the Houston Endowment.

A discussion at the 23rd Annual Communications Policy Conference

Lawrence Fetters and Erroll Southers

Edd

ie H

on

Business Symposium Thinks Long-TermOn September 17, investors, analysts, and operating com-pany executives gathered to examine the best methods behind the oft-practiced, and recently criticized, art of providing guidance to investors on a company’s projected future earnings. Former SEC Chairman and DLJ founder William Donaldson and Robert Pozen, chairman of MFS Investment Management and former vice chairman of Fidelity Investments, keynoted the event. “Quarterly earnings guidance plays a prominent role in generating short-term market pressure and a penchant for short-term thinking among both corporate managers and money managers. This ‘short-termism’ threatens to undermine our economic future,” said Donaldson. The event, hosted by Bloomberg LLP at its headquarters, was run by the Institute’s Business & Society program in partnership with the Business Roundtable, Center for Financial Market Integrity, National Investor Relations Institute, the Center for Economic Development, and the Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness.

Aspen Health Forum: July 24–27, 2009

Is health a right or a privilege? Attainable or inaccessible? Political or personal? Join the Aspen Institute and Time magazine as we convene more than 100 leaders at the Aspen Health Forum. Ses-sions will include the science of sex, food for a new world, the mysteries of the mind, boomer medicine, and “body 2.0.” Join the debate as we address the most important health question of all: “What

does health mean to you?” For more information, contact Noah Bartolucci at (202) 736-2536 or noah.bartolucci@aspeninstitute.org.

Aspen Health ForumDirector Dr. Michelle McMurry