(Neil Kinnock , Chair of the British Council, with members of the Transatlantic Network 2020 in Berlin, March 2008. Photo: Peter Adamik)

Transatlantic Network 2020: Four new members from Germany

100 outstanding young North Americans and Europeans will gather in Belfast on Sunday, September 28, for the Inaugural Summit of Transatlantic Network 2020, an initiative by the British Council to unite the next generation of global leaders and influencers and create new collaboration on world challenges.

Boris Moshkovits is the project director of the Russian Jewish Museum in Moscow. Concurrently he is publishing the international culture magazine "Berliner.“ He has been active in the Jewish community for the last 20 years in youth counselling and cultural affairs. As a member of the “Roundtable for Jewish-Turkish dialogue” of the American Jewish Committee, he is actively contributing to the mutual understanding of minorities in Germany. Born in Odessa, in the times of the Soviet Union, his family immigrated to Israel and later to Germany, where he grew up. He has worked as an editor and publisher in Milan, Moscow and New York. Currently Boris is living between Moscow and Berlin.

Victoria B. Robinson is a writer, poet and activist currently living in Hamburg. She has an M.A. in American Studies and Public Law from the University of Hamburg. She is a founding member of the Black European Women's Council where she represents the Initiative for Black people in Germany. She is an integral part of the Black Community Hamburg and an Advisory Board Member of the Black Women in Europe Social Media Group. She conducts talks, lectures and seminars about the representation of Black people in German media. She has been blogging about issues affecting Black people in Germany for more than two years.

Arn Sauer is an M.A. graduate of Humboldt University in Berlin, and a Research Associate of the Simone de Beauvoir Institute at Concordia University in Montreal. He has also studied at Bristol University and at the Università degli Studi di Milano. His current dissertation research, conducted in collaboration with Status of Women Canada, compares the state of gender equality policy tools in Canada and Europe and explores the potential for diversity analysis as part of gender impact assessment in (post)modern policy analysis. Currently based in Montreal, Arn was an invited speaker at the conference on gender policy analysis by the GenderKompetenzZentrum in Berlin in 2008. He is a long-term activist and artist in the Berlin and Montreal transgender and queer community.

The transatlantic relationship has been one of the world’s most important in addressing political, cultural and social issues, yet it is currently frayed. In research commissioned by the British Council in January 2008, Europeans and North Americans gave a generally negative assessment of the effectiveness of current  uropean-North American cooperation on many key issues. However, strong majorities of European and North American respondents expressed a desire for a closer transatlantic relationship. The Transatlantic Network 2020 responds to this desire for closer cooperation by building longterm, people-to-people relationships across the Atlantic.

Jacqui Allan, who heads the Transatlantic Network 2020 programme at the British Council says, “We believe that the transatlantic relationship matters. It is crucial that we not take the relationship for granted; we need to continually invest in new connections because the nations that make up North America and Europe are changing.”

The Network’s 100 members from 22 countries were selected by the British Council as emerging leaders who are on track to be in positions of global influence in the year 2020. They represent both continents’ changing demographics, bringing diversity of race, nationality, gender, income, profession, religion, sexual orientation, and educational background. Among the members are an LAPD cop focused on gang violence prevention, a Turkish journalist who writes on Islam and the Modern World, a Kosovo activist in post-war civil society projects, a scientist working on an HIV vaccine and the youngest elected member of the Welsh Assembly.

“Our generation and the people born in the seventies, eighties and nineties can change the world and we must change the world,” says Ryan Allis, a TN2020 member who was named one of BusinessWeek’s Top 25 Entrepreneurs under 25.

At the Inaugural Summit, held September 28 – October 4 in Belfast and Dublin, the members will participate in a series of workshops, debates, lectures, and creative exercises under the theme “transatlantic conflict and cooperation.” They will hear from Irish President Mary McAleese, UK Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs David Miliband and Arianna Huffington, Editor-in-Chief and Founder of the Huffington Post. Each member will develop an action plan, individually or as part of a group, that brings home best practices and ideas from the Summit to his or her own community.

Events at the Inaugural Summit will be posted on the British Council’s website through blog postings, twitter feeds, videos, and photos. Please follow the updates at the Virtual Summit on www.britishcouncil.org/tn2020, or at the Network’s Facebook page www.facebook.com/pages/Transatlantic-Network-2020/8874393741, which has become an online hub for information and discussion on transatlantic issues.