On September 1-3, Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) in partnership with the Economic Policy Research Center (EPRC) of Georgia held the ON Leadership Forum: The Future of Democratization: Lessons of Building a Modern State in 21st Century-Georgia.
The three day Leadership Forum was supported by Omidyar Network, Open Society Georgia Foundation, the Bank of Georgia and the U.S. Embassy in Tbilisi.
The workshop gathered over 30 regional leaders drawn from Stanford University’s Omidyar Network Leadership Forum from the former Soviet Union together with Stanford faculty, Georgian policymakers and members of the business community to exchange lessons on modern state building.
Stanford University’s leading experts on state building and political reforms – Francis Fukuyama and Erik Jensen moderated the panels on the features of a modern state – including economic growth, rule of law, governance reforms, safety and security. The panels highlighted priority areas of reforms as Georgia moves forward to solidify its democratic gains.
DF Watch, local English language web portal talked to Francis Fukuyama.
Start reading the interview:
Many Georgians are discussing how far Mr Putin will go in his attempt to subdue his neighbor Ukraine. Maybe he will take this important seaport of Mariupol and go to Odessa or even Kiev? What’s your opinion about the outcome of this conflict?
I don’t really have a prediction about this. I think that he set off a dynamic domestically in Russia where it’s very hard for him to back down, and so my assumption has been that he is going to control at least the Russian speaking parts of Ukraine by one means or another. I think the only serious deterrent right now is the fear that if he does occupy Mariupol and that area it will get into a kind of long guerrilla war with the Ukrainians and he may not want to pay that price, but I don’t think that the sanctions or the Western response at this point is really going to be sufficient to stop him. see more