2020 presidential and congressional candidates are taking the field and looking for themes that will galvanize their campaigns in 2019. There will be strong competition for votes among Republicans, Democrats, and independents.

Regardless of which political stripes win at the ballot box, the president and Congress taking office in January 2021 will be faced with old constraints and new opportunities, including immediately having to deal with the FY2022 budget. The political pressure cooker will include the need to address a historic level of public debt and stem budget deficits while addressing neglected domestic priorities, ensuring the national defense, and meeting global challenges.

In the development arena, issues that are drawing attention include the growing prevalence of state fragility and violence, climate change, the unprecedented level of refugee populations, China’s entry as a major development actor, and how to address development issues such as education, youth, women’s empowerment, sustainable infrastructure, and job-friendly growth.

The 16th Brookings Blum Roundtable considered what narrative and practical proposals will not only maintain current levels of U.S. development leadership and investments, which have remained static in recent years, but respond appropriately to rising global challenges.

       

On April 8, the Global Development and Economy program at Brookings and IFC hosted an event to discuss these topics, as well as findings from the IFC report. Following the presentation of the report’s findings, IFC CEO Philippe Le Houérou spoke about his organization’s leveraging role and the fast-changing impact investment landscape. A panel featuring investment firms and scholars of corporate responsibility followed. Global’s Interim Vice President Homi Kharas moderated the discussion. Afterwards, panelists answered questions from the audience. 

       

The fifteenth Brookings Blum Roundtable will explore challenges to, and opportunities for, U.S. foreign assistance and global leadership. With U.S. government resources for global development now secured, the next steps on redesigning the State Department and USAID are looming, with legislation to create a new development finance agency well advanced.

Other reform options being considered by Congress and the Administration are how the U.S. can best reduce fragility, how it can best use and support multilateral institutions, and how it can compete or collaborate with China on promoting global development. In each of the sessions, participants will share ideas on specific opportunities for U.S. leadership in the development arena.

The agenda topics deal with live policy issues on which participants are engaged. Thus, the discussions could have a direct impact on policy.

       

The book is a collaborative effort with the Japan International Cooperation Agency to identify where we need to reach beyond what has simply worked in the past. The volume draws attention to the emerging challenges of engaging new actors with new approaches. It covers topics ranging from the role of businesses in supporting the SDGs, to how advanced economies can tackle the goals, to reforms that expand women’s opportunities, and many other innovations that are needed to overcome inertia and break through bureaucratic and political hurdles stalling progress.

On July 18, several of the book’s contributors discussed the big ideas that would lead to a departure from business-as-usual and avoid an unsustainable, crowded, brutish future for the world.

       

From August 2-4, the Global Economy and Development Program at Brookings will host the 14th annual Brookings Blum Roundtable, “U.S. Foreign Assistance Under Challenge,” to discuss these issues. It will focus on the challenges presented by the proposed fiscal year 2018 budget and organizational restructuring, along with the intransigency of bringing stability and economic growth to fragile states. Consideration will be given to bilateral and multilateral approaches and working collaboratively with private philanthropy and the private sector. It will consider opportunities to advance and revisit important initiatives and reforms of the past two decades.

The discussion will be guided by three overarching goals: (1) to assess areas of development assistance that are most vulnerable; (2) to discuss whether reforms or other funding sources could mitigate the risks; and (3) to identify policy and advocacy opportunities to minimize damage from budget cuts and strengthen U.S. economic development assets.

       

On April 6, the Global Economy and Development program at Brookings co-hosted a panel discussion along with the United Nations Foundation on the role of the private sector in global sustainable development, with opening remarks from Lord Mark Malloch-Brown. Lord Malloch-Brown chairs the Business and Sustainable Development Commission, which recently released the “Better Business, Better World” report. The report makes the case that, not only do the SDGs need the private sector, but business needs the SDGs too. Specifically, the report argues that sustainable business models could open economic opportunities worth up to $12 trillion and increase employment in the developing world by up to 380 million jobs by 2030.

       

On November 1, Global Economy and Development at Brookings will host a discussion on the role of the private sector in development. Doug McMillon, president and chief executive officer of Walmart International, will offer remarks and join a panel discussion featuring Bruce McNamer, president and chief executive officer of TechnoServe and Brookings nonresident senior fellow Jane Nelson, director of the Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative at Harvard University. Brookings Vice President Kemal Derviş, director of Global Economy and Development, will moderate the discussion.

After the program, the panelists will take audience questions.

       

Building on the momentum generated from the Presidential Summit on Entrepreneurship, planned for April 26 and 27 in Washington, DC, a panel of experts addressed the potential for social entrepreneurship to contribute to human, and especially youth, development in the region. Kemal Derviş, vice president and director of the Global Economy and Development program at Brookings, provided introductory remarks, followed by Tarik Yousef, Brookings nonresident senior fellow and dean of the Dubai School of Government; Sonal Shah, director of White House Office of Social Innovation; and a panel of experts.

After the program, panelists took audience questions.