 in closing political space in various parts of the continent. Today's panel is a reflection of how much we at USIP are committed to Africa and to conflict prevention, mitigation, and management on the continent. We believe that while much progress has been made and indeed many African economies are thriving, there is also all too much violence that threatens to constrain economic growth on the continent as well as many other positive developments involving governance, human rights, education, and many other issues related to social well-being. Here at USIP we have a stellar Africa team and it benefits from the deep expertise, relationships, and experience of Ambassador Johnny Carson and Ambassador Princeton Lyman, both of whom are senior advisors here at the Institute, as well as our Vice Chairman, George Moose. All three of them have such distinguished careers that I was asked to tell you that their biographies have been handed out to you on paper because otherwise if I read them we would take up the entire event time, but we have a really terrific team in the three of them. They're joined by a very strong bench of senior program officers and assistants Linda Beshai, David Smock, John Temmon, Elizabeth Murray, Carol McKay, and Emily Fornoff. I think I got everybody. We've got a strong bench. Let's just leave it at that. From Nigeria to South Sudan, USIP is working with political, civic, religious, and traditional leaders. Our projects are seeking to foster negotiation and dialogue skills among existing and also potential peace builders. We're also attempting to work with our partners to incorporate peace studies into institutions of higher learning in various parts of the continent. Our projects apply our research on the most effective tools to prevent election violence, leverage technology to expand the impact of peace messaging and conflict prevention, design national dialogue processes for conflict transformation, and build relationships between communities and the police to solve local problems without needing to resort to violence. Today I'm particularly pleased to introduce our moderator and the important thing about this event is not only is Susan serving as our moderator, this is her debut appearance as our incoming director of our Africa program. We're very pleased to welcome her. Susan currently leads USIP's work on constitution making with our rule of law team and she'll assume the role of director at the beginning of September. Susan brings almost 15 years of experience working on Africa, including almost eight years living and working in Sudan, in South Sudan, in Kenya and South Africa. She brings significant leadership experience, and is recently leading a team of 15 international staff and 60 national staff for the National Democratic Institutes program in Sudan, in the South Sudan. So you're in very good hands. I'd like to turn it over to students. Thank you. Good afternoon everybody, and welcome to this conversation about US policy today for Africa tomorrow. So as Kristen noted, this US Africa summit is a historic opportunity. It is the first time that 50 African heads of states and the chairperson of the African Union have been invited to Washington D.C. The summit is also historic because there will be the first ever US Africa business forum. This will be co-hosted by Bloomberg Philanthropies and the US Department of Commerce. And it will be a day when African leaders, US business leaders sit to focus and discuss trade and investment opportunities on the continent. But the US Africa summit isn't just about political and business leaders. There will also be an opportunity for US and African civil society, diaspora and private sector leaders to come together to talk about issues of governance, issues of transparency, labor, trade and investment through a civil society forum. So in our conversation today, we really wanted to focus on what are the opportunities out of this conversation? How can the US leverage our policy to support growth and investment for Africa tomorrow? And so we're going to work under the broad theme of the US Africa summit which is investing in the next generation. And to look at the three sub-themes under that. I'm not going to go through and introduce our panelists because Kristen's already introduced them. So I think we're going to move right to the conversation and start with the theme of investing in Africa's future. And ask Ambassador Simon, what are the opportunities that the US and Africa should be looking at to support inclusive, sustainable development, economic growth, trade and investment? Thanks very much, Susan. Congratulations on your appointment. Let me start on the economic situation. There's a lot of talk now about Africa being a fastest growing continent. Six of the ten fastest growing countries are in Africa and that's all very good. But there's a new report out from the Africa Center for Economic Transformation headed by the distinguished Canadian economist K. Y. Moko who points out that in terms of transformation, in terms of transforming economies in Africa from largely commodity supplying and exporting economies, very little has changed over 40 years. And if you take three of the six fastest growing countries in Africa, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Rwanda, he puts them near the bottom of countries who are actually transforming their economies. So the point isn't that this growth isn't significant, it is and that there aren't many opportunities. But unless economies transform themselves in terms of broadening their export base, increasing their manufacturing, their productivity and particularly the opportunities for employment and human development, they will not be anywhere truly developed in the next 10 years or 15 years than they've been before. And it's surprising that some of the countries you would expect to be near the top, like Ghana and Botswana are also not transforming themselves. But that isn't all negative. There are a number of things going on in the continent that are very exciting. Nigeria is privatizing the power sector after a long period of time and this opens up opportunities that haven't been there for the country for decades. Rwanda is investing heavily in IT. Burkina Faso, landlocked, poor but not afraid of GMO is now the largest cotton producer on the continent. Ethiopia has taken a number of changes that have produced growth. So as the summit gets underway and the business and investment part of it gets underway, it's not enough to just talk about fast-growing economies. It's what can be done to deepen these growth into transformation. And I think a number of things that Americans or the US is doing are very relevant. Power Africa, obviously very relevant. Health education, extremely important. Feed the future, transforming African agriculture. Again, a major part of transformation. Emphasis on democracy and good governance. And the point is that these issues that they're advanced and the kinds of investment that are promoted, I think will make a major contribution. It's interesting. We'll come back to this connection between the economy and democracy and governance and how those different priorities fit together. But let's turn to the second theme, which is peace and regional stability. Ambassador Moose, I'm wondering what your thoughts are about the long-term solutions to regional conflicts, peacekeeping challenges, and combating transnational threats. What should the summit be focusing on for those issues? Well, let me start by saying congratulations. And also saying that Princeton's outlined, if you will, the positive agenda that we would like to pursue in the future. And this summit will certainly be an opportunity for the administration to showcase programs and initiatives that it has already launched or will be launched in the next couple of weeks to advance that agenda. And we know that many of these things are powerfully important in terms of their ability to have a measurable impact on the welfare of the lives of people in Africa. But I will argue that the dominant reality of Africa at the moment is the reality of violence, of violent conflict and violence in a variety of different ways. And indeed, I would say in my 40 years, and it goes back to my first encounter with Johnny Carson, in my 40 years of dealing with the economy, I have never seen more pervasive violence than we see right now today. And I think that's borne out by statistics. We have, for example, studies that show that currently of the 10 most violent conflicts across the globe, half of those are in Africa. Of the places where the fragility is the greatest and where there is the greatest likelihood of conflict is in Africa. But it's not only true of rebellions and insurrections and terrorism, it's also true in terms of criminality and in terms of other forms of violence, including domestic violence and murder. All of these are prevalent and more importantly the violence is what threatens to undermine all of the progress that we're seeking to achieve in every other sphere. And therefore, unless we find a meaningful way to address that reality of violent conflict and violence more pervasively, we will not have succeeded in moving the needle and advancing our broader goals and objectives for the African continent. Now, let me add to that by saying if there's a second issue that I believe dominates the challenges of Africa, it is the challenge of institutional weakness. And needless to say, those two things are linked. Violence and institutional weakness are two sides of the same coin. On the one hand, institutional weakness has in itself become a driver of conflict. By virtue of the fact that corruption and malfeasance feed grievances which in turn feed the stoke the resistance and sense of grievance among populations. And which in turn are exploited by extremist groups across the continent. At the same time that institutional weakness is a major inhibitor to the capacity of governments to be able to respond in appropriate ways to the violence that is a reality and I think one does not have to look very far in Northern Nigeria or Central African Republic or South Sudan to see that linkage between violence and poor governance. So what then would I wish to see come out of this summit? Well I think first and foremost I would like to see out of this summit clear evidence that not only the United States but the participants probably have prioritized this question of violence and governance and that we are focusing on a strategy, not just a statement but a strategy about how we're going to over time address these challenges of violence and governance and beyond that say that a recognition that these are challenges that are beyond the simple capacities of the United States. Ultimately they're going to take the collective will of the entire international community and so that beyond this summit I would hope that the next summit is going to be one that brings together not only the United States and African leaders at the US and our partners in Europe and indeed why not even China into that conversation about how are we together to assist Africa in dealing with these two enormous threats to its future. So building a little bit on the idea of governance and how this relates to conflict the third theme is on governing for the next generation and I'm wondering Ambassador Carson what do you think the options are to enhance governance to deliver services to citizens to attract and prepare for domestic and foreign investment and to address this institutional issue that Ambassador Moose talked about? Susan thank you very very much for the opportunity to participate this afternoon and congratulations as well on the assumption of your new responsibilities. One of the most challenging discussions at the forthcoming summit will center around the issue of democracy and governance and human rights. Democracy and governance as primary issues have been the highest priority for the Obama administration since coming into office in 2009. Many of you will recall that in July of that year President Obama made his first trip to the continent as President of the United States and speaking before the Ghanaian Parliament he laid out an agenda for US engagement across the continent. The first priority that he talked about was democracy and governance. Strengthening democratic institutions and promoting good governance. Respect for human rights, the fight against corruption not simply holding good elections and holding elections at all but strengthening democratic institutions and in fact one of the more memorable lines from his speech was is that Africa does not need more strong men and Africa needs more strong democratic institutions. That has been a prevailing viewpoint continuously throughout the administration and during the first four years in the White House President Obama was extraordinarily careful about who he invited into the Oval Office and over that first four years only leaders with democratic credentials cross the threshold into the Oval Office. If someone from the continent had not been recently elected in a free and fair contest if they had not already demonstrated their democratic credentials they weren't there and so the number of individuals who came in were all democratic. As Obama also spoke out very very clearly against the excesses, the political excesses of a number of African leaders during those four years. Most famously about Robert Mugabe, one of the three leaders who was not being invited to the summit and the theme of democracy and strengthening of democratic institutions has remained strong. That Ghana speech was also seminal because he pointed out the connections and linkages between democracy and economic growth and he pointed out that strong democracies, capable democracies not only protect the civil liberties and individual rights of citizens, they also protect the corporate rights, they protect the intellectual property rights of citizens as well. Democracy provides a framework for individuals in countries to create and think produce and to be able to keep the things that they produce and move forward and benefit from them. So it's been a constant theme. It was also a theme I might point out in June of 2012 when the administration outlined its new Africa policy, the one that it is implementing right now and there were four principles in that document and the number one principle there too remained strengthening and enhancing democratic institutions, promoting good governance, transparency, accountability, supporting and respecting human rights and fighting corruption. All of this remains a centerpiece. Clearly over the last 25 years, certainly since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, there has been a remarkable uptick across the continent in democracy. As we have seen more countries move towards multi-partyism, towards constitutional rule, towards free and fair elections and greater accountability. But today and the reason why the conversation will be extraordinarily difficult is that African leaders are going to push back. African democracy is not sufficiently strong that it cannot be toppled. And the great challenge will be to hold a conversation with African leaders. Some of whom have democratic credentials that are certifiably good. Some that have credentials that are fiber optic thin. Some countries have in fact strengthened and deepened their democracies and in some places democracy has hardly taken root at all. So the challenge will be will these conversations produce something meaningful out there. Because what we see today across Africa are probably six or seven things that should be of concern to anyone who wants to see democracy grow. One is that we continue to see in place a number of the big men in Africa. Leaders who have been in power for 10, 20 and 30 years. Secondly, we see a number of leaders today who are facing elections between now and the middle of next year who are seeking to change their constitutions to end the term limitations that are out there. Thirdly we see a closing down of the public and political space for opposition parties in some countries. For civil society, groups and NGOs in others. And we also have seen an assault on the civil liberties and human rights of gays and lesbians in a number of other countries. All of these things are going to be worrying. But equally worrying are some of the issues that Ambassador Moose has brought up and this is related to the issue of corruption. In far too many of the countries whose economies are driven by oil and to a lesser extent minerals corruption seems to be endemic and systemic to those countries. And the three or four of the countries that are leading oil producers in sub-Saharan Africa are also noted for the highest levels of corruption in their societies. These are challenges to democracy. They're challenges to accountability. They're challenges to civil liberty. And these will be a very difficult set of issues to discuss with a lot of leaders who may not believe as firmly as their people do that democracy, elections, accountability, integrity and honesty should in fact be a part of good governance. So each of these issues in and of themselves as themes, they have immense challenges to try to address them. But it seems that it becomes even more challenging when you have to look at deepening and transforming economies, ending violence deepening democratic institutions and dealing with priorities that are sometimes competing. So there are several countries in Africa that are playing a really critical role in helping to support peace and stability regionally but face some significant challenges in their own backyard in terms of democratic institutions in terms of violence. So how do U.S. policymakers and African leaders deal with this challenge when priorities come into conflict with each other? It's amazing how you can walk down two different roads at the same time. And I'll give you an example because you do balance, you are always balancing these interests. And Johnny and I engaged on this with regard to Ethiopia and Sudan. And at one particular point in the Sudan situation when the government had taken over RPA and UN peacekeeping operation failed, we knew we had to put in a stronger peacekeeping operation and the only one we could put in there which would have a real force behind it would be Ethiopia. But Ethiopia internal democratic record is very poor. It's a big issue in our bilateral relations. And we had to work out how we'd balance that without giving up our principles you try and convey both in different ways operating through different mechanisms. But that's a balance that you have to fight. But you don't have to sacrifice one for the other even though the ruler may know, and Melisa the Ethiopian knew, well I'm getting a little leverage here that I didn't have there. But nevertheless you don't give up. Constant negotiation and diplomacy? But you raise the issue of how do we prioritize and I think that it is always a challenge and it's always a challenge in a resource constrained environment and we are living very much in that resource constrained environment. But perhaps it's because I've been out of office longer than either. Therefore I have a bit of a different perspective on the top. Johnny rightly talked about the historical preeminence of democracy and governance agenda for the administration and I tried to suggest that that agenda is inextricably linked to the conflict agenda. Both because it becomes a driver when it's not there and it becomes an incapacity as well. But the reality is if you look at what's happened to the government over the last decade or so there has been a definite decline in the amount of resources that this administration, looking at Christopher Munoz sitting here in the front seat from India, in the amount of money and we had this conversation not long ago, I'm sorry to call you that. Not long ago the fact of the matter is that the resources that the US government is devoting to democracy and democratic institution building worldwide but particularly in Africa has declined. It shows to me there's a disconnect between priorities. The President and his address at West Point acknowledged the need to prioritize the building of civilian capacities and civilian institutions. He noted that we cannot, for example, have a strategy, a counter-terrorism strategy that relies exclusively on a military response. And yet the only initiative that was announced in the course of that speech was $5 billion for building military partnership capacity now. I understand that our very clever folks at the State Department are busily now trying to figure out how they might carve away some of that money to use it for other purposes, but the fact of the matter is that the only initiative that came out of that speech was one that seemed to contradict the actual theme of the President's analysis. So I come back, if indeed we acknowledge that these issues of governance and conflict are at the center of the challenge for the African continent somehow that has to be reflected in the administration's own priorities and moreover in the nature of the conversations we are having first and foremost with African leaders that I would argue then beyond that with our partners elsewhere in the world. So what I would hope again coming back to the expectation for the summit is to see that reflected in the structure of the meeting itself and dare I say, it's not evident to me that it's already built into the current structure and in the nature of the conversations we're having and in the outcomes that we are shown. What's the blueprint? What's the plan? What's the strategy for how are we going to carry this agenda forward? Mr. Carson, any thoughts? Yeah, let me just back up a little bit and say that our foreign policy abroad and I refer specifically to Africa is best when it is based on our fundamental values and principles. And those fundamental values and principles are a deep respect for democracy and its institutions, human rights and the things that go along with them. We should always have that is the starting point but as Ambassador Lyman has pointed out, there are occasions when our national security interests will require easing off of the rigidity in which we advance the democratic values which are primary concern to us. But in backing off from them we should never leave them off the table. We should never leave them off the agenda. They should constantly be a part of the discussion and the dialogue and they should be fundamental to who we are and what we stand for. The national security issues and interests will over time be transitory but our principles and values of democracy should be permanent and we should never back off of those. Obviously we're focusing now on the fact that we have the summit coming up and we've got 50 heads of state coming and needs us to say those heads of state are major interlocutors for us and as we're trying to pursue both our values, agendas and our policies. But I think it's important to realize they're not our only audience nor are they our only interlocutors. And we have found over lots of years of experience that much of the work that we can and should be doing is not only at the governmental level, it's at the community level it's civil society, it's with groups that often are working despite the constraints that are imposed upon them by their own governments. And we need to be doing more than that and that's again why I say that if indeed this is to be a priority for us it needs to be reflected in the way we resource our programs, our institutions and it needs to be reflected as well I would argue in this summit and I know that there are supposedly going to be opportunities here to engage civil society both American civil society as well as African civil society but I think that sends its own message. It says that yes indeed we respect the leadership that is here to speak with us but we're not betting all of our apples in this one basket. We recognize that we have other constituencies that are important to our agenda. Because there is a criticism among African leaders in particular that we're preachy. And that's why I think George's point is important because the message for civil society and youth etc when you're talking about democracy and human rights you get a much different more positive so the messages out of the summit should be there's several civil society groups coming and conferences going and that outreach ought to be there and let that be reflected back. Just to add a point in all of this and again I think George makes some good points one of the things that will be that is occurring now and will be a transition point towards the summit is an initiative that President Obama originally started some four years ago and now has been codified into something called YALI, the Young African Leaders Initiative. And currently in the United States there are some 500 young African leaders at 20 different universities around the United States taking a modified executive leadership course that will help to strengthen their leadership management and organizational skills as they go back. There were some 15,000 applicants for 500 positions and the administration hopes over the next three to five years to increase this number from 500 to some 5,000. But what it speaks to is the point that both Princeton and George have referred to and that is the other constituency out here to whom we should also be talking. And that is Africa's next generation. And I think that one of the things that President Obama has done is to focus on that next generation. Not so much dwelling and looking back at Africa's both glorious and sometimes inglorious post-colonial history, but looking ahead to the younger generation which is going to have the most impact five years, 10 years, 15, 20 years from now and focusing on them as a constituency and a community to be worked with as partners under a new paradigm of cooperation. Maybe just to stay on that point for a second, I mean we're talking about different constituencies on the continent and the perception of the US and the US's role in Africa. And you've all spent a lot of time working on the continent and talking to young African leaders, talking to African leaders. And what's your sense of how those perceptions are changing? What does the US have to think about in designing the messages and designing the outcomes if indeed those are other audiences that need to be part of the messaging? I'm always a little disappointed that we are not able somehow to add up all that we do and develop that sense of partnership and maybe it's because it's easier to criticize us than some of the other donors, but I look at the just to go back to the economic sector. We have lower tariffs on African goods in China or India and we're the biggest importer of African manufacturers and we have a Goa and we have all this. Go to the WTO and the Africans vote against us with the Chinese and Indians all the time. There's something wrong in that picture. And so it bothers me sometimes that the partnership doesn't extend as it should. I think there's a lot of politics involved in Africa to do it, but I find that frustrating. But on the other hand I think you have to take a little beating on pushing on some issues which are unpopular, which other donors don't want to touch because as John and Georgia both said those are very important for the long term. Any thoughts on perceptions of the US? I've been probably removed from the continent longer than either of my colleagues, but I would say that I interact a lot with African parts of the African to ask for here in Washington. Reading just recently a piece by somebody at the Center for Global Development who alleged that somehow our narrative for Africa was not one that resonated with the quote average African. Well, I think we can come up with evidence polling and other that would strongly suggest that the vast majority of Africans are indeed concerned about their sense of well-being, their own sense of security in their own communities, the sense of the extent to which they are being dealt with badly by their own governments, the sense to which their governments are delivering the services that they think they deserve. I think all of those are issues that are central to that sense of well-being and to the extent that we are narrative for Africa embraces those issues. I think that's where the future is of Africa. I think that's where the communities are, I think that's where the youth are and that's what we ought to be doing because it's the right thing to do, but also because I think it's the kind of thing that really is of concern to Africans. It's complex and difficult as the most media and communications savvy country in the world. We frequently lose the media and communications more in Africa. We frequently lose it. And the negative messages, the anti-U.S. narrative gets more play. We have to work much harder because we live in a much more multi-media, multi-polar world when it comes to media. Anyone today who has a cell phone, a Twitter account, a Facebook account and the ability to both record and photograph is in the media business. And because of this the VOAs of the world and even the BVCs do not have a monopoly on getting our message out. And those who are far more media savvy than we are have used the media in very sophisticated ways. For an organization like Boko Haram for example none of us are likely to meet with Mr. Shakawe soon. But the thing that we do know is that his media skills and his ability to get his message out here is far more sophisticated than any of us would have thought six months ago. And it's just as competitive as frontline media on K Street. So we have to work harder. And again George I agree with you. We need to put absolutely more resources into being able to get our message out and to promote the democratic principles and values that we stand for. Or we run the risk of being swamped not only by media savvy rebels and crooks and sometimes government but we also we run the risk of having our values and principles distorted and undermined at the same time. We have to look at this much more seriously than we do today or we lose out in many ways. And that includes on the trade front as Princeton has pointed out. Last point on this is that I think still when I talk to people people still hold the US up to a higher standard than they do other countries. They take our values and principles as written seriously. And they hold that up as nice. We're still far more popular if you look at the Pew studies and I haven't seen one in about five or six months. But looked at them regularly over a long period of time people here in the audience, Dan and others who follow the stuff. But our ratings are far higher than the Chinese or the British or the Germans or the French across the continent whether it's Anglophone Francophone or Lucifone Africa. Let me just remind everyone that if you have questions you should have cards. Please pass them to the end of the row. And for people who are following on the webcast you can tweet your questions at the hashtag Africa policy. The first question actually picks up on what Ambassador Carson was saying about spreading message and communication. And it's a question about Boko Haram. And if Boko Haram is willing to use violence against religious leaders with whom they disagree then how can Nigeria hope to spread less radical messages messages of peace, messages against violence through religious communities. So it's quite a specific question about Nigeria but are there strategies that we should be thinking about to help to use religious leaders to spread messages of peace even though that's being challenged by people who are perpetrating violence? I'm going to have to preface this by saying that I'm not the expert but there are in this building and indeed here at the institute people who are expert and precise of this. One of the things that the institute has devoted lots of its time and intellectual energy in doing is trying to expand the origins and the sources and the drivers of the kinds of religious or ideological views that can lead to violence. And we have deployed that expertise in a variety of different ways working primarily with local constituencies and local communities. I think one of the important things that we have learned is that you can't really build, you can't make peace and build peace just at the top. You have to build it at the grassroots and the only way you can do that is by engaging the people at the grassroots and by the way who has a greater stake in that than people at the grassroots. And so one of the things that I think where we do indeed desperately need to increase our investment is in the kinds of programs that build the capacities of local communities to resist both the appeal of violence and to resist the violence itself and we know that that works. We've seen it, we saw it operate in Iraq and Afghanistan where USIP also had programs. And how to understand also therefore the ways in which one can communicate positively and constructively with communities to both first and foremost to allow them to understand that they are not powerless in a situation but they have a means, they have a capability and that capability can make a difference in terms of the radicalization of their communities and the kinds of violence that follows them. So yes, again I would come back to this one of the problems we've had frankly is that we've been playing reaction and ketchup with regard to the conflict agenda in Africa. We have too often been behind the curve of conflict rather than ahead of it and that too is I think directly related to setting priorities and matching those priorities with the resources that go with it. We could have perhaps foreseen that in the situation of Central African Republic which was evacuated twice when I was assistant secretary. There were the makings here of a major conflagration and the question therefore for us would have been for the US government broadly for this institution to be part of the kinds of capabilities of strategies that we ought to be deploying in order to try to mitigate those drivers of conflict. And you know it's a moot point what we have succeeded who knows but I think that that's the kind of thing that we ought to be doing much more. I was just saying quickly on Nigeria there are a number of religious leaders who are working very hard on that. You have the Imam in the pastor program and you have others it is a serious attack on the institutions of religion both Christian and Muslim in Nigeria and there's been some politicization of the leadership of these communities which has hurt them. But I think they're quite conscious of this and a number of them are working quite hard on. Just another element here we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that some of the drivers behind these conflicts are social and economic and that some of the drivers behind conflicts are also resource driven and I'm not talking about diamonds and the eastern part of Zimbabwe I'm talking about the genuine climate change where there are conflicts of diminishing water resources in grazing land and that these economic and social and climatic and environmental changes are then used as elements and drivers in what can be political and religiously inspired conflicts on the surface when in fact there's a deeper reason and so while I think I agree with George and Princeton on this entirely as we throw more resources into addressing some of the face to face religious elements in this we also need to make sure that if one of the drivers of a conflict is 80% youth unemployment that we find a way to deal with that as well. On the constituencies that we've talked about in terms of youth and religious communities another question is about what's the role of women in promoting peace and one of our audience members hypothesizes that in countries where women are in more leadership roles they're better suited and better prepared to deal peacefully with conflicts that arise what the U.S. can be doing to support women's leadership as part of the U.S. Africa summit discussions. Well you know there's no question that to the extent that women are permitted in a variety of ways to become more active in society whether economically or politically it has a tremendously positive impact on the country. We have a number of instances in Africa where women have played a very important role in the peace process and in reconciliation whether it's in Liberia and Sierra Leone whether it's in Rwanda and other places and I watch the women's movement in Sudan and South Sudan try very hard to help bridge gaps it is difficult however to get civil society and women in particular into the actual peace processes when they're dominated by the people with the guns or the people with the political power and I think there are a number of programs underway U.S. government and otherwise to promote women's capabilities and organizational abilities in this regard and I think it makes a difference and I think a lot can be done in that regard. I'm going to give a pitch to my former boss, Secretary Clinton made this a particularly important issue for her and I think did as much as anyone has done in reaching out to and promoting women's involvement in the political sector and also in the economic sector as well. Certainly very very supportive of women and the roles that they play politically and economically across Africa and almost on every occasion possible highlighting the significance that they can play and should play in society as a whole. So we have another question from the audience on one of those very difficult issues justice and given the challenges faced currently with the ICC cases for Kenya as well as the recent announcement about the African Court of Justice and the immunity of heads of state and senior officials and governments, how do you think the U.S. can promote, can support a policy related to justice in Africa? How do you think that will come up in conversations about investing in the next generation or in peace and violence and security? There's a very self-serving drive among the leadership in Africa to make themselves all exempt and I think if you went to civil society and asked them if they agreed, you get a very different reaction. Nevertheless, the issues of peace and justice and reconciliation are sensitive issues and let me just use the example of South Sudan right now. There are a lot of terrible things going on but there's also been a history of violations of human rights within groups in South Sudan and that society has never come to groups with that history, brought it all to the surface and then come to their own terms about how do they deal with that and you can't just drop in a court from outside and you can solve that. So I think societies have to figure out how they want to come to this and deal with it sometimes you need the ICC kind of thing but you need more than that. You have to help promote the capacity of societies to deal deeply into these problems and find a way to balance and each country will do it a little bit differently that reconciliation, that amnesty, that justice that really does deal with a problem rather than just keep it on the surface. It seems that there's also a challenge that this is also looked at quite narrowly as justice for a particular moment when many of these countries are also facing challenges for their general justice systems to ensure that there is justice even in the future as part of the reform as part of democracy and governance processes. Let me just put in a word here for though I'm going to use this word against strategies because I think this one of the things that we need to get much smarter and I go back here to the President's own address back at West Point. We need to be a lot smarter about assessing situations and they're going to vary as Princeton said from case to case case by case. Assessing situations to look at what are the factors that are contributing to violence and conflict and tension in these societies which inevitably leads to injustice. So from my perspective the first way to get out the issue of injustice is to minimize violence because in any violent situation you're automatically going to create victims and grievances which only deepen. So again I bring us back to the conflict agenda. But one of the things we need to be smarter at and I would say this both in terms of our overall approach to Africa as well as the way in which we approach individual situations is to look at what the drivers are and what the levers are that are available to us and to figure out how we weave them into a strategy and a framework and a strategy for change. So often we do things piecemeal. We say we're going to support civil society organizations and their engagement in conflict or conflict resolution and we're going to identify certain economic activities that we think will benefit certain parts of the population. But at the end of the day if those things aren't mutually reinforcing in some way then they're going to be self-defeating. And so again part of that is some of that's money. A lot of it's just simply being smarter about the way we approach these issues. And so again one of the things I would hope would come out of this summit is a recognition that we need to be strategic in the way we assess the challenges that are facing the continent as a whole but case by case. And that we're going to be much more systematic in our own approach to how we develop strategies for responding to these challenges. Sometimes peace requires that justice be deferred. It's not popular, it's not what we would want and it can also be the source of the next round of grievances and tensions. But in many instances achieving both the peace, the stability, the end of the conflict may in fact not allow for justice to occur immediately. And so I think one has to again assess the nature of the situation. And try as much as we can in achieving that peace to also try to ensure that the villains are not given the same level of respect and respectability in the outcome as victims. I think this links back to the question about messaging because I think the US will often be criticized for not pushing hard enough on justice or not pushing hard enough on corruption or not pushing hard enough on violence and rights violations. So we talked earlier about kind of winning the public relations war with extremists. But how do you win the public relations war with ordinary African citizens who have this perception that the US maybe isn't doing enough or the US is prioritizing security, stability and other policies over the democracy, human rights, peace or you could bring back USIA. I miss it. Let me say something heretical about corruption. In my view there are two kinds of corruption. There's corruption which is costly but not debilitating to development. And there's corruption which is debilitating. Let me just give you an example. I live in South Korea in the 60s when the economy was turning around. And our chief economist said, you know, it doesn't bother me that the ruling party is taking a percentage off the top of every project it approves as long as they're approving good projects. And they are. Now the difference in a lot of countries, African and others, is that the projects being approved are terrible projects. They don't produce anything. The contract is signed, the payment is made and you look and the power is built. So it's not just corruption. It's how debilitating it is. And there are leaders who have mixed motives just as countries have mixed motives. Who should be convinced to say you're not going to be perfect and you may want to fund your political party. But there's a difference between taking something off the top and wasting resources and not producing anything for the long term. So I make that kind of distinction over corrupt. I think that would be a hard PR message to sell. Let me just point out, and this is why the good governance and the accountability message of democracy is so critical for Africa. Princeton makes a good point and some of you have seen a couple of very recent studies that have come out and I think there's one just recently released by a number of British aid organizations which point out that I think some $190 billion is lost out of Africa every year because of different kinds of illegalities and transactions. Some would question and quibble with the nature of some of what they've listed there. But they point out that it's, you know, it runs everywhere from tax evasion to illegal transactions and contracts down through other things. But they also point out that on any given year Africa only gets $130 billion in aid, concessionary loans and grants. So that Africa is a net loser. But underlying all of this is a very high level of corruption and a corruption is greatest around the world. Corruption is greatest around the world in places where there is an absence of accountability. And generally when there is an absence of accountability there is an absence of democratic institutions. There's an absence of a free and vibrant press to investigate civil societies to expose and uncover. And where there is a democracy to protect those who are seeking to have their leaders act in a responsible way. So we have a specific question that may be directed to you. From a recent graduate from Sudan, wondering what he could do to help to link Sudanese youth with American youth to try to promote some of the cooperation and linkages in view of what would be the obvious political challenges. Well, you know, there is an important role for the diaspora in general and the youth in general. I think there's an opening actually in South Sudan now for a much more active role of civil society, religious groups, etc. Because the political system has been so discredited. And the mediators from the neighboring countries are open to that. So I think there are a number of opportunities. There are a number of Sudanese diaspora organizations on the campuses where you could link up. And I think it's a good question because a lot of the advocacy organizations are not well linked into the Sudanese youth who are here, etc. So I think perhaps bringing more of those together and one could think about more ways to do that. And then having those communicate directly with the people in the country helping promote the willingness and ability of youth in Sudan, South Sudan, to take advantage of the fact that with political institutions discredited there's an opportunity for voicing something new. Maybe I can come back to one of your earlier points about rethinking what a next summit would look like. Maybe not just US-Africa, but US allies with Africa. A broader approach. Yeah, out of the box approach. I think it relates to that and asking why aren't civil society voices being included within the summit itself? Is that something that we should be thinking about in the future? Rethinking this idea of having a separate parallel civil society forum beforehand or rethinking in general how these summits work to have the greatest results? Let me divide that into two parts. I had understood that the fact that the planners for the summit were in fact looking at ways to ensure that civil society would have a place and opportunities to speak and to have an input into this agenda. I have to assume that, I mean I think given what we've talked about in the priorities of the administration I'd be very surprised if they didn't find ways to do that. And I do think that's vitally important. I do think again that part of our own approach and part of our own strategy goes to the governance agenda, it goes to the conflict agenda, it goes to every one of these is that at the end of the day it's not outsiders who are going to be able to impose our will on African societies. What we need to be thinking about is how do we build resilient African institutions, governmental as well as non-governmental and regional as well as sub-regional that are going to help reinforce, that are going to build that fabric that is going to increasingly hold political leaders accountable, is going to be used to ensure that corruption is at least contained if not eliminated. So part of our agenda has to be that, the question of how do we engage civil society in a way that helps them to build their ability to be better Democrats and better participants in their societies. In terms of that next summit and I've said this to my colleagues and they know this and I'm a deep skeptic when it comes to these national summits, these one-off things. The US meets with Africa, China meets with Africa, France meets with Africa, Britain meets with Africa. Well guess what folks at the end of the day not one of us has the capacity to deal effectively with the enormous challenges that are facing that conflict. And so if we're going to be serious about having an impact, then we ought to get out of these silos and figure out how together we're coming together Will Davis was up there in Monaco, maybe he slipped out our former UN information center colleague. How are we going to bring together our collective capacities? Now Princeton and I both toiled for many years in the sometimes rocky vineyards of the United Nations and we know that there are challenges there as well. But the fact of the matter is when I was assistant secretary of state I spent enormous amounts of time in New York and Geneva, why? Because that's where I had to go to seek the partnerships that I felt we needed in order to make our own impact meaningful and where the capacities of these institutions that we've created at the UN and elsewhere could be brought to bear on solving some of our problems. And therefore I earnestly believe that that's where we need to be having these conversations in various configurations perhaps in different ways, but that's where ultimately we need to take these conversations so that we can in fact bring to bear all of the collective capacities of the international community, by the way share the burden and the responsibility of dealing with these challenges. I think of peacekeeping as just a perfect example. Where would we be in Africa and elsewhere if we did not have the abilities of the UN peacekeepers? Because in so many instances they are the only thing that is standing between relative calm and fear chaos. And one of the things that concerns me at the moment is that we have so overburdened that international capacity that there is real risk that the wheels are going to come off it. And if that happens we're going to be in so much worse shape than we are now. But we need therefore to be figuring out how do we strengthen those capacities as well as we're talking about not only what we're going to do or what the French are doing or what the Chinese are doing but how collectively we're going to respond meaningfully to these significant challenges on the African continent. Let me throw out a reason or two why I believe this summit is not only historic in nature but also quite essential. And why President Obama and the White House are and should be given credit for doing something that could be catalytic. One of the days of this summit as I understand it is being devoted almost exclusively to serious economic issues of trade investment and exploring the potential and the promise of economic relationships between African countries and some of the giants and titans of American industry and finance in the United States. Without this type of summit the views of African leaders probably would never reach the ears directly of a CEO of a Fortune 500 country company or a Fortune 100 company. The views of what an American industry leader is looking for in order to put in an investment or to build a plant and never reach the ears of an African leader. They would continue to meet one another in the perceptions that they have coming out of the Financial Times or off the front pages of the New York Times. And one would be of a negative image and the other one would be of some questionable economic story. And so if for no other reason given the kind of world in which we live in in which we all know that development and change and progress is not going to be driven by aid dollars and aid resources whether it's from USAID or DFID in the UK or the old or new GTZ in that the only way that it's going to be done is to do it the way Mr. Dr. Nyoko is saying and that is to put in investment build up manufacturing capacity create transformation in the economies. It's not going to happen through USAID but it can happen if in fact some of the people who probably are going to be at this summit from American corporations begin to realize that there is in fact opportunity and promise out here that there are leaders that they can work with and that this is an opportunity to bring some new insight into the corporate headquarters where a lot of diplomats African leaders never never get a chance to have their views aired. I think it's quite significant and that's quite catalytic there will be people there who can make things happen for Africa and if African leaders have their ears open and an ability to change they can be able to make their countries attractive potentially in ways that have not been seen before so I think that there is an opportunity one other thought when I come back to Africa's youth as I understand it again the Yali folks are ending up the young African leaders are ending up in the next week or so but the views of that next generation not the current the old generation the leaders who have been there for 20 or 30 35 years but that new generation is going to have an opportunity to share with the current and old generation some of its thoughts and insights on what should be happening across and around the continent I think this is important we should admire our histories but constantly look towards the prospects of a better future and that does it for Yali and having them involved maybe we can start to wrap up the conversation and get each of you to reflect a little bit to summarize on what are the goals if you could whisper into President Obama's ear or Secretary Secretary Kerry's ear what are the top goals that they should really be trying to get out of this summit can you imagine George's multi-summit summit I have this the USCU Japan China Center hosting that's a challenge for USIP to put this together look first of all let me just say this because there's been a lot written about it we should not try to compete in this summit in a narrow way with what China did or some China has a different set of objectives when they call all the Africans together they do some things well they have other objectives they don't touch democracy or human rights or very much on governance they do make some economic we're not in the business of putting up billions of dollars anymore so we shouldn't pretend that we are we'll be lucky to hold on to the XM Bank so we should look at the summit in terms of what we're doing and in that sense so get that out of the way and it seems to me and just I want to pick up on this issue where I started with the economics that it shouldn't be a glib discussion oh wow Africa is growing and isn't this a wonderful opportunity has to get into these issues of transformation what has to be done on the African side to get the investments into the transformation side of economies and as Johnny says hearing from businessmen and getting businessmen and combinations like through power Africa and others out there beyond the commodity sectors to do that that's a big objective and if there's follow up to that I think it will be very important second let me put in a plug for the National Endowment for Democracy which is running a parallel big civil society meeting on the 5th and then everybody going up to the hill on the 6th so there can be a lot of voices in Washington and I think hopefully all those voices will be heard and it won't just be the 50 heads of state etc and third I think that the the messages on democracy and governance and Johnny is absolutely right where you have accountability you get at the worst forms of corruption Madame Ngozi the finance minister of Nigeria wrote a book on what's called reforming they were unreformable talking about Nigeria and she says reform is politics and the one of the things she didn't realize was how important to build political support behind reforms and goes to government to go see institutions etc so those things are linked and then it's just coming out of this conference and serious attention to them and recognizing that's what America stands for in Africa and for those who want to work on that in Africa the US is a partner I think those are results that are well well merited and we don't have to say whether it's better or worse than somebody else's I want to address something that Princeton said we shouldn't be out there feeling that the purpose of this event is so that we can upstage the French or the Chinese or somebody else and also going to Princeton's rightly posed questions about this multi I love it I think the point though is this we've talked about China we've talked about the fact that China has a different agenda and that they're prepared to do different things to advance that agenda their agenda is how do I get immediate short-term access to resources so I can sustain my economic growth at home and by the way find markets for my underpriced goods overseas and in order to do that they do a lot of things but I would argue and I've argued this with some of my Chinese interlocutors is that at the end of the day their prospects, their investment in Africa is going to be affected as well by these same set of issues an ungoverned or a misgoverned Africa is not going to be able to assure them a return on their investments and at the end of the day they're going to have to become as concerned as everybody else's about the environment in which they're operating and I think that gives us an opportunity to engage them in the same kind of a conversation and say you may say that you're unconcerned about these issues of democracy, human rights and governance but at the end of the day if you wish to ensure that you're going to be there for the long haul and those resources that you desperately need to fuel your economy are going to be available to you you're going to have to be concerned about these issues so my point simply is this that rather than having these serious individual conversations or in fact not having them at all in some cases that's what we ought to be doing. We ought to be finding ways to encourage, incentivize other partners to be as concerned about these issues as we are and to be engaged with us in how we find solutions to them. I come back to where I started which is I continue to believe if we do not understand the impact of the conflict agenda on all of the other things we're doing then we will have missed the point. We can promote power Africa, we can promote Agoa, we can continue to support PEPFAR, we can pursue our anti-malaria programs, we can do all of these things but if we don't realize that they're all threatened by the recruescence of violence across the continent then we're going to miss the boat. It's not to say that there is any simple solution to that, there is not. It's simply to say that we need to figure out how to focus more of our attention, our energies and our resources on that conflict agenda and to try to the best of our ability to cease to be in the reactive mode and to be in a more proactive mode. And that also means that how then do we engage not just the resources of the State Department USAID but the resources of our entire government. I'm going from this panel to a panel with the Atlantic Council which started out as a panel on the combatant commands. The combatant commands are AFRICOM, UCOM, etc., etc., and their role in American policy. At the end of the day the combatant commander said, you know, if we don't fix the civilian parts of our government to enable them to have more capacity to deal with the problems, we can't do what you want us to do. So I would say, again, what we need to be looking for are strategies that bring together the collective capacities of our own government and of others so that we can address the root problems of Africa, and I would again sum those up as being the institutional governance piece on one hand and the conflict piece on the other. Great. The last word, Master Carson. Let me just say I agree that we need to be proactive in trying to do what USIP is set up to do, and that is to do as much as possible to prevent, mitigate, and resolve conflicts, and clearly they are a debilitating problem when it comes to economic growth, to human welfare and to peace and stability. But focusing in on the conference, the summit itself over the coming up in two weeks. At a very broad and general level I hope that the conference will be an opportunity for the administration and the US government to solidly reaffirm its long, historical and political interests and support for Africa. And that leaders will walk away recognizing that the United States is in fact a genuine partner, a friend, and a country with whom they can effectively work in trying to resolve issues related to conflict, issues related to economic development, and issues related to governance. And that civil society groups in Africa and those who support democracy will realize that the democratic agenda has not been given short shrift or short change by the others. And that whatever we do reflect our values and principles to the greatest and fullest extent possible except when they bump up against national security issues which cannot be avoided. That's on a broad plane. On a more specific plane, I hope that we'll come out of this and see that some of the relationships that are built up on one or two days of discussion will lead to greater interest and support for Power Africa. Lead to a greater commitment on the part of a chief executive to say I'm going to send the team out to take a look at whether what I heard makes sense for a potential investment and whether in fact this can lead to subsidiary kinds of discussions with African leaders who may be concerned strictly with power with American companies that are concerned with power generation. And that sub themes can come out of this behind which smaller groups of more focused companies and more focused sectors, business sectors of the United States can come together. I also hope too that the White Houses and the Government's interest and focus on Africa will lead some to look very hard at why they are questioning things like the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank that drives trade investment, a reaffirmation and an early commitment to have a renewal of the AGOA agreement as a part of the effort to move forward and a reaffirmation and a commitment to fully fund all the initiatives that are out here. And again I'm going to come back to the theme that I think is really important and that is to send a signal, a strong signal at least for Africa when it comes to the continent is that good governance, democratic institutions and respect for civil liberties all are an integral part of making the place more stable, secure and peaceful but an integral part in ensuring that economic growth when it occurs benefits the entire country and not just a state house or particular ethnic or religious or regional group. We'd hope that there might be a little bit more disagreement from what we've made but let me thank all of you for taking the time to join us today and everybody who joined us on the webcast. Let me thank the panel for sharing your insights and your creative ideas. I'm sure we'll all be following the summit closely hopefully listening to the variety of voices among the African leaders from civil society from business and hopefully we'll have an opportunity in a few months to come back here and have a discussion about what came out of it and what does this mean for next steps and for perhaps the great multilateralism. So thank you very much everyone. Susan, thank you.