Global Initiatives Symposium

6 to 12 July 2009
Taipei, Taiwan

Website: http://gis-taiwan.ntu.edu.tw/

Global Initiatives Symposium is an international conference organized by university students in Taiwan. We hope to gather innovative ideas from fellow students around the world to address current issues faced by the international community.

Organized by: GIS Taiwan 2009 Student Committee

PROGRAM

Light behind the clouds — Green technology makes the crisis of global warming into a favorable turn

Guest Speaker : Dr. Michael Braungart

Global warming and its effects are no longer new to the discussion table in the international society. However, in the past, the public were reluctant to face the inconvenient truth, for environmental protection was regarded as a contradiction to economic development. However, a new solution is gradually being formed. The concept of renewable energy boasts clean and inexhaustible power which contributes to the sustainability of the environment. In the meantime, the development of related technologies also benefits the economy by creating jobs and producing new commodities. According to the Economists, green investment is expected to provide more than 2.5 million jobs. In this new era, the world now seeks to integrate the resolutions of environmental issues and the development of global economy.

The speech is to illustrate the impact of global disasters to the entire planet, and to explore new approaches to deter the crumbling of our natural environment. Progress is to be brought if crises can be turned into opportunities. Thus, the comprehension of the difficulties, along with the integration and innovation of solutions to them, are to be another major point of this speech.

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Connecting People

Guest Speaker : James Y. Fang

Can you imagine what electronic products will be like in the future? Will cell phones replace blackberries, or even laptops? Can the products be more humanized? High-tech products used to be focused on their small sizes and the characteristic of carrying easily. Next, they emphasized on the multi-function in one product. Now, cell phones can be laptop also and due to the Internet, laptop can also be cell phones. What is the next step in High-tech? There is more technology being developed beyond our imagination. Follow the speaker to find out the next step in technology development.

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Making NEW Fans in the Social Economy of the 21st Century

Guest Speaker : Daniel Pawley

In their book, Raving Fans: a Revolutionary Approach to Customer Service, authors Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles wrote, “Just having satisfied customers isn’t good enough anymore. If you really want a booming business, you have to create raving fans.” That unusual book, written in the form of a practical business parable, advertised itself as a visionary approach to understanding and winning over disillusioned consumers by transforming them into “raving” and “spending” fans. And judging by its sales of more than 600,000 copies, the book struck an important nerve within the business community of its time: the early 1990s.

Of course, a great gulf of social, cultural, and economic change has spilled across all global boundaries and borders since that time, giving even the recent past a kind of ancient historical quality, and the current paper seeks to enter this gap by bringing Blanchard’s and Bowles’s argument into the current moment. Specifically, I argue that visualizing the modern consumer as a fan was a stroke of prescient insight, but also that understanding fan motivation and behavior requires theoretical insights based on qualitative research that were never brought into Blanchard’s and Bowles’s book. Fandom, defined academically here as “the socialization of textual consumption,” or understood more simply as “doing what we do with what we like,” is very much an up-to-the-moment topic that can take us some distance toward both comprehending our times and knowing how to find personal and commercial success in them. Most people are fans of something or someone, yet what is it that moves us from being random consumers to becoming heightened consumers who organize our tastes and preferences around specifically chosen objects of interest? Or are we in a resistant age of the anti-consumer whom, while still motivated by basic, established human desires, prefers to function outside of any consumerist model?

These and other concerns will be presented as an attempt is made to condition our thoughts about the future of commerce with varied integrations of fan theory.

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Essay Subtopic Seminars

Subtopic 1 : Rethinking of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Social Entrepreneurship

Guest Speaker : Roger Lee

Corporate Social Responsibility, known as CSR, is gaining more and more concern among modern corporations. In former days, corporations consider only the profits. However, now successful corporations take social responsibility into consideration. Nowadays, corporations focus on social issues related, and combine professional knowledge, brings positive impact to the society while promoting public image.

We are honored to have Mr. Roger Lee, General Manager of Inter-Alpha Universal Consultant Inc. as our guest speaker of this part of essay subtopic seminar. Inter-Alpha Universal Consultant Inc. is a CSR consultant company which undertakes the CSR of many corporations. Mr. Lee is the pioneer in the field of CSR and absolutely well-experienced.

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Subtopic 2: Bliss or Misery? — Contemplating the Engagement of Cultural Forms and Economic Progress

Guest Speaker : Hsien-hao Sebastian Liao

Cultural Creative Industry, a combination of culture and economy, contains books, publishings, music, drama, movies, design, architecture, and many other distinct forms. As new techniques developing, cultural creative industry is increasingly important. While most industries decline, cultural creative industry still attain astonishing development at the same time.

We are honored to have Professor Hsien-Hao Liao, Chief Secretariat and professor of Department of Foreign Languages&Literatures of National Taiwan University, as our guest speaker of this part of essay subtopic seminar. Professor Liao has been the Administer of Department of Cultural Affairs of Taipei city, and is well experienced in both academy and industry.

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Subtopic 3: Find the Next Wave to Ride On — New Business Strategies in the Changing World

Guest Speaker : Edward H. Chow

Society changes rapidly in recent days. Obviously, the traditional business strategies are not suitable for modern corporations anymore. The core concept of business is about “people”, and most people follow trends. To successfully run a business, it is necessary to recognize the slight shifts of the market trend, and take proper response accordingly. Without enough awareness, it is hard for a business to survive through the stiff competition.

We are honored to have Professor Edward H. Chow, ex-Administer of College of Commerce, and Professor of Department of Finance of National Chengchi University, as our guest speaker of this part of essay subtopic seminar. Professor Chow has been the committee of Financial Supervisory Commition, Executive Yuan, and is well experienced in both academy and commercial world. Participants of this subtopic should read two assigned essays from Harvard Business Review in advance.

The essay subtopic seminars address interactive discussions on the three subtopics—the SCR & social entrepreneurship, the engagement of culture forms and economic progress, and new business strategies. Delegates who wrote about the same subtopic would be divided into the same seminar. With the respectfully professional moderator’s assistance and hosting, delegates can understand the current diverse perspectives, and go deeper to the roots of the subtopic.

While heavily rely on moderator to reach conversations, the works and discussions of delegates count as the main body of the seminars. Assigned extra readings may be delivered beforehand to the delegates. During the seminars, intensive team works and interactive presentations from the delegates are required to reach out resolutions or action projects as the
concluding marks.

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Global Terrorism and its Impacts — from the Perspective of the Clash of Civilizations
Chairman : Hsieh, Han-Hui (William)
Cochair : Arthur CHEN
Letter from Chair
Study Guide
Rule of Procedures

This topic for the model international conference, while is set to echo the main subject of GIS “challenges and opportunities”, also intends to bring participants of the activities of GIS to focus their attention and concern on other issues no less important than those economic ones. The United Nations declares that “the acts of international terrorism constitute one of the most serious threats to international peace and security in the twenty-first century” in its Security Council resolution 1377. According to such declaration and the fact that terrorist incidents are taking place continuously on every continent, terrorism is definitely a serious challenge to global peace and security, and the targets of such acts are set and attacked regardless of races or religions or classes, hence is an issue affecting each human being on Earth. This model conference provides an opportunity to put different voices and opinions regarding terrorism together on the debate and to promote dialogue and mutual understanding through exchanging ideas between different groups, and at the same time tries to prevent the Clash of Civilizations, which according to Professor Samuel Huntington will be the major source of conflicts in the contemporary world. By easing the tensions across the gap between participants from different backgrounds, this conference also serves as an opportunity to enhance peace and harmonious coexistence in the global community.

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World Café

Guest Speaker : Jou, Sue-Ching Liu, Ching-Yi Lin, Kuo-Ming

In this activity, the host team will raise a certain question, and then participants have to respond to it according to their own essays. There will be three rounds of discussions. Participants will be grouped and seated at different tables. Participants should move from table to table and will not sit with the same person in different rounds. There will be a host at each table. He (she) remains sitting in his (her) seat, plays the role of welcoming new table members, and summarizes the discussions of previous rounds to them. During the discussion, participants can make use of others’ opinions from previous discussions in answering the questions. In the end, 3 to 5 participants can share what they have learned from the activity. The result of discussions, which will all be written in papers, will be left on the tables for participants to view freely.

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Social Welfare—Promotion of Community-based Child Care System in Taiwan

Guest Speaker : Yu-Hsiu Liu

From an anthropological perspective, the government maintains a reciprocal relationship with people through social welfare. For instance, the Scandinavian model of social welfare has consistently enjoyed a reputation as a unique example of generous provision. With the low-cost public child care and better work-life balance, the Scandinavian countries have the highest rates of women participating in the workforce and relatively high birth rate. In this session, we’ll take a look at a welfare system that promotes child care services on a community basis in Taiwan. Elucidating the system from three perspectives of government, people, and the market, Yu-hsiu Liu, one of the main promoters of the system will tell us how the Taiwan government could reinforce the reciprocal relationship with people through the Taiwan-oriented social welfare system.

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Outstanding Essay Sharing

This activity aims at providing the participants a deep look into three outstanding essays and inspiring creative ideas about their topics. At the beginning, the authors of the outstanding essays, which are elected by the judging panel during the previous process of evaluation and selection, will give short speeches about their main ideas in the essays. After each short speech, there will be time for the participants to ask the author to clarify some of the context like the definitions of words. A further discussion will take place when all three speeches are complete. Besides the questions from the instructors, the participants as well as the authors themselves are encouraged to ask for details like the research process or share different point of view about the essays’ topics during the discussion. A conclusion will be given by the instructors in the end.

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NGO Experience Sharing

Guest Speaker : Asad Moten

Innovator Factor Foundation is a non-profit global organization aiming at constructing a large scale platform for people to share their innovative views. It is founded by Mr. Apurv Mishra in 2007, and has now cooperated with members from countries such as India, USA, Israel and UK.

IFF intends to provide a space where the innovators as well as the innovation-seekers can get their ideas/problems listened. It means to eliminate the gaps among different departments in a company, which, in IFF’s opinion, has slowed down the innovation-producing process. By gathering people/organizations of all kind together on one platform, IFF hopes to not only inspire more creative notions but also get these notions utilized by the industry. Both GIS and IFF share the same perspective that one individual’s opinions should be valued, and that practicing those opinions in the industry is vital. By listening to their successful story, GIS participants are expected to know better how such effort can be made.

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Workshop - Day 1

Financial Tsunami (I) : The Importance of Risk Management - [2009/7/7 pm1330-1520]
Guest Speaker : Steve Chi
Notice before the Workshop

In this workshop, we’ll start with a brief introduction on the financial risk management (FRM) given by the Taiwan Corporate Country Risk Manager of Citi group. Since more emphasis has been put on FRM in the financial market recently, the speaker will also provide an insight on how it affected the contemporary global economy. Afterwards, participants will be divided into to several small groups to discuss the problem of FRM with the news they found (before the workshop.) Each group will choose a piece of news that best reflects the problem of FRM and share their opinions. The speaker will then give feedback and final remarks on the discussion.

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The Impact of Fast Food - We do not have a common future: The Political Economy of the Dominant Environmental Discourse in a globalized world - [2009/7/7 pm1330-1520]

Guest Speaker : Chi, Chun-Chieh

Fast food industry is a specific type of restaurant characterized by a combination of convenience food and simplified dining service.

The purpose of this workshop is to offer participants an insight into various phenomena created by these potent corporations, especially focusing on the impact of fast food industries on local culture in different countries.

The speaker will give a 40-minute lecture about how fast food industries changed our societies and what they have brought to our lives. After exchanging opinions with the speaker, there will be a group discussion on a few key points mentioned in the lecture. A group presentation followed by the speaker’s final remarks will be held afterwards.

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Creative Economy Cluster (I) : Youth in Action - [2009/7/7 pm1330-1520]
Guest Speaker : Joseph Tzeng
Notice before the Workshop

Youth clustering together can make a creative difference. Innovating products and services may spark from one critical idea and groups of friends, as actions taken from youths are crucial to the development of creative economy.

Speakers from successful cultural industries are invited to empower the participants to best utilize their cultural assets on providing creative products and services. In this team project competition, participants will go through several stages of brainstorming and cooperation to raise their group project. Multiple backgrounds and professions among the participants may serve as keystone toward the next promising project on creative economy.

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Workshop - Day 2

Financial Tsunami(II) : What's the Next Step? - [2009/7/8 am1040-1210]
Guest Speaker : Cheng, Cheng-Mount Peng Teming
Notice before the Workshop

Both companies and governments are taking actions to tackle the crisis in this wave of financial tsunami. In Financial Tsunami 2, participants will be divided into two groups, with one representing the government and the other the company, to debate on the pros and cons of certain government policy and measures taken by companies. After the short debate, two speakers from economic field will conclude the debate and state their opinions. Participants can raise questions for further discussion afterwards.

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Prove Yourself the Pioneer of Epoch - [2009/7/8 am1040-1210]

Guest Speakers: Ariel Chi Liaw, Kuo-Ming Liu, Pei-Ling

People with keen insight can often catch up with the trend before others and seize the chance to make a difference. The latest and hottest issue, be it green technology or biomass energy, has brought tremendous value to the world. Yet if one only follows new trend as they come, one can’t possibly be outstanding in the world. The leader of tomorrow should think outside of the box in order to unearth means to improve the status quo and to seek opportunities from the undiscovered potentials.

In this workshop, you, as a participant will be able to evaluate your competence to take the lead. The task is to propose a project under a given subject. Aspects from technique application, product designing to positioning, marketing and even demand projection should all be taken into consideration. Through team brainstorming, you may come up with various means to refine your proposal in order to bring an innovative revolution in human life.

Actions speak louder than words, so just kick off and prove yourself to be the pioneer of the next epoch.

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Creative Economy Panel (II) : Youth in Action and Creative Economy in Asia - [2009/7/8 am1040-1210]

Guest Speakers: Hsueh, Wen-Jean Joseph Tzeng

Concerning the creativity and capacity, youths have been considered the major player to generate the next prosperity of creative economy. Creative economy panel is a platform for youths to explore their capacity about creative economy, and better understand the opportunity lies in Asia. Successful young entrepreneurs and experts from diverse backgrounds would share their insights through speeches and group discussions.