Toda Peace Institute Public Conversations

A discussion with Dr.-Ing. Mohammad Assem Mayar, a leading expert on climate, conflict and post conflict recovery, whose research and field experience in Afghanistan, in Syria and in Iraq offer vital insights for practitioners and policy makers worldwide. In conversation with Janani Vivekananda, he discusses the dual challenge of rebuilding in the face of both recurring violence and intensifying climate impacts as countries emerge from conflict. Dr Mayar's recent paper can be found here: Afghanistan’s Climate Crisis: A Call for Decentralised and Inclusive Finance https://toda.org/policy-briefs-and-resources/policy-briefs/afghanistans-climate-crisis-a-call-for-decentralised-and-inclusive-finance.html

A discussion with Ambika Vishwanath, the Director of the Kubernein Initiative in India. Ambika is a renowned expert on foreign policy, water security and peace building with deep expertise across South Asia and beyond. In conversation with Janani Vivekananda, she discusses the value and practical potential of trilateral policy exchange, and broader policy exchange on the topic of climate, peace, and security, bringing in India which to date has not played a big part in the climate, peace and security discourse.

A public conversation on current challenges to democracy, and in particular challenges to democracy in America, with Professors Stephan Haggard and Bob Kaufman, with Kevin Clements and Olivia Stokes Dreier. The last jointly authored book by Professor Haggard and Professor Kaufman was Backsliding: Democratic Regress in the Contemporary World. The primary focus of the conversation is what's happening to democracy in America under the second Trump administration.Interview recorded 9 May 2025

In this conversation, Dr Merewalesi Yee discusses her doctoral research with Prof. Kevin Clements, Director of Toda Peace Institute, and Dr Carol Farbotko from Griffiths University. In particular, they focus on planned relocation, non-economic loss and damage, disaster risk reduction and place belongingness, and the impact of climate change on Fijian communities.Interview recorded 28 April 2025

In part one of a three-part conversation between Ambassador Thomas Greminger and Toda Peace Institute Senior Research Fellow Keith Krause, the speakers focus on prospects for the future of the war in Ukraine.Interview recorded 26 November 2024

As part of SGI’s Oceania O60, a peace symposium titled “Challenges to Peace in Turbulent Times” was hosted at the New Zealand Parliament. The event featured a thought-provoking dialogue between Rt. Hon. Helen Clark, former Prime Minister of New Zealand, and Prof. Kevin P. Clements, Director of the Toda Peace Institute as the world grapples with unprecedented social, economic, and political challenges, with conflicts raging from Ukraine, Middle East to Sudan.

A discussion with Frances Namoumou, ecumenical coordinator for the ecological stewardship and climate justice program of the Pacific Conference of Churches. In conversation with Kevin Clements and Volker Boege, they discuss the work of Pacific Conference of Churches at a local and regional level in meeting the needs of those most affected by climate change.Interview recorded on 22 August 2024.

A roundtable discussion with India democracy experts Harsh Mander, Shabnam Hashmi, Deb Roy Chowdhury, Vinod Shetty and Colin Gonsalves, in conversation with Kevin Clements and Olivia Stokes Dreier. The discussion is a reflection on the positive and negative consequences of India’s recent election.Interview recorded 22 August 2024

Paulo Baleinakorodawa and Alex Azarov have developed a thriving climate peace partnership between their respective NGOs, Transcend Oceania and Conciliation Resources, working in the Pacific, and Fiji in particular.Interview recorded 28 June 2024.

Professor Katerina Teaiwa is a Pacific scholar, artist and teacher of Banaban, I-Kiribati and African American heritage. For 80 years, the island of Banaba was mined for phosphate by Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Mining devastated the landscape and, after World War Two, the whole population was moved to what is now Rabi Island in the northern part of Fiji. Professor Teaiwa explains the narratives around displacement of the population, and the way that inhabitability of the island and extraction impacted not just the landscape and the environment, but the culture, the language, the sense of identity, land rights, protocols, genealogies of the Banaban people. This very personal connection and experience forms the basis of much of her academic research which is shared in ways that include exhibitions, art and dance.Interview recorded 28 November 2023.

A conversation with Ed Garcia, hosted by Toda Peace Institute's Kevin Clements and Olivia Stokes Dreier. Ed Garcia has dedicated his entire life to the pursuit of peace, justice, human rights and democracy. He's been a teacher, a nonviolence advocate and social movement leader, a member of the 1987 Philippines Constitutional Commission, a human rights activist and researcher with Amnesty International, and for the last 20 years a peace worker, mediator, negotiator and peacebuilding advisor.Interview recorded 2 November 2023.

A discussion with Carol Farbotko from Griffith University on her project that aims to understand what indigenous solutions to global challenges look like, with a particular focus on climate change in atoll countries like Tuvalu. With Kevin Clements and Volker Boege, the conversation explores the narrative of inevitable uninhabitability, habitability thresholds, and the impact of adaptation measures on the ability to stay put. To what extent are Pacific experience and philosophies informing decisions by policy makers and development partners, and how can climate change knowledge be decolonized?Interview recorded on 30 August 2023

A discussion with young Pacific climate activists Sulu-Danielle Joseph, Iemaima Vaai and Bedi Racule, who have grown up in diaspora communities. They discuss the impact of growing up away from the Pacific communities they call home, and their advocacy work for the Pacific as activists, particularly in relation to the effects of climate change. They are in conversation with Kevin Clements and Volker Boege.Interview recorded on 11 May 2023.

A discussion with Emeritus Professor Kazuo Matsushita, and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Volker Boege. They discuss the interlinkages between the triple global crises of climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss, and calls for a social shift to non-fossil fuel civilization. They talk in detail about the vision for a zero carbon Japan; what that means on personal, regulatory and policy levels; and the position of the Japanese government.Interview recorded 23 March 2023

A conversation with Debasish Roy Chowdhury and John Keane, hosted by Toda Peace Institute’s Kevin Clements and Olivia Stokes Dreier. They discuss their book “To Kill A Democracy: India's Passage to Despotism”, their views of India under Prime Minister Modi, and the prospects for Indian democracy.Interview recorded 4 March 2023

A discussion with Gina Gustavsson (University of Uppsala and Nuffield College Oxford) and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Olivia Stokes Dreier. They discuss the recent electoral success of the Sweden Democratic Party, and what this means for Swedish social democracy and its welfare state.Interview recorded 15 November 2022

A discussion with Akio Takahara and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Hugh Miall. They discuss Prof. Takahara’s lifelong interest in the political economy of China and Chinese foreign policy. He reviews the present state of China–Japan relations and comments on possible solutions to the territorial dispute over the Senkaku Islands in the broader security context of Northeast Asia.Interview recorded 9 October 2022.

A discussion with Lydia Khalil (Lowy Institute) and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Olivia Stokes Dreier. They discuss the salient features of right-wing extremism and the structural factors which have led to a huge increase in right-wing extremism since 2016: global Inequality, the New World Order, the spread of disinformation and conspiracy theories, environmental degradation and climate change, and global democratic decline.Interview recorded 26 September 2022

A discussion with James Bhagwan (Pacific Conference of Churches),and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Volker Boege. They discuss the role that Pacific churches have been playing in raising awareness of the impact of climate change in the region. The spiritual worldview of Pacific people is deeply influenced by the indigenous culture, and a sense of connection with land, the environment, the ocean and their Christian faith. Rev. Bhagwan explains the importance of ‘reweaving the ecological mat’ as a Pacific articulation of the reweaving of the sacred thread that binds ecology, economics, and relationships with one another and the natural world.Interview recorded 1 June 2022

A discussion with Hon. Ralph Regenvanu (Vanuatu) and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Volker Boege. They discuss the campaign to unite Pacific Island nations against deep sea mining. In conversation with Kevin Clements and Volker Boege, he backgrounds the issue of deep sea mining in the Pacific and describes efforts to utilise the strength of Pacific regionalism via the newly formed Pacific Parliamentarians Alliance on Deep Sea Mining. Through their founding statement, Our Ocean Call, the alliance articulates a common responsibility and moral obligation for the protection of the ocean for future generations.Interview recorded 30 May 2022

A discussion with Hon. Gareth Evans (former Foreign Minister of Australia) and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Ramesh Thakur. They discuss conflict prevention, preventive diplomacy and nuclear arms control, and the lack of momentum in the 21st century. Can cooperative security principles be resuscitated and what opportunities might arise from the current crises that the international community is facing?Interview recorded 6 May 2022

A discussion with Upolu Luma Vaai (Pacific Theological College) and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Volker Boege. They discuss the core principles of Pacific ecorelationality and their implications for climate change policies in the Pacific region, advocating for a ‘holistic gaze’ that overcomes anthropocentric understandings of climate change and climate policy. He explains the “Reweaving the Ecological Mat” project, an initiative which is a self-determination strategy aimed at weaving a Pasifika story of hope about genuinely Pasifika approaches to climate change, development, ecology and peace.Interview recorded 4 May 2022

A discussion with Masakatsu Ota and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Hugh Miall. They discuss the status of Japan’s commitment to the three non-nuclear principles, alternative approaches to upholding the peace constitution and geopolitical relationships within Northeast Asia. Has anything changed with a new Japanese Prime Minister at the helm and what are polls of public opinion revealing about the mood of the Japanese population particularly in the light of heightened nuclear rhetoric since the Russian invasion of Ukraine?Interview recorded 29 April 2022

A discussion with Timothy Snyder (Yale University) and Nora Krug (Parsons School of Design), author and illustrator of “On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century”, and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Paula Green. They discuss factors that contribute to the rise of tyranny: a widely felt sense of approaching doom largely caused by climate change, the stupefying inequality of wealth, and social media’s appeal to our lowest instincts. Interview recorded 6 December 2021.

A discussion with Stephan Haggard (UC San Diego) and Robert Kaufman (Rutgers), authors of “Backsliding: Democratic Regress in the Modern World”, and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Paula Green. They discuss ways that political parties and societies can combat autocratic tendencies: through meeting fundamental needs and delivering public goods, through reform of the political system itself, and through international cooperation that seeks to uphold democratic governance. Interview recorded 13 October 2021.

A discussion with Ambassador Joseph Yun and Frank Aum of the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), and Toda’s Kevin Clements and Hugh Miall. They discuss the ways that East Asia order might be structured, and the impact of recent developments in the region. Speakers: Ambassador Joseph Yun: Senior advisor to the Asia program at the U.S. Institute of Peace. Frank Aum: Senior expert on Northeast Asia at the U.S. Institute of Peace Kevin Clements: Director of the Toda Peace Institute. The Foundation Chair of Peace and Conflict Studies and Foundation Director of the National Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies (NCPACS) at the University of Otago, New Zealand Hugh Miall: Senior Research Fellow of the Toda Peace Institute, Emeritus Professor of International Relations at the University of Kent, and Chair of the Conflict Research Society.Interview recorded 22 September 2021.