CASSANDRA PALMER-FIELD
The annual Integrity 20 Summit is set to commence at Griffith University’s Conservatorium on the 25th October.
The Summit lasts for three days and involves guest speakers from around the globe examining world-wide issues and their integrity.
Issues at the core of the summit are ethics, human rights and morality.
Amongst the high-profile speakers for this years event is Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington DC, Sarah Chayes.
Ms Chayes is no stranger to talking about global integrity, having authored the award-winning Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security.
Ms Chayes thinks a summit around the idea of integrity in today’s climate is a great initiative and welcomes the public discussion that the event will entail.
Brisbane's #integrity20 kicks off this morning with the integrity roundtables @griffith_uni https://t.co/015KFXGJZQ
— Integrity 20 (@Integrity_20) October 23, 2016
“Values such as integrity are almost not discussed as genuine factors in decision making. There is lip-service, but our societies are failing to reward these values or take them seriously in policy or strategy debates” she said.
Ms Chayes during her extensive career in journalism has also lived and reported from Afghanistan, where she also took on an advisory role, however she is disappointed with the lack of progress made in the country.
“A choice was made early on in the intervention, and never fundamentally challenged, not to address the two underlying drivers of the conflict” she said.
Drivers, she believes have to do with integrity.
“The corruption of the Afghan Government and the International Community’s role enabling and reinforcing it, and the role of Pakistan cultivating, organising and directing the very same insurgency it has been collecting money to help combat.”
For young journalists out there, Sarah Chayes serves as a role-model having worked in war-torn countries and has worked extensively in radio across numerous countries.
Ms Chayes had the following advice for her younger self, something young people can all draw guidance from, “The hardest times, the times you feel the most uncertain about your place in the world, in the deepest doubt, or when you take what you think may be a dive off a cliff without a parachute, are the moments from which the greatest creativity can emerge. See them as a blessing.”
The Integrity 20 Summit starts on the 25th October 2016 at the Griffith University Conservatorium, South Bank Campus.