”Club of Gdansk”: Poland’s and Russia’s leaders meeting

From the 3rd through to the 6th of October 2013, the representatives of IICS: Mateusz Komorowski, Marcin Barański and Robert Wiśniewski, participated in the 1st edition of ”The Club of Gdansk” – a meeting of Poland’s and Russia’s young leaders. The meeting was organised by the Centre for Poland-Russia Dialogue and Partnership and the City of Gdansk.

The Club of Gdansk is to become a lasting forum for meetings of the young and dynamic people from Poland and Russia who actively participate in public life at the national, regional and local levels. The long-term ambition of the initiative is to form a network of small local communities in both countries.

- We want the young people from Poland and Russia to acquire new skills that help to function in public, enable development and growth and facilitate one’s career – dr Sławomir Dębski, head of CPRDP explained. – We want the young people who acquire such skills through our project to associate this fact with Poland and the city of Gdansk.

The event was divided into a few sessions. During the first – theory-related, but with a lot of interaction - Prof. Ryszard Stemplowski (former Chief of Staff of the Polish Parliament and Ambassador of Poland in London, the first Director of PISM) led a workshop regarding philosophical dilemmas in political analysis. We talked about such issues as: social justice, development, democracy, sovereignty, transformations of the state and global economic crises.

During the second session, the former Ambassador of the Great Britain in Poland, Charles Crawford conducted a professional workshop regarding negotiating techniques “Negotiation in Action”. He presented basic aspects of contemporary theories in the field of negotiating. The participants of the workshop acquired practical skills as used in professional mediations. The examples discussed during the workshop included true high-profile diplomatic negotiations to show what real-life negotiation were like in practice.

The programme of the Club of Gdansk also included a workshop regarding the ins and outs of Diplomatic Protocol – “Participation at meetings and receptions” accompanied with a mock party conducted by Ms Bogumila Wieclaw of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Poland – a specialist in the field of Diplomatic Protocol.

Additionally, the members of the Club would then meet the Mayor of the City of Gdansk Pawel Adamowicz, to talk about citizen participation.

The Club brought together a number of social activists, academics and representatives of NGOs and local communities from both Poland and Russia alike.

IICS will have the honour to recommend a few participants who will have the chance to attend the next edition of “The Club of Gdansk”.