The Department of Accounting and the Lloyds Bank Centre for Responsible Business were delighted to welcome Professor Adrian Macey for a three day cross-disciplinary networking event from the 28th to the 30th of May.
From left to right Dr Robert Charnock, Dr Ann-Christine Frandsen, Professor Adrian Macey and Professor Keith Hoskin.
Professor Macey has a rich and extensive career spanning government and academic worlds. He was the first New Zealander to study at the French École Nationale d’Administration. Having then completed his PhD he went on to a stellar career in the New Zealand Diplomatic Service, where he became New Zealand’s Chief Trade Negotiator, working with the WTO in multiple negotiations, before being appointed Ambassador to Thailand and then to France. Finally in 2006 he became New Zealand’s first Climate Change Ambassador, and then went on to chair the Kyoto Protocol negotiations.
As a Professor at Victoria University Wellington since 2010, he has been actively involved in a joint international research project into new governance models to enable the effective global and local management of climate change initiatives. He has also this year been a Research Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Studies, Nantes, along with BBS’s Professor Keith Hoskin. He graciously accepted our invitation to spend three days meeting with BBS faculty and PhD students, culminating in a 3-hour seminar where his topic was: “Global Governance of the climate after the Paris Agreement. Have we got it right this time?” The ensuing discussion of this key global political and economic issue was deep and wide-ranging. Valuably for us, Adrian offered rich insights into the nitty-gritty of the global negotiating process, and the diplomacy involved in managing all the impasses and trade-offs encountered along the way. For us it was an enormously stimulating and enriching three days, and all our thanks go to Adrian for giving so generously of his time. Finally we look forward to continuing research discussions and interactions with him and his project team into the future.
