Invite to webinar on: 'Thinking and working politically about regional cooperation and integration'

[Katherine Hellier]

Dear All, 

We are delighted to invite you to the next event in the TWP Global Webinar Series; 'Thinking and working politically about regional cooperation and integration', on Thursday 23rd June, 10:00-11:30 BST, 11;00-12:30 CEST. 

Please REGISTER HERE.

Why do governments sign up to regional agreements but then not implement them? The challenge in thinking and working politically (TWP) regionally is that practitioners must not only seek to understand how political interests, incentives and power relations relate to regional ambitions, policies and contexts between countries, but also how these interact with political relations within countries. This online event, organised in collaboration with ECDPM, will discuss the experience and challenges of thinking and working politically in regional approaches, focusing on economic integration and cooperation in Africa. Building on lessons from more of a decade of work that ECDPM has led on this, the event will explore examples of innovative efforts at supporting regional integration in politically-informed ways to tease out insights about how what has worked well, less well and why, and to move from policy to practice and impact.

The discussion will be framed around the following questions:

1. How do regional processes and support programmes in Africa currently take account (explicitly or implicitly) of politics and context at different levels (subnational, national, regional, and even global)?

2. What lessons can be drawn from those experiences, both for regional policy and for the donor community?

3. What broader lessons are there for TWP?

Speakers include:

• Allen Sophia Asiimwe, Chief of Programmes, TradeMark East Africa
• Bruce Byiers, Head, African Economic Integration, ECDPM
• Maiko Miyake, Principal Operations Officer, World Bank Group & Head of Programme, Trade Facilitation West Africa
• Wumi Olayiwola, Researcher, ECOWAS COmmission
• Kathleen van Hove, Senior Policy Officer, ECDPM (facilitator)

We hope you can join us for this important conversation. 

Kind regards, 

Katherine Hellier

Project and Communications Officer, Thinking and Working Politically Community of Practice

twpcommunity.org