The aim of this Future Forum is to use the latest thinking about knowledge societies, including the frameworks that enable rigorous definitions of the changing nature of knowledge stocks, flows and processes, so as to produce up-to-date images of future of knowledge societies. By improving the quality of the images used to describe tomorrow’s knowledge societies this Future Forum will sharpen the recommendations for enabling transformative, post-industrial knowledge societies today. In particular the discussions will focus on the relationship between new forms and processes for generating knowledge (content) and the institutional conditions at local, regional and global levels.  At the forefront in this Forum will be the special role of UN agencies and international governance systems in establishing the transparency, trust, access, and open connectivity needed to make good on the promise of knowledge societies.

The session will consist of keynote speeches by:

• Don Tapscott, Author of “Wikinomics”
• Pankaj Ghemawat, Professor of Global Strategy at IESE Barcelona and author of “World 3.0”

These will be followed by commentaries by discussants:

• Nicolas Colin, Author of “L’âge de la multitude”, Inspecteur de Finance, Professor at Sciences Po
• Izumi Aizu, Deputy Director at the Institute for HyperNetwork Society
• Mihaela Ulieru, President, IMPACT Institute for the Digital Economy
• Stefaan Verhulst, Chief of Research, Markle Foundation
• Ana Carla Fonseca, Special Advisor for the Creative Economy for the UN (UNDP/UNCTAD)

This Forum open to UNESCO Member States, the UNESCO community at large and the external audience will conclude with panel discussions and an open question and answer debate with the audience.