Paris Peace Forum
[3] In a world requiring more collective action, the Paris Peace Forum is a platform open to all seeking to develop coordination, rules, and capacities that answer global problems.
[10] President Macron and then-president Justin Vaïsse aimed at bringing together global governance actors, in an international and open space, in order to interact, discuss and generate concrete solutions.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and President Emmanuel Macron gave speeches at the opening of the forum.
[19] The three day event presented a variety of formats, including debates, panels, round tables, masterclasses, workshops, project pitches, as well as a hackathon during which developers worked on financial data transparency programs.
[25] The forum also hosted the Declaration on Information and Democracy by Reporters Without Borders,[26] with the presence of the representatives of Burkina Faso, Canada, Costa Rica, Denmark, France, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Norway, Senegal, Switzerland and Tunisia.
[28] It aims to protect civilians, to keep external actors from interfering with elections, and to preserve intellectual property, and has been likened to a digital version of the Geneva Convention.
[28] 120 projects advancing concrete solutions were presented during the three-day event in one of the following categories: environment, peace and security, development, new technologies and inclusive economy.
[31] 117 foreign guests attended the forum, including 54 heads of state and government, 16 diplomats accredited to France, and 15 representatives of international and supranational organisations.
[32] What was also noted was US President Donald Trump's absence at the forum,[33] despite having attended a commemoration ceremony at the Arc de Triomphe on the morning of 11 November.
[34] Other attendants included French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Yves Le Drian, Nobel Peace Prize laureates Nadia Murad and Shirin Ebadi, and Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Christophe Deloire.
These included B4IG,[43] which started out at the G7 Leaders' Summit in Biarritz, and which is driven by Emmanuel Macron, the OECD and Danone in order to unite companies for inclusive growth.
The third edition, hosted virtually from 11 to 13 November 2020, was chiefly devoted to the multi-actor response to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the conviction that all relevant actors can collectively overcome the enormous challenges faced by the international community and use the crisis as an opportunity to rebuild a more sustainable world.
This new initiative calls for achieving sustainable use of outer space for the benefit of all humankind by 2030 by taking concrete actions to tackle the pressing challenge of reducing debris orbiting Earth.
The Paris Call invites all cyberspace actors to work together and encourage states to cooperate with private sector partners, academia, and civil society.
The 1,200 supporters of the Paris Call (80 states, more than 700 companies, 350 civil society organizations) commit to working together to adopt responsible behavior and implement within cyberspace the fundamental principles which apply in the physical world.
French President Emmanuel Macron and UNICEF, along with seven other states, a dozen non-governmental organizations, and most of the major digital platforms (including Amazon, Google, YouTube, Meta, Microsoft, Dailymotion, Qwant, Snap, and Twitter) signed this call and committed to enabling children to use digital tools safely and benefit from their full potential without being exposed to abuse through a series of actions.
[52] The seventh edition of the Paris Peace Forum was held 11-12 November 2024 at the Palais de Chaillot with the theme "Wanted: a Functioning World Order".
[54][55][56] The Paris Peace Forum faced criticism in 2018 for having extended an invitation to Saudi Arabia, in light of the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the continuing war in Yemen.
[57] Due to similar contradictions, such as France's involvement in weapons sales, and nuclear armament, questions were raised as to the extent to which the peace summit was truly substantial or just an instrument of communication.
