For years there has been a preference for having male offspring in many parts of the world. Consequently today there are over 160 million women and girls missing from Asia’s population and an unknown number missing from other continents thanks to selective sex abortion. This staggering gender gap is beginning to transform entire nations, leading to everything from a spike in bride-buying to an increase in crime. Join the Council in welcoming Mara Hvistendahl as she addresses the issues surrounding gender selection around the world and how the West bears responsibility for the world’s “missing women.”

Senator Boxer will join the Council to discuss the need for a new course in Afghanistan in a speech entitled, “Ending America’s Longest War.” Senator Boxer is a senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and author of a Senate bill that would require the Obama administration to give Congress a plan for the safe redeployment of U.S. troops from Afghanistan. She is the co-chair of the Senate Military Family Caucus and chairs the first Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee to focus on global women's issues.

The 8.9 earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11, 2011 set in motion one of the largest nuclear disasters in almost three decades. It also renewed the debate over the future of nuclear energy in the US and abroad. With 104 nuclear power plants across the country, generating about 20 percent of America's energy, there is no doubt that we are currently dependent on nuclear energy, yet the debate over this highly contentious technology is far from resolved. The three panelists will discuss what this disaster means for the future of US energy. How will the disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi plant shape future energy policies and public opinion, and are there existing renewable technologies capable of fulfilling the world’s energy needs? Will nuclear energy be the fuel of the 21st century, or a relic of the past?

Since its beginnings in the 1970s with the founding of the Grameen Bank, microcredit has been praised as a powerful tool for reducing global poverty. By putting small loans into the hands of the poor, microcredit has allowed entrepreneurs world-wide to establish and expand their businesses, delivering sustainable income to those who need it most. The last decade brought an explosion in the number of micro-lenders and borrowers around the world. The number of customers served by microfinance institutions now surpasses 100 million, most of them women. This growth has helped scores of impoverished communities, but the recent commercialization of several large lenders, and the scarcity of quantitative analysis on the lasting impacts of microcredit has drawn scrutiny. Please join Dr. Dean Karlan, Yale University behavioral economist and co-author of the new book More Than Good Intentions (with Jacob Appel) for a review of what recent research has shown about the effectiveness of microcredit and other financial services for the poor. Dr. Karlan will be joined by Christopher Dunford and Sean Foote for a dialogue on the state of the microfinance world today and what it might mean for the future of poverty alleviation.

Since President Obama’s assumption of office, he and Secretary Clinton have signaled their interest in strengthening economic and political relations throughout Asia. The US has important interests in Southeast Asia, and the Administration has expanded U.S. ties with multilateral organizations in the region, particularly the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). ASEAN member states are important partners for U.S. diplomatic and security efforts in the region, America’s 4th largest export market. What role does the U.S. diplomatic corps have in expanding political and economic partnerships in this critical region? What policies can be advanced to strengthen US relations with individual countries and the relationship with the ASEAN community as a whole? Please join a panel of U.S. Ambassadors to the region as they address these questions.

Approximately two million Cambodians were killed under the Khmer Rouge. The tyrannical leadership of Pol Pot and a decade of civil war took a severe toll on the nation’s population and wealth. In 1993, under the UN’s wing, Cambodia held successful democratic elections, with 90% of the electorate voting. Cambodia, it seemed, was ready to shed the past and move forward. Joel Brinkley won the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the 1979 fall of the Khmer Rouge regime at the New York Times. In 2008-2009, he returned to Cambodia to investigate the condition of this troubled nation. He found a political system crippled by corruption and dependence on aid, and a culture haunted by the genocide of the last generation. Mr. Brinkley will discuss his findings and what they mean for the future of Cambodia.

In 2007 Tim Harford established himself as the Undercover Economist, with a book of the same name. Now he’s back with a new book, Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure, suggesting that in a multi-polar and interconnected world, we cannot tackle challenges with ready-made solutions and expert opinions. Instead, we must adapt. Harford argues for the importance of adaptive trial and error in tackling issues such as climate change, poverty and financial crises, as well as in fostering innovation and creativity in our business and personal lives.

While the advanced countries are still reeling from a near economic crash and a challenging economic depression, developing nations are seeing unprecedented economic growth that is reshaping the world. These growth rates present new challenges in governance, international coordination and environmental sustainability that are little understood. Nobel Laureate Michael Spence will ask what implications these challenges hold for advanced countries, and will look ahead to the post crises period to how the global economy will develop over the next fifty years.

2011 has brought with it many challenges to the global community, namely weather extremes pushing up record food prices, and political instability spiking oil prices. Until now our economy has been based on consumption and waste, where we lived beyond our means and the resources of the planet’s ecosystems. According to Paul Gilding we have come to the end of economic growth as we know it and now it is time for Economic Growth 2.0. Gilding paints a picture of the coming decades as ones filled with loss, suffering, conflict, geopolitical instability, food shortages and massive economic change. However, he believes all of this will bring out humanity’s best qualities; compassion, innovation and adaptability will carry us through these coming crises and make us a stronger and more advanced civilization.

After his controversial 2008 re-election campaign, Robert Mugabe began a brutal terror campaign against his people which would later become known simply as, “The Fear.” Peter Godwin will tell of his secret trip to Zimbabwe where foreign journalists had been banned, the battle waged by Mugabe to stay in power and the courage and resilience of the Zimbabwean people.