From April 23 to 25, 2025, the Valdai Discussion Club will host a conference for participants of its Valdai – New Generation project at its Moscow headquarters.
The event will bring together over 40 Russian and international experts, including young specialists, postgraduate students, and graduates of leading universities in international relations. Representing Algeria, Belarus, Brazil, China, the Czech Republic, India, Indonesia, Italy, Kyrgyzstan, and Serbia, these participants have been actively engaged in the Valdai – New Generation initiative since its launch in March 2024 at the first Youth Conference, “The Valdai Club: The World in 2040”, held during the World Youth Festival.
Valdai – New Generation is a dynamic community of researchers under 35, united by their pursuit of innovative solutions to the most pressing challenges in international politics and the global economy. These accomplished specialists are poised to become the next generation of policymakers and thought leaders in their respective countries.
The project aims to foster intergenerational dialogue on global affairs, support the professional development of young scholars, and strengthen their ties with Russian and international expert networks. Organisers believe these emerging voices will bring fresh perspectives to the Club, propose novel solutions, and highlight overlooked opportunities for change.
Over the past year, participants have contributed analytical articles to the Valdai Club’s website and co-authored a report titled “The New Horizons of Multipolarity”, which will be unveiled on April 24, the conference’s second day. The report’s themes – along with the participants’ research interests – have shaped both the event’s agenda and the report’s structure.
The two-day conference will feature an opening session, five thematic discussions, a summary debate, and the report presentation. During the sessions, experts will discuss the following topics:
New global governance;
International political economy and sustainable development;
Artificial intelligence and technology;
Conflicts and integration;
The world of regions.
After the end of the open programme of the conference, its participants will meet with Russian microbiologist Alexander Ginzburg, director of the N. F. Gamaleya Institute, Valery Fyodorov, General Director of the All-Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM), Roman Dushkin, General Director of the A-Ya Expert IT company, as well as with Ivan Timofeev, General Director of the Russian International Affairs Council and Programme Director of the Valdai Discussion Club.
The international participants of the Valdai New Generation project invited to the conference include: Nikita Ryabchenko, researcher of international relations and world development, Master of the Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Republic of Belarus; Boris Zabolotsky, Professor of the Federal University of Portuguese-Afro-Brazilian Integration, Doctor of Political Science at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil); Rupal Mishra, graduate student, senior researcher at the Center for Russian and Central Asian Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (India); Sellita, lecturer of the Department of International Relations, Bakri University (Indonesia); Emanuel Pietrobon, Head of the Information and Security Department, MasiraX (Italy); Peng Bo, Director of the Shanghai Center for Strategic and International Studies RimPac (China); Milana ？ivanovi？, Senior Researcher, Institute of Contemporary History of Serbia; Ladislav Zemánek, Visiting Researcher, Institute of China and Central and Eastern Europe, Hungary, (Czech Republic), and others.
The Russian participants of the project and the conference include: Anna Sytnik, Associate Professor of the Department of American Studies, Faculty of International Relations, St. Petersburg State University; Alla Levchenko, Lecturer, MGIMO University of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia; Alexander Ulanov, Vice-Rector for Development, Innovation and Digitalisation, Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia; Matvey Kiselev, Deputy Director for Legal Issues and GR, Perspektivy Tyumeni LLC; Nubara Kulieva,Research intern at the HSE Center for Contemporary Economics and International Studies, visiting lecturer at the HSE, junior research fellow at the Caucasian Studies Sector at the Center for Central Asian Studies at the Institute of Central Asian Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Alexey Chikhachev, Associate Professor at the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations at St. Petersburg State University, leading expert at the Center for Strategic Studies at the Institute of Foreign Economic Relations at the HSE, and others.
The conference will also feature traditional participants in the Valdai Club events. Some of them, including Anastasia Likhacheva, Dean of the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs at the National Research University Higher School of Economics, and Nikolay Silaev, Leading Research Fellow at the IMI MGIMO, will present their expert comments on the presentations of young researchers. Fyodor Lukyanov, Research Director of the Valdai Discussion Club, Oleg Barabanov and Anton Bespalov, Programme Directors of the Valdai Discussion Club, and Andrey Sushentsov, Dean of the Faculty of International Relations at MGIMO will also take part in the conference and will summarise the results of the year of work with the project participants. The conference will be opened by Andrey Bystritskiy,Chairman of the Board of the Foundation for the Development and Support of the Valdai Discussion Club, and Timofei Bordachev, HSE Professor, Programme Director of the Valdai Discussion Club, curator of the Valdai New Generation project.
Working languages: Russian, English.
Please follow the updates and broadcast on the online platforms of the Valdai Club: on the website, X (formerly Twitter), VK, Telegram and Dzen.