Africa Forum: Centering an African Vision for a New Multilateral Future

The African Continent has the potential to have a revolutionary influence on the second half of this century. As demographic trends across much of the world project a future of older and less productive economies, the African Continent stands out for its rapidly increasing youth population, its potential for innovation and growth, and its central role in addressing a range of critical global challenges, from economic transformation, to climate change, to biodiversity, to a new vision for a geopolitical order that more fully represents the ideas and visions of the world’s largest – and youngest – continent. However, how and whether these “dividends” can be fully realized through Africa’s future global engagement, remains a significant question.

With both the world’s fastest growing youth population and vast natural resources, the African continent is increasingly central to global economic growth and geopolitical influence. Despite this central importance, the United States and Europe lack a coherent and inclusive strategy for engagement, trade, governance, and economic development with Africa, and are burdened by the legacies of their colonial pasts. Likewise, China’s trade and engagement with Africa is often contested and controversial, with growing concerns about China’s interest in geopolitical leverage taking precedent over broad-based and inclusive African development and growth.

With the African Union as the G20’s newest member and South Africa holding the G20 Presidency from December 2024, how will Africa navigate these issues? What might Africa’s global leadership role look like over the coming decades? How might the African Union – and other African States – best shape global policy debates and institutions to highlight and activate African innovations and solutions? What is the African Union – or even Pan-African – vision of geopolitical cooperation and peace in this context, including the central role Africa might play? What specific African approaches to leveraging the continent’s unique assets have the greatest potential to drive both domestic growth and global environmental solutions, while safeguarding peace, sovereignty, and future prosperity? And what do Africans across the continent – especially Africa’s young people – want and expect from their own leaders and from an international system that should represent their 21st century interests?

Against this backdrop, the purpose of Salzburg Global’s 2025 Pathways to Peace Program will be to center African perspectives and ideas in ways that elevate the key role and distinct contributions of the African continent in an emerging geopolitical nexus of cooperation and competition, and more importantly to highlight an African vision for the pathways that might lead to a more peaceful, prosperous, and sustainable 21st century.

Date

Apr 22 - Apr 26, 2025

Session no.

S896-01

Location

Schloss Leopoldskron, Salzburg, Austria

Contact

Benjamin Glahn

Deputy CEO and Managing Director, Programs

Kateryna Anselmi

Program Manager, Peace and Justice

Edlira Kastrati

Program Manager, Peace and Justice

Content overview

ADDITIONAL INFO FELLOWS

ADDITIONAL INFO

KEY ISSUES AND QUESTIONS

Africa’s Vision for Multilateral Cooperation: The global multilateral system is flawed, beset by polarization and often plain absent. It has also too often underperformed, including on trade, debt relief, investment, and more recently on climate change. There is thus widespread agreement that the world needs more just and equitable solutions – especially for Africa - but what form should these take? What is the direction of travel? What needs to change?
Geopolitical Competition and Influence: China has emerged as a dominant player in strategic resource investment in Africa, giving it significant advantages in leveraging political influence both across the continent and within the multilateral system. At the same time, the US, EU, and other global powers lack a coherent strategy to engage with Africa’s diverse economies, increase investment, decrease corruption, and help address development priorities and economic growth. How will African states and the African Union navigate this context and leverage their own geopolitical influence to enhance their capacity to compete in the global economy?
Climate Leadership, Conservation & Peace: The challenge of peace and stability in the 21st century will be shaped – perhaps more than any other factor – by climate change, biodiversity, and the conservation of natural ecosystems and resources. The African continent has enormous potential – due to its size, the scale of its natural resources and ecosystems, and its extraordinary biodiversity – to contribute solutions and innovations that can reduce these challenges. In short, the future of the planet is conservation, and the future of conservation is in Africa. Yet, across the continent African economies have been beset by corruption and governance challenges, priced out of carbon markets, and have suffered from a lack of investment in new climate mitigation and adaptation technologies. How can Africa’s rapidly developing and dynamic economies harness economic growth, increase jobs, reduce emissions, conserve precious ecosystems, and provide solutions for the global climate crisis? What is needed?
Harnessing Africa’s Demographic Dividend: Africa’s demographic transition may be among its most significant assets, but also its most significant challenges. In 1950, the African continent made up only 8% of the global population. By 2050, more than 25% of the global population will be African, and the African population alone will be more than 2.5 billion people. More significantly, as birthrates decline in the “Global North,” by 2040 more than one-third of young people on the planet will live in Africa. Africa has the youngest median age (19) of any region, and by 2035 Africa will have the largest potential workforce anywhere in the world – while advanced economies in then “Global North” continue to place structural limitations on immigration and African economic growth and mobility. In this context, the demographic dividend comes with significant questions: With high-unemployment and limited economic prospects, today more than 60% of young Africans are seeking to emigrate. Can Africa’s diverse economies grow fast enough to ensure opportunity, jobs, and livelihoods for this young demographic? How will education systems need to transform to education and train young people for the jobs of the 21st century economy? What other changes are needed to ensure that girls and young women share equal access to opportunities and are also empowered to succeed? And how will Africa’s diverse states and regional alliances leverage this demographic dividend on the global stage? What policies, investments, and international alliances will African countries prioritize, and who will benefit most?

FORMAT

The Forum will convene approximately 40-50 participants for a 4-day program at Salzburg Global, based at Schloss Leopoldskron in Salzburg, Austria. The session will consist of panels, discussions, small group dialogues, and informal debates. Emphasis will be placed on open and off-the-record exchange of views and ideas. Chatham House rule applies. It will be a forward-looking opportunity to highlight Africa’s vision for global engagement and peace, as well as how to center Africa in ways that change the conversation about the future of Africa’s role in the 21st century’s geopolitical balance of power.

Following the discussions, Salzburg Global will work with select partners to produce a written report summarizing critical findings and recommendations without attribution, and generate other media to raise public awareness of the Forum’s findings.

Participant Profile

Participants will include those with insights into Africa’s economy and politics, and the dynamics of global economic and technological interdependence from a variety of stakeholder perspectives. The forum will assemble an intergenerational, international, and interdisciplinary group from government, the private sector, and civil society to engage in off-the-record conversations to evaluate the opportunities with and within the African Continent and to highlight and celebrate uniquely African solutions to global challenges.