Online Seminar Series: October 2025 – June 2026
This project, led by Jean-Jacques Subrenat (ret. French Ambassador and Distinguished Fellow of the IGN), brings together different generations from across the world to discuss current topics at the junction of geopolitics and negotiation.
The online seminar series offers a platform where ideas can be exchanged and dialogue is fostered in times of polarisation.
Sessions take place once a month from October 2025 until June 2026. Applications for participation in the series close on 19 September 2025.

Applications for 2025/2026 are open!
Read more below on how to apply until 19. September 2025.
The Seminar
The seminar series takes place once a month on Zoom with a selected group of up to 30 participants from an interdisciplinary and intergenerational background.
After a successful pilot phase (April to June 2025), IGN is expanding this participatory monthly seminar to a full cycle, from October 2025 to June 2026. Designed as an online, intergenerational and international exercise, the Challenges of Our Time seminar requires each registered participant to actively engage.
The list of monthly topics will be announced at the first session (October 2025). Each monthly topic shall be prepared by a group of 2 to 3 participants, as the framework of that session’s debate. In between sessions, the Project Leader and Project Associate will be available for advice on preparing an upcoming topic. The Challenges of our time seminar provides an overview of topics generally discussed in separate silos (politics, economy, society, innovation, defence, environment, diplomacy, etc). Working with people from different generations, backgrounds or geographic locations, is an opportunity to enrich one’s understanding of contemporary challenges. At the end of the 2025-2026 seminar, participants will receive an IGN Certificate as a testimonial of their active involvement.
Subrenat has conducted similar monthly seminars in-person with Collegium60Plus in Bern from 2017 to 2024 (in English), withOPAD in Dijon since 2019 (in French), and recently most with members of U3A-York (online in English and French).
Challenges of our Time – Geopolitics & Negotiation
