Bios | Ideas Network 2030

On this page you can find bios of speakers at this year’s Summer University.

Open sessions from the Summer University will be archived and available online next week after the conclusion of the event.

Session 1: Opening session

Stephen Hammond
Deputy Chair, Conservative European Forum
& Member of Parliament for Wimbledon

Stephen Hammond is Deputy Chair of the Conservative European Forum (CEF). He is the Member of Parliament for Wimbledon and was first elected in 2005. Stephen previously served in Government as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport (2012-14) and Minister of State at the Department of Health and Social Care (2018-19). In Opposition, he was a spokesman on Transport and was PPS to SoS DCLG. He also has chaired the influential APPG on Wholesale Financial Markets and the APPG on Infrastructure. Between 2015-2018 he was a member on the Treasury Select Committee. Stephen was born in Southampton, attended King Edward VI School and studied Economics at Queen Mary College, University of London. Before being elected to Parliament, Stephen had a successful career in finance, leading fund house management and working for major investment banks. He was appointed a Director of the Equities division of Dresdner Kleinwort Benson in 1994 before joining Commerzbank Securities four years later. Stephen is married to Sally and lives in Wimbledon Park, with their daughter and three RSPCA rescue cats.

Tomi Huhtanen
Executive Director, Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies

Tomi Huhtanen studied International Politics and Economics at the University of Helsinki and spent a year in Spain at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid studying International Law and Political History. He also holds an MBA degree from the United Business Institutes in Brussels. Tomi started his carrier by working for the Finnish delegation of the European People’s Party in the European Parliament. From 1999 to 2007, he was a Political Adviser and subsequently a Senior Adviser for the EPP, mainly focusing on economic and social policy. During this period, he launched the European View policy journal, of which he became Editor-in-Chief. In 2007, Tomi was put in charge of launching the political foundation of the European People’s Party, the Centre for European Studies (renamed the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies in 2014); in the same year, Tomi was nominated as the Centre’s Director, and is since October 2015 its Executive Director. Tomi speaks Finnish, Swedish, English, Spanish, French, Italian, Greek and has basic knowledge of German.

Angelos Chryssogelos
Research Associate, Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies

Angelos Chryssogelos teaches European politics and international relations at King’s College London. His interests lie in external relations of the EU, foreign policy in Europe, and European party politics. Apart from being a Martens Centre Research Associate he is also an Associate Fellow of the Europe Programme of Chatham House and an associate of the Hellenic Observatory, European Institute of the London School of Economics. He is also the president of the Athens-based think tank Hellenic Conservative Policy Institute. He holds a doctoral degree from the European University Institute in Florence. In the past he has worked at the LSE and Chatham House, and taught at the universities of Limerick and Antwerp. He was a visiting fellow of the Martens Centre (then CES) in 2010 and has been a frequent contributor to events and debates in the EPP network ever since, including Martens Centre and EIN events, and EPP campaign managers meetings. He has published academic articles in the Journal of Common Market Studies, European Foreign Affairs Review, Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, and European View; and authored or co-authored policy reports for Chatham House, Martens Centre, and Political Capital Institute. He has commented extensively on European and Greek affairs for the media, including BBC World News, CNBC, Bloomberg, the Guardian, and the Financial Times.

Felix Dane
Director of The Ideas Network 2030

Felix Dane is Director of Hendrik Ltd, a hydrogen start-up, as well as a co-Director of IN2030. Prior to this, Felix led several offices around the world for the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, including lastly the UK/Ireland office, where he worked to intensify German-British/Irish relations. He also spent some time at the European Parliament and holds a master’s degree in European Studies from the LSE.

Caroline Newton
Director of The Ideas Network 2030

Caroline Newton is a director of The Ideas Network 2030. Her career spans the FCO, BBC News and the Greater London Authority. She is a local councillor in Oxfordshire and has a particular interest in sustainability and biodiversity.

Session 2: Priorities emerging from global trends 2030 and beyond

Mathew Burrows
Director, Foresight, Strategy, and Risks Initiative & Co-Director, New American Engagement Initiative, Atlantic Council

Mathew Burrows is a security and intelligence expert. He was formerly with the CIA and served as the National Intelligence Council’s Counselor, and was the intelligence advisor to Richard Holbrooke when he was the US Ambassador to the UN. After 9/11, he became deputy national security advisor to US Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill.

Dr Franck Debié
Director for Library and Knowledge Services, DG EPRS, European Parliament; Member of the Steering Group of European System for Policy Analysis and Strategy

Associate professor of geography and geopolitics at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (in sabbatical) and former head of the department of Geography and Geopolitics, Dr Franck Debié worked on peace processes (UN peace operations, peace building in the Balkans and the Middle East) before turning to European affairs. For him, the convergence provided by the EU still remains the best chance for peace in the European continent and the Mediterranean. He headed the European programme at the HEC business school for 10 years. He joined Alain Juppé and Edouard Philippe and the newly created centre right UMP party in 2002 as head of policy planning. With Jérome Monod and Francis Mer, he established the Fondapol (2004-2008) the leading independent centre right policy think tank with a strong European commitment. He then became the policy director of the European Ideas Network of think tanks and foundations working with the European People’s Party Group in the European Parliament (2009-2010). He has led the team of the Secretary General of the European Parliament on long term trends, dealing with foresight and strategic planning at administrative level. He served as deputy Head in the cabinet of the Secretary General of the European Parliament (2011-2019) as the one in charge of foresight, innovation and strategic planning. The directorate which he is currently heading within the European Parliamentary Research Services provides MEPs with all sources (press, journals, books, data bases, big data, audio-visual) needed for their legislative and political work.

Lord Syed Kamall
Member of the House of Lords and Professor of Politics and International Relations at St Mary’s University, Twickenham

Syed Kamall is a member of the UK House of Lords and a Professor of Politics and International Relations at St Mary’s University, Twickenham. He is also an Academic and Research Consultant at the Institute of Economic Affairs, a classical liberal think tank and educational charity. From May 2005 to June 2019, he was a Conservative MEP for London. In 2014, he was elected the leader of the European Conservatives and Reformist pan-European political group in the European Parliament and acted as an interlocutor during the negotiations on the UK’s withdrawal from the EU. In London, he regularly met and worked with local community projects tackling poverty and social exclusion. He is currently setting up a microfinance project to offer grants or online loans to entrepreneurs from poorer communities. He is also in discussions to set up a network of local charities and volunteers to help inspire and incubate more local community charities. He formerly worked as a strategy, public affairs and diversity consultant.

Session 3: Guest Speaker in Conversation: Elements in US, EU and UK architecture looking to 2030

João Vale de Almeida
EU Ambassador to the UK

João Vale de Almeida is a senior European Union diplomat who became the EU Ambassador to the UK in February 2020. He previously served as EU Ambassador to the United Nations from 2015 to 2019. Ambassador Vale de Almeida previously served as the first EU Ambassador to the United States of America, from 2010 to 2014. Prior to his appointment in Washington as the European Union’s Ambassador, he served as the Director General for External Relations at the European Commission, the European Union’s executive body. Between 2004 and 2009, Ambassador Vale de Almeida was the Head of Cabinet (Chief of staff and main adviser) for European Commission President José Manuel Barroso. João Vale de Almeida was also the President’s Personal Representative for the negotiations on the Treaty of Lisbon and the EU’s “Sherpa” for G7/8 and G20 Summits.

Flick Drummond MP
Conservative Member of Parliament for Meon Valley

Flick Drummond has been the Member of Parliament for Meon Valley – a place she calls home – since December 2019. She is also a Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) in the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). From 2015 to 2017 she was MP for nearby Portsmouth South. Flick has a wide range of experience in public service and in the voluntary sector. Recently, she was the Chair of the SE Region of the Veterans Advisory and Pension Committee, a Board member of the National Citizens Service (NCS) and Voluntary Director of the Conservative Policy Forum. She resigned from all these appointments when she was elected again to Parliament. Flick has been a school governor at Milton Park Primary School in Portsmouth and has a keen interest in education. She used to work as an insurance broker, Ofsted lay school inspector and was a member of the TA Intelligence Corps. Her other interests are in foreign affairs and especially the Middle East where she was born in what is now Yemen. Flick is married with 4 grown up children.

Session 4: Guest Speaker in Conversation: Assessing the power of the Internet

Marietje Schaake
International Director of Policy, Cyber Policy Center, Stanford University

Marietje Schaake is the international policy director at Stanford University’s Cyber Policy Center and international policy fellow at Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence. She was named President of the Cyber Peace Institute. Between 2009 and 2019, Marietje served as a Member of European Parliament for the Dutch liberal democratic party where she focused on trade, foreign affairs and technology policies. Marietje is affiliated with a number of non-profits including the European Council on Foreign Relations and the Observer Research Foundation in India and writes a monthly column for the Financial Times and a bi-monthly column for the Dutch NRC newspaper.

Tyson Barker
Head of Technology and Global Affairs Program, DGAP German Council on Foreign Relations

Tyson Barker joined DGAP in October 2020 as head of its Technology and Global Affairs Program. He previously worked at Aspen Germany where, as deputy executive director and fellow, he was responsible for the institute’s digital and transatlantic programs. Prior to that, Barker served in numerous positions including as senior advisor in the Bureau for European and Eurasian Affairs at the US State Department and director for transatlantic relations at the Bertelsmann Foundation. He has written for numerous publications on both sides of the Atlantic including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Politico, The Atlantic, The National Interest, and Der Spiegel. Barker was a Fulbright scholar in Austria and a Truman National Security Project Fellow. He was a recipient of the Taiwan Cultural Exchange Fellowship and a grant from the Starr Foundation to conduct research on Sino-European relations. Barker has a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University and a master’s degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS).

Session 5: Technology: Who regulates cyberspace? (By invitation only)

Damian Collins MP
Conservative Member of Parliament for Folkestone and Hythe
Chair, Joint Committee on the Online Safety Bill

Damian Collins is the Conservative MP for Folkestone and Hythe, first elected in 2010. Prior to being a MP, Damian’s business career was in the advertising and communications industries. From 2016 to 2019, Damian chaired the House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, leading inquiries into football governance, homophobia in sport, reality TV, disinformation and ‘fake news’, and immersive and addictive technologies. During this time, Damian also launched the International Grand Committee, a group of parliamentarians from around the world focused on electoral communications, digital competition, online harms, and data privacy. Damian now chairs a joint committee of members of the House of Lords and House of Commons scrutinising the Online Safety Bill. He also hosts a popular digital policy podcast, The Infotagion Podcast.

Karen Massin
Head Government Affairs and Public Policy EU Institutions, Google Europe

Karen Massin leads Google’s Government Affairs & Public Policy team in Brussels. She drives the development and implementation of outreach strategies, and engages in various policy areas affecting the digital industry such as platform policies, privacy, content management, economic recovery and sustainability. Previously, Karen was the CEO of the public affairs consultancy BCW. She also led its Public Affairs Practice across Europe and managed pan-European advocacy programs for a wide range of industries towards regulators, industry, NGOs and media. Previously Karen worked at the UN, the European Commission and the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Frank Nigriello
Director of Corporate Affairs, Unipart Group

Frank Nigriello has worked in ‘blue chip’ companies such as Barclays and IBM, as well as with a wide range of SMEs, in establishing strong reputations, clear value propositions and effective marketing & communication programmes. Promoting responsible business behaviours has been at the heart of much of his work. As a result, in 2014, he was named as HRH the Prince of Wales’s Responsible Business Ambassador for the South East, a role he concluded in 2021. He also chaired the South East Leadership Board of Business in the Community. Frank began his career as a journalist in New York then in the UK. After several roles in marketing and communications, he was appointed to his current role as Unipart’s first Director of Corporate Affairs focusing his expertise on a company at the leading edge of values-based business transformation in Britain. He is a founder member of the Ideas Network 2030 and non-executive chairman of B4, the business network. He is also Chairman of Oxfordshire Business First, the innovation business network . He is a member of Oxfordshire Inclusive Economy Partnership and Oxford Strategic Partnership board . Frank is a visiting industrial fellow and frequent guest lecturer at Oxford Brookes University, and is on the Advisory Board of the School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics. He has also lectured at Rewley College. Through his work in China, Frank has been recognised as an expert foreign lecturer in the Chaoyang district in Beijing.

Session 6: Economy and Trade: Resilience or openness? (By invitation only)

Emily Rees
Senior Fellow European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE) and Managing Director, Trade Strategies

Emily Rees is an international trade policy expert and founder of Trade Strategies, a trade and regulatory consultancy advising governments, businesses and civil society organisations. A Franco-British national, Emily comes from an extensive career in EU affairs, trade policy and economic diplomacy, having led Brazil’s trade and investment agency relations with the European Union and served as Deputy Trade Attaché of France to Brazil. Emily is a Senior Fellow at the European Centre for International Political Economy in Brussels, where she leads the EU-Mercosur project, a comprehensive programme to bridge trade relations between Europe and Latin America. An economist by training, Ms Rees’ expertise lies at the intersection of trade, agriculture and climate change. Her areas of interest include “new generation” trade issues including environmental food standards, animal welfare, and values in trade. A regular guest lecturer in trade, diplomacy and the European Union, her analyses are regularly featured in international media, including BBC World Service, Financial Times, Politico, The Economist, Sky News, Estado de São Paulo and Valor Econômico.

Penelope Naas
President for International Public Affairs and Sustainability, UPS

Penelope (Penny) Naas began her UPS career in May 2012, managing the Public Affairs team for the EMEA Region, where she enhanced governmental understanding of UPS and the issues impacting the logistics industry. In 2014, Penny was also asked to oversee sustainability in Europe, and has worked to advance internal and external appreciation of the importance of sustainability for UPS. She then served as UPS Vice President and District Manager for International Public Affairs and Sustainability from January 2015 until early 2020. Penny worked for Citigroup in the Global Government Affairs team from 2006-2012. She moved to Europe in 2007 and opened Citigroup’s first government affairs office in Brussels, Belgium, where she oversaw the various legislative and regulatory issues that arose after the 2008 financial crisis. Penny started her career at the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC), where she worked for 13 years in various roles covering international trade and commercial issues. Her roles included leading the Office of Europe and creating strategies to help US companies facing market access challenges in Europe, as well as working in both the Clinton and Bush White House on task forces to pass trade deals. She started her career at the Department of Commerce conducting anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations on foreign companies. Penny has a bachelor’s degree in economics and a Master’s degree in public policy from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She co-chairs the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Trade and Investment. She is a former board member of the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU and the University of Michigan Alumni Board, the American European Community Association and the Fulbright Commission for Belgium and Luxembourg. She is active in UPS’ Women’s Leadership Development program. Her husband, Niels, is a Danish diplomat and they have three children. Penny enjoys playing sports and travel.

Sam Lowe
Senior research fellow, Centre for European Reform

Sam is a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform. He is also a visiting senior research fellow at The Policy Institute, Kings College London and a co-founder of the UK Trade Forum. He works on trade issues, with a focus on Brexit, customs and regulatory barriers, and trade in services. He regularly briefs businesses, government officials, politicians and European institutions, including Parliamentary select committees and the European Central Bank and was previously a member of the British government’s Strategic Trade Advisory Group (2019-2020). Sam often appears in the media, including the BBC Radio 4 Today Programme, The Financial Times, The Times, Politico, The Economist, The Wall Street Journal and Sky News.

Session 7: Geopolitical: Is the rise of China inevitable? (By invitation only)

Tom Tugendhat MP
Chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, Conservative MP for Tonbridge and Malling

Tom Tugendhat is the Chairman of the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Since his election as Conservative MP for Tonbridge and Malling in 2015, Tom has become one of the leading parliamentary thinkers on the UK’s evolving relationship with Europe, the US, Russia and China; and as Chair of the parliamentary China Research Group, has been particularly outspoken about China’s record on human rights, and regarding its recent actions in Hong Kong. Before his election to Parliament, Tom served in the British Army and Foreign and Commonwealth Office in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Steve Tsang
Director, SOAS China Institute

Professor Steve Tsang is Director of the SOAS China Institute, School of Oriental and African Studies University of London. He is also an Emeritus Fellow of St Antony’s College at Oxford, and an Associate Fellow at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House). He previously served as the Head of the School of Contemporary Chinese Studies and as Director of the China Policy Institute at the University of Nottingham. Before that he spent 29 years at Oxford University, where he earned his D.Phil. and worked as a Professorial Fellow, Dean, and Director of the Asian Studies Centre at St Antony’s College. Professor Tsang regularly contributes to public debates on different aspects of issues related to the politics, history, foreign policy, security and development of the People’s Republic of China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and East Asia more generally. He is known in particular for introducing the concept of ‘consultative Leninism’ as an analytical framework to understand the structure and nature of politics in contemporary China. He has a broad area of research interest and has published extensively, including five single authored and thirteen collaborative books. One of his latest publications is an article ‘Party-state Realism: A Framework for Understanding China’s Approach to Foreign Policy’, in the Journal of Contemporary China (2020), and his current research project is on ‘The Political Thought of Xi Jinping’.

Roland Freudenstein
Policy Director, Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies

Roland Freudenstein was born in Bonn, Germany. After a two year voluntary military service, he studied political science, economics, Japan studies and international relations in Bonn and Los Angeles. Having worked as a research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations, he became a member of the foreign and security planning staff of the European Commission in Brussels in the 1990s. Subsequently, he became the director of the Warsaw office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and later held a leading function in the Foundation’s central office in Berlin. After coming back to Brussels in 2004, he represented the German city state of Hamburg to the EU. Roland Freudenstein has been, since 2008, Head of Research and Deputy Director of the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies and, since October 2015, its Policy Director. He has contributed to debates and published extensively on European integration, international security, German-Polish relations, global democracy support and about Russia and Eastern Europe. As of October 2021, Roland will become Vice President and Head of the Brussels office of GLOBSEC, Central Europe’s biggest think tank.

Session 8: Guest Speaker in Conversation: The challenges ahead for Europe (By invitation only)

Jyrki Katainen
President, Sitra, former EU Commissioner and former Prime Minister of Finland

Jyrki Katainen is President of Sitra. His main objective is to lead the future-oriented work at Sitra in such a way that Sitra will be able to generate new ideas to aid decision-makers in society and private companies, and to try and test new operating models. He has a special interest in transforming the market economy so that it complies with the principles of circular economy and sustainability. Jyrki also wants Sitra to stimulate debate concerning the forces that will shape our future. Before his appointment as President of Sitra, Katainen was European Commission Vice-President for Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness. Prior to that, he has held the positions of Prime Minister of Finland and Finance Minister. During his 15 years as a Member of the Finnish Parliament he was Chair of the Committee for the Future, among other appointments.

Anna Nalyvayko
Project Officer, Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies

Anna Nalyvayko carries out projects with the Wilfried Martens Centre’s partners and maintains external cooperation with stakeholders. She monitors the developments in the European Eastern Neighbourhood with a particular focus on Ukraine and Belarus. Before joining the team in 2017, Anna worked in the humanitarian field in Thailand, with Humanitarian Affairs Asia in Bangkok and at the Regional Office for East Asia and the Pacific of HelpAge International in Chiang Mai.

Session 9: Sustainability: How to make a success of COP26? (By invitation only)

Anthony Browne MP
Conservative Member of Parliament for South Cambridgeshire

Anthony Browne studied Mathematics at Cambridge University, where he got a scholarship. Despite being scientifically trained, Anthony became a national journalist, working as business reporter and economics correspondent at the BBC, reporting on national television and radio news, including the Today programme. He was economics correspondent, health editor and environment editor of the Observer, and then environment editor, Europe correspondent and chief political correspondent at the Times. He covered the Iraq war for the Times. Anthony was then asked to run Policy Exchange think tank, where he developed policies for David Cameron ahead of the 2010 general election. Anthony worked for Boris Johnson in his first term as Mayor, in charge of economic and business policy in London, and then wrote his 2012 election manifesto. Anthony became CEO of the British Bankers’ Association, leading the banking industry through the reforms in the wake of the financial crisis. After the 2016 referendum, he led Brexit negotiations for the banks with the Government and the EU before leaving the Association in June 2017. Anthony is the co-founder of the HomeOwners Alliance and he has also been a member of the board of a range of financial technology companies. Anthony was elected as MP for South Cambridgeshire at the general election in 2019. In January 2020 he was elected as the Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for the Environment. In February 2020 he was elected as a member of the Treasury Select Committee.

Sam Hall
Director of the Conservative Environment Network

Sam Hall joined CEN after having served as a Policy Adviser to Michael Gove when he was Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. He was also the Head of Research at the liberal conservative think tank Bright Blue, leading their work on energy and the environment and authoring several policy reports. Before that, Sam was a Parliamentary Researcher for Graham Stuart MP. The Conservative Environment Network is the independent forum for conservatives that support conservation and decarbonisation.

Tanya Beckett
Journalist

Tanya Beckett is currently one of the most experienced business journalists/anchor/reporters around on British TV. She has recently returned to the UK having spent three years broadcasting from New York on Monday – Thursday and Washington DC on Fridays as the BBC World US Business Anchor. She also fronted BBC World News on PBS in the States. Since her return she has been working for BBC World and Newsnight BBC2. Tanya Beckett has a degree from Oxford in Metallurgy and the Science of Materials and her first job was in research for Courtaulds and she then made the leap from laboratory to finance when she began a stint in Investment Banking. She has worked in the past for such giants of the financial world as Citibank in London within their Credit Analysis division and with Commerzbank in Frankfurt, with the Capital Markets Division.

Session 10: Guest Speakers in Conversation: Global Britain: Cooperation in a competitive age?

Stephen Booth
Head of the Britain in the World Project at Policy Exchange

Stephen Booth is Head of the Britain in the World Project. He was previously Director of Policy and Research at the think tank Open Europe. A specialist in UK-EU affairs, he has written extensively on the UK-EU trade relationship, regulation, and immigration policy. He has appeared regularly in the media and to give evidence to several parliamentary select committees. His work at Policy Exchange focuses on the UK’s economic relationships with Europe and the rest of the world.

Georgina Wright
Head of the Europe Program, Institut Montaigne

Georgina Wright is head of Institut Montaigne’s Europe Program. She is also a Visiting Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, associate of the Institute for Government in London and Senior Fellow at the Centre for Britain and Europe at the University of Surrey. Before joining Institut Montaigne, she was senior researcher at the Institute for Government (2019-2020) and research associate at Chatham House (2014-2018). She has also worked for the European Commission and NATO in Brussels. Georgina regularly represents Institut Montaigne on national and international news media, and has written widely for foreign policy outlets. She studied at the University of Edinburgh and the College of Europe (Bruges).

Professor Anthony Glees
Emeritus Professor, The University of Buckingham

Anthony Glees is recognised as a nationally and internationally published expert on European affairs, the British-German relationship and Security and Intelligence questions. The author of numerous books and scholarly studies in this field he is very frequently quoted in the national and international media. He was educated at St Catherine’s College, University of Oxford. 1971-2 Michael Foster research Scholar, University of Oxford, senior associate member St Antony’s College. 2008-present Professor of Politics, and until July 2019, director of the Centre for Security and Intelligence Studies (BUCSIS). Thereafter, Emeritus Professor at the University of Buckingham. Previously Professor of Politics & director of European Studies, then director of Centre for Intelligence and Security studies, at Brunel University, London.

Session 12: Closing session

Felix Dane
Director of The Ideas Network 2030