30 May 2019
May 30th, the first joint conference of MGIMO, Henley Business School at the University of Reading (Great Britain) and the University of International Business and Economics (Beijing, China) unfolded at MGIMO. The event was devoted to «Formats of Cooperation in Greater Eurasia: a view from Russia, Great Britain and China» and the participants discussed different aspects of interaction between the three states on the Silk Road.
The conference was kicked off by MGIMO’s Vice-Rector for Graduate and International Programs, Andrey Baykov, the Dean of Henley Business School John Board, and the Deputy Head of the International Department of the UIBE Xiang Jie. The Vice-Rector underlined the importance of holding such events to develop the inter-university dialogue and expressed hope that cooperation would further expand in this format in the future.
During the first section, the Deputy Dean of Henley Business School, Professor Yelena Kalyuzhnova, spoke about the prospects for cooperation. Professor W. Jun described the vectors for collaboration between Russian and Chinese economic universities in the framework of the association. Aleksander Lukin shared his views on the geographical and cultural boundaries of the Greater Eurasia (in contrast with Minor Eurasia, which refers to the post-Soviet region). Anna Tsibulina, Shu Chan and Natalia Galischeva gave talks on the outcomes of the Eurasian integration, the Russian-Chinese partnership in the sphere of e-commerce and on Indo-Pakistani cooperation. Ekaterina Koldunova spoke about the wider interaction pattern of the Eurasian Economic Union through the Shanghai Cooperation Organization with ASEAN.
The second session, dedicated to differences in approaches, was moderated by Alexander Vylegzhanin. Sergey Markedonov described the existing conflicts in the post-Soviet space. The Chinese lawyers Gong Hongliu and Xue Yuan depicted the One Belt, One Road initiative as an institution for global governance and spoke of the Chinese experience of cooperation within the International Commercial Arbitration Court. Tim Potier made a presentation on the specificities of the British approach to Eurasian projects. The reports sparked a lively discussion.
The students of the MA program «Russia and China: Economic and Political Trends in Eurasia» participated in the work of the sessions. The conference was held during the visit of the British and Chinese delegations to MGIMO. During their work meetings, the sides mulled over the idea of creating a joint tripartite master’s degree program. MGIMO has long-term partnership agreements with both universities and runs a dual degree program with Henley Business School in management and international finance and with UIBE.
Founded in 1945, Henley Business School merged with the University of Reading in 2008. It is one of the few business schools globally to have received triple accreditation by EQUIS, AMBA and AACSB. It also appears in the top 50 business schools in the Financial Times and the Economist rankings.
Founded in 1951, the University of International Business and Economics is one of the leading Chinese universities in economics, finance, international business and foreign languages. It came second among Chinese universities specializing in economics and finance in the Netbig ranking. The university is under the Chinese Ministries of Education and of Commerce.
— See the MGIMO web-site for russian version
