15th Anniversary of BICC (Bonn International Center for Conversion)
June 23, 2009
On 22 June 2009, BICC (Internationales Konversionszentrum Bonn – Bonn International Center for Conversion) celebrated its 15th anniversary at the Wissenschaftszentrum Bonn. One of the first to congratulate was the Chair of BICC’s Supervisory Board, Dr. Michael Stückradt, State Secretary at the Ministry for Innovation, Science, Research and Technology of the Land North Rhine-Westphalia, the Mayor of Bonn, Bärbel Dieckmann, the Rector’s Representative of Bonn University, Prof. Dr. Armin B. Cremers and Prof. Dr. Herbert Wulf, founding Director of BICC.
- You can find pictures of the event at the bottom of this page
“Many of the hopes of 1994 embodied in the term ‘conversion’ have, unfortunately, not been realized,” Peter J. Croll, Director of BICC, stated in his opening speech. The peace dividend turned out to be smaller than had been anticipated, and military expenditure has increased continuously over the last five years. The ceiling of US $1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion) per year was already exceeded in 2005. The rift between military expenditure and expenditure on development aid has widened steadily.
In view of this challenge, the center for conversion has continued to develop and renew its activities. “It is BICC’s intention to foster peace through applied research, advisory services and capacity-building,” Croll stressed. Its current foci of work are: the provision of advisory services on demobilization and reintegration (DD&R) processes, such as in Colombia; small arms control in West- and East Africa; research on the interdependencies between natural resources and conflicts or between migration and security. BICC places particular emphasis on examining global trends in arms exports and control. “The Global Militarization Index, which BICC published for the first time this year investigates the effects of size and composition of the military sector on human and economic development of 115 countries,” explains Croll.
Dr. Michael Stückradt, Chair of the BICC Supervisory Board, spoke of an impressive and positive balance of BICC’s work over the past 15 years. In a read-out ‘Word of Welcome’, the Mayor of Bonn, Bärbel Dieckmann pointed out that “15 years ago, Bonn became ‘godmother’ of BICC when it lent its name to the Bonn International Center for Conversion.” She added: “BICC has a variety of links to the profiles of our city as international center of competence and science location.”
Prof. Dr. Armin B. Cremers acknowledged the work of the peace and conflict research institute by pointing out: “BICC has had a major share in the fact that in the last decade, the city of Bonn has become the location for development cooperation in Germany.”
“It is gratifying to see how the cooperation of BICC with numerous international organizations—from the United Nations to local non-governmental organizations in many countries in the world—has developed,” BICC’s founding Director, Prof. Herbert Wulf remarked.
All participants in the celebration agreed in their assessment that BICC as peace and conflict research institute still has a lot to do. Referring to Immanuel Kant’s statement: “Peace is the masterpiece of reason”, Mayor Dieckmann wished: “May BICC one day succeed in achieving the special masterpiece of making itself obsolete in a world without violence and wars.”
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Susanne Heinke
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