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Financing the ecological transition
12 June 2024, 3:45 pm–5:00 pm
Join UCL IIPP for this IIPP Forum 2024's plenary sessions, taking place on Wednesday 12 June at 15:45 - 17:00 BST.
This event is free.
Event Information
Open to
- All
Availability
- Yes
Cost
- Free
Organiser
-
UCL IIPP
Location
-
Henry Wellcome AuditoriumWellcome Collection183 Euston Rd.LondonNW1 2BEUnited Kingdom
IIPP 2024 Forum
As part of the IIPP Forum 2024, UCL IIPP is hosting five plenary sessions. These sessions are an opportunity to rethink existing policy systems and explore what transformative ‘market shaping’ policy approaches look like in practice.
About the session
The ecological transition requires a fundamental transformation of our economies, and with it, financial flows. Historically, the key macroeconomic institutions - central banks and ministries of finance – coordinated together and with other government ministries to steer private credit & finance markets to achieve structural economic change.
Today, the dominant policy narrative relies on the private sector to lead the pace and direction of the green transition. Policy interventions by financial and fiscal authorities are limited to mandate-relevant actions that support price and financial stability and constrained by concerns over public debt sustainability. Emerging market developing economies face huge fiscal challenges in implementing large-scale green investment. This session critically examined this consensus and considered alternative macrofinancial arrangements, including reforms at the global level, that could more effectively steer economies towards sustainable well-being.
Meet the panel
Our expert panel of scholars and policy makers included Professor Sarah Bloom Raskin, former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Steffen Murau, Principal Investigator at Global Climate Forum, Vera Songwe, senior fellow in the Africa Growth Initiative at the Brookings Institution. The panel was chaired by Josh Ryan-Collins, Associate Professor in Economics and Finance at UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose.
Key information
- When: Wednesday 12 June at 15:45 - 17:00 BST
- Where: Henry Wellcome Auditorium at the Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Rd., London NW1 2BE
About the Speakers
Sarah Bloom Raskin
Former deputy secretary at U.S. Department of the Treasury
As the second-in-command of the U.S. Treasury, Sarah oversaw the entire Treasury Department and its various agencies and departments. She is known for her pursuit of innovative and equitable solutions to economic challenges, as well as for a focus on the resilience of the country’s critical financial infrastructure.
Earlier, Sarah was a governor of the Federal Reserve Board and a member of the Federal Open Market Committee, where she helped conduct the nation’s monetary policy and promote financial stability. She focused both on the macro performance of the economy in light of widening heterogeneity of income and wealth, and on the micro contours of economic insecurity in households and communities. In the height of a prolonged high rate of unemployment, she went to a job fair, posing as a person looking for a job. She also served as Commissioner of Financial Regulation for the State of Maryland from 2007 to 2010. She and her agency were responsible for regulating Maryland’s financial institutions during the height of the Great Recession.
Sarah’s public-facing work focuses on economic resilience. She has a deep understanding of the origination and management of systemic risks from diverse sources such as financial instruments, supply chains, pandemics, and climate events, as well as their distributional and inequitable impacts.
Sarah is a leading voice in understanding climate change as it pertains to the economy. Her courage was evident when she stood for confirmation to return to the Federal Reserve Board, in the face of concerted attacks by the American Petroleum Institute and their Senate allies opposing the nomination of persons who examine climate change’s role in the economy. In a letter to President Biden at the time, she wrote that “[a]ddressing the transition of the economy as it grapples with the effects of climate change is critical to the future of the American economy“.
Her current work – internationally, nationally, regionally and at the state level -- focuses on creating a climate resilient economy and illuminating the contours of the decarbonization transition. Her talks include “Climate Change and the Precautionary Imperative“(Green Swan Conference, 2020), “Bearing Witness to the Resilience is of the American Economy; Why Climate Change Matters“ (Trinity Wall Street, 2022) and “Changing the Climate of Financial Regulation“ (Project Syndicate, 2021).
Sarah was recently named Co-Chair by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to examine the recognition and accountability of net zero pledges by the private sector.
Sarah received her B.A. in Economics from Amherst College and her J.D. from Harvard Law School.
More about Sarah Bloom RaskinSteffen Murau
Principal Investigator at Global Climate Forum
Vera Songwe
Senior fellow in the Africa Growth Initiative at The Brookings Institution
Josh Ryan-Collins
Associate Professor in Economics and Finance at Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP)
