This webinar launches the newly released book Global Cooperation in Times of Crisis: Grasping the Changing Mood of the World and opens the first session of the Virtual Dialogues webinar series on that. The discussion asks what became of the spirit that characterized 2015, marked by the adoption of major international frameworks such as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, and the Paris Agreement on climate change. Why does the global atmosphere today feel so different?

Bringing together perspectives from philosophy, societal security, and cultural analysis, this webinar examines how moods such as hope, fear, fatigue, trust, and uncertainty influence public life, political imagination, and international cooperation. Rather than focusing solely on institutions, economics, or geopolitics, the session explores the emotional and atmospheric dimensions through which crises are experienced and interpreted.

Participants will be invited to reflect on how collective moods emerge, circulate across societies, and shape decision-making, solidarity, and responses to global challenges. By treating moods as a serious analytical lens, the webinar offers a fresh perspective on contemporary crises and global governance.

Speakers:

• Reidar Staupe — Associate Professor of Societal Security and Aurora Fellow at UiT The Arctic University of Norway and Adjunct Associate Professor at Oslo New College.
• Gerhard Thonhauser — Assistant Professor of Philosophy at TU Darmstadt, specializing in social and political philosophy, emotions, and collective agency.
• Duncan Reyburn — Professor of Information Design at the University of Pretoria, focusing on creative thinking, hermeneutics, and humour perception.

This webinar is the first of five sessions in the Global Cooperation in Times of Crisis series, each exploring different dimensions of crisis, cooperation, and global transformation.

Register here