Guest Speaker

Dr. Thomas Homer-Dixon

Keynote Speaker – SOLEC 2008
Niagara Falls, Ontario
October 22nd, 2008

Dr. Thomas Homer-Dixon is one of the world’s leading experts on the intricate links between nature, technology, and society. Born in Victoria, British Columbia, he received a BA from Carleton University in Ottawa and a PhD from MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Dr. Homer-Dixon most recently held the George Ignatieff Chair of Peace and Conflict Studies at the Trudeau Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Toronto. He moved to the University of Waterloo in the summer of 2008 and currently holds the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) Chair of Global Systems at the Balsillie School of International Affairs.

Dr. Thomas Homer-Dixon has almost three decades of professional, academic, and research experience dealing with energy and climate issues. He is currently studying the interactions between energy, climate change, and society, with special attention to the challenges facing the energy industry. His research focuses on threats to global security in the 21st century and on how societies adapt to complex economic, ecological, and technological change.

Dr. Homer-Dixon is one of Canada’s foremost public intellectuals and writes regularly for the Toronto Globe and Mail, New York Times and Washington Post. His research includes an interest in topics as they interface between the natural and social worlds, especially those relating to environmental change, energy, and complex adaptive systems.

His most recent book, The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization, was an immediate #1 best-seller in Canada, a Globe and Mail top 100 pick, and the winner of the 2006 National Business Book Award. His previous book, The Ingenuity Gap, won the 2001 Governor-General’s Award for Non-fiction.

For more information on Dr. Homer-Dixon, visit his website at http://www.homerdixon.com.