Eighty years is not a long time, and momentous global change has occurred not much more than a lifetime away.

When I was young I met elderly Ugandans who remembered the first European colonial administrators arriving in their area in the 1920s, and I’ve met Kosovans whose grandparents were citizens of the Ottoman Empire. My own grandfather paraded in Berlin in 1917 for the German war effort, and when I was a child my great Aunt Tudi told stories of living in a shattered city during the Second World War and its immediate aftermath.

It is important to remember this because the values and purpose that Wilton Park was established in 1946 to pursue – international decision making through reasoned discussion on the basis of mutual respect – may seem self-evident to many today, but when Wilton Park was created, they represented an experimental break with a more brutal and cynical past.

Indeed, one might go so far as to say that the creation of Wilton Park itself was a radical act of hope for the better nature of humans, especially when set against the horrors of the Second World War and the depths of depravity it was clear modern societies were, and are, capable of descending to. Yet the founders of Wilton Park, and those who came after them, believed that Germany, Britain, Europe and the world could do better, despite everything they knew to have happened.

This is worth thinking about today as global horizons seem darker again and age-old cruelties re-emerge in force. Eighty years since its foundation, Wilton Park is not only still here but growing in ambition: determined to re-affirm that radical belief in the human capacity to resolve and accept differences whilst remaining civil and reasoned. Because this is the only way we can sustainably manage our affairs in a world of over 8 billion people.

So, as we celebrate our 80th anniversary, it is a good moment to remember that choosing hope can be a radical act, but also a realistic one. I’d like to thank our founders, staff and friends past and present for making that choice, as we commit to at least another 80 years of supporting humanity to manage global affairs reasonably – and hopefully.

Tom Cargill

Chief Executive