U.S. Ambassador’s Youth Council engages in organizing various activities and events for students as well as the general public. Debates on current topics and pressing issues, such as elections, democracy, and security, take place either in person or online. Currently, we have moved all projects to an online format, but they still retain their unique interactive character.
As a part of the Town Halls project, we have launched a special edition of debates about the US presidential election. The first online edition of the "Town Halls Presidential Election" series took place on Friday, October 30, 2020, in the form of a live broadcast on our Facebook page from 6:30 p.m.
The debate was attended by leading experts, such as Magdalena Fiřtová (Charles University), Jan Hornát (Charles University), Martin Jirušek (Masaryk University), Roman Joch (CEVRO Institute), and Griffin Rozell (Embassy of the United States of America in Prague). The debate was moderated by Barbora Chaloupková.
Participants in the interactive discussion on democracy, security, and freedom learned, for example, how the US president is elected or what changes can be expected from this year's elections. The debate focused on evaluating the presidential campaign of both candidates and on what the outcome of this year's elections is likely to mean for the United States and global politics. At all times, the audience was able to ask questions that interested them in connection to the presidential race or the American constitutional system itself.
The second online debate on the subject of the United States presidential election took place on Monday, November 9, 2020, at 5 p.m. The debate, entitled "America after the election", was organized in cooperation with the Department of North American Studies at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University.
The guest speakers to the Special Edition post-election Town Halls were leading experts focusing on the United States. The invitation to the debate was accepted by: Daniel Anýž (Aktuálně.cz), Petr Kolář (diplomat), Kryštof Kozák (KSAS IMS FSV UK) and Jakub Lepš (University of New York in Prague). The discussion was hosted by Jan Hornát. In addition to evaluating the results of the US election, the speakers talked about what affected the election results and what changes can now be expected in the US.
The post-election events were discussed further in a debate that was organized in cooperation with the Department of North American Studies at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University. The second post-election debate: "AND WHAT NOW?" focused on the future of the United States and the world after the presidential election. Our guest speakers were: Roger Johnson (Republicans Overseas - Vice President for Europe), Cameron Munter (former US Ambassador), Mark Neužil (St. Thomas University), and Danielle Piatkiewicz (EUROPEUM). The debate was moderated by Jan Hornát (KSAS FSV UK). The online debate took place on 19 November 2020 from 3.30 pm on the Facebook page of the Department of North American Studies.
At the beginning of 2021, we continued to follow events in the United States. On the occasion of the inauguration of the President of the United States, we followed up on our previous debates. In cooperation with Politologický spolek POLIS and the Association for International Affairs, we organized an online debate entitled "American Inauguration" that took place on January 20, 2021, from 7:00 p.m. The debate was attended by Czech leading experts: Petr Boháček (Asociace pro mezinárodní otázky AMO), Jana Ciglerová (Deník N), Jan Slavíček (Institute of History of the ASCR), Daniel Anýž (Aktuálně.cz).
After the American presidential debate, we moved back to the subject of the Czech Republic. Our guest speaker in the debate "the Czech Republic, NATO, Security" was the retired army general Petr Pavel, former Chairman of the NATO Military Committee. This online discussion, organized in collaboration with the American Center took place on March 25 from 4 pm on the Zoom platform. The topic of the debate was, among other things, the participation of Czech soldiers in foreign NATO missions, the Czech Republic's defense expenditures, and the preparedness of NATO states for current security threats.