After the Fall: A World Transformed?

Does the current financial crisis, as George Soros recently argued, require a "new way of thinking about how markets work"? Or is the recent economic downturn an extraordinarily painful recession, but at its core nothing fundamentally more than a normal stage of an economic boom-to-bust cycle?

In the wake of investment firm and bank failures, stock market declines, and staggering job losses, governments around the globe have taken actions with major ramifications for the markets. The United States government has approved nearly $1 trillion in relief programs and bailouts to shore up the economy. In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced that his government will unveil a second bank bailout which builds on a previous £37 billion relief program.

Does the scale of the current economic contraction, along with the unprecedented decisions of governments to nationalize industries and make other direct investments in the private sector, herald a "new era" defined by fundamental, lasting, and as yet not fully understood changes in the world economy?

The Inaugural David and Lyn Silfen University Forum, hosted by Penn President Amy Gutmann, will bring together distinguished Penn faculty with expertise in business, economics, politics, law, and history to answer the question: Has our economic world fundamentally and permanently changed? And if so, what will the new world economic order look like? The panel members will also explore the causes of the economic downturn and its short- and long- term impacts on the world in which we live.