Papers/Podcasts

Participants in the Madison Dialogue are interested in taking steps to find and promote solutions.

Participating members have organized a series of white papers and podcasts to allow various constituencies to openly explore important issues, challenge, opportunities and solutions.

Additionally, to help advance this objective we post other interesting articles, reports, videos and other information sources.

The purpose of this series is not necessarily to find consensus or agreement. The purpose is to give voice to differing points-of-view so as to increase understanding and create the opportunity to find solutions that actually work for all sectors.

These papers will focus on exploration of the central, real-life issues of importance to each sector and each actor -- the things that participants in these processes are grappling with every day. We will consider --

• why these issues matter,
• the key risk factors,
• the potential rewards,
• the elements that really drive change in each sector,
• and similar issues.

We will seek out the perspectives of those directly involved in these initiatives. We will seek to dig below the issues themselves to better understand the sector dynamics that are actually preventing or catalyzing progress.

We will take a number of steps to seek to meet the objective of keeping these papers accessible:

Short Issue Papers -- We will publish a series of short Issue Papers as they are ready and we will seek to respond to real-life challenges and issues.

Virtual Books -- They will be published in virtual form, on a website dedicated completely to promoting cross-sector dialogue on these issues -- www.madisondialogue.org. This will make the inexpensive and easy to circulate and update. And, taken together, these papers will serves as a full-volume, or virtual book, on important issues in these sectors.

Companion Podcasts -- With many papers a companion podcast will be published -- essentially a short conversation with the author of each Talking Paper. Podcasts are easy to listen to and download on computers, ipods or other electronic media players. And the format is inherently low-tech and informal. Note: A podcast is a downloadable electronic file that allows a listener to the listen to the discussion, at a later date, as they would music on an ipod or other portable music player.

Current White Papers and Podcasts

• Kirsten Hund, SRK Consulting, Making Diamonds Work for Development. An overview of iniatitives. (Double sided version available here)
• Cristina Echavarria, Assocation for Responsible Mining, Getting to Fair Trade Gold and Jewellery A white paper to articulate the standards and criteria for the responsible mining of precious metals in the artisanal and small scale mining sector (Spanish language version available here)
• Ian Smillie, Partnership Africa Canada, A Different Kind of Diamond Mining. A white paper on the need for the Diamond Development Initiative

Upcoming White Papers and Podcasts

• Michael Conroy, Yale University/Rockefeller Brothers Fund, on the lessons-learned from certification in other sectors and how the might apply in the mining and jewelry sectors.