President's Welcome
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Dear Members and Friends,
2014 was another exciting year at the Americas Society and Council of the Americas as we broadened the scope of our activities and the reach of our offering.
We hosted 267 public policy programs in 22 cities around the hemisphere. Our Latin American Cities series took us to Bogota, Buenos Aires, Guatemala City, Lima, Medellin, Mexico City, Monterrey, Santiago, and Sao Paulo, bringing together nearly 3,000 regional leaders from business and government and attracting over 32,600 live views via webcasting. We took a mission to Neuquen, Argentina to discuss future prospects of the oil and gas industry, and a delegation to Havana, Cuba, to study entrepreneurship and the emerging non-state sector. Our Women’s Hemispheric Network held six events in five cities, including its first conference in Mexico City, and its YouTube playlist garnered over 32,000 views. In December, our Cuba Working Group applauded U.S. President Barack Obama’s historic announcement regarding shifting U.S. policy towards the island, an executive action that echoed many of the recommendations from our 2014 Action Memo to the President: Cuba and Entrepreneurship and our 2013 memo Seven Steps the U.S. President Can Take to Promote Change in Cuba by Adapting the Embargo. Our Young Professionals of the Americas opened a chapter in Miami, widening its engagement with the next generation of business, political, and cultural leaders in the Western Hemisphere. Americas Quarterly, now eight years old, continues to grow its readership and importance. In 2014, the magazine published our third Social Inclusion Index in both English and Spanish, helping to bring a multidimensional approach to the way development is traditionally measured in the region.
In the fall, we honored Gabriel Orozco with Americas Society’s first Cultural Achievement Award. Following a competitive selection process, Peruvian artist Elena Damiani was commissioned to design the centerpiece of the David Rockefeller Atrium as the final part of the transformation of the space in our New York headquarters.
It was an outstanding year for our Visual Arts program, with three exquisite exhibitions, including a show called Unity of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt and the Americas, whose catalogue was nominated for the Alice Award. Our Metlife Foundation Music of the Americas Concert Series regularly has a waiting list for attendance, and is now staging concerts outside of our townhouse as well, to accommodate concertgoers. And our Literature program featured celebrated authors from the region, including Isabel Allende and Juan Gabriel Vásquez.
I want to thank all of our members, friends, and partners throughout the hemisphere for their support; you are a testament to the quality and impact of the work we do every day. I also want to thank our Boards of Directors and the Chairman’s International Advisory Council for their unwavering confidence and their commitment to our organizations. Finally, I want to thank my amazing team, who makes all of this possible. We look forward to working with you all to make 2015 our best year yet.
Susan L. Segal
President and CEO
