Geneva (dpa) – A pink-coloured villa surrounded by a park and directly situated on the shores of Lake Geneva: in this idyllic setting one can find the world’s diplomats of tomorrow.
Many of the current big names in world politics and business, for example United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, are graduates of the international studies programme of the Institut Universitaire de Hautes Etudes Internationales (HEI).
Around 650 students from more than 63 countries are currently enrolled at the HEI. For the master’s degree programme, there are some 700 applications each year – but only the best 100 are selected, says HEI spokeswoman Carine Leu.
Given such figures, it is no wonder that Marjori Granjon of France admits that she “sometimes feels part of a certain elite”.
William Rappard and Paul Mantoux founded the institute in 1927 in order to give experts practical training for a career in diplomacy.
It was no coincidence that the HEI was set up around the same time as the ill-fated League of Nations, whose headquarters building, just a few hundred metres away, today houses the European headquarters of the United Nations.
“There is no comparable course of studies in Germany,” says an enthusiastic Jan Stiehle of Freiburg, one of eight Germans now enrolled in the HEI.
An integrated curriculum of international history and politics, along with economics and legal studies is available at only a handful of universities around the world, he noted.
“Naturally the location is unique,” adds another German man, Florian von Koenig, about the HEI. Stiehle adds: “What do I need an excellent academic training in Oxford for, so far away from world politics?”
Given the HEI’s location, the students are very close to the world of diplomacy. Besides the U.N., the World Trade Organization (WTO) is right next door, and that is where the HEI’s library is located.
HEI students can also use the U.N.’s library. Such top international diplomats like the U.N. High Commissioners for Refugees and Human Rights, Sadako Ogata and Mary Robinson, who have their offices nearby, give lectures at the HEI.
The institute also helps set up internships at the United Nations. Courses are taught in French and English, and one can now hardly believe that German student von Koenig could speak barely a word of French two years ago.
With the limited enrollment, the ratio of students to professors is about 20 to one, and the faculty is augmented by various guest lecturers, such as the former Amnesty International representative to the U.N., Andrew Clapham, or the former legal advisor to the WTO predecessor organization GATT, Ernst-Ulrich Petersmann.
The United Nations is fond of recruiting its future staff from the ranks of the HEI graduates. At the moment, Vanessa Gray from the German city of Muenster, is writing her graduate thesis, but already has a job assured her at the International Telecommunications Union.
But private corporations and banks also esteem the strong training provided the HEI students. Stiehle, for example, already is under contract with a Geneva-based corporate consulting company, while von Koenig is planning to volunteer for U.N. work in Kosovo.
A further strength of the HEI is the network provided by its alumni who can set up contacts for to help the new graduates get a start in their careers.
And the alumni know that it might pay off to keep in touch with their erstwhile classmates – for it could be that one of them will turn out, like Kofi Annan, to head the United Nations one day.
