The Sweeney Agency

About Stephen Lewis - Celebrated Humanitarian, Former UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, Inspiring Speaker:

Inspiring keynote speaker Stephen Lewis is a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Ryerson University in Toronto. He is the board chair of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, which is dedicated to turning the tide of HIV/AIDS in Africa, and he is co-founder and co-director of AIDS-Free World in the United States.

Mr. Lewis is a member of the Board of Directors of the Clinton Health Access Initiative and Emeritus Board Member of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative. He also serves as a Commissioner on the newly formed Global Commission on HIV and the Law, created by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) with the support of the Joint United Nations Programme of HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

Stephen Lewis’ work with the United Nations spanned more than two decades. He was the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa from June 2001 until the end of 2006. From 1995 to 1999, Mr. Lewis was Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF at the organization’s global headquarters in New York. From 1984 through 1988, he was Canada's Ambassador to the United Nations.

From 1970-1978, Mr. Lewis was leader of the Ontario New Democratic Party, during which time he became leader of the Official Opposition.

Mr. Lewis is the author of the best-selling book, Race Against Time. He holds 34 honorary degrees from Canadian universities and in June 2010 he received an honorary degree from Dartmouth College in the United States. Mr. Lewis was appointed a Companion of the Order of Canada, Canada’s highest honour for lifetime achievement, in 2003.

He was awarded the Pearson Peace Medal in 2004 by the United Nations Association in Canada; the award celebrates outstanding achievement in the field of international service and understanding. In 2007, King Letsie III, monarch of the Kingdom of Lesotho (a small mountainous country in Southern Africa) invested Mr. Lewis as Knight Commander of the Most Dignified Order of Moshoeshoe. The order is named for the founder of Lesotho; the knighthood is the country’s highest honour.

Stephen Lewis’ topic areas include:

• Education
• Health Care
• Globalization
• Philanthropy
• Human Resources /Human Development
• Community-building / Peace issues
• International issues/World Affairs
• Human Rights
• Leadership
• Ethics

Some sample titles from Stephen Lewis’ Presentations:

Education: The World's Greatest Force for Good
Stephen Lewis explores the way in which education, throughout the world, transforms the lives children lead, and is perhaps the greatest, unacknowledged instrument we have for dramatic social change.

Global Issues - Local Impact
Universities are, first and foremost, centers of academic excellence and academic inquiry. But if they are to be relevant to the modern world, they must understand the nature of community, especially the community of which they are a part, and understand, increasingly, that they have obligations to the wider world as well. Stephen Lewis explores both those themes, drawing on personal experience to make his case.

Education at the crossroads: Diversity as the touchstone
Stephen Lewis argues that the nature of society in 2005 requires that diversity be seen as the centerpiece of the educational experience. Anything less than that, and learning is fatally flawed.

Public Health is everywhere under siege
Globalization has succeeded in compromising the social sectors in general and health in particular. Nor is the situation confined to industrial countries alone; the developing world is hurting, and hurting badly. If the principles of public health are to be rescued in this world, radical changes will be required.

Global Health: Hope or Deterioration?
Mr. Lewis addresses the growing disparity in the standard of health between the developed and developing countries. He will take a hard look at the emergence and re-emergence of communicable diseases, the struggle for pharmaceuticals at low cost, the absence of health professionals, the question of resources, and the overall efforts of impoverished societies to reach the admirable levels of health which characterize Canada and the United States.

Human Development, Career Development and Training: Foundations for a Better World
Stephen Lewis draws on his careers in politics, diplomacy and multi-lateralism to demonstrate the principle and practice of self-development. He will attempt to demonstrate that the culture of the work-place is every bit as important to self-development as the capacity of individuals. Mr. Lewis takes a somewhat heretical view, believing that professional development, particularly the qualities of innovation and leadership, are influenced most profoundly by the working environment, and not by numbers of courses taken or training received. The former is fundamental; the latter is peripheral.

Community-Building
The world is falling apart: what role civil society? Mr. Lewis draws upon his extensive international experience to illustrate the importance of an active civil society in creating a safer, more peaceful world.

The Power of Community: Creating Positive Environments
Mr. Lewis speaks on the importance of community in the lives of children, focusing on leadership, accountability, health and education in both a national and international context.

Where in the World is the World Headed?
Mr. Lewis will make a panoramic sweep of international affairs, concentrating, especially, on globalization, conflict, poverty, disease and the place of corporate social responsibility in all of it.

Human Rights Gone Wrong: A pattern of world indifference
Stephen Lewis examines the problem from global and local perspectives, with an emphasis on social and economic rights.