International engagement (Julie Smith)

International Engagement

Julie with international publications

Julie is Chairman of the Liberal International (British Group) or LIBG and in that capacity was elected as a Vice-President of the Liberal International at its Congress in Cairo (30th/31st October 2009). Julie wrote the official history of Liberal International: "A Sense of Liberty, a short history of the Liberal International" for its fiftieth anniversary in 1997, and hopes that it might be possible to produce an updated version in the coming years.

As an academic, Julie has been involved in a range of research networks, co-organised highlevel workshops in the UK, Ukraine and Japan and attended international conferences and/or high-level 'bilateral' and 'trilateral' events in the Baltic States, France, Germany and the Netherlands, as well as the US . In 1997 she was a visiting professor at the Central European University in Budapest, and she has given guest lectures in several countries, including Japan, Turkey, Germany, and Croatia

Julie is a regular attender at ELDR congresses and represented the Federal Policy Committee on the ELDR Council in 2007 and 2008, and was heavily involved in negotiations for the 2009 ELDR European manifesto. In 2009 she worked with Lib Dem and Swedish colleagues to put forward a motion on energy and climate change at the Barcelona Congress.

Julie is active in European politics