Dr Dwayne Ryan Menezes is Founder and Director of two foreign policy think-tanks based in London – Human Security Centre (HSC) and Polar Research and Policy Initiative (PRPI). He is also an Associate Fellow of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London; and Principal Coordinator of PRISM, an EU-wide consortium of think-tanks and universities dedicated to understanding and addressing the causes and processes of radicalisation and violent extremism.
Previously, he served as Consultant to the Secretary-General of the Commonwealth; He has also served as an Officer on the Management Committee of the UK Polar Network and a Governor of a Church of England school in West London. Dwayne read History at the LSE and the University of Cambridge, where he was a member of Gonville and Caius College. He graduated from Cambridge with a PhD in History and has been affiliated as a visiting or postdoctoral research fellow since with the Centre of Governance and Human Rights (CGHR), University of Cambridge; Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), University of Oxford; and Heythrop College, University of London.
Dwayne is also involved with the creative industries: he is a co-sponsor and producer (impact) of the Oscar-shortlisted, Emmy-nominated documentary, My Enemy, My Brother (2016), and the Director of Think-Film Impact Production Ltd., a film production company that makes and supports films that advocate positive social outcomes.
1) What is your current position?
Currently, I serve as Director of two London-based independent, international foreign policy think-tanks, Human Security Centre (HSC) and Polar Research and Policy Initiative (PRPI). While HSC addresses current and emerging threats to human security worldwide, PRPI focuses on Arctic and Antarctic issues.
2) What are your proudest achievements?
I look at the world with too much awe to see anything I have accomplished as a source of pride. I remember the awe and joy I used to feel as a child when the little black-eyed beans I’d place delicately on some moist cotton would sprout in a couple of days. In recent years, I have felt a similar sense of awe and joy when ideas I’d similarly plant and nurture would take shape and grow into projects and enterprises bigger and more effective than I had thought.
3) What inspires you?
I like to surround myself with people I find wiser, more knowledgeable and more experienced than myself. It could entail reading works by and biographies of great men and women I admire, appointing Advisory Boards that bring together the great and the good in a particular field, or even inviting a group of talented and enterprising friends over for dinner. It allows me to recognise what I do not know and have yet to learn, to seek wise counsel and timely advice, and to draw inspiration to walk the extra mile.
4) What has been the biggest obstacle in your career?
As stimulating and fulfilling the experience of setting up and running a social enterprise can be, funding constraints can render it quite challenging. The challenges are all the more pronounced when one is a relatively young social entrepreneur. While I have been very fortunate to see both the social enterprises I co-founded grow faster than expected and have the impact I hoped they would have, I am constantly reminded that the crucial work carried out by both organisations will only prove sustainable if their funding needs are met. Steering the ship effectively, while ensuring there is enough fuel to keep the engines running, is the biggest obstacle in the career of nearly every social entrepreneur, and I am no exception.
5) Who has been the biggest influence on your career to date?
William Wilberforce. He was most certainly a man on a mission. The anti-slavery movement, with which he was involved, captured my imagination as a child. It led me to ponder about what were the greatest challenges of my day, and how I could make a difference. Perhaps that is how I ended up with these two think-tanks that address issues such as extremism and climate change.
6) What is the best aspect about your current role?
It allows me to travel and meet the people directly impacted by or engaged with our work. Whether this translates as discussing pressing policy issues with heads of government, or spending time meeting refugees from Iraq or reindeer herders from the Sakha Republic, or supporting films that advance the values we hold dear, my current role allows me to wake up excited about the new opportunities each day will bring and go to bed hoping that my contributions might make a positive difference.
7) And the worst?
Defining success in my line of work can be quite difficult. If there is an outbreak of an infectious disease and a medical doctor should find himself having to treat many more cases than is usual, might his/her practice be seen as successful? In much the same way, it is hard to define success in humanitarian work. A thousand satisfied and generous clients would not constitute success if there are still people dying from disease, starvation or conflict each day.
8) What are your long term goals?
I would like to see both think-tanks continue to have great impact in the years to come and acquire financial security along the way. At some point, I’d also like to run for Parliament, so I contribute more greatly in public service and effect the change I want to see. Most of all, I’d like to ensure that the think-tanks and I do not lose sight of the vision and the values that were at our heart at the beginning of our journeys.
9) If you were Prime Minister, what one aspect would you change?
I’d focus more on the UK’s place in the world. I am rather weary of the widely-accepted narrative of national decline. I believe in the UK and the force for good it can be in the world, as I believe the sun will rise every morning. The UK may have lost its empire, but it doesn’t need an empire to be outward-looking and great. I’d seek happier, healthier and more mutually respectful and beneficial relationships with Europe. I’d ensure the Special Relationship with the United States would remain meaningful and vibrant. I’d also increase our focus on the North, building the potential of the UK to be the heart and the hub of a northern, transatlantic ‘Arc of Prosperity’ that includes the United States, Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Faroe Islands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland.
10) If you were marooned on a desert island, which historical figure would you like to spend your time with and why?
Sir Ernest Shackleton. I’d love to listen to his stories about his previous adventures, watch the explorer do what he does best, and know in my heart that, in the end, this will just be one long – even if tedious – holiday as we will both survive and make it back to Blighty in the end.
