Yuval Noah Harari officially received the title of Doctor Honoris Causa of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel in recognition for his powerful and ground-breaking insights as a historian, thinker and author of human history, and for his provocative and disruptive views about contemporary society and the world of tomorrow.

The Israeli historian, born in 1976, regularly tops best-seller lists around the world with books in which he shines a light on the past, the present and the future of humanity. His most recent book, 21 Lessons for the 21st century, was published in 2018 and deals with the era in which we now live. Before that, he wrote Homo Deus, about the future, and Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. 

Rector Caroline Pauwels dedicated the award to the young people of the 21st century, represented by the 21 VUB students who stood behind her on the stage. “In Harari we have an outstanding guide to show us the possibilities and dangers of future developments. They will have to make the right choices.”, Pauwels said.

First keynote speech in the Benelux

After the presentation of the honorary doctorate in front of a huge crowd, Harari gave a keynote speech followed by a Q&A session. It is the first time he has made a public appearance in the Benelux. He was invited by the Belgian edition of Newsweek, one of the most important news magazines in the US.

Read more about the event:

• De Morgen: ‘Eindelijk iemand die uitlegt wie en wat wij zijn’
• De Standaard: VUB reikt eredoctoraat uit aan auteur Yuval Noah Harari
• Knack: Yuval Noah Harari krijgt eredoctraat van VUB
• De Tijd: De meest uitgebreide samenvatting
• VUB TODAY

War journalist Rudi Vranckx

Rudi Vranckx is one of Belgium’s best-known journalists, thanks in no small part to his unique reporting of international conflicts. What makes him remarkable is the way in which he always tries to focus on the human aspect of war.
Vranckx isn’t interested in spectacular images, but in understanding what drives people to war. Like no one else, he understands the dangers linked to populism and propaganda in an armed conflict. In each conflict he reports on, he must get to grips with the eternal struggle between truth and lies. In every war, news sources become coloured and it’s down to the journalist to remain sufficiently critical.

Investigative journalist Elena Milashina

Elena Milashina is a Russian investigative journalist for the independent Russian newspaper Novaja Gazeta. She’s known for her extensive investigations and critical articles about human rights violations and government corruption. Among her work are investigations into the persecution of the LGBTI community in Chechnya and other parts of the North Caucasus. 
Following the assassination of her colleague Anna Politkovskaya in 2006, Milashina continued her work by reporting on forced disappearances, arbitrary arrests, extrajudicial executions, torture and the persecution of relatives of alleged insurgents.
Milashina also works closely with Human Rights Watch to record the atrocities that took place during the 2008 conflict between Russia and Georgia in South Ossetia. With Human Rights Watch, she has interviewed victims of human rights violations in South Ossetia, Chechnya and Dagestan.
In October 2009, she won the Human Rights Watch Alison Des Forges Award for extraordinary activism, and in 2013 she received the US State Department’s International Women of Courage Award.

Societal commitment

VLIR-UOS is the platform through which Flemish higher education stakeholders have been working together on university cooperation for development, with cooperation projects between academics from Flanders and the South, as well as of scholarships for students and professionals from both Flanders and the South.

The honorary degrees will be awarded to people from the South, people who are active in the field of university development cooperation and who carry out scientific and/or policy work which has an important development impact. Academics from Brazil, Cuba, Liberia and DR Congo.

José Ramón Saborido Loidi - Cuba

The VUB’s honorary degree goes to José Ramón Saborido Loidi (Cuba). He was rector of the Universidad Central de Las Villas (UCLV) for many years, and is now the country’s minister of higher education. Since 1998, the VUB and the other Flemish universities have been working closely together with Cuban higher education institutions. Saborido Loidi has always been an enthusiastic supporter of this collaboration – not only with his own UCLV but with other Cuban universities as well.

Deirdre N. McCloskey

The American economist Deirdre N. McCloskey (1942) is currently a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). She has enriched and broadened the economic research with new insights. Over the last years her focus is on the role that values and ideas play in the historic development of markets.

“Most of my colleagues are wasting their time”, she boldly stated a few years ago in an interview with newspaper De Tijd. “To them the market is only about supply and demand and utility. But I am of the opinion that there is ethics in capitalism and that capitalism in its turn creates moral values.”

Proximus to Deirdre McCloskey is professor Luc Hens of the Faculty of Economic and Social Sciences & Solvay Business School. Professor Hens points out the importance of her tripartite magnum opus ‘The Bourgeois Era’ (2006-2016). “In it she emphasises the significant role of bourgeois values or civil values in economics.”

Deirdre McCloskey was born as Donald. “My gender change definitely gave me an added impulse to release myself from the extremely masculine world of economics, and to consequently look at it from a distance. I believe my current work is a synthesis of my entire intellectual, personal and spiritual life”, she added in De Tijd.

Paul Ginsparg

American Paul Ginsparg (1955) is a physicist in theoretical high energy physics (Cornell University). But he is best known as the father of arXiv, an absolute pioneer in open access information distribution. Paul Ginsparg started the arXiv e-print archive in 1991. “It signified a true revolution in the transfer of scientific results within the world of theoretical physics”, states professor of physics Alexander Sevrin, who nominated Ginsparg and will act as proximus.

In the field of Sevrin all papers are made available on the arXiv repository before being published in conventional scientific publications. Over the past 25 years arXiv has known explosive growth and became a dominant archive for physics, astronomy, computer science and more and more other domains. In 2015 alone more than 105.000 new pre-prints were archived and more than 139 million downloads were registered. “I believe that few people have had such a significant impact on the distribution of scientific results as Paul Ginsparg”, says professor Sevrin of the Faculty of Sciences and Bio-Engeneering.      

Willem Van Mechelen

Dutchman Willem van Mechelen (1952) is professor Social Medicine, with a focus on occupational and sports medicine at VU Amsterdam. He has had a fruitful career sporting an impressive list of more than 550 scientific publications. He is co-author of an article that was published in the medical scientific journal The Lancet a few months ago titled ‘The economic burden of physical inactivity’. The article was widely cited in the international media. The research of Willem Van Mechelen centers around health prevention, sport injuries (prevention and treatment) and the socio-economical aspects of exercise. “Willem van Mechelen is someone who - free of prejudices - has a clear opinion and dares to act”, posits professor of exercise physiology Romain Meeusen, who acts as proximus on behalf of the Faculty of Physical Education and Physiotherapy.
 

Gary T. Marx

The American sociologer Gary T. Marx (1938) is professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was a pioneer with groundbreaking insights in the research on surveillance. He gained fame with his book ‘Undercover: Police Surveillance in America’ (1988). Proximus professor Serge Gutwirth of the Faculty of Law and Criminology emphasises that “Gary Marx was absolutely the first one to profoundly research the undercover topic in a scientific manner. From there he expanded his focus into privacy and surveillance.” Last year his magnum opus ‘Windows Into the Soul: Surveillance and Society in an Age of High technology’ was published. To Gary Marx surveillance and social control are inherently neither good nor bad, it all depends on the context and the behaviour. Marx looks at all possible shapes and forms of surveillance: by governments, by corporations and organisations, but also between individuals. Marx’ approach in that sense is also groundbreaking in that it is inductive and “modestly analytical”, and as such, takes the used techniques very seriously.
 

Jan Terlouw

Jan Terlouw (1931) is probably most known for his work as a (youth) author of among other the classics Koning van Katoren and Oorlogswinter. Jan Terlouw grew up as a child during World War II and that left a profound effect on him.

After his studies as a mathematician and physicist he commenced a successful academic career. This scientific predisposition stayed with him throughout his life, even as a politician, where he was one of the leading figures of the D66 party. Terlouw always considered himself a scientist first, on his own account because that was his profession as a young man and because his academic approach influenced his writing and work in politics, but never the other way around.

In recent years Terlouw strives very explicitly for more sustainability and a long term vision on climate change. His most recent work “Het Hebzuchtgas” focuses completely around that topic. Last December Terlouw made a passionate plea in the popular Dutch talkshow De Wereld Draait Door to that effect. A plea against the destruction of our planet and for the restoration of trust between people.

Rector Caroline Pauwels is proxima of Jan Terlouw. “He fits perfectly in the theme of our honorary doctorates: Break down the walls. Terlouw is scientist, author and (former) politician all at the same time. That is not an obvious combination but Terlouw manages to be a little bit politician, writer and academic in everything he does.”