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Known as the “Father of Peace Studies”, Professor Galtung is a world renowned advocate of non-violent solutions to resolving conflicts. He is the founder and director of TRANSCEND: A Peace and Development Network, and TRANSCEND Peace University. Born in Oslo, Norway in 1930, Galtung completed doctorates in Mathematics and Sociology. In 1959, he founded the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo and consequently he founded the Journal of Peace Research in 1964.

He is the winner of many prestigious awards such as the Right Livelihood Award (Alternative Nobel Peace Prize) in 1987, the 2000 Norwegian Literary Prize and the 2006 Augsburg Golden Book of Peace. His recent publications include Pax Pacifica: The Pacific Hemisphere and Peace Studies (2005), Transcend and Transform (2004), Peace by Peaceful Means (1996) and Choose Peace (1995). He has also collaborated on many other publications and has published his autobiography entitled Johan without Land (2000).

He has held numerous professorates at leading international universities such as the United Nations University in Geneva, Columbia University and Princeton University.  He has been the recipient of nine honorary doctorates (emeritus) and four honorary professorships from universities around the globe. He also serves as Distinguished Professor of Peace Studies at the University of Hawaii and Distinguished Visiting Professor at John Perkins University.

The Memorial Lecture is in honour of Dr Herb Addo, Reader, who was at IIR from 1975 to 1996. He lectured in International Relations Theory and Methodology, and Global Political Economy of Development. Within the tradition of International Relations, he distinguished himself by his contribution to critical theories on imperialism, social transformation, and the global development problématique. His major writings include: Transforming the World Economy? Nine Critical Essays on the New International Economic Order (1984), Development as Social transformation: Reflections on the Global Problématique (1985) and Imperialism (1986).

Over his distinguished career, Dr. Addo collaborated with many renowned International Relations scholars, such as Galtung, George Aseniero, Andre Gunder Frank and Immanuel Wallerstein. Wallerstein was the feature speaker at the 1st Herb Addo Memorial lecture, which was took place in November 2002 by IIR in collaboration with the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies (SALISES), UWI.