A diverse group of organizations and experts from around the world have come together to establish Values 20 (V20) as an unofficial engagement group among the G20 ecosystem, with a mission to demonstrate to the G20 and the wider world the ‘value of values'. Having identified a lack of insight on how values can impact our lives and inform regional, national, and global policy-making, the V20 members aim to advocate to the G20 and wider world the positive impact possible in finding people-centered public policy solutions based on values which help to improve societal outcomes and contribute to overcoming global challenges. The V20 aims to leverage the huge potential of its community of specialists and practitioners through a network hub that will enable continuous knowledge sharing and become an innovation lab for impactful policy designs. The V20 has formed three task forces: • Global values addresses how values can contribute to achieving societal and economic objectives; • Leadership Values is assessing how values can improve organizational outcomes; • Quality of Life Values is focusing on how to enhance people's wellbeing. They will work collectively to consult their networks, carry out research, develop policy briefs and present their findings at an annual V20 Summit. In 2020 and subsequent years, a global crowdsourcing campaign will be launched to encourage people around the world to share ‘what works' to promote values in their individual lives, communities, countries and beyond. The insights harvested about practical values in action will be made available to the public on a knowledge-sharing platform. Dimah Al-Sheikh, chair of Values 20 and executive manager of Misk Values, said: "In keeping with the G20's ethos of international cooperation, which celebrates and bridges differences towards achieving shared human goals, we're glad to be helping launch Values 20 as an unofficial engagement group during the year when Saudi Arabia is chairing the G20. "The V20 will mirror the collaborative, bottom-up approach of the other G20 engagement groups to facilitate debate, and communicate findings to the leaders." She continued: "The V20 members believe in the pivotal role of values in shaping people's behavior, improving societal outcomes and even helping to overcome global challenges. By bringing together thinkers and doers, the V20 demonstrates the value of values to decision-makers, in government, business and beyond, but equally importantly to people. The V20 will show that values-based policies can improve people's lives around the world." Richard Barrett, managing director of the Barrett Academy for the Advancement of Human Values and Founder of the Barrett Values Centre said: "We at the Barrett Values Centre are delighted to be involved in Values 20, because what we are doing fills the vacuum of knowledge about how to ensure that values properly inform public policy decisions. "That's why the V20 has developed dynamic mechanisms to engage as many experts and organizations as possible, through three task forces and a network hub. The Values 20 crowdsourcing campaign will also harvest best practice about what works on the ground in values-centered policy and activity of any kind. V20 will help discover, demonstrate and help deliver practical values in action." The network hub, the continuous crowdsourcing of best practice and the work of the task forces will contribute towards a V20 Communiqué to be passed to the G20 leaders. In time, V20 hopes to be adopted by the G20 as an official engagement group. The G20 encourages bottom-up policy-making through its eight existing independent engagement groups. Each is led by organizations from the host country, which engage with a wide range of stakeholders from all the G20 countries and beyond, carrying out research, discussion and outreach in order to develop policy recommendations to be considered by the G20 leaders for their annual Leaders' Summit. The organizational capacities of V20 are being built up throughout 2020 to facilitate continuity into the future. Hosted by an organizing body each year, ongoing facilities and institutional knowledge will be carried over to support and manage communications and encourage further growth. — SG
