Our Finalists Received at Buckingham Palace
The five UK finalist teams of the 2025–2026 Entente Cordiale Day Challenge were received at Buckingham Palace, where they had the opportunity to present their reports and recommendations on this year's theme, "Conflicts, Technologies, and World Security." The finalists represented the London School of Economics, the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge, with proposals ranging from the security implications of private technology in the Global South and Indigenous governance in West Papua, to Pakistan's groundwater crisis, space debris and the future use of FPV drones.
The presentations and discussions took place under the auspices of Sir Clive Alderton KCVO, Principal Private Secretary to His Majesty The King; Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury and former Leader of the House of Lords; and Thomas Hartley, Assistant Private Secretary to The King and former British High Commissioner to The Bahamas. Among the highlights was the presentation of Cambridge's King Edward VII Prize-winning report, ICSO Out of This World: Solving the Problem of Space Debris, which proposes an International Civil Space Organisation, a unified licensing framework and a Joint Remediation Fund to address the growing challenge of orbital debris. The presence of the Marquess of Salisbury also offered a particularly fitting historical connection: his predecessor, the 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, played an important role in the Anglo-French rapprochement that ultimately led to the signing of the Entente Cordiale in 1904.
We are deeply grateful to Buckingham Palace for welcoming the five finalist teams and for giving them the opportunity to place their research before such distinguished representatives of British public life. Beyond the honour of presenting at one of the country's most historic institutions, the reception allowed the students to test their ideas in direct conversation with experienced figures in diplomacy, government and the Royal Household, bringing their work one step closer to the policy discussions it seeks to inform.
