Olivia Lazard is a strategic consultant, researcher, and public speaker focused on the intersections between international and planetary security. Her work anticipates the geopolitical, economic, and ecological risks driven by planetary transformations such as climate change. She advises governments, international organizations, and private sector actors on managing transition risks related to energy systems, technological disruption, and ecological collapse. Her research also contributes to shaping public debate and governance on emerging planetary technologies, including geoengineering.

Olivia began her career in conflict zones across Africa and the Middle East, working for the UN, donor governments, and business actors as a conflict analyst, stabilization advisor, and mediator. There, she witnessed firsthand how ecological degradation, nature-based conflict, illicit economies, and geostrategic competition over critical minerals, water, and soil were converging—reshaping both the planet and international systems. As she emphasized in her 2022 TED Talk, this convergence is accelerating faster than existing peace and security frameworks can adapt.

Today, Olivia works at the nexus of fieldwork, systems research, and policy design. She collaborates with scientists and policymakers to protect and regenerate ecosystems amid rising transition risks, and pilots regeneration-based mediation approaches in climate-vulnerable regions to help communities and governments reimagine water, food, and energy futures.

As a Planetary Fellow at the Berggruen Institute, Olivia is writing a book on the drivers of human and planetary insecurity in the age of the techno-industrial revolution. She is also founding Transition Intelligence, a European institute dedicated to guiding planetary transitions through policy, technological, economic, and mediation innovation labs.

Olivia holds a BA from McGill University, an MA from Sciences Po Paris, and an MSC from the London School of Economics. Most recently, she was a senior fellow with Carnegie Europe, advancing research on the geopolitics of climate change and transition risks. She is based in Europe, and speaks French, English, Spanish and Italian.