Bilderberg Group

The Bilderberg Group, Bilderberg conference, or Bilderberg Club is an unofficial, annual, invitation-only conference of around 130 guests, most of whom are persons of great influence in the fields of politics, business, banking, and media.

The group meets annually at hotels or resorts throughout the world—for two consecutive years in Europe followed by a year in the United States or Canada. This tradition appeared to be broken in 2008 when the meeting was held in Chantilly, Virginia, so as to give easier access to those associated with the US elections. The 2009 Bilderberg meeting took place from 14-16 May in Athens, Greece.

Origin

The original Bilderberg conference was held at the Hotel de Bilderberg, near Arnhem in The Netherlands, from 29 May to 31 May 1954. It was initiated by several people, including Denis Healey and Józef Retinger, concerned about the growth of anti-Americanism in Western Europe, who proposed an international conference at which leaders from European countries and the United States would be brought together with the aim of promoting understanding between the cultures of the United States and Western Europe. Retinger approached Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, who agreed to promote the idea, together with Belgian Prime Minister Paul Van Zeeland, and the head of Unilever at that time, the Dutchman Paul Rijkens. Bernhard in turn contacted Walter Bedell Smith, then head of the CIA, who asked Eisenhower adviser Charles Douglas Jackson to deal with the suggestion.^[3] The guest list was to be drawn up by inviting two attendees from each nation, one of each to represent conservative and liberal points of view. Fifty delegates from 11 countries in Western Europe attended the first conference along with 11 Americans.

The success of the meeting led the organizers to arrange an annual conference. A permanent Steering Committee was established, with Retinger appointed as permanent secretary. As well as organizing the conference, the steering committee also maintained a register of attendee names and contact details, with the aim of creating an informal network of individuals who could call upon one another in a private capacity. Conferences were held in France, Germany, and Denmark over the following three years. In 1957, the first US conference was held in St. Simons, Georgia, with $30,000 from the Ford Foundation. The foundation supplied further funding for the 1959 and 1963 conferences.

Organizational structure

Meetings are organized by a steering committee with two members from each of around eighteen nations. Official posts, in addition to a chairman, include an Honorary Secretary General. There is no such category in the group’s rules as a “member of the group”. The only category that exists is “member of the Steering Committee”. In addition to the committee, there also exists a separate advisory group, though membership overlaps.

Dutch economist Ernst van der Beugel took over as permanent secretary in 1960, upon Retinger’s death. Prince Bernhard continued to serve as the meeting’s chairman until 1976, the year of his involvement in the Lockheed affair. The position of Honorary American Secretary General has been held successively by Joseph E. Johnson of the Carnegie Endowment, William Bundy of Princeton, Theodore L. Eliot, Jr., former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, and Casimir A. Yost of Georgetown’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy.

A 2008 press release from the American Friends of Bilderberg stated that “Bilderberg’s only activity is its annual Conference. At the meetings, no resolutions are proposed, no votes taken, and no policy statements issued” and noted that the names of attendees were available to the press.^[10] The Bilderberg group unofficial headquarters is the University of Leiden in the Netherlands.

Chairmen

• Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands (1954–1975)
• Alec Douglas-Home (1977–1980)
• Walter Scheel
• Eric Roll (1986–1989)
• Lord Carrington (1990–1998)
• Étienne Davignon

Participants

The steering committee does not publish a list of attendees, though some participants have publicly discussed their attendance. Historically, attendee lists have been weighted towards politicians, bankers, and directors of large businesses.

Heads of state have attended meetings, including Juan Carlos I of Spain and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands. Prominent politicians from North America and Europe are past attendees. In past years, board members from many large publicly-traded corporations have attended, including IBM, Xerox, Royal Dutch Shell, Nokia and Daimler.

The 2009 meeting participants in Greece included: Greek prime minister, Kostas Karamanlis; Finnish prime minister, Matti Vanhanen; Sweden foreign minister, Carl Bildt; U.S. State Department number two, James Steinberg; U.S. Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner; World Bank president, Robert Zoellick; European Commission head, José Manuel Barroso; Queen Sofia of Spain; and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands.

Meetings

Recent meetings:

• 2005 (5–8 May) at the Dorint Sofitel Seehotel Überfahrt in Rottach-Egern, Germany
• 2006 (8–11 June) at the Brookstreet Hotel in Kanata, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
• 2007 (31 May – 3 June) at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, in Şişli, Istanbul, Turkey.
• 2008 (5–8 June) at the Westfields Marriott in Chantilly, Virginia, United States
• 2009 (14–16 May) at the Astir Palace resort in Athens, Greece

Further reading

• Jon Ronson (2001). Them: Adventures with Extremists. London: Picador. ISBN 0-330-37546-6.
• Eringer, Robert (1980). The Global Manipulators. Bristol, England: Pentacle Books. ISBN 0906850046.
• Estulin, Daniel (2007). The True Story of the Bilderberg Group. Oregon, United States of America: Trine Day. ISBN 0977795349.