Civil society involvement

     Since the Copenhagen Summit in 1995, the International Council on Social Welfare (ICSW) has organized about 15 regional and global forums for its members and other civil society organizations in order to review implementation and pursue further action. This has included global forums before each of the annual meetings of the Commission for Social Development, and regional forums before each of the biennial high-level reviews convened by the UN regional commissions. Some of these forums have been organized in partnership with another global or regional organization. Reports, including the recommendations from these forums will be published by ICSW as part of a series of papers about implementation of the Copenhagen commitments entitled The Copenhagen Papers.

     In 1996, ICSW commenced publication of a regular quarterly journal, Social Development Review, which contains information and ideas from around the world on implementation of the Copenhagen commitments. It has also published a booklet entitled The Copenhagen Consensus, which briefly summarizes the principal commitments in the 120 pages or so of agreements made at the Summit.

     Another important publication on Summit implementation is Social Watch, which is prepared and published annually by a team coordinated principally through the Third World Institute in Uruguay. It contains innovative statistical analyses of progress with implementation, together with a range of papers from different countries on particular issues.

     In a few countries – such as France, Germany and South Africa – national committees have been established to focus specifically on implementation of the Copenhagen commitments and have held meetings and published reports for that purpose. In most countries, however, there has been little if any specific follow-up action by civil society organizations.

     In mid-1998, ICSW commenced a two-year Copenhagen Project aimed at helping its members and other civil society organizations to become actively involved in preparations for the Special Session, at the Special Session itself, and in the aftermath of that meeting. The Project will include at least fifteen global and regional forums of which three (in Amman, Guatemala City and Paris) had been held by the end of 1998. Wherever possible, forums will be scheduled to precede the regional governmental reviews being convened by the UN regional commissions. One such forum took place in Nairobi in March 1999 preceding the Economic Commission for Africa review meeting and others are planned in Asia and Latin America.

    The Copenhagen Project will also include publication of research and policy papers on key issues, continued publication of the Social Development Review, and financial support for representatives of civil society organizations to attend the UN preparatory meetings at global and regional levels and the Special Session itself. The Project has already attracted substantial financial support from the British, Canadian, Danish and Dutch governments, as well as from the United Nations Development Programme and other donors.

      It is likely that a number of civil society organizations, including those which formed a Women’s Caucus and a Development Caucus to operate during the preparation for the Summit itself, will become involved again in the preparatory meetings. These two caucuses and ICSW coordinated their respective activities and policies to some extent before the Summit, without seeking to develop entirely common policies, and this may recur in the course of preparations for the Special Session. The annual editions of Social Watch, and other special publications by civil society organizations or individual experts, will also contribute specific analyses and policies for consideration in these preparatory processes.

Some observations

     By way of conclusion, a number of observations about preparations for the Special Session may be made in the light especially of the information summarized above, experience in preparations for the Copenhagen Summit and its aftermath within the UN system, and comments by people who were closely involved in the five-year review of the Rio Environmental Summit which was conducted by a Special Session in mid-1998.

First, it is crucial that the Special Session honours the promise that it will not renegotiate, or polish the wording, of the Copenhagen commitments. Its principal outcome should be a brief statement consisting primarily of specific decisions about action involving the UN system itself and specific recommendations about action by other actors. The initial draft of this statement could be prepared by an independent expert consultant on the basis of guidelines adopted at the meeting of the Preparatory Committee in May 1999. It could then be fully analysed and discussed before being considered at the final meeting of the Preparatory Committee and redrafted for submission to the Special Session.

Second, many proposals which are developed or promoted during the preparations may be pursued and acted upon more effectively through other forums and processes rather than at the Special Session itself. This does not mean
that they should be excluded from consideration during the preparations, where they can be refined and promoted to some extent, but rather that they should not necessarily be insisted upon for inclusion in the principal statement of the Special Session.

Third, the principal statement approved by the Special Session could be accompanied by an extensive summary by the UN secretariat of information and proposals which have been contributed during preparations and are referred by the Special Session for consideration by other specified organizations and processes. This would enable the principal statement to remain brief and focused on concrete action to address top priorities, while ensuring that progress in relation to other issues and proposals is also facilitated.

Fourth, the need to focus the Special Session on specific and effective action to address a few priority issues could be assisted greatly if a small group of eminent persons was established to prepare a brief list of recommendations about what those issues and actions should be. The group would need to be small, independent and of the highest calibre in order to facilitate a speedy, forthright and authoritative report.

Fifth, for reasons outlined earlier, the Special Session should focus especially but not exclusively on initiatives which would substantially improve the extent to which international economic, political and legal environments are conducive to social development and sustainable economic development.

Sixth, also for reasons outlined earlier, special emphasis should be placed on identifying action which can be adopted or facilitated at the regional level. This would be assisted if
the system of regular biennial reviews at regional level was firmly established around the world before the Special Session and if each region developed a Regional Agenda for implementing the Copenhagen commitments. In addition, the emerging regional groupings of governments which have been mentioned earlier should be encouraged to contribute to preparations for the Special Session and to implementing its outcome, and to become more closely involved in the ongoing processes of the UN system.

Seventh, the Copenhagen process should draw upon and interact with the five-year reviews of the 1994 Cairo Conference on Population and the 1995 Beijing Conference on Women. This should include identifying a few common priority actions to be pursued through each process but avoiding excessive duplication and multiplication which would weaken the emphasis on those key issues for which the Copenhagen process is especially appropriate and which are less likely to be given high priority elsewhere. The same applies to interaction with processes relating to the Millennium Session of the General Assembly scheduled for the latter part of 2000, and the special civil society forums which are likely to precede that Millennium Session.

Eighth, in seeking to enhance their influence on the preparatory process, civil society organizations could usefully place more emphasis on being given timely opportunities to see and make detailed comments on key drafts for negotiation at intergovernmental working groups rather than focusing principally on being allowed to make brief set-piece addresses to plenary sessions. This would be facilitated if some informal coordination of priorities and activities occurred between a few leading groupings of civil society organizations which are involved in the preparatory meetings. But it is unlikely to be desirable or practicable to seek, or assert, a single representative structure or policy statement on behalf of all civil society organizations. Past attempts to do so – sometimes at the urging of governments – have often led to serious delay, divisiveness or diffusion of focus. On the other hand, less ambitious or authoritarian approaches can often achieve a sufficient degree of convergence and synergy in lobbying of governmental representatives.