ICSW

ICSW is extremely disappointed with the final UN document which was agreed in Geneva… Over the last twelve months it became apparent that governments were not giving the process the priority it deserved. …Developing countries stood to gain the most from the review, but …the G77…had problems with coordination and there was a strong feeling of mistrust between Developing and Developed countries as a result of the recent Seattle trade negotiations. It was also clear that certain countries such as the USA in particular, were against strengthening the UN if it meant weakening the developing role of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund… However, in spite of these problems the final document…did produce some valuable agreements for future work. For the first time, an internationally negotiated target was set to reduce the number of people living in extreme poverty by 2015.


Statement of the Arab NGO Caucus made by the Arab NGO Network for Development

     The Arab NGO Network believes that most of the Copenhagen Summit resolutions have not been applied neither on an international level nor in the Arab world…. We therefore suggest that the UN takes a greater responsibility… in the implementation of the Summit’s resolutions.
We also believe that the national policies in most Arab countries do not include the essential basics that would qualify them to be named as programs of development, be it on the political, social or economic levels.
Moreover, the dialogue between the NGO’s and the local governments in most Arab countries is nonexistent. We therefore, take the opportunity of our presence in the UN to address our respective governments and urge them to establish a dialogue of cooperation and coordination with NGO’s, so that we may both work together towards development, social justice, democracy and the respect of human rights, and so we may confront the pressures of globalization and its negative consequences on our countries.


Roberto Bissio, Social Watch

     While a more careful and detailed reading of the Geneva documents is still pending… many of the NGO demands were met, except for those that frontally challenged the functioning of the international economy. Yet, all those issues (currency transaction tax, trade rule versus human rights and social development, debt, structural adjustment, lack of transparency of the Bretton Woods institutions) were intensively debated by the diplomats, highlighted by the “Alternative Summit” and the people in the streets and widely reported in the press covering UNGASS. This is in itself a major achievement…

     NGO lobbying made the difference that ensured that the section on “further initiatives” kept all the 10 commitments as the framework… and… reaffirmed the role of the UN General Assembly as the place to debate macro-economic issues, in spite of the attempt by the developed countries to shift the debate to the forums where they prevail: Bretton Woods and the WTO…


Martin Khor, Third World Network

     A Major controversy at the conference was the launching of a report, “A Better World for All” by the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan. The report was jointly published by the UN Secretariat, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the OECD (the club of 28 rich countries).

     Besides setting targets for social development, the report also promoted free-market policies as the key to resolving developing countries problems.
Many NGOs protested that the UN maintain its integrity and should not produce joint reports with organizations of the rich countries like the OECD… which they said were responsible in the first place for generating the conditions for poverty and lack of development.

     This sentiment was also shared by many developing-country governments, as well as by leaders and staff of several United Nations agencies, some of whom felt betrayed by their own Secretary General.


International Confederation of Free Trade Unions

     “Overall the conclusions of the Session give the UN an important mandate to do more for social development, to address the poverty of billions of people” said Bill Jordan, ICFTU General Secretary. “But the references to basic workers’ rights have been watered down significantly because of that small group of authoritarian countries. The Session’s main Political Declaration does not even mention the new ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, adopted in 1998.”

     The final Political Declaration adopted yesterday makes a series of proposals to reduce world-wide poverty by half by 2015. Yet, says the ICFTU, it fails to lay down concrete measures and a calendar enabling progress to be kept under scrutiny.

     Although Brazil, Namibia, South Africa and a large group of moderate, democratic developing countries had tabled a proposal to look into the social problems caused by globalization, they were in the end defeated by the Egyptian-dominated hard-line group.

     Also defeated were proposals, led by the ILO, to achieve better compliance with international instruments on multinational enterprises, with the involvement of trade unions and civil society.


Victoria R. Raquiza, NGO member, Philippine Delegation

     As one UN report on the outcome of the Special Session stated, “developed countries tend to stress issues such as democracy, the rule of law, human rights, good governance and good management. While developing countries don’t disagree that good governance is important, they emphasize the need for a solid resource base and a level playing field in the world economy. Many strongly object to any section of the document that sets conditions for assistance…” On the one hand developing countries were dissatisfied because they felt they did not obtain the new and additional resources required for social development. On the other hand, the developed countries also felt that they were unable to promote a greater role by international organizations outside the UN system such as the WB, IMF and the WTO, to create standards by which to measure progress towards the achievement of social development goals for countries – standards which are perceived by developing countries to be conditions for loans and development assistance.

     Special mention must also go to civil society, and the active and vibrant role it played, whether as lobbyists in the official processes or as social critics and commentators on the substance of the text. Using street mobilizations, parallel fora, media and “alternative statements”, civil society helped to sharpen the discourse on social development and draw attention to the cutting-edge issues related to the text such as debt and structural adjustment, on capital controls (e.g. the currency transaction tax), and on poverty-reduction strategies.


Joint final statement of more than 60 NGOs

     More disheartening has been the lack of will to carry forward the Copenhagen vision of social development in the negotiations.

• The weakening of a proposal for a tax on currency transactions which could contribute to a fund for development by helping to redistribute wealth.
  
• The setting of 2015 as the timeframe to half poverty levels, which in effect sentences hundreds of millions to continue living in abject conditions for another generation
  
• The failure to tackle the differential impact of poverty on women, men, children and young people, and on indigenous people and other marginalized groups;
  
• The failure to recognize the links between globalization and increased insecurity and social inequalities at local, national and global levels
  
• Failure to build upon progress made in human rights, and to recognize inter-institutional cooperation on works’ rights

     In light of these inconclusive decisions, we wish to challenge the prevailing view promoted by OECD governments, the Bretton Woods Institutions, WTO and the UN Secretary General, that globalization is the only way to organize the world economy and that more globalization will reduce poverty.