Sustainable Development & Human Rights - Archive

The long awaited work of an experts committee on sustainable development financing, a key outcome of the Rio+20 United Nations conference, has finally started. The Intergovernmental Committee of Experts on Sustainable Development Financing held its first session on 28-30 August at the UN headquarters in New York. However, contrary to most multilateral discussions and intergovernmental processes in the UN, the session was closed to not only external stakeholders but also the Member States that are not part of the Committee [...]

Women's Major Group, representing 500 women's organizations form all around the world, today addressed UN Secretary-general Ban Ki Moon with regard to his report to the 68th General Assembly on the progress towards the MDGs and the UN's development agenda beyond 2015. In the letter, which is supported more than 50 civil society groups (including GPF), the coalition calls for a stronger recognition of women's rights in the debated post 2015 development agenda as well as for a meaningful approach [...]

The First session of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean took place in Montevideo, 12-15 August 2013 with great attendance of women’s rights activists from the region. In this context AWID (Association in Women’s Rights in Development) identifies universal access to health, sexual and reproductive rights, and gender equality as key elements for the Post-2015 agenda on sustainable development.

The Arab NGO Network for Development (ANND) has issued a statement regarding their perspective of the current developments in Egypt. ANND describes the efforts they have made in achieving public democracy, social justice and stability during the unrest being faced in the Arab community. The network stresses the importance of ending all violence from conflicting sides to provide a safe basis to encourage economic and political development in Egypt. They recognize that the media has been adding to the cause [...]

The European Commission’s recent accountability report and communication on financing for development highlights the importance of domestic resource mobilisation, tackling illicit financial flows and meeting aid promises. But it contains no substantive new commitments, ducks issues of wider systemic reform and adopts an alarmingly one-sided endorsement of stepping up the use of public money to leverage private finance. These are the conclusions of an article written by Jesse Griffiths, Øygunn Sundsbø Brynildsen, Jeroen Kwakkenbos, María José Romero and Bodo Ellmers [...]

In a report commissioned by UN DESA/DSD Major Groups Programme in response to the Rio+20 outcome document, Barbara Adams and Lou Pingeot (Policy Advisors at GPF but acting in their personal capacities) take stock of the reviews of the history of Major Groups' engagement with the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) and highlight examples of best practices that were deemed successful and efficient and those that did not work. Furthermore, they identify lessons learned from the experience and concerns raised [...]

Alliance Sud, a coalition of Swiss development NGOs, criticizes industrialized countries for not living up to the promises made at the Cancún climate conference in 2010. While rich countries had pledged additional funding to support developing countries, they have resorted to cosmetic tactics instead. Thus, Alliance Sud points out that Switzerland is trying to declare private financing as public contributions. Yet, more innovative public finance mechanisms would be needed instead. This process could endanger a global climate change agreement.

In an open letter to UN Secretary-General Ban-Ki Moon, a coalition of women's rights groups DAWN, IWHC and Resurj urge Ban to reassert the importance of women's rights within the post-2015 development agenda. They call on the Secretary-General to put on emphasis on women's reproductive health, sexual education for both girls and boys and the promotion of women's leadership. The groups see an emerging consensus in the High-Level Panel's report, the Sustainable Development Solutions Network's report and the Global Compact's [...]

Pacific women advocates as part of the Women’s Major Group have issued a statement for the Pacific Small Island Developing States Preparatory Meeting in Nadi, Fiji. The statement calls for recognizing the central role of women for sustainable development in the Pacific area in the outcome document of the Preparatory Meeting that took place in June 2013. The Meeting is part of preparations for Third International Confenrence on SIDS (Small Island Developing States) that will be held in 2014.

“The worst thing about living in extreme poverty is the contempt - that they treat you like you are worthless, that they look at you with disgust and fear and that they even treat you like an enemy.”

“We experience the violence of being discriminated against, of not existing, not being part of the same world, not being treated like other human beings.”

Time and again, poverty is associated with violence against the people that suffer it. Poverty is frequently [...]

The debates on an agenda for international co-operation and development beyond 2015 offer the opportunity to (re-)address in a holistic manner well-being and justice in societies. Given the economic, social and ecological challenges in the world, this is urgently needed.

The present framework of international development goals centering on the MDGs and the related strategies do not provide adequate answers to the global problems, be they accelerated global warming, the growing gap between rich and poor, the financialization of the [...]

The International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD)Beyond 2014 took place from July 7-10. As a product of the conference, participants developed The Hague Civil Society Call to Action on Human Rights and ICPD Beyond 2014. If you would like to support the conference's work on the themes of women’s autonomy and reproductive rights, sexual health and well-being and human rights and gender-based discrimination and violence, please sign the petition.

Growing inequalities and unregulated finances are expropriating people everywhere from their fair share in the benefits of global prosperity. The Social Watch Report 2012 concentrates on the effects of present mismangements and false recepies on the rights and well-being of future generations. “The ‘right to a future’ is the most urgent task of the present,” writes Roberto Bissio, coordinator of Social Watch, member of the Reflection Group and editor-in-chief of the study. “It is about nature, yes, but it is [...]

The world faces an unprecedented coincidence of global crises. They testify to the failure of the dominant model of development and economic progress that is oriented on a technocratic modernisation path, is blind to human rights and the ecological limits of the global ecosystem, confuses growth of Gross Domestic Product with progress in society, and regards poverty as a primarily technical challenge in which categories of inequality and social justice are neglected.

The Civil Society Reflection Group on Global Development [...]

On 31 October 2011 the Reflection Group submitted a statement to the secretariat of the Rio+20 Conference to be held in June 2012. It was prepared during a drafting session in October in New Paltz, NY and highlights some of the issues and proposals that will come up in the final report of the Reflection Group again. The final report will come out in spring of 2012 after a final meeting of the Group.

Over the years since the Millennium Summit, the MDGs have proved to be an instrument of development policy that is both effective as publicity and suitable for campaigns. They are easy to understand and to communicate to a broader public. The civil society and UN campaigns on the MDGs have contributed to enhancing public awareness of the problems of poverty and hunger in the countries of the South – including not only those people especially concerned with development. Under the [...]

Jens Martens and Tobias Debiel point out that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are much less ambitious than previous international development goals. Even so, the UN, World Bank and NGOs agree that most countries will not achieve most of the MDGs on time. The authors further argue that the MDGs fail to deal with the structural root causes of poverty, such as unequal distribution of wealth, land and political power, as well as unfair global trade rules.(Institute for Development [...]

The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) published the 2005 Human Development Report just a week before the Millenium+5 Summit. The release was intended to influence governments to promote a more incisive approach to development, aid and security policies. This briefing paper analyzes the report and agrees with the UNDP's concern that in the current path towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals, the lack of distribution and social justice policies is leading to a "blind spot." (Global Policy Forum and Friedrich [...]

This Global Policy Forum and Friedrich Ebert Foundation Briefing Paper examines Secretary General Kofi Annan's UN reform agenda and notes that "for some, the initiatives are not sufficiently far-reaching, [yet] others view them as too radical and unsuitable to implement politically." The paper criticizes Annan for his weak stance on alternative development financing, including global taxes on currency transactions. It also draws attention to the need for greater civil society participation in the preparations for the Millennium+5 Summit in September [...]

The year 2005, it is to be hoped, will be a decisive year for thorough reform of the United Nations. The High-Level (heads of state and government) Plenary Meeting of the 60th Session of the UN General Assembly (Millennium +5 Summit) is due to meet in the middle of September 2005 to discuss the future institutional and sectoral development of the UN. On the agenda are the new challenges of global security, poverty eradication, the implementation of human rights, gender [...]

After more than two years of work, the United Nations Millennium Project published its final report, "Investing in Development," in January 2005. This Global Policy Forum and Friedrich Ebert Foundation briefing paper provides a more accessible analytical summary on the massive report and places it in a political context.