From Wikiprogress.org

The Reflection Group on Global Development Perspectives is an initiative launched on November 15th by a coalition of NGOs, Foundations and Academia to assess conventional and alternative models of development and well-being, reconsider development goals and indicators, including the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), draw conclusions for future development strategies and provide specific policy recommendations for the UN Conference on Sustainable Development 2012.

Background

When, in the past, the UN or individual Governments established international expert commissions or independent panels, such as the Brundtland Commission, Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) often reacted ex post. They participated in consultations or hearings by invitation; they offered their comments on the reports (through a variety of means). Sometimes representatives of civil society participated in their personal capacity in the panels or commissions themselves.

A year ago, governments decided at the UN conference on the global economic and financial crisis to ask ECOSOC to consider and make recommendations to the UN General Assembly regarding the establishment of an ad hoc panel of experts on the world economic and financial crisis and its impact on development. This decision followed the initiative of the Stiglitz Commission for an International Panel of Expert on Systemic Risks in the Global Economy. Since then, Governments and the UN have failed to make any significant progress in establishing such a panel.

CSOs are now becoming more pro-active. They will not wait until the UN decides to establish another expert body and later invites civil society to participate. Thus, an alliance of civil society groups, networks and foundations, including Third World Network, Social Watch, DAWN, the Friedrich-Ebert-Foundation, Global Policy Forum, terre des hommes, and the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, launched the Civil Society Reflection Group on Global Development Perspectives. With this initiative they tend to provide the space for in-depth discussions for an interdisciplinary group of civil society activists and scholars from all parts of the world beyond the usual format of a workshop or a conference.

The group is going to assess conventional and alternative models of development and well-being, reconsider development goals and indicators, including the MDGs, draw conclusions for future development strategies and provide specific policy recommendations for the UN Summit on Sustainable Development and the MDG process. The work of the Group is supposed to build a bridge between the discussions at the MDG Summit 2010 and the Sustainable Development Summit 2012.

The aim of the group is not to reinvent the wheel but build on former and current discourse projects, such as the UNDP led debate about the future of the human development concept, the “What next – another development” project, initiated by the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, the interdisciplinary project “Building Global Democracy” and the “Jo’burg Memo” of the Heinrich-Boell-Foundation presented at the Johannesburg Summit 2002.

Group members

Barbara Adams (Global Policy Forum, US), Beryl d’Almeida (Abandoned Babies Committee, Zimbabwe), Alejandro Chanona Burguete (National Autonomous University of México), Chee Yoke Ling (Third World Network, China), Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker (Germany), Filomeno Santa Ana III (Action for Economic Reforms, Philippines), George Chira (terre des hommes India), Gigi Francisco (Development Alternatives with Women for the New Era, Philippines), Henning Melber (Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, Sweden), Jorge Ishizawa (Proyecto Andino de Tecnologias Campesinas, Peru), Karma Ura (Centre for Bhutan Studies, Bhutan), Roberto Bissio (Third World Institute/Social Watch, Uruguay) Victoria Tauli-Corpuz (Tebtebba Foundation, Philippines), Yao Graham (Third World Network-Africa, Ghana), Jens Martens (Global Policy Forum Europe, Germany), Hubert Schillinger (Friedrich-Ebert-Foundation, Germany), Danuta Sacher (terre des hommes Germany).

External links

http://www.reflectiongroup.org/