Mesade articulación

Civil Society Communiqué
The Global CSO Forum on the Post-­‐2015 Development Agenda
March 23-­‐24, 2013, Bali, Indonesia

As the fourth meeting of the High-­‐Level Panel on the Post-­‐2015 Development Agenda begins in
Bali, Indonesia, we, the members of global, regional and national civil society urge the HLP to be
ambitious by setting a framework for transformative, universal, people-­‐centered development.
We call on the HLP to outline the bold and relevant commitments needed to ensure a new
paradigm for sustainable development, firmly rooted in existing economic, social, cultural, civil
and political human rights obligations.

Nothing less than a wholly transformative development framework is required to fulfill the
international commitments of the past and present. It must produce concrete processes to achieve
outcomes and tackle structural root causes. It must be based on the principles of human rights,
equity, social, economic, gender, climate and environmental justice, participation, accountability,
and non-­‐discrimination. It must ensure dignity, safety, happiness and wellbeing, harmony with
nature, and resilience. It must redistribute power, wealth and resources between and within
countries, between rich and poor, and between men and women.

The framework must be based on acting on the demands of grassroots voices; the post-­‐HLP
processes, including the Open Working Group and inter-­‐state consensus-­‐building phase from
September 2013, must be based on co-­‐determination and social partnership; the bias towards the
private sector across development must end; corporations must respect the principles of
environmental sustainability and enforceable international accountability in line with human
rights.

Context

As the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) near their target date, financial, food, energy,
environmental crises and conflicts are presenting new challenges that are undercutting gains
made in development. The dominant neoliberal growth model is exposed by entrenched and
deepening poverty and inequality. Human rights remain without respect, protection and
fulfillment, and are exacerbated by conflict and insecurity, economic, social and gender injustice.
Three of nine planetary boundaries – climate change, biodiversity, biogeochemical -­‐ have been
breached, and there is a distinct lack of international, binding commitments to tackle the
planetary emergency.

Half the world’s population lives on less than US$2.50 per day. Some 2 billion live in
multidimensional poverty, a measure incorporating nutrition, education, infant mortality and
sanitation, among others. The wealthiest 20 percent of humankind enjoy more than 80 percent of
the world’s total wealth while the bottom 20 percent share only 1 percent.
Global Partnerships and Means of Implementation

MDG8 aspired to support the delivery of the MDGs through global partnerships and means of
implementation, but suffered from a lack of political commitment and clearly defined, binding
targets and responsibilities. It was not explicitly linked to other MDGs, left out non-­‐traditional
donors, and did not assign responsibility to developing countries.

As such, there remains no democratic, global and multi-­‐stakeholder executing mechanism or
enforcement body to ensure commitments on development cooperation are met -­‐ non-­‐binding
statements are not translated into action, and developing countries must still contest for the
democratic ownership of their development strategies. Multilateralism has weakened over the
last decade, with the current regime favoring powerful states to the detriment of the rest, and

regional bilateral partnerships the preferred model. The lack of a strong framework for inclusive
and equitable partnerships means the financial crisis has underscored existing gaps in
development financing, which has shrunk when it has been most needed, setting the stage for
future debt crises.

There remains little coordination and coherence in defining the role of emerging economies in
providing development finance and South-­‐South Cooperation. The private sector is increasingly
emphasized by governments as an important development actor, but it lacks strong regulation
and accountability: the conditions for private sector engagement risk undermining development
gains rather than supporting them, through sharply escalating human inequalities. Although
formally recognized as an independent development actor in its own right, civil society is not
granted the voice or resources to fulfill this role in society.

At the same time the last decade has brought to attention the potential failure of new sources of
financing. Illicit financial flows, capital flight, and tax avoidance by multinational corporations are
draining many of the poorest countries of resources for development. Unfair trade rules have led
to the bankruptcy, destitution and destruction of millions of small farmers, fisherfolk and local
markets in developing countries. Unbridled and misguided liberalization has encouraged a race to
the bottom in labor rights and working conditions, with women and girls bearing the brunt of
these impacts.

Priority areas
The vision and priorities of the post-­‐2015 framework must include a focus on indigenous
peoples, religious and ethnic minority groups, marginalized caste groups, stateless people, people
living in remote and conflict or disaster-­‐affected areas, women, children – including those without
parental care, youth, the aged, disabled, LGBT, people living with HIV and AIDS, small-­‐scale food
producers, and the informal sector. The framework must ensure accountability through
disaggregated data on progress based on these groups. It must also include full employment and
decent work for all, combined with universal social protection, access to justice and progressive
taxation. It requires a commitment to equitable access and governance of natural resources,
building climate-­‐resilient livelihoods through low carbon development pathways, including safe
and sustainable transport and infrastructure. Gender equality must be central -­‐ including
addressing violence against women and girls with and without disabilities, and guaranteeing
sexual and reproductive health and rights -­‐ as should ensuring peace, security and state-­‐building
in fragile states. The framework must include goals and zero-­‐targets on universal access to
equitable healthcare, quality, inclusive education and life-­‐long learning, water and sanitation, and
food and nutrition security.

Any future framework must redefine the current notion of a global partnership from an
inequitable relationship between donor and partner country governments into a global
partnership for development cooperation that is equitable and inclusive of all development actors.
This partnership must reaffirm civil society organizations as independent development actors in
their own right, promote minimum standards for an enabling environment for CSOs, include their
full, meaningful, informed and sustained participation, and ensure that those most affected by
poverty and exclusion have a space to voice their perspectives and influence outcomes. It must
ensure ownership of this process by including civil society formally in any and all negotiations pre
and post-­‐2015, and promote consensus-­‐based decision-­‐making. The framework must prioritize
the needs of the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Small Island Developing States (SIDS),
Landlocked Developing Countries, and Fragile and Conflict Affected States in any future
framework, taking into account their special requirements, and recognizing that all countries have
common but differentiated responsibilities. Climate justice and sustainable management of the
planet’s resources must be at the center of the framework, and must ensure that any public

financing for development guarantees both financial additionality and development additionality
to promote positive and sustainable development impacts.

The means of implementation must support the achievement of democratically determined
human development objectives. To tackle long-­‐term structural imbalances, international trade
rules and policies must be brought in line with socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable
development. The one-­‐size-­‐fits-­‐all approach in economic and trade policy does not allow states
the space to determine their own development strategies or support the protection of public
goods. Commodity markets must be regulated, including banning speculation, in order to ensure
income and food security for producer countries and their people; the new framework must
include international measures to ensure commodity prices are stabilized at levels enabling
adequate incomes for the countries and producers; the new framework should eliminate trade-­‐
distorting agricultural subsidies in developed countries and provide mechanisms to protect local
farmers, fisherfolk, and small and medium-­‐sized enterprises.

The privatization of public services combined with the reduction of government responsibility is a
fundamental concern – social partnerships must supersede public-­‐private partnerships. Domestic
government revenues based on progressive taxation are a sustainable source of funding for public
services. Domestic resource mobilization must be enabled through changes to international tax
regulation. Existing commitments on quantity and quality of aid must be met. Loan-­‐based forms of
development cooperation should not be used to deliver financing commitments. Climate finance
must be public, obligatory, predictable, grant-­‐based, and free from conditionalities. It must be
additional to the other financial obligations of developed countries.

The widespread democratic deficit, which is evident at the local, national and international levels,
results in the exclusion of people around the world from key decision-­‐making processes that
affect them. Civil society groups strongly urge decision-­‐makers to embed global governance in
the post-­‐2015 development framework by institutionalizing democratic participation and
accountability to citizens at all levels; developing new models of governance based on the
principles of equality, justice and human rights; and promoting conditions for civil society to
engage as development partners, while enhancing and protecting optimal standards for civil
society.

Ensuring universal access to social protection is a human right and a direct and efficient way of
achieving equality. Global and regional institutions should support governments in investing in
universal social protection by implementing the social protection floor as a basic right of all
people, regardless of the sector they work in. While social protection remains the responsibility
of governments, a Global Fund for Social Protection should be established to introduce or
strengthen social protection floors in the poorest countries. There should be an inclusive
framework for ensuring income and job security for all peoples, including those in the informal
sector. This includes realizing full employment and decent work for all, and reinforcing and
universalizing international labor standards.

Systematic exclusion and discrimination are at the root of poverty and marginalization. The
international human rights framework is not being applied universally. Lack of social and legal
recognition means many of those working in the informal sector are denied their basic rights. This
includes street vendors, motorbike and some other transport workers, traditional fisherfolk, small
producers, home based workers, sex workers, domestic workers, unpaid care workers, small-­‐
scale farmers, migrant workers and others. It is the responsibility of the international community
as well as national and local governments to address the current injustices experienced by these
groups.

Women’s rights and gender equality must be prioritized specifically and throughout the post-­‐
2015 framework. It is critical that the framework commits to end structural violence against

women and girls embedded in patriarchy, feudalism, and capitalism, while promoting the
democratic empowerment of women at home, in their communities, nationally and
internationally. Governance starts at home, with women making decisions over their own bodies,
sexualities and lives -­‐ sexual and reproductive rights are fundamental and must be guaranteed,
while laws and policies that discriminate on the basis of gender, sexual orientation and gender
identity must be repealed. The framework must ensure women’s rights to and control over land,
property, intellectual and productive resources, and information and technology, while promoting
fair asset distribution among different social groups. There must be guarantees of women’s decent
work and a living wage, including the right to social protection, and transformative and
progressive women’s leadership and decision-­‐making at all levels.

Conclusion

Civil society wants to engage in a new development framework that it believes will support the
poor and marginalized. Civil society must not merely be consulted, but engaged as an equal
partner in all political processes to co-­‐determine a bold, transformative and people-­‐centered
framework. We call on the HLP report to set a visionary tone to correct the repeated failures in
addressing the critical sustainable development challenges facing the world.

If the new sustainable development framework is to tackle poverty and inequality nothing less
than this will suffice. Indeed, anything less than this will not be supported by civil society.