Social Watch Report 2012 to be launched in Brazil

Social Watch Report 2012, which includes citizen contributions from 66 countries and several exhaustive global analysis, will be launched in Porto Alegre, Brasil, on 26 January.

The report includes the preliminary findings of the Civil Society Reflection Group on Global Development demanding a reaffirmation of the principles of sustainable development and a comprehensive redefinition of global governance and policies to make it possible.

From the Arab Spring to the Occupy Wall Street movements, citizens are on the streets all over the world demanding alternative policies to the economic, financial, climate and food global crises. In order to re-think goals and strategies, the voices from Civil Society need to be heard. Social Watch organizations around the world have shaped this unique report from the grassroots, complemented with the contribution of leading civil society voices from five continents.

Social Watch, with the support of Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Global Policy Forum and terre des homes, invites to a lively debate with key authors of the Social Watch Report 2012. Copies of the report will be distributed.

The speakers at the event, that will take place at the UFRGS / Faculdade de Engenharia (nova) in Porto Alegre, will be Roberto Bissio (Social Watch), Alejandro Chanona (National Autonomous University of Mexico), Barbara Adams (Global Policy Forum, USA), Gigi Francisco (Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era-Dawn), and Wolfgang Obenland (GPFE/ Social Watch, Germany).

The next day, 27 January, will be held in the same venue a a critical debate around Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with members of the Civil Society Reflection Group on Global Development and other guests. Are SDGs a way forward, given the MDG-experience? Can they be of help to usher in a new development paradigm? Do we fi rst need a new Charter on the Right to Sustainable Development as a normative basis for SDGs?

Are SDGs for the rich or for the poor, or can they be applicable to both? How would a balanced approach to SDGs look like, that include development and human rights goals as well limits for the depletion of natural assets to stop the destruction of nature?

The speakers will be Alejandro Chanona (National Autonomous University of Mexico), Barbara Adams (Global Policy Forum, USA), Gigi Francisco (Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era-Dawn), Hubert Schillinger (Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Germany), Rodrigo Stumpf Gonzales (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil) and Roberto Bissio (Social Watch).

Both seminars and panel discussions will be held in English and Portuguese.

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