Social Watch news

“The need of a multilateral dept dispute resolution mechanism was highlighted by the financial crisis of 2008 and the debt crises that it unleashed in several European countries. It is dramatically emphasized in these days by the tragic fact that a country like Argentina that is fighting hard to lift its people out of poverty, reconstruct the national economy destroyed by two decades of neoliberalism and recover the trust of the international financial markets is being attacked by unethical “vulture funds” and might be even forced into default by a resolution over its sovereign debt taken by the justice system of another country. This does not only threatens to submerge millions of Argentinians back into poverty but might even put into risk the whole international financial system” said Roberto Bissio, on behalf of Social Watch, during the Special Session of Trade and Development Board organized by UNCTAD Geneva, 17 June 2014.

There is almost no dispute that the worst performance of all Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) was registered on MDG 8, the Global Partnership for Development. The impending deliberations to shape the post-2015 development agenda offers a high level political opportunity to correct that imbalance.

For that, it is important to avoid treading the same path of the MDG approach. The initial blueprint for the MDGs entirely neglected mention of the means of implementation necessary in the form of international support. Since it was clear that developing countries would never get on board with an agenda that would harshly judge their progress in improving certain quantifiable indicators without correlative commitments of financial support to help achieve them, one more goal was added, and this was Goal 8 on the Global Partnership. Accepting this approach condoned the methodological nonsense of putting means of implementation as a category equivalent to the goals they should serve. It condemned finance for development to the constraints of a format that required simplified, succinct, one-size-fits-all statements that could never capture the breadth, complexity and diversity needed for development finance to work.

Only through financial reform can human rights be sustained. The Center of Concern provides this video for your use in classes, meetings, and other community organizing opportunities to educate viewers regarding the need for financial policy makers to be held accountable to those in marginalized situations and poverty.

The brief video stimulates new ways of thinking about equality and social justice and its inextricable linkage to financial systems. The program recommends actions that each of us can and should take to address changes in local and global financial systems to promote and sustain equality and human dignity throughout society.

Book Review By Prof Kuldeep Mathur

The Citizens Report on Governance and Development 2013 is the seventh Citizens’ Report of National Social Watch.

Democracy is not an easy system of governance. It is fragile and its essence cannot be guaranteed only because there is an assurance of periodic elections. Its fragility is dependent on several factors among whom is the way its governing institutions function and the kind of policies that are determined by them. This requires constant vigilance lest the people who come into power and institutions that they oversee function according to the mandate given to them by the people who have elected them go astray. This vigilance can be exercised only if there is information available to the people. Thus, transparency and availability of information is critical to hold then accountability.