ON 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF CONFERENCE OF NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS, DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL SAYS NGOS SERVE AS GLOBAL CONSCIENCE
Press Release
DSG/SM/38
ON 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF CONFERENCE OF NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS, DEPUTY SECRETARY-GENERAL SAYS NGOS SERVE AS GLOBAL CONSCIENCE
19981203 Louise Fréchette Stresses Role of NGOs in Fight Against Landmines, Creation of International Criminal CourtFollowing is the text of an address given by Deputy Secretary-General Louise Fréchette on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the Conference of Non-Governmental Organizations in New York on 3 December:
It is a great pleasure to join you on this happy occasion. Fifty years is a milestone indeed. The United Nations celebrated its first half-century three years ago. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide turn 50 next week. Of course, this confluence of birthdays is no coincidence. All of us -- institutions, instruments and individuals -- have been key participants in the great post-war project of international cooperation for the common good.
Anniversaries give us an opportunity not only to celebrate noteworthy achievements, but also to reflect on why some goals remain unmet, to build on lessons learned and to map a course for the future.
The Conference of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) marks its fiftieth anniversary at a time when NGOs are making their mark on global society as never before.
Since the Earth Summit of 1992 in particular, NGOs have to a significant extent shaped the agenda and the outcome of world conferences on such vital issues as human rights, the environment, population, women and poverty. The result is a far-reaching blueprint for action on the major challenges of our day.
Thanks also to NGOs, the year 1997 can be thought of as the year of the landmine -- or should I say, the year of no more landmines. The Nobel-prize-winning International Campaign to Ban Landmines helped turn a growing awareness by ordinary people into a grass-roots movement of conviction and then into a truly global cause. And it made governments acknowledge that the cost of landmines far outweighed the need to use them. How did they do
it? One thousand NGOs in 60 countries were linked together by a weapon that would ultimately prove more powerful than the landmine: E-mail.
With that same weapon, and with that same intensity, NGOs helped make 1998 the year of the International Criminal Court. More than 200 NGOs took part in that process, an unprecedented level of participation by civil society in a law-making conference.
Although many -- governments and NGOs alike -- would have preferred the Court to have been vested with more far-reaching powers, we should not minimize the breakthrough that was achieved. As the Secretary-General has said, the International Criminal Court "can save lives and serve as a bulwark against evil". But let us also recall that the Rome Statute will enter into force only when 60 States have ratified it. I hope that NGOs will continue to display the commitment that has helped bring us this far. We have some distance to go yet if we are to create a court that has been called the "missing link" in the international legal system.
Looking ahead, NGOs are already at work on next year's observance of the International Year of Older Persons, and I am also aware of a coalition-in- the-making around the issues of small arms and children in armed conflict. So NGOs already have a full plate for the year 1999. In that spirit, I would like to continue the chronology by saying a special word about the year 2000.
In a world where change is an essential condition of life, our needs and priorities are always evolving. This is as true of institutions as it is of individuals. That is why the United Nations embarked upon the path of fundamental reform and is continuing to carry out a top-to-bottom overhaul. Through that process, we are trying to overcome some of the unfortunate legacies of the past, such as overlapping or outdated mandates, duplication of effort and a pattern of over-centralized decision-making. At the same time, we need to be thinking equally hard about the future.
To some, the arrival of a new millennium is merely an accident of the calendar. But to the United Nations -- and I know we are not alone in this -- it is a compelling symbolic moment.
Like the San Francisco Conference at which the United Nations was founded, and like conferences held at other turning points in history, we have an opportunity to join together to articulate a vision and a plan for the Organization in a world that is radically different than that which existed even a decade ago.
What kind of United Nations do Member States desire in the twenty-first century? What objectives are Member States prepared to support? How should the United Nations relate to the increasingly populated universe of international institutions and to the increasingly robust forces of civil society?
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To answer such broad but crucial questions, the Secretary-General has suggested that the session of the General Assembly in the year 2000 be designated the Millennium Assembly and that a non-governmental Millennium Forum be held in conjunction with that event.
I know that consultations among NGOs have already begun and I look forward to working with you to make this initiative as fruitful as possible. We need your ideas, your energy, your proven commitment. A Millennium Assembly would be unthinkable without the involvement of NGOs.
The same can be said about the United Nations work in general. NGOs occupy an indispensable place in today's world. You have always been a presence at the United Nations -- there at the founding and mentioned explicitly in Article 71 of the Charter. But your growth has been especially remarkable in recent years.
Consider the numbers. In 1948, 41 NGOs were granted consultative status by the Economic and Social Council; today more than 1,350 enjoy the right to participate in that body's proceedings. The number of NGOs associated with the Department of Public Information (DPI) has also skyrocketed, from 200 in 1968 to more than 1,550 today.
The information and communications revolution has fuelled this growth, giving you new tools with which to assemble, air your views and forge links with the like-minded. Your size, compared to that of governments, renders you less bureaucratic and more agile in going about your work. And your deep involvement in the daily lives of people and communities makes you singularly equipped to speak and act on behalf of your chosen causes.
Globalization, and changes in the nature of the State, are additional factors behind your success. Today's economy is global, markets are global, and the problems we face -- from the environment to organized crime to the spread of disease and the proliferation of arms -- tend more and more to be global. But politics for the most part remain local. Thus, there is a widening gap between what citizens demand and what governments can deliver. Our challenge is to bridge that gap.
The United Nations and other organizations, international and regional, have sought to play a role in this regard. NGOs have also stepped into the breach. Where governments have shrunk or do not function effectively, they have provided much-needed services. Where governments have been unresponsive, NGOs have advocated paying greater attention to various issues and constituencies. And where governments are repressive, NGOs have formed protest and democratic opposition movements.
All of this is not at all to suggest that the State is disappearing or ceding authority. Far from it. NGOs and civil society are themselves dependent on States in many basic respects. After all, achievements such as
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the International Criminal Court and the ban on landmines, and others such as the Convention on Climate Change, rely on the will of governments. But we have entered an era of ever greater partnership, and this creates considerable, even limitless, space for effective NGO action.
The United Nations has been both witness to and participant in the birth of a global civil society. To various degrees and with various rates of success, we have attempted to adapt to and encourage the "global associational revolution" and the emergence of a new, participatory international system. In short, we have tried to open our doors much more widely to civil society. This has been a crucial theme in the reform effort.
Most likely you know by now that all United Nations departments are designating a liaison officer for NGOs, and that training programmes for staff, including those at the United Nations Staff College, will henceforth include a component dedicated to cooperation with civil society. You may also know that the United Nations programme on HIV/AIDS is the first programme of the United Nations system to include NGO representatives on its governing body as full participants rather than observers.
But I also want to be sure that you are aware of how much we are doing to facilitate the emergence of NGOs in developing countries and help them build the capacity to work effectively with the United Nations. The aggregate numbers of NGOs I cited earlier mask a disturbing paucity of developing- country NGOs. Of the 1,550 NGOs associated with the Department of Public Information, only 251 are based in developing countries.
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, for its part, reports that only 25 per cent of organizations associated with it are southern NGOs, and that they rarely participate in the Trade and Development Board and Commission meeting because of financial constraints.
The United Nations Drug Control Programme is just one United Nations body working to address this situation, and recently helped Asian NGOs to form a Committee of NGOs in Bangkok. The World Bank, seeing that the policy environment for NGOs and civil society varies enormously from country to country, has published, in draft form, a handbook on good practices for laws relating to NGOs.
Gradually, such efforts are helping to enhance the presence of southern NGOs at United Nations conferences and meetings and in other aspects of our work.
We do this because we believe in the power of NGOs. NGOs are the leading edge of civil society -- the legions of local authorities, mass media, private sector leaders and academia -- who are increasingly involved in international affairs and who are bringing new life and meaning to the idea of an international community.
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With goodwill and reason, you are serving as the global conscience. With foresight and imagination, you will help us define the future. With great gusto, you are using this occasion to reaffirm your commitment to the United Nations/NGO partnership. Finally, I note that the Conference o Non-Governmental Organizations has dedicated its fiftieth anniversary publication to the principles of the United Nations and to the hundreds of thousands of men and women around the world working towards global peace, prosperity and justice. All of this, my friends, adds up to model global citizenship. Congratulations again on this important anniversary, and thank you.
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