HIGH-LEVEL PANEL ON CIVIL SOCIETY HOLDS FIRST MEETING AT UN HEADQUARTERS, 2 - 3 JUNE

HIGH-LEVEL PANEL ON CIVIL SOCIETY HOLDS FIRST MEETING

AT UN HEADQUARTERS, 2 - 3 JUNE

The Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Civil Society, chaired by former President of Brazil Fernando Henrique Cardoso, held its first meeting at United Nations Headquarters in New York, on 2-3 June 2003.  The Panel members also had working lunch meetings with Secretary-General Kofi Annan on 3 June and with Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Nitin Desai on 2 June.

The Secretary-General established the Panel in February 2003, as part of his broad set of reform measures, announced on 30 September 2002 in a report to the General Assembly.  The reform process aims to make the United Nations more able to respond to the new demands of the twenty-first century, and highlights the growing interaction between civil society and the United Nations as one of the areas that need improvements.  The Panel’s expected output is a set of practical recommendations on how and in which areas such improvements can or need to be made.

This first meeting of the Panel reviewed in detail its terms of reference and the modalities with which it would conduct its work.  The Panel will use multiple means and vehicles to reach civil society and other relevant actors, including surveys, consultation meetings, hearings, briefings and analytic studies.  Further detail on these modalities will be announced by end of June.  The Panel’s second meeting is scheduled for December 2003.  The coming summer and fall months will engage the Panel members in various consultation efforts.

Background materials, including a contextual piece by Mr. Cardoso on the role of civil society in today’s world and a review of United Nations’ relationships with civil society prepared by the Panel’s secretariat, were used by the Panel members during this meeting.  These papers will be available at http://www.un.org/reform/index.html by mid-June.

Opening the meeting, Mr. Cardoso reflected on the growing civil society engagement at all levels, but especially at the multilateral level, coupled with a growing public disenchantment with the current world order.  Civil society wants a voice, not a vote, in shaping the future; and dialogue with the diverse civil society actors helps expand democracy.

In the course of the meeting, the panellists highlighted a number of concerns regarding the United Nations and civil society relationship.  These included the need to clarify the rules of engagement to align them with the realities of the twenty-first century, the need for improvements in the relationship with civil society at both international and other levels (national and regional), and the need to create environments and opportunities for genuine dialogue.  Many challenges are before the Panel in developing the practical recommendations it has to deliver to the Secretary-General by April 2004.  Among these are how to continue reinforcing the relationship between civil society and the United Nations in the absence of upcoming large global conferences, how to increase the influence of civil society experience in the making of global decisions, how to define the concept of “civil society”, and how to balance concerns of civil society with those of the States, while also responding to the scale and quality pressures.

In addition to its Chairperson, the Panel is composed of 12 individuals with backgrounds that span across governmental and non-governmental sectors:  Bagher Asadi (Iran), Manuel Castells (Spain), Birgitta Dahl (Sweden), Peggy Dulany (United States), Andre Erdos (Hungary), Asma Khader (Jordan), Juan Mayr (Columbia), Malini Mehra (India), Kumi Naidoo (South Africa), Mary Racelis (Philippines), Prakash Ratilal (Mozambique), and Aminata Traore (Mali).  Short biographies of the Panel members are available at http://www.un.org/reform/pdfs/cspnlbios.htm.

Non-governmental actors have been part of broad range of United Nations activities from humanitarian missions and development projects to campaigns around intergovernmental norm-setting processes.  They have been instrumental in framing the global agenda by directing public attention to areas such as poverty reduction, environmental protection and human rights.  In turn, the United Nations has been a beacon for civil society through its Charter principles and the global targets, norms and standards it has set at major summits.

However, the successful relationship between the United Nationsand civil society currently appears to be strained, in some areas.  The Secretary-General, in his reform report of September 2002, mentions, for example, the wariness of Member States in response to civil society demands for more space in intergovernmental deliberations and the civil society’s frustrations with the  lack of meaningful participation.  There is also a continuing disparity between participation of non-governmental actors from developed versus developing countries, which needs to be addressed.  The Secretary-General’s report highlights the fact that “... all concerned would benefit from engagement with civil society actors based on procedures and policies reflecting greater coherence, consistency and predictability”.

For more information, contact Zehra Aydin, Secretariat of the High-Level Panel on Civil Society, tel: (212) 963-8811, e-mail: aydin@un.org; or Tim Wall, Department of Public Information, Development Section, tel: 212-963-5851, e-mail: wallt@un.org.

* *** *