The United Nations World Summit for Social Development

Copenhagen, 6-12 March 1995

John Angus
Social Services Policy
Social Policy Agency

When the United Nations World Summit for Social Development ended late on the evening of 12 March, agreement had been reached on a substantial set of commitments and actions, as befits an event of the magnitude of the Summit. World leaders from 117 countries took part in the final session, and delegations from most of the United Nations' 186 members took part in the preparatory meetings which drafted the documents. The documents themselves are lengthy - ten commitments in a 25-page Declaration followed by a 100-page Programme of Action . The topics covered by the Summit included the eradication of poverty, the expansion of productive employment and reduction of unemployment, and the promotion of social integration at an international and national level. This was social policy-making on a grand scale.

This brief review will summarise the outcomes of the Summit and then make comment from a New Zealand perspective on the content of the documents and the process by which they were produced.

Summary of outcomes

The Declaration sets out the general commitment of governments to people-centred sustainable development, and then itemises ten specific commitments. They are:

• to create an economic, political, social, cultural and legal environment, that will enable people to achieve social development;
• to eradicate poverty in the world;
• to promote the goal of full employment as a basic priority of economic and social policies;
• to promote social integration;
• to promote full respect for human dignity, and to achieving equality and equity between women and men;
• to promote and attain the goals of universal and equitable access to quality education, the highest attainable standard of health and access of all to primary health care;
• to accelerate the development of Africa and the least developed countries;
• to include social development goals in structural adjustment programmes;
• to increase significantly and/or utilise more efficiently the resources allocated to social development;
• to improve international co-operation for social development.

The programme of action

The Programme of Action contains five chapters. The first focuses on an enabling environment for social development, including:

• sustained economic growth and sustainable development on a global scale, including growth in production, trade, employment and incomes;
• an equitable distribution of the benefits of global economic growth;
• measures to make economic growth and market forces more conducive to social development;
• political frameworks which include the rule of law, democracy, and the wide participation of civil society in policy making;
• promoting and protecting all human rights and fundamental freedoms.

Chapter II deals with one of the fundamental issues addressed by the Summit, poverty. Overall poverty is defined in relative terms as a lack of income and access to resources, lack of access to basic social services such as education, and alienation from civil, social and cultural life. Absolute poverty is defined as severe deprivation of basic human needs such as food and shelter. Actions include:

• providing sustained economic growth;
• developing poverty eradication plans;
• empowering people living in poverty and their organisations;
• improving access to productive resources;
• meeting the basic human needs of all
• enhancing social protection systems such as social insurance programmes;
• reducing the vulnerability of particular groups to poverty, including children, women and older persons.

Chapter III concerns the expansion of productive employment. Actions include:

• placing the expansion of productive employment at the centre of sustainable development strategies;
• emphasising education and training;
• emphasising the quality of work;
• acknowledging groups with specific needs, such as older persons, single parents, and migrants;
• recognising the significance of unremunerated work.

Chapter IV concerns social integration, which is defined in terms of an inclusive society, where diversity is respected and the problems of divisiveness and disintegration associated with such factors as wide disparities of wealth, uncontrolled urbanisation, violence and crime are addressed. Actions include:

• promoting a participatory democracy;
• promoting tolerance and respect for diversity, equality and social justice;
• being responsive to groups at risk of being marginalised including indigenous people, children, people with disabilities, refugees and migrants;
• strengthening families.

Chapter V concerns implementation. It calls for:

• the development of national strategies and programmes;
• the involvement in planning of civil society through such organisations as non-profit NGO groups;
• mobilising financial resources including striving to meet the official development assistance goal of 0.7% of GNP.
• reducing the debt burden of developing countries;
• a review in the year 2000 by the General Assembly of the United Nations of progress on the Programme of Action.

Comment on content

Much of what is set out in the documents will be familiar to those who follow social policy in New Zealand, and reflect what might be characterised as the prevailing orthodoxy, at least amongst governments in the Western world. Examples are the central importance given sustained economic growth for the achievement of poverty eradication and employment growth, the importance given the free market, the emphasis on education and training, and the value placed on a participatory democracy. Similarly, there is a familiar ring to calls for gender equality, adequate support for the family as a central social institution, and the categorisation of children, older persons, and people with disabilities as vulnerable.

Perhaps less familiar to New Zealand are the prominence given to migrants and refugees as a special group; the specific references to countries in transition from centrally planned to market driven economies; the emphasis on the role to be played by non-government organisations in policy formulation and evaluation; the emphasis on a collective approach to labour relations; and the lack of prominence in earlier drafts of the special position of indigenous people.

The New Zealand delegation, in collaboration with some other developed and developing countries, was able to achieve greater recognition within the documents of the position of indigenous people. In general, however, the prevailing orthodoxy at an international level was broadly similar to official pronouncements on social policy within New Zealand.

It is likely that the social development consensus reached at the Summit reflects the predominance of Western economic paradigms following the collapse of the centrally planned economies of the USSR and Eastern Europe. Significantly, after the arguments about resource transfer between developed and developing nations, the most difficult issues to resolve were those concerning social and cultural differences, for example on the definition and role of the family or on reproductive health services, rather than about social and economic structures.

A second general comment on the documents is that they represent a consolidation of positions reached at past international conferences and summits rather than a significant advance. For example, the writers made use of language on the environment, on human rights, and on health and development from previous summits at Rio, Vienna and Cairo. Goals for meeting basic human needs were drawn from previous declarations and programmes of action. The single most significant move forward was the consensus text on poverty which well-reflected the complexity of the phenomenon and comes up with agreed definitions, some common understanding about root causes, and a host of recommended actions.

Thirdly, the Summit did not meet the expectations of many developing countries which sought some movement on the international resource issues of the level of official development assistance (ODA) and debt relief. The position of developed countries remained firm: an emphasis on the effectiveness of ODA rather than increases in the level of assistance, and a case-by-case approach to debt relief.

A comment on process

Those readers familiar with the process of reaching common positions on policy matters amongst several agencies will be aware of the magnitude of the task which faced Summit participants. The complexity of the issues and the number of participants threatened to overwhelm the process. Working group sessions resembled, at times, officials' groups from hell as the text was gone through word by word in drafting sessions which went long into the night.

However, agreement was reached, albeit just in time for the meeting of heads of government. Two things were important in making progress: the role played by factional groupings amongst UN members, and the use made of informal working sessions. The role of factions, or blocs, amongst UN members is well established. The important factions at the Summit were G77 (the block of developing countries which now number some 140) and the European Union. The Union spoke only through France, which currently holds the presidency, and the G77 through the Philippines, who currently chair it. The United States delegation also played a major role, and for the most part the text was driven by the agreements reached between the three main players.

The second thing which facilitated progress was the setting up of informal working sessions. Informal sessions were not restricted to faction leaders, but there was a clear understanding that the major players and others with a significant interest would sit around the table and argue to reach compromises. Those with a lesser role would, literally, take a back seat. The pressure for resolving differences was increased by time pressures and, often, the physical constraints of the rooms allocated for informal sessions. Consensus was facilitated by the role played by members of permanent missions to the UN, who knew the underlying agendas and the consensus language which had been used in the past. The compromises were then put to formal working group sessions and almost always ratified.

The New Zealand delegation was in an interesting position as one of a small group of countries, including Australia, Canada and Japan, who were not part of the major factions and as a consequence had some freedom to seek support for specific positions, and to advocate for them in the informal working sessions. The adoption of particular proposals, however, depended on obtaining the agreement of the two main factions.

Conclusion

The most frequently asked questions about the Summit are: "Will it make any difference?" and "Was it worth it?"

The answers depend very much on what expectations were held for it. The Summit does not mark any great breakthrough in the issues of world poverty and unemployment, and the commitments made and actions agreed are non-binding on governments. Many of the outcomes are best characterised as a consolidation of previous global social development initiatives.

On the other hand, the Summit did emphasise the importance of collaborative approaches to the problems of poverty, unemployment and social disintegration, and the attendance of so many heads of government gives its outcomes considerable moral force. The documents agreed at the Summit are a mark in the ground, against which progress can be measured in future years.