Introductory Remarks

Let me at the outset join all previous speakers in thanking the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Foundation for International Development, (DES) for having organized this important dialogue and for their kind invitation. The issue of global policy, global governance and the perceived or existing "democracy deficit", in particular of civil society, is one of the key issues in our current state of globalization.

Speaking on this topic within the frame of this multifaceted dialogue is a real challenge. I am part of the civil society landscape, representing the Conference of NGOs (CONGO). Before you ask me questions such as : Where are NGOs at this current stage of global policy decision making and what steps need to be taken, allow me to give a short overview of the rise and recent development of NGOs and the role of CONGO.

Looking back ..the rise of NGOs

There has been an explosive growth in the number, size and reach of transnational NGOs, especially since the end of the Cold War when the process of democratization encouraged the growth of NGOs. For many countries in Africa and Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America, the rise of civic organizations and NGOs has been one of the most startling developments since the transition from authoritarianism to democracy.

Over 30.000 international NGOs are active on the world stage, joined by approximately 20.000 transnational civil society networks of various kinds, including virtual ones. The story is the same for developing countries, except those with repressive regimes. In 1996, the largest ever survey of the non-profit sector found over a million such groups in India, and 210,000 in Brazil.₁ NGOs in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the United Nations have surpassed 2000 this year.

Yet, the real importance of their influence has come in the last decade, as they have moved from being what Michael Edwards describes as "simple instruments to pick up the pieces of state and market failure" to becoming "a force for transformation in global politics and economics" through worldwide concerted advocacy. Outstanding examples include the now so often cited Jubilee 2000 debt relief campaign, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines as well as the current campaign for affordable medicines to fight AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and other killer diseases.

During the UN World Conferences held throughout the 1990's NGOs helped to shape an ambitious worldwide agenda from Conference to Conference, including on children, environment, human rights, population, social development, women, food and habitat. The Beijing Conference in particular had empowered women the world over to claim women's rights as human rights.

The phenomenon was that, despite all their diversity, NGOs had found some communality and the capability for consensus building, (even between international, regional and national NGOs). The United Nations played a harmonizing role and catalyst for this to happen by providing a forum where diverse points of views were aired, proposals debated and where, most importantly, political consensus was achieved. CONGO helped during these Conferences and 5-year-follow-up-appraisal sessions to facilitate NGO participation in a most integrated way.

Millennium Forum and NGO Power

Another example was the Millennium Forum held last year at UN Headquarters itself which reinforced the power of NGOs and was a further step in the evolving process for civil society to find its collective voice in a manner widely representative of the world's peoples. (Organized by CONGO, DPI and a Millennium Executive it brought together some 1350 NGOs from the Global North and South.)

The Forum achieved to project an NGO vision for the 21st Century and delivered it directly to the Millennium Summit (of Heads of States). And Kofi Annan declared that "...If the global agenda is to be properly addressed, a true partnership between civil society and the United Nations is not an option; it is a necessity."

The Declaration underscored the impact of globalization on the poor and described the growing phenomenon as a process of economic, political and cultural domination by the economically and military strong over the weak. It issued a warning: "...if the architects of globalization are not held to account, this will not simply be unjust; the edifice will crumble with dire consequences for everyone..." In the wake of 11 September, this holds a macabre foreboding.

Nevertheless, all the above evidenced the steady rise of NGOs and their increasing interaction with the United Nations activities, often supported by UN Agencies themselves through partnership programs. And many Governments around the world, except for repressive ones, have, at least until recently, viewed this development with a benign eye, because the general public, their voters, see NGOs as uniformly altruistic, idealistic, trustworthy and independent. Governments also find NGOs useful, because less costly and yet quite efficient, for aid distribution and as sources for information, e.g. in some far away corner of the world, sometimes only NGOs can reveal what is going on.. Some scholars see this as evidence of a fundamental 'power shift', an 'associational revolution', as profound as the rise of the nation state in the eighteenth century.

Seattle and aftermath

However, in the aftermath of violent clashes in Seattle, Prague, Quebec and Genova, (less so after Doha, because NGOs were almost excluded)) voices/questions critical of NGOs - and they were always there - have become louder. Some just challenge the right of NGOs to occupy such a prominent place in policy debates, while others raise issues such as legitimacy:

Do NGOs practice what they preach, who - if anyone - do NGOs represent?

• Are they maybe just unaccountable interest groups?
• Are they transparent in structure of power
• Who speaks for whom in an NGO alliance?
• Whose voice is heard, and which interests are ignored?
• Do they represent a dangerous shift of power from elected to un-elected and unaccountable special-interest groups?
• Do NGOs represent a threat to the representative democracy?

Others touch on accountability:

• To whom do NGOs report on their activities, constituencies? (the poor) donors?

Still others criticize NGOs about accuracy:

• They are supposed to often be simplistic, driven by fashion and sensation rather than loyalty to facts.²

Some UN officials have said that it is no accident that questions about legitimacy are being raised at a time when NGOs have started to gain real influence on the international stage. In that sense they are victims of their own success. As CONGO we are less concerned by these questions for ourselves, because we and most of our members are governed by strict rules, bylaws or codes of conducts. However, we are concerned for our members and NGOs in general about backlash attitudes of some governments against NGO participation which translates into a general deterioration of access to the UN machinery, especially in New York. (Following the 11 September, security reasons are often conveniently given to exclude NGOs. And I have plenty of examples of what happened only last week)

Connectivity

Another question has to do with the problems of disconnection - are global NGOs in touch with local communities? Following Seattle, many leading international NGOs were urgently seeking to distance themselves from the violent outbreaks of mostly national/local NGOs. Notwithstanding the need to condemn violence in any form, it was nevertheless through these outcries for more justice, this deep frustration and anxieties about the way our world develops into ever more divided camps of "haves" and "have-nots" that policy makers got the message about the urgent need to shift gear in the economic globalization process. (Or haven't they? The social justice advocates have recently been joined in their criticism of WTO/WB/IMF, Western banks and US Treasury policies by prominent personalities such as Nobel Prize winner and former Chief Economist of the WB, Joseph Stiglitz, who rings the alarm bell over (secret) corporate-led globalization)

The World Conference against Racism

The question of 'connected and disconnected' brings me also to the recent World Conference against Racism. This Conference had set out with an ambitious agenda to adopt a declaration and plan of action which would provide the standards, the structure, the remedies - in essence, the culture - to do away with 'Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance' (so the full title) and ensure full recognition of the dignity and equality of all, and full respect for their human rights.

But while the process was unfolding and NGOs and Civil Society around the world were mobilized through various regional and preparatory meetings, it became evident that this Conference had embarked on a process not so much oriented towards a visionary tomorrow but rather to an examination of a painful past. The NGOs who came from all corners of the earth and from all walks of life - many came for the first time to an UN meeting - spoke with the voices of victims, of excluded, marginalized, discriminated and minority parts of society.

The deep wounds left by slavery, colonialism, ethnic oppression, cast and class discrimination and treatment of indigenous peoples were opened again. NGOs spoke with hurt and anger and demanded apologies and reparations and did not use much diplomatic or UN parlance. And while some of them expressed some solidarity with each other during the preparatory process, it seemed that, when we came to Durban to the NGO Forum, every group was only interested to focus narrowly on its own cause with the loudest voice possible.

Political maneuvering and manipulation became easy. Consensus building among each other, or for that matter with the official Conference did not really take place. In the end, the NGO Forum was not an event to impact positively on the Government Conference. It remained a Conference on its own. However, all the victims' voices were heard, and this for the first time in such a global event. This marks another beginning, however tumultuous and chaotic, to recognize the 'other' as also belonging to the one human family.

Many lessons, including on NGO (intolerable) behaviour, need still to be learned, and I believe a short list of general principles for NGOs be established. (And CONGO will do that) But what was striking was the victims' deep distrust of everything international, of international NGOs in particular. International or global NGOs were not connected, or not meaningful enough, to these groups and communities.

CONGO and the Way Forward

What then is the way forward ? Let me at this time briefly introduce CONGO for those who do not know us: We are an independent membership/ umbrella association of some 400 national, regional and international NGOs, associations and networks from North and South in consultative relationship with the United Nations. Our mission is to work for NGOs to ensure that they are present and have a voice whenever substantive issues are being discussed at the UN; and the second part of our mission is (will be) to go out to assist, train and empower organizations to enable them to take their seats and have a voice at the decision making table of the UN.

We want to become ever more inclusive and representative as a partner for the UN, and for this we are involved in an important membership drive. We also want to bring the UN agenda to the regional, national and local level through our outreach program, connect to our regional, national and local constituencies and bring their concerns in a bottom up approach back to the global level.

We care that diverse voices are heard. When, for example as part of our efforts to strengthen our regional outreach, we sensed low participation of African women's voices in the process leading to Durban, it became one of our priorities to ensure that they be present. We worked in partnership with Femmes Africa Solidarité and the African Women's Committee for Development and Peace. Prior to Durban CONGO had facilitated participation of women from the global south at important UN meetings such as the Commission on Human Rights, the Third World Conference on Least Developed Countries, the UN Special Session on HIV/AIDS and during the PrepCom for the Special session on Children.

We are committed to pursue intensively the attainment of the international development goals signed by all countries in the Millenium Summit last year. And I propose to integrate the Durban agenda into the road map which will guide us through the different stages of our outreach program to our next General Assembly and Millennium Forum Follow Up Event...

Partnerships

Within this program we are preparing for regional consultations. The first one will be held under the theme of 'global governance' in the fall 2002 in South East Asia. We are open for partnerships and cooperate with those who share our vision, as we did at the 1999 Seoul Conference on NGOs. ( with DPI and Kyung Hee University) We have currently entered into an informal partnership with the DESA NGO Section in the creation of an informal NGO Network. (The first meeting will be held in Tunis in January) And I am open to explore new ways of cooperation with UN Agencies and parlamentarians, other than on an ad-hoc basis and more than the occasional shoulder rubbing during e.g. the Commission on Human Rights. (CONGO has also been asked to provide space for a new interfaith dialogue)

In addition, we want to push the envelope at the UN and support initiatives for opening the General Assembly and its Committees for an NGO voice (not a vote) and further develop the "Arias" model with the Security Council. We are currently in dialogue on working procedures with UN Specialized Agencies which do not automatically recognize ECOSOC Status as a door opener such as WHO.

(Many of our members have been frustrated about exclusion from the WTO and have pushed for more open processes and procedures. In this context I welcome last week's announced Swedish contribution to the WTO Global Trust Fund for technical cooperation to help poorer countries (hopefully including NGOs ) to participate more actively.)

At a time when questions about legitimacy and accountability are being raised, when many obscure NGO groupings appear and disappear, CONGO brings a track record to the table. With our structure of substantive Committees, WGs, ad-hoc task forces and caucuses we bring clear rules to the game, self- regulation/discipline of representation and through the diversity of our members promote equal voice and opportunity in the global UN arena, and we apply different models for different purposes.

Vision

We also have the vision to help building the global civil society that is both strong and civil in all it does. To connect the disconnected we must re-establish the grounds of our human identity in all its dimensions, and provide new foundations to bring about the true values and human strength of our social, political, religious, cultural, racial and spiritual diversity.

NGOs have been in the past on the forefront of political and social reform. We will promote that they can become now the connector, the social/human glue, to add the social, human and spiritual dimension to the current globalization process. They can help to connect the local with the global and develop this New Social Architecture based on equality, social justice, tolerance, respect and shared responsibility, as expressed in the Millennium Summit Declaration.

'I have a dream' said Archbishop Tutu in Durban. 'I have a dream that we enter this new Millennium in which my humanity is bound up with your humanity, in which I AM BECAUSE YOU ARE.' We share this dream.