Homework from Copenhagen (1)

Homework from Copenhagen (1)

By Mely G. Tan

This is the first of a two-part article on the what, who and how to address some of the issues discussed at the Copenhagen summit.

JAKARTA (JP): Now that the pressure of the preparation meetings, including three Prepcom meetings in New York and the various regional meetings, are over and the hubbub of the Copenhagen Summit has died down, the "real" work has to begin: how to translate the strong language of the Declaration with the 10 Commitments and the 100 paragraph Program of Action into actions that are operational and directly felt by the people concerned.

These will be the indicators of whether all the activities which went on for the last few years, involving great numbers of people in the member countries of the United Nations; the 139 heads of state, of which seven were women, and the thousands of participants; both the members of official delegations and of NGOs present at the Summit (not to mention the estimated US$8 millions expended), were worth doing. No doubt it is on the national and sub-national level that these activities should occur, while the international level has more to do with financial assistance, coordination and networking.

The documents in hand, dated March 10, 1995 and called the Draft Declaration, includes the 10 Commitments and the Program of Action, consisting of five chapters: 1) The enabling environment 2) Poverty eradication 3) Productive employment 4) Social integration 5) Implementation and follow-up. The closing session of the Summit occurred only in the early hours of Monday March 13 (due to the fact that the presentation of the statements of the heads of states did not finish until about 1:00 am when the documents were ratified.

As these documents are non-binding, while the language is based on consensus requiring lengthy negotiation sessions lasting until after midnight, there are those, especially among the NGOs but also among official delegations, who were very critical and skeptical of the final outcome of the Summit, gravely doubting the effectiveness of the implementation and follow-up actions.

Nonetheless, the fact that the majority of the heads of state of the UN member countries were present and adopted the document is a clear indication of the recognition of the need for concerted efforts on a global scale for the eradication of poverty, the creation of productive employment and the promotion of social integration. It is also a recognition of the direct relationship between the persistence of poverty, high unemployment and social disintegration. In turn this recognition gives legitimation to all efforts attacking poverty, creating jobs and building solidarity, on the national, regional and international level.

As a matter of fact, if the Commitments and the Program of Action are implemented faithfully and consistently this means a total review of existing development policies and strategies in many of the countries that participated in the Summit. How far governments will go in the implementation will be tested in the policies and programs generated in the months and years to come.

In this regard there is a provision in Commitment 10, which refers to the role of the UN Economic and Social Council to review and assess on the basis of national reports, while the General Assembly is to hold a special session in the year 2000 for an overall review and appraisal of the implementation of the outcome of the Summit.

On the national level, Chapter 5 on Implementation and Follow- up, especially on section A on national strategies, evaluation and reviews refers to, among others, developing quantitative and qualitative indicators for social development desegregated by gender and the strengthening of implementation and monitoring mechanisms, including arrangements for the participation of civil society in policy making and implementation and collaboration with international organizations. Section B on the Involvement of Civil Society in the same chapter, refers to supporting academic and research institutions, particularly in the developing countries, in their contribution to social development programs, and facilitating mechanisms for independent, detached, impartial and objective monitoring of social progress.

Although there are many concerns we can address in discussing these documents, I will limit myself to two areas, "the role of women", and "the place of civil society". I have gone through the documents and counted the number of times women are referred to in the paragraphs and points in the paragraphs. In the Commitment 5 of the Draft Declaration, there are 14 points entirely devoted to women. These refer to "achieving equality and equity between women and men, and to recognizing and enhancing the participation and leadership roles of women in political, civil, economic, social and cultural life and in development". In all, the entire Declaration refers to women in 31 points.

In the Program of Action, chapter 1) An enabling environment, refers to women in 8 points; chapter 2) Eradication of poverty, refers to women in 28 points, chapter 3) The expansion of productive employment and the reduction of unemployment refers to women in 20 points, chapter 4) Social Integration refers to women in 17 points; chapter 5) Implementation and follow-up refers to women in 3 points.

In all these references the emphasis is on gender equality and equity, full involvement at all levels in decision-making and implementation process, removing all legal impediments to ownership of all means of production and property, rights of the girl child, gender-sensitivity education, elimination of gender discrimination, empowerment of women, women's unremunerated productive work, feminization of poverty, single mothers, female- headed and female-maintained households, access to traditionally male-dominated occupations, elimination of violence against women.

Chapter V on Implementation and follow-up, which only refers to women in three points, states in the first "bullet" of the first point that at all levels of implementation, the crucial and essential requirements are: "The promotion and protection of all human rights and fundamental freedoms, the support for democratic institutions and the empowerment of women".

These, admittedly selective, references indicate clearly the recognition of the crucial role of women in social development. I have not been able to get information of the number of women in the official delegations. There is a provisional list of delegations, but this is not very reliable, as many changes have occurred since the list was made. For example, the list of the Indonesian delegation has names of people who were not present, while there were people present whose names were not on the list. Of the 34 people that I know were present, only seven were women.

If we look at the list of names of senior officials and ministers and representatives of the UN and international agencies and of NGOs, who made a statement during the "general exchange of views" in the first five days of the Summit, based on the daily Journal, I counted about 236 names, of whom about 63 or close to 1/4 were women, while as mentioned earlier, of the 139 Heads of States present, seven were women. I think we can each of us draw our conclusion about the state of empowerment for women from these figures.

Window: How far governments will go in the implementation will be tested in the policies and programs generated in the months and years to come.