Introduction
From Guyana’s perspective, today’s column continues to focus on an evaluation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2015-2030, their 169 targets and 304 indicators of compliance, which are scheduled to be agreed upon by all 193 member states of the United Nations (UN) at their upcoming summit on September 25-27 this year. As previously indicated the Outcome Document for that summit has emerged from two separate, but related UN processes, in which Caricom (including Guyana) has played a significant part; namely, 1) the follow-up to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) process, which began in 2000 and will terminate at the end of this year; and 2) the follow-up to the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) held at Rio, Brazil in 2012. The inter-governmental open working group (OWG) established to prepare the Outcome Document for the upcoming summit finalized its work on August 2, which is entitled: ‘Transforming our World: The 2030 Agenda for Global Action’.
Priorities
At its very inception, the OWG had set certain clear priorities for its work. These were: first, as indicated last week, it sought to benefit from the lessons to be learnt out of the experiences of the previous MDGs process. The lessons drawn were primarily three, the need to: 1) locate the SDGs process among governments, and avoid confining it to “development experts”; 2) avoid a donor-recipient model of development, whose main focus is on transfers of overseas development assistance (ODA) from rich to poor countries; and 3) emphasize the ongoing struggle against inequality, both among and within countries, through a global partnership in which conditions for improving the contribution of domestic resources to growth is given primacy. The OWG by adopting this particular approach, also readily acknowledged that the MDGs process, despite its limitations, was on the whole, a major global developmental success.
Second, the OWG similarly declared from its inception that, both in its modes of operation and the methodology used in constructing the SDGs, it was going to be action-oriented. This meant it would spare no effort to steer the OWG process away from becoming an academic exercise, where theoretical elaborations and analytical correctness were given primacy over implementability and performance delivery. This action orientation is emphasized in the design of the targets, as well as their indicators of compliance for the 17 SDGs.
Third, in order to reach the widest possible audience and, indeed, to avoid the perils of “being lost in translation”, the OWG opted for the use of concise, easy to communicate, and unambiguous language. As it happened, throughout the process, civil society organizations bombarded the OWG with suggestions, and recommendations designed to ensure that it adhered to this style of presentation.
Fourth, the great fear, which existed throughout this period was that every region, country, organization, or special interest group would demand that its own goals are treated as absolutely essential. If the OWG gave in to these demands it would have led to a very long list of SDGs. And, of course, such a list would have diluted the focus of the Post-2015 Development Agenda. Wisely, the OWG decided at the outset, to restrict the number of the SDGs to an essential minimum, in an effort to ensure they remained focused.
Fifth, a further aim of the OWG was to make the goals global, in their essence. This meant, above all, being faithfully representative of the fact that it was the output of a global partnership of countries defining goals to be subscribed to by all 193 Member Countries of the United Nations.
Finally, and as extension of the fifth observation cited in the paragraph above, the OWG chose to define the SDGs as aspirational. This meant that the SDGs aim at being universally applicable across all continents, regions, countries and societies, while explicitly recognizing and accepting their diverse national realities, levels of development, capacities, cultures and institutions. In this regard the aim was to recognize national political priorities as the product of inter-governmental collaboration on global challenges.
Summing up
Summing up, from a Caricom and Guyana standpoint it can be observed that, at the national level, the proposed SDGs are broad and comprehensive, yet remaining operational and implementable nationally as global goals. Indeed the broad and comprehensive range of the SDGs was captured in the Schedule that I presented last week, which had attempted to classify them into five broad categories namely: economic wellbeing; services; environment; equality and fairness; and the means of implementation.
Further, by common consent, the proposed SDGs are widely recognized as embodying three unique features. First and foremost they constitute a universal agenda. This is quite different from the MDGs, which had targeted developing countries, like Caricom and Guyana. In contrast, the SDGs target all countries, rich and poor alike.
Second, as a result of the above, the SDGs cannot be considered as simply an updated version of the MDGs. They are qualitatively different and more than MDGs plus, in that their scope is broader, deeper, and more transformational. Thus for example, they include dimensions of environmental sustainability, which go far beyond those listed in the MDGs, since these dimensions are directed at the sustainable development of all economies, people everywhere, as well as all global ecosystems treated as an integral whole!
Third, the SDGs, which have emerged out of the OWG process represent a global partnership of all 193 member countries of the UN. Given the enormous diversity of these states, this poses a challenge to the very notion of partnership. The OWG has settled on the concept of “common but differentiated responsibilities” (CBDR). This concept will be explored more fully next week, as I continue this evaluation of the SDGs, which is the principal constituent element of the Post-2015 Development Agenda.
Next week I shall also conclude the overall evaluation of the SDGs, before turning to locate them in the specific context of Caricom and Guyana’s long-term development strategy.
