1
Liaison Committee of Development NGOs to the European Union
RENEWING THE EU’s GLOBAL ROLE IN THE WORLD
INITIAL LIAISON COMMITTEE NGDO-EU SUBMISSION TO THE CONVENTION ON THE FUTURE OF EUROPE Discussion paper June 2002
The Convention on the Future of Europe has the task to consider the EU’s future missions and responsibilities and to propose in that respect a reform of the European institutions in view of the forthcoming IGC leading to a new Treaty, and in the perspective of EU enlargement. The Liaison Committee of Development NGOs to the European Union welcomes the stated willingness of the Convention to associate European civil society organisations – among them development NGOs – to its debates. The Liaison Committee takes this opportunity to propose this first contribution concentrating on the EU’s global role. In the course of the Convention work and the IGC the Liaison Committee is willing to present further submissions.
THE GLOBAL ROLE OF THE EU IN THE WORLD
Among the EU’s essential missions is the role it plays on the international scene. The Laeken Declaration has identified external challenges that a renewed Europe should meet: “to play a stabilising role worldwide, to shoulder its responsibilities in the governance of globalisation and to seek to set globalisation within a moral framework, in other words to anchor it in solidarity and sustainable development”. In order to meet these challenges, the Liaison Committee believes that the European Union has to renew its policy framework for external action on the basis of an independent development cooperation policy whose objectives should inspire all EU policies that have an impact on development worldwide and on developing countries in particular. In that respect, the Convention has to take into account the main features of the EU’s role in the world: - The European Union is present in every region of the world. It is a major trading partner of developing countries and the world principal donor of official development assistance. Moreover, because of the size of the European economy and its prominence in global financial and trading systems, decisions taken in Europe have a profound impact on the development conditions of the populations of these countries. - The EU has a historical, human, political and economic responsibility towards these populations, in particular those in the most marginalised social categories and it has the duty to ensure that the interests of developing countries are safeguarded and promoted.
2
- This responsibility is based on the fundamental values of the EU: solidarity, social equity, respect of cultural diversity, fighting poverty, and the protection of the environment. These values should underpin all actions of the EU including all economic and commercial aspects. The partnership between the EU and developing countries needs to be accountable with regard to this approach. - The European Community and the EU Member States have adopted the results of the major UN conferences – known as the UN Millennium Development Goals - and committed themselves to the specific objectives, targets and actions collectively agreed on by the International Community at these conferences. In addtion, the Göteborg European Summit, in June 2001, also adopted a Sustainable Development Strategy. All these agreements provide a framework for international and sustainable development integrating social, economic and environmental dimensions based on poverty eradication, equality and justice in order to secure peace and stability. All in all, the EU, as a global player, has international commitments and responsibilities towards the interests of the international community and in particular towards developing countries. The renewed global role of Europe in the world, based on an independent EU development policy, must be put at the forefront of the debates of the Convention to propose the necessary institutional changes in order to ensure that the Union is more inclusive and accountable not only to its citizens but also to the world’s poor. The Liaison Committee is however concerned by the following trends that at present characterise the EU’s external actions: despite the stated commitment in the Treaties to coherence between policies that affect developing countries and Treaty articles making Development Cooperation a community policy, the Union’s foreign and commercial selfinterests are increasingly prioritised to the detriment of poverty eradication while development policy is increasingly subordinated to foreign policy; the objective of coherence is not effectively reflected in these external policies; with the reform of external assistance, development policy has become isolated from its implementation; an overarching EU strategy for poverty eradication is severely lacking;
-
the priorities of EU Development Policy as adopted by the Development Council in November 2000 – including the mainstreaming of a poverty focus – are not reflected in Titles XX and XXI (the new title of the Nice Treaty) of the TEC and in other policies that affect development; the effectiveness of EU aid/development cooperation is heavily criticised; the future of Development Cooperation – as a Community policy – is itself put into question by proposals to abolish both DG Development and the Development Council and dilute development policy into a Foreign Affairs Council alongside a General Affairs Council.
-
-
-
-
FOR A COMPREHENSIVE EU EXTERNAL POLICY FRAMEWORK TO STRENGTHEN COHERENCE AND EFFECTIVENESS OF EU EXTERNAL ACTION
In order to reverse these worrying tendencies and to ensure greater coherence and consistency of EU action towards poverty eradication and sustainable development, the Liaison Committee calls for the establishment of a comprehensive external policy framework which puts development policy at the centre of all other EU policies that have an impact on development. Poverty eradication should be mainstreamed throughout this external policy framework as well as throughout all these other policies.
3
Before being introduced into the Treaties, the establishment of this policy framework should be broadly debated in the Convention on the Future of Europe with all actors concerned – including civil society organisations - and take the form of an inter-institutional agreement between the Council, the Commission and the European Parliament. To be more specific: this comprehensive external policy framework should guide all the EU’s external actions, including foreign policy; it would be based on the following main objectives: o poverty eradication, the fight against inequality, active EU involvement in conflict prevention; o the promotion of sustainable development models in economic, social and environmental terms; o the promotion of the indivisibility of economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights, as set out in the UN Charter on Human Rights and related core charters and conventions; o greater equity and fairness in economic and social affairs as well as equality between men and women; o compliance with international commitments to which the EU has subscribed – among them the Millennium Development Goals; o clarification of the respective division of responsibilities and tasks between the various actors/institutions involved in order to promote coordination among them.
-
As a consequence, treaty articles dealing with coherence between external policy and sustainable and international development should be strengthened in order to be consistent with this comprehensive EU external policy framework: article 3 of the TEU dealing with coherence should incorporate this policy framework, including the mainstreaming of poverty eradication and the principles of sustainable development; this external policy framework should guide title V of the TEU on CFSP as well as all Community policies that have a direct and indirect impact on developing countries – in particular Agriculture, Trade, Fisheries, Transport, Energy, Environment, and External Relations policies including conflict prevention – thus ensuring that particular geostrategic and/or economic interests of the EU do not contradict or undermine the objectives of Development policy; Title XX of EC Treaty and the new title XXI (Nice) should not only reflect this coherence and mainstreaming of poverty eradication and compliance with EU international commitments but also reflect the priorities of the present EU development policy (including sustainable development); More specifically o o Development cooperation should become a shared competence between the Community and the Member States; Article 177 (Title XX, TEC) should be based on the objectives of the comprehensive EU external policy framework (as stated previously), putting at its centre an independent development policy, including poverty eradication and sustainable development1. In addition, the article should refer to compliance with the results of the UN conferences and EU commitments towards the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals.
-
-
-
1
As far as the present policy objective of “smooth and gradual insertion of the developing countries into the world economy” is concerned, the Liaison Committee would like to draw the attention of the Convention to the following concern: the implicit assumption that the integration of developing countries into the world economy is the best way of reducing poverty and ensuring sustainable development is disproved by the growth of disparity within societies and between countries. Developing countries are increasingly becoming integrated into the world economy, but in a very uneven way. It is important to ensure that integration into the world market occurs in line with fair terms of exchange, which will promote the growth and development of the poorest populations.
4
o
Article 178 should refer to coherence between development cooperation and other EU policies that affect development, based on the comprehensive EU external policy framework; o Article 179 – The European Development Fund should be integrated into the EC budget. The Liaison Committee believes that development policy must reflect the way ODA is broken down between third countries, i.e. in favour of least developed and vulnerable countries. As most of the Least Developed Countries are ACP countries, the financial envelops of the EDF supporting the Cotonou agreement represent the most important part of the financial means available for the implementation of EC Development policy towards LDCs. This integration would promote accountability and transparency of EU aid to LDCs. o Article 180 should make explicit the terms of coordination between the actors involved (especially between Member States, the Community and international institutions). Consequently to these Treaty changes, the comprehensive EU external policy framework would thus constitute the basis of EU global governance guiding its external policies and its role on the international scene. Moreover, the EU must focus on governance as an element of struggle against poverty and to integrate it into EC development cooperation policies. As a matter of fact, good governance is an instrument of development: the overarching goals of development policy as stated in article 177.2 – developing and consolidating democracy and the rule of law and respecting human rights and fundamental freedoms – are bases for peace and stability; good governance issues are of essential importance for the effectiveness and sustainability of development cooperation policies because poor administration, corruption or a simple lack of sufficient institutional capacity can be significant obstacles to development.
-
INVOLVEMENT OF CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANISATIONS, IN PARTICULAR DEVELOPMENT NGOs
NGDOs participate in enhancing the quality of EU external relations by drawing on local experience, expertise and in building solidarity and partnership with Southern partners in developing countries and articulating this in debates at the European level. In so doing, they also contribute to bringing European Union development and humanitarian aid policies closer to EU citizens. For many years now NGDOs have been engaged in an on-going dialogue with European institutions. Participation of civil society organisations – in particular European Development NGOs - in the Convention and IGC work should be inspired by the lessons drawn from this experience in full recognition that such “civil dialogue” is an essentiel element of good governance. In effect, the Commission White Paper on European Governance calls for a reinforced culture of consultation and dialogue with civil society organisations. This dialogue should be structured and promoted in a way which is independent from the Economic and Social Committee, as its present structure and the way its members are nominated does not give it the legitimacy to be recognised as a facilitator of the voice of civil society organisations. Despite commitments by the various EU institutions to consulting civil society, it is necessary to guarantee the participation of civil society organisations on a more systematic and dependable basis, where all actors are accountable. This can only be provided by an article inserted into the Treaty guaranteeing a legal basis for civil dialogue. In the interim period before the next IGC, this could be provided by an Inter-institutional Agreement. Furthermore, in the context of development cooperation, there should be a new treaty article within title XX enshrining the principles for consultation with civil society organisations dealing with development policy, humanitarian aid, rehabilitation and conflict prevenention, both in the EU and the South, in all the EU’s relations with developing countries, as already exists in the Cotonou agreement.
5
In the framework of the Convention process and in order to facilitate dialogue with the Convention members and to promote the role of civil society organisations in the work of the Convention, the Liaison Committee has contributed to setting up the Civil Society Contact Group which brings together representatives of four large sectors of NGOs at European level – Development, Human Rights, Social and Environment NGO networks. The Liaison Committee is an international non-profit association representing 938 European Development and Humanitarian Aid NGOs, organised in national platforms in the 15 EU Member States. The Liaison Committee represents Development NGOs to the EU institutions in the field of EU development cooperation policy. In addition, the Liaison Committee facilitates coordination between European NGDO networks. 10 square Ambiorix – 1000 Brussels Tel 32 (0) 2 743 87 60 e-mail: sec@clong.be