Beyond FfD
Alma Espino Presented at the AWID Forum Guadalajara, 3 October 2002 The creation of the Cartagena Feminist Initiative was based on the true conviction about the need to influence the UN Conference on Financing for Development, which gathered actors of the private sector (business people, NGOS), financial and international organisms and governments. The debates taking place in the frame of this process showed, once again, the asymmetries among countries in terms of their access to resources and the relative limitations to design development strategies. Financial resources and development Given this context, we wondered what kind of development the feminist groups have been thinking of. That is, in what way our visions about the economy and the economic development from a gender perspective could contribute to a critical analysis on the current economic model, providing as well, some basis or ideas to build new alternatives. We have tried to keep up the process with these ideas. The dominant policies have not been able to ensure equity or combat poverty and they were neither capable to achieve the "for-so-long- waited" growth. All these are basic elements if we are going to talk about sustainable development. FFD Expectations The debate around the process of the FFD reasonably created expectations on the chance to agree on some kind of structural oriented challenge to the current model, the achievement of some basic agreements among different actors aimed to overcome the failures and produce at least in some degree, sustainability for life, not only for poor countries but also for the whole planet. At the end of the 90s, experience showed us that free trade was only for some; and that capital freedom represented by the flow of speculative capitals and free -of –government’s control- capitals, had turned into a destabilising factor at the diverse economies. Financial capitals or direct investment capital operating in a market with no boundaries and with no effective regulations have conditioned the availability of funds in the economies, specially in our countries, and subsequently the State policies themselves. In the 90s private flows exceeded development assistance as the main source of foreign capital available in developing countries. Economic growth, resting on the free flow of scattered capital with almost no regulation, took to a deep external fragility. Monterrey Consensus, crossed out every single expectation.
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The Conference was a complete failure in relation to the steps taken towards improving situations of poverty and difficulties faced by developing countries to satisfactorily integrate the global world. Not only is there a lack of intention to improve resources availability or commitments to improve market access, but also a lack of mechanisms of control or regulation of capitals that would allow among other things, a major flexibility in the types of economic policy adopted by countries. Besides, there is no mention to the need to reduce the level of uncertainty of international markets and the risk of financial crisis. The regional crisis The productive crisis and the outstanding raise of unemployment rates, in spite of all the flexibility measures implemented and the speech about the need to eliminate the labor market stiffness to diminish unemployment levels; financial and banking crisis; the responsibility of governments and private capitals; the weaknesses or incapacity of regulatory institutions or the non- existence of necessary regulations; the increase in the levels of indebtedness and therefore, the decrease of the relative levels of sovereignty and also, the viability, in broader contexts and apparently adequate in times of globalisation, of regional initiatives, such as MERCOSUR, virtually paralysed. Still today, the economies of the region have not been able to recover from the crisis initiated in Asia that has had a serious impact on the MERCOSUR initiative. As far as growing issues are concerned, predictions look really dramatic. The conditionalitites of the international financial organisms in spite of all the contradictions start to get some sort of shape, and they not only affect the relative sovereignty in economic terms, limit the still-weak democracies even, in the formal field. The decisions of the peoples are permanently conditioned by the COUNTRY RISK INDEX and the capital out-flow. The Challenges Today we have the same challenges but our economies are more deteriorated, our political systems are more vulnerable and our democracies are fragile. Experience shows that power relationships cannot avoid economic theory. The elaboration of policies cannot overlook this kind of relationships. The asymmetries between economies and regions should be an important part of any proposal if viability is intended; viability understood in one sense, because the exclusion and poverty are not only matters of excluded or poor people; the differences between men and women, the different forms of gender discrimination, but also other related forms of discrimination on the basis of race, religious etc, apart from being socially unfair, they could also undermine the results of the policies. The problem of equity cannot be left behind, either we grow with equity or we do not grow. Feminists’ contributions need yet to be sharpened, but the gender perspective and our practices, can surely be a contribution to the required changes for the access to welfare, social justice, and strengthening of democracy and peace.
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