Review and Recommendations - Hemispheric Summit on
Sustainable Development
Bolivia, December, 1996
Nola-Kate Seymoar, Ph.D., International Institute for
Sustainable Development*
Background
In March of 1996, IISD was asked by the Fondacion Futuro de Latinamericano
(FFLA) of Ecuador, to coordinate the Canadian National Consultations of Civil
Society in preparation for the upcoming Summit of the Americas. We accepted the
invitation in cooperation with FOCAL. In May, with the assistance of the
Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), we convened a
consultation meeting in Ottawa. Approximately 70 people participated -
representing national organizations and individuals interested in contributing
to the discussions of the Canadian position at the Summit. Participant observers
from several federal departments also attended. The issues for discussion were
chosen from a list of priorities identified through a questionnaire in advance
of the meeting. Eight issues were discussed in groups with a resource person and
recorder. The notes and recommendations from the discussions were circulated
back to participants, revised twice and submitted to FFLA, DFAIT and the OAS.
Similar consultations were held in May and June in 33 other countries.
In response to these consultations, the OAS convened a special session with
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in Washington in July. Seven Canadians
participated and presented a summary of the views expressed at the National
Consultations. Copies of these presentations were also circulated to
participants, the FFLA, OAS, DFAIT and others, and were posted on IISD's
internet site (IISDnet). They were incorporated into the hemispheric report and
recommendations of the consultations from all of the countries, compiled and
submitted to the Summit organizers by FFLA. (see There
is Not Sustainable Development Without Effective Public Participation:
Recommendations of the Civil Society of the Hemisphere to the Santa Cruz Summit)
In August, I was invited to participate with two Canadian government
representatives at an OAS meeting in Uruguay on the topic of the participation
of civil society in sustainable development in the Americas.
In September, briefings were given to Minister Axworthy and his senior
staff, and at his suggestion, briefings were also arranged with Ambassador
Fraser, Christine Stewart, John Godfrey, and staff of Environment Canada. These
briefings generally involved five of the participants from the consultations and
OAS meetings (Nola-Kate Seymoar IISD, Jean Perras - Learning for a Sustainable
Future, Ed Dosman - FOCAL, Harry Bombay - Aboriginal Forestry Association, and
Marie Segger - Youth for Sustainability Campaign).
In October and November I participated on the Canadian delegation to the
Preparatory Committee meetings in Washington, and in December was a member of
the official delegation to the Summit in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. During the summit,
members of the Canadian delegation met with the Youth representatives who were
participating in a parallel Youth Forum and with representatives of several
groups attending the parallel NGO Forum. It should be noted that unlike UN
Summits, the official Santa Cruz meeting was short (2 days) and the NGO Forum
and Youth Forum (one week) were relatively small. The Forums lacked "official"
recognition or status. With the exception of my participation on the official
delegation at the Prep Comms and Summit, the participation of civil society
representatives throughout the process was at their own or their organization's
expense.
This report attempts to assess the results achieved in the process over the
past ten months and makes a number of recommendations regarding the substance
and process of Canadian positions at the OAS and future summits.
Results Achieved
Objective: to build consensus positions and recommendations
among representatives of civil society on issues they consider of major
importance regarding sustainable development in the hemisphere. In doing so,
it was hoped that these discussions would influence the positions and
participation of the Canadian delegation to the Summit in Santa Cruz.
Results: Almost 130 groups and individuals responded to the request
to identify priorities from a long list of topics which had been circulated by
FFLA following a meeting of national coordinators in April. The eight topics
identified as most important from the Canadian perspective included: Trade and
Sustainable Development; Biodiversity; Water; Sustainable Livelihoods and
Poverty Alleviation; Indigenous Peoples; Forests; Pollution Prevention and
Control; Communication, Education and Public Participation. (Energy and Measures
and Indicators, were the next topics on the priority list). Approximately 70
people participated in a one day consultation in Ottawa in May. In June and
July, approximately 20 people were involved by fax and e-mail in reviewing and
revising the meeting notes and recommendations. Although this is a small
proportion of the original 70 participants, the results seemed to represent a
consensus.
The recommendations from each of the working groups at the consultation
shared a number of points in common. The first was advocating that Canada exert
greater leadership in the hemisphere. Within that context, almost all
the groups identified examples of success in Canada in tackling the issues under
discussion and thought that sharing such practical examples would be a
positive contribution to the summit process, facilitating a movement away from
rhetoric and into action. There was a call for integrating all aspects of SD
- social, economic and environmental. Recommendations regarding the need to
respect indigenous peoples' knowledge and rights were common to the
discussions, along with a concern for improving the participation of civil
society in policy formulation and implementation. Participation of youth
was added when we became aware of the consultations and partnership projects
being undertaken under the auspices of the Canadian Environmental Network's
Youth Caucus. Finally there was broad agreement on the need for continuity
in support of previous and future international meetings and summits - a need to
build upon agreements and gain synergy from different activities.
On these general issues we made some but not a great deal of progress:
Leadership
On the issue of exerting greater leadership in the hemisphere, we had some
success. Although the Prime Minister did not attend, the delegation was very
ably headed by the Deputy Prime Minister, Sheila Copps, accompanied by Clifford
Lincoln and Ethel Blondin. The Deputy Prime Minister had a high profile during
the Summit. Throughout the preparatory process and the Summit itself, it was
clear that Canada is viewed as a significant friend of the southern countries,
and along with Mexico is trusted to take independent views. This view will be
reinforced by the upcoming visit to Cuba by Minister Axworthy. Our image as
mediators is also reinforced by the role currently being played by Ambassador
Vincent in the Peru hostage taking. Ambassador Vincent was a member of the
Canadian delegation and his wife participated in the First Ladies Conference.
At the official level our key person, Peter Boehm was outstanding and the
competence of all of the departmental officials reflected very well on Canada.
Canada's positions were expressed clearly and each of our delegates negotiated
effectively in their areas of expertise. On issues of concern to civil society
the delegation was persistent in communicating our positions and in encouraging
the direct participation of civil society representatives. At the Uruguay
meeting on civil participation it was important that our delegation was headed
by our Ambassador, Brian Dickson. He and Darren Schemmer effectively conveyed
the message that Canada took NGO participation seriously.
Sharing experiences
We were not successful in promoting a "best practices" forum.
Although the idea of sharing experiences and successful cases between countries
gained support from the NGOs in Uruguay, it was not accepted by the governments
or the OAS. The limitation of funding and the lack of time left before the
Summit were cited as the reason. This remains one of the areas which should be
pursued further both within the context of the OAS and for future Summits.
Integrated view of SD
We were successful in working with the Latin American countries in
countering the efforts of the USA to limit the consideration of the agenda to
environmental concerns and follow up to the Miami Summit. As a result of these
efforts, social issues were front and center along with economic and
environmental ones. Thanks to the tenacity of Janet Stephenson, minerals were
added to the agenda.
Indigenous Peoples
Canada led the way in raising issues of indigenous peoples and (after
meetings in Geneva) did encourage use of the term indigenous peoples (with an "s).
The inclusion of two indigenous representatives among our six presenters at the
OAS meeting and the inclusion of Ethel Blondin among the official delegation was
a significant accomplishment.
We raised the concept of participation of indigenous peoples at the OAS on
lines similar to the structure of the Arctic Council. Although this was not
explicitly supported, the NGO synthesis document has a very strong section
calling for full participation of indigenous peoples. The Declaration includes
several references to indigenous participation but they are not as strong as the
NGO position.
Civil Society
The issue of the participation of civil society and of youth was frustrating
and ultimately disappointing. The declaration has all the right rhetoric, but
only a handful of countries included representatives of civil society on their
delegation. FFLA was not allowed to present the results of the 34 nation
consultations at the Summit itself, nor were youth representatives allowed time
to present the results of their Youth Forum. There is a meeting organized for
February which will pursue the issue of " Strengthening Public
Participation in Environment and Sustainable Development Policy-Making in the
Americas" to which IISD has been invited.
This issue and frustration is not unique to the Bolivia Summit. With the
exception of Habitat 11, all of the UN Summits and most other intergovernmental
fora lack any structured way to incorporate the views of the civil sector. The
manner in which government to government negotiations proceed encourages a focus
on political rhetoric, photo opportunities and bi-lateral meetings by the
politicians and on details, legal implications and wording of documents by the
officials. Dialogue and debate about ideas, sharing information about policies,
programs, successes and failures occurs, if at all, outside of the formal
agenda. At UN meetings, debates, panels, intellectual challenges to accepted
paradigms all occur at the parallel fora of NGOs, the private sector, indigenous
peoples, women's coalitions or gatherings of spiritual leaders. Thus there is a
sharp contrast between the dynamic interchanges of the parallel fora and the
restricted and often ponderous discussions of the intergovernmental
negotiations.
It seems possible to design a structure which would allow for cross
fertilization between these two processes. One idea is to incorporate
multi-sectoral committees or commissions (perhaps formed like round tables or
the National Sustainable Development Councils) into the structures of the
intergovernmental organizations such as the OAS and UN. This would provide
access by different sectors to the formal process. What was apparent throughout
the America's process was that there was an interest and willingness to involve
civil society but no structure to facilitate the exchange of ideas.
Continuity
There was minimal progress on tying the formal declaration with previous
initiatives and other agreements. From the NGO and indigenous perspectives, the
Declaration is very weak. On a variety of issues, Habitat 11, Beijing or Rio
were stronger. In addition there is an interesting lack of continuity between
the regular governance of the OAS through the General Assembly and Secretariat
and the direction and leadership which comes from the Summits. Given that Canada
is scheduled to host the General Assembly in the year 2000, I would like to
suggest that we also offer to host the Summit and hold them concurrently. The
Summit could set the direction and the GA could work on implementation issues
and together they might revitalize the organization. We should also set an
explicit goal that Cuba would be back in the OAS and that we would work out a
structure to allow Indigenous Peoples to participate as participant observers
and a formal way of integrating the in-put from civil society.
In an earlier report on one of the Preparatory Committee meetings, I
observed that the Bolivia Summit was not about words in the declaration and
action plan but rather was about shifting power: in particular the shift from
dominance of the agenda by the Americans to greater sharing of power with the
Latin Americans. Although the USA's pre-eminent place was very apparent during
the Summit (we waited for several hours for the late arrival of Al Gore's plane,
for example) the Bolivians did succeed in empowering themselves and others. The
Mexicans and Canadians played an important role as mediators and brokers. The
challenge to greater sharing of power from governments with civil society and
indigenous peoples was far less successful. The lack of continuity of some
clauses of the Summit documents with Rio, the Social Summit, Beijing or Habitat
must be viewed in this context.
Other matters of note:
Participatory Policy Making
One of the accomplishments worth noting is that the consultation process
itself was different from the usual DFAIT format. Rather than wait until called
upon, civil organizations began the dialogue early and established priorities
independently of the official agenda yet in response to the preliminary
documents. We used resource people and worked in small groups and followed up on
the discussions using faxes and e-mail. While still falling short of
inclusiveness, we did bring in regional participants through conference calls
and when it was apparent the indigenous issues were important we made a
concerted effort to involve indigenous people who were actively working on
issues of sustainable development. This approach is similar to the recent
efforts of the Centre for Foreign Policy Development in conducting the Foreign
Policy Forum in 1996. Involvement of civil society before the government has
decided its opinion is far less frustrating to those of us consulted.
One of the better outcomes was that we built a team of five who worked
together to brief as many relevant politicians and officials as possible. The
team included women, an indigenous person and a youth. We failed to involve
industry representatives to any large degree, but often that was the result of
timing not lack of interest. In the forest and energy sector active interest was
expressed by industry people on several occasions.
Mining Problems
Because we were also representing NGOs at the Summit we were approached by
youth and adult groups who were participating in the parallel fora. Canada was
heavily criticized for activities of our mining sector. We met with four
representatives from the International Mining Campaign of Friends of the Earth
(the Chair is from Costa Rica and the others were from Chile, Mexico and
Bolivia). Canadian mining companies, especially Placer Dome were criticized for
open pit gold mining and for exploiting native peoples. Although I was not in a
position to speak to gold mining, I did speak about Alcan's efforts to maintain
standards in their operations in developing countries and challenged them to
establish environmental regulations in their own countries. I also referred them
to the new minerals policy framework of the federal government and pointed out
that we were working to make SD an important element of the Mining Ministers
meeting next September.
It should also be noted that the mining issue is the subject of considerable
action these days (see http://www.igc.apc.org/mining or http://www.moles.org).
What struck me was the way in which our national reputation was affected by the
actions of our companies. It is ironic that although governments have less and
less influence over the international activities of companies, the public
expectation is that they will exert more and more control.
Education
With regard to education and communication, we worked hard to make the
document focus on SD rather than simply Environmental Education and strongly
supported initiative 5 (education and communication). This was not a high
priority for other governments.
Recommendations:
The following recommendations are based on the author's experiences and do
not necessarily reflect the views of the NGOs involved in the Summit
Consultations.
- Canada should priorize the America's and take a more strategic leadership
role both at the OAS and at future Summits. This involves maintaining a high
caliber of staff assigned to the OAS, selectively targeting more funds to the
area, enlisting the involvement of the private sector to undertake some useful
projects (for example in the mining, energy and forests sectors) and actively
promoting the trade and SD issues related to the FTA.
- A long term strategic plan for our involvement in the hemisphere should
be developed with the participation of the government and civil society. A
mid-term goal might be set to host the GA of the OAS and the Summit of the
Americas together in the year 2000.
- Canada should propose that the new OAS Commission on Sustainable
Development incorporate a multi-sectoral round table for advice and input at the
policy level.
- A structure to identify and share examples and experiences and show case
them is needed. Canada might propose to undertake something for the GA Session
in 2000 (based on a format similar to the Habitat 11 "Best Practices"
or the "We the Peoples Awards").
- "Participatory policy making" should continue to be pursued as
an alternative or complement to traditional consultations. The Bolivia process
is similar to the approach of the Centre for Foreign Policy Development. Perhaps
they could be encouraged to develop a short paper describing the principles and
key elements of participatory policy development. (This may even be a new social
technology which we could export).
- Natural Resources Canada should be encouraged to take the initiative in
following up on the criticisms of the Canadian mining companies. Highlighting
the Whitehorse initiative and pursuing Ed Dosman's proposal for work with the
small and medium sized miners would be appropriate and could be part of a
positive contribution to the Mines Ministers meeting in September.
- Identifying and maintaining continuity among civil society
representatives to a Summit or in relation to a region increased both the
efficiency and the effectiveness of the process. Such continuity on the part of
the government delegation and the Ministerial delegation might have similar pay
off.
- Educational initiatives are referred to throughout all of the action
plans. This may be a "neutral" entry point to provide practical
actions, highlighting Canada's experience and building productive partnerships
with southern groups. If this were started early, some of the results might be
featured in the OAS-GA in 2000.
In conclusion, I wish to express my appreciation to everyone who has been
involved in this preparation and follow-up to the Summit. These recommendations
are offered in the spirit of improving upon a good experience.
* Note: The opinions and recommendations
expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of IISD
or of others involved in the civil society consultations. |