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Plethora of Fora

With 'global civil society' winning a Nobel Peace Prize, we can expect to see a proliferation of settings and processes that include CSOs as important participants in official policy debates and decision-making. But it is going to be a major challenge for the international community to create opportunities for the kind of collaboration that delivers the benefits that the landmine treaty process has produced. Incorporating a multitude of diverse partners into global conferences, committees, and other fora will be a complex task. We can anticipate a period of experimentation with a variety of approaches, each adapted to the issue at hand, the people involved, and the goals of the collaboration. For example, we can expect quite different methods depending on whether the purpose is sharing information, debating options, performing specific tasks, or making and implementing decisions.

One of the methods is the Round Table, a multi-sectoral group which allows government officials to meet in a low key setting with people from CSOs and the private sector, and with other knowledgeable individuals to share information and opinion and to plan coordinated action. National Councils for Sustainable Development are being set up in many countries. In Canada, Round Tables have brought together multiple stakeholders to work on such things as sustainable development, forestry, Canada's role in the repatriation of Guatemalan refugees and in the international response to the crisis in Rwanda.

At a more formal level, governments already make space for CSOs in all stages of work on important global conferences, particularly the key UN conferences of this decade. CSOs have participated in the preparatory sessions, been included as members of official delegations, contributed to the drafting of the final agreements, and participated in follow-up action and monitoring. Watch for this space to be expanded in the future and for CSOs to demand and receive a place in negotiations from which they are currently excluded, such as economic and regional summits and trade negotiations.

The United Nations Commission on Global Governance has proposed the creation of an annual Forum of Civil Society consisting of representatives of 300-600 CSOs accredited to the United Nations. It would be preceded by regional forums to allow a wider number of organizations to contribute to the preparation. The Forum would meet before the General Assembly. The Commission believes that such a forum would strengthen the capacity of civil society to influence the governments of member states of the UN on issues on the Assembly's agenda - and those off it.

But remember that the strength of CSOs is in their base and their credibility outside official fora. They will not serve anyone's interest if they begin to look and sound like government officials. Their participation will be most effective when it is backed up by work at the base with their own members, with the media, and with the general public.