B:Conference
on the role of Human Rights and Democratisation in Conflict Prevention
and Resolution. Speech by Poul Nielson Commissioner for Development and
Humanitarian Aid
Brussels, May 28 and 29, 2001
Member of the European Commission responsible for Development and Humanitarian Aid
This Conference
is staged at a very significant time for the Commission. We are intent
on making all of our programmes coherent and consistent in the pursuit
of peace, democracy and human rights, and we are making real progress
towards improving our policy formulation and implementation. This meeting
is an excellent opportunity to exchange ideas about implementing this
fundamental goal. Nice to work together with IDEA - having been one of
the fathers of the institution it is nice to see it at work here.
Development co-operation has a central role to play in ensuring peace
and security in developing countries. At the same time, the absence of
peace and security are highly detrimental to the development process.
The EU is therefore particularly aware of the need for a comprehensive,
integrated policy of peace building and conflict prevention, as conflict
can destroy years of development progress.
I would like to highlight a few key areas in which the development programmes of the Community can make an important contribution to conflict prevention and resolution, areas which address some of the root causes of conflict; poverty reduction, good governance, political dialogue, strengthening civil society and coordination.
The links between poverty reduction and conflict prevention are obvious. The poorest citizens of the world are the most vulnerable to violent strife. Extreme economic inequalities, and the resulting tensions between different identity groups, are frequently at the root of the most bloody confrontations.
The EU has recently restated its commitment to poverty reduction and targeting development assistance to to the Least Developed Countries at the recent conference in Brussels. The Conference adopted a Programme of Action for the decade 2001-2010, which sets out a series of concrete actions by LDCs and development partners to reduce poverty and to promote sustainable development. I believe that the international consensus we secured will allow us to build a stronger partnership to fight poverty in the LDCs, through the promotion of governance, conflict prevention, national ownership by LDCs of development processes and also better donor co-ordination. I agree with Gun Britt - it is valuable to have human rights in conference conclusions - which was the result of negotiations. Injecting realism is the first important step to take.
Targeting assistance to the poorest countries is of course only one element of the complex response required of a mature development strategy. Social and economic progress relies also on having the necessary institutions of the state and an active and participatory civil society. A lack of political pluralism, corrupt or incompetent government and bad public administration pose a major threat to democracy and stability. This has an important role to play in building the institutional capacity of its partners in the development process. The increasing focus of the international community on issues of good governance is very much to be welcomed in this respect. Transparency, accountability and strong measures against corruption must be built into a coherent development strategy. This is one of the reasons we elevated - governance and capacity building as one of six priorities of development policy and did not treat them as just one added horizontal aspect. Capacity building and governance of partner countries is important.
The approach
of strengthening national capacities also implies that the EU encourages
the partner country to play a primary co-ordinating role in the development
strategies which they will have devised.
Such strategy also demands that we pay increasing attention to the evaluation
of programmes and assess the outcome of out action. The lessons learned
from the results of such appraisals must feed into the planning of new
programmes and projects. This also relates to mainstreaming and enhancing
co-ordination; every action we support has the capacity to develop respect
for human rights and the promotion of peace. Here measurement more important
than in projects involving the constructing of bridges or other similar
works because in this field it is much more difficult to measure.
The proper participation of non-state actors in decisions, which affect them, and 'ownership' of the resulting policies and programmes are also necessary components of good governance. Civil society is an essential pillar of development, and strengthening the capacity of civil society organisations is a key component of effective conflict prevention and resolution. An important goal of development aid is therefore to advance the participation of civil society in the setting of policy and the implementation of action. Such organisations can have a central role to play in bringing peace and stability to regions of conflict. But it has to be kept in mind that not all elements in civil society necessarily represent civilised society! Tribal and religious extremism are also part of non-state actors so some selectivity is desirable.
In societies where conflict has rendered cooperation with state institutions impossible, it is clear that civil society has a particular responsibility in the regeneration of democratic institutions. In this context the EU can facilitate dialogue between governments and non-state actors with the aim of consolidating democracy and sustaining development. An important feature of the recent LDC Conference was the active participation of civil society. NGOs were granted full access to the Conference events and a number of EU member states included in their official delegations NGO representatives in liaison with the NGO Forum.
The Cotonou agreement expressly endorses this new recognition of the complementary role of civil society. Under the agreement, civil society is given the right and responsibility to be involved in consultations and be involved in the design and implementation of development policies.
The Cotonou agreement also substantially strengthens the notion of political dialogue with the countries concerned. Dialogue on development policy and on specific political issues will have a central role in the partnership between the EU and ACP partners. The dialogue is intended to include a regular evaluation of developments relating to respect for human rights, democratic principles, the rule of law and governance. Dialogue should be used as a tool to guide progress, it should be complementary to the commitments undertaken in Cotonou as "essential elements". In countries emerging from conflicts, the operation of institutions and mechanisms to sustain peace will be a crucial part of this political dialogue.
The new ACP-EC agreement is based on respect for human rights, democratic principles and the rule of law, and on good governance. It elaborates a new framework for partnership, which addresses the challenges of war and conflict, which has devastated so many of these countries. It also establishes special consultation procedures and appropriate sanctions for dealing with human rights violations and serious corruption. Peace-building policies, conflict prevention and resolution are specifically built into the new agreement. The critical issue now is to determine the pragmatic number of countries with which it is appropriate to use this mechanism. I have talked before about the 'battle for coherence' which must take place within all the institutions. Cross-cutting issues such as human rights, democracy and peace demand a serious refocusing on results; working the principle of mainstreaming into policy formulation and operational implementation, including the definition of country strategies onwards.
The reform of the management of external assistance has important implications for the coherence of Community development policy, setting out as it does new guidelines for programming and the unification of the project cycle, with one body having responsibility from identification to implementation. More work must be done however on improving the coherence of Commission policy and actual performance with our partners.The Interservice Quality Support Group is supposed to be of real added value in this respect.
The new Human Rights Communication provides very useful guidelines as to how the Commission can enhance the positive impact of development programmes in respect of human rights and democratisation. These include an enhanced focus in Country Strategy Papers on cross-cutting interventions to improve governance and make complementary use of the full range of EC instruments; supporting the participation of civil society in dialogue and the implementation of programmes; taking active steps to use participatory approaches in programme design and to assess, monitor and enhance the impact of individual projects on human rights.
Enhanced co-ordination and building effective synergies is not only required within the Community, we must also be aware of how to improve complementarity with the action of Member States. Coordination on the ground between Member State and Commission representations, in close cooperation with partner countries should occur during the formulation of programmes, and their implementation and evaluation. I believe that the enhanced role envisaged for Commission delegations can substantially contribute to such coordination, who are in a better position to provide information about how policies and programmes actually work on the ground. This process of deconcentration and decentralisation is being backed up by the provision of substantial extra human and financial resources for Delegations. But this has only just started and new resources will be needed to carry it through. Co-operation with other international agencies such as UN family and the World Bank, must also be improved.
The Commission's external assistance programmes taken together with the European Development Fund resources for ACP countries amount to over 7 billion Euros spent each year and this level of spending is to increase in the next years. Armed conflicts cause incalculable human suffering, and wipe out development progress, which has taken decades to achieve. Beyond our moral responsibility to help prevent humanitarian disasters, it is clearly in the interest of the EU, as a major development donor and trading partner of these countries to focus our efforts on the establishment and maintenance of peace and security. But I need to warn against overestimating the power of being a donor. The conflicts are not only automatic consequences of poverty. They have a deeper root, and they are as real in Africa as they are in Northern Ireland. All this, however, does not subtract from the conclusions that: prevention is better, and certainly cheaper than the cure and all of our policies and programmes must work towards this essential goal.