Social Summit +5

Follow-up activities by the Division for Social Policy
and Development

Division for Social Policy and Development serves as the focal point within the UN for follow-up to the Summit and the special session and it has undertaken a number of initiatives to implement mandates and recommendations for action contained in the outcome documents.

The Division has initiated a process of inter-agency coordination within the UN system on follow-up to the special session. On 1 November 2000, an inter-agency consultation was convened in New York with participation of representatives of more than 20 agencies, funds and programmes to provide an opportunity, on an informal basis, to report on programmes and plans for follow-up to specific mandates and recommendations and to discuss further action on cross-cutting themes contained in the Geneva outcome document. Click here for more information on follow-up activities within the UN system.

The Division is co-funding a study, edited by Professor Lance Taylor, on the impact of external liberalization on economic performance and social policy, which is to be published shortly.  The book includes studies made in nine countries: Argentina, Colombia, Cuba, India, Mexico, the Russian Federation, the Republic of Korea, Turkey and Zimbabwe. 

In the context of the Division’s work on poverty, including as focal point for the United Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty, consultations have been carried out with UNDP and other agencies on the modalities for a global campaign to eradicate poverty.  Further discussions on plans for a global campaign are scheduled in the major coordinating bodies of the UN system.

The Department of Economic and Social Affairs has launched a project entitled “International Forum for Social Development”, which will bring together main actors of the development process from the public and private spheres to debate the policies and modes of cooperation that could contribute to the implementation of the objectives of the Summit and the special session.  Initial sponsors of the project include the Governments of Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands.  Other Governments have expressed interest in supporting the project.

The Division and the Department for International Development (DFID) of the United Kingdom jointly convened a meeting at the end of March 2001 on “the integration of social and economic policies”, the priority theme of the 40th session of the Commission for Social DevelopmentThe meeting provided an opportunity for representatives of Member States to exchange experiences on best practice in integrating the social and economic, particularly in the context of globalization and of discussions on international financial architecture.