52/25 Implementation of the outcome of the World Summit for Social Development
| Date: 26 November 1997 | Meeting: 56 |
| Adopted without a vote | Draft: A/52/L.25 and Add.1 |
The General Assembly,
Recalling its resolutions 46/139 of 17 December 1991, 47/92 of 16 December 1992, 48/100 of 20 December 1993, 50/161 of 22 December 1995, 50/227 of 24 May 1996 and 51/202 of 17 December 1996,
Recalling also Economic and Social Council decision 1991/230 of 30 May 1991, resolutions 1992/27 of 30 July 1992, 1995/60 of 28 July 1995, 1996/7 of 22 July 1996, 1996/36 of 26 July 1996 and 1997/56 of 23 July 1997, and agreed conclusions 1995/1 of 28 July 1995, 1996/1 of 26 July 1996 and 1997/1 of 25 July 1997,
1. Reaffirms the commitments adopted by heads of State and Government at the World Summit for Social Development, contained in the Copenhagen Declaration on Social Development (1) and the Programme of Action, (2) and their pledge to give the highest priority to national, regional and international policies and actions for the promotion of social progress, social justice, the betterment of the human condition, and social integration, based on full participation by all;
2. Emphasizes the necessity to create a framework for action to place people at the centre of development and direct economies to meet human needs more effectively;
3. Stresses the need for renewed and massive political will at the national, regional and international levels to invest in people and their well-being in order to achieve the objectives of social development;
4. Emphasizes that democracy, respect for all human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the right to development, transparent and accountable governance and administration in all sectors of society, and effective participation by civil society, are an essential part of the necessary foundations for the realization of social and people-centred sustainable development;
5. Also emphasizes that an equitable and favourable national and international economic, political, social and legal environment, in accordance with the provisions of chapter 1 of the Programme of Action of the World Summit for Social Development, is essential for the realization of social and people-centred sustainable development;
6. Stresses that social development is clearly linked to the development of peace, freedom, stability and security, both nationally and internationally;
7. Takes note of the reports of the Secretary-General on the implementation of the outcome of the World Summit for Social Development (3) and on the observance of the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty (1996) and recommendations for the rest of the first United Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty; (4)
Critical importance of national action and international
cooperation for social development
8. Stresses that social development and the implementation of the Programme of Action of the Summit are primarily the responsibility of Governments, and that international cooperation and assistance are essential for their full implementation;
9. Notes with satisfaction the initiatives and actions taken by Governments towards the implementation of the commitments made at the Summit;
10. Reiterates its call to Governments to define and implement time-bound goals and targets for reducing overall poverty and eradicating absolute poverty, expanding employment and reducing unemployment and enhancing social integration, within each national context;
11. Urges national Governments to formulate or strengthen comprehensive cross-sectoral strategies for implementing the Summit outcome and national strategies for social development;
12. Acknowledges the key role of developing country actors and institutions in creating and implementing effective programmes to maximize the positive impact of investments in social development;
13. Stresses also the importance of putting full employment at the centre of policy-making in conjunction with other goals, while emphasizing the need for enhancing employment opportunities for women and for groups with specific needs;
14. Reiterates also the call of the Summit for Governments to assess on a regular basis national progress towards implementing the outcome of the Summit, and encourages them to submit such information on a voluntary basis to the Commission for Social Development, which serves, inter alia, as a forum for the exchange of national experiences;
15. Stresses its solidarity with people living in poverty in all countries, and reaffirms that the satisfaction of basic human needs is an essential element of poverty eradication, those needs being closely interrelated and comprising nutrition, health, water and sanitation, education, employment, housing and equal opportunities for participation in political, economic, cultural and social life;
16. Reaffirms the need to strengthen, in a spirit of partnership, international, regional and subregional cooperation for social development and implementing the outcome of the Summit;
17. Calls upon all Governments and the United Nations system, in particular the relevant funds, programmes and agencies, to promote an active and visible policy of mainstreaming a gender perspective and to use gender analysis as a tool for the integration of a gender dimension into the planning and implementation of policies, strategies and programmes on social development;
Mobilization of financial resources
18. Recognizes that the implementation of the Declaration and Programme of Action will require the mobilization of financial resources at the national and international levels, as set out in commitments 8 and 9 of the Declaration and paragraphs 87 to 93 of the Programme of Action;
19. Recognizes also that the implementation of the Declaration and Programme of Action in developing countries, in particular in Africa and the least developed countries, needs additional financial resources from all sources and more effective development cooperation and assistance;
20. Calls upon all countries to develop economic policies that promote and mobilize domestic savings and attract external resources for productive investment, and to seek innovative sources of funding, both public and private, for social programmes, while ensuring their effective utilization, and in the budgetary process, to ensure transparency and accountability in the use of public resources, and to give priority to providing and improving basic social services;
21. Takes note of the report of the Secretary-General on new and innovative ideas for generating funds for globally agreed commitments and priorities; (5)
22. Welcomes the holding of the Micro-credit Summit in Washington, D.C., from 2 to 4 February 1997, and the adoption of the Micro-credit Declaration and Plan of Action, and encourages its full implementation as appropriate by all concerned;
23. Calls upon the international community, including international financial institutions, to implement fully and effectively all initiatives that will contribute to a durable solution to the debt problems of developing countries, in particular African countries and the least developed countries, and thus support their efforts to achieve social development and, in this context, reaffirms the need to make further progress towards the implementation of the recommendations of the World Summit for Social Development by the Bretton Woods institutions, including the Highly Indebted Poor Countries Debt Initiative;
24. Reaffirms the need to continue to evaluate the impact of structural adjustment programmes by, inter alia, integrating the social dimensions involved and, in this context, welcomes the recent initiatives of the World Bank, including the Structural Adjustment Participatory Review Initiative which brings together a tripartite team in a number of developing countries and countries with economies in transition to review at the national level structural adjustment experiences and to identify problems;
25. Also reaffirms that a strong political commitment by the international community is needed to implement strengthened international cooperation for development, including social development, that the mobilization of domestic and international resources for development from all sources is an essential component for the comprehensive and effective implementation of development, that enhanced efforts should be made for the mobilization and provision of new and additional financial resources for the development of developing countries and that, despite an increase in private capital flows, official development assistance remains an essential source of external funding; and notes that developed countries reaffirm the commitments undertaken to fulfil as soon as possible the agreed United Nations targets of 0.7 per cent of their gross national product for overall official development assistance and 0.15 per cent of the gross national product for official development assistance for the least developed countries, that donor countries that have met the 0.15 per cent target will seek to undertake to reach 0.20 per cent, and that further efforts are also needed to improve the effectiveness of official development assistance and to focus such aid on the poorest countries;
26. Further reaffirms the importance of agreeing on a mutual commitment between interested developed and developing country partners to allocate, on average, 20 per cent of official development assistance and 20 per cent of the national budget, respectively, to basic social programmes, and recalls the outcome of the meeting held at Oslo from 23 to 25 April 1996 (6) which reaffirmed that promoting access for all to basic social services was essential for sustainable development and should be an integral part of any strategy to overcome poverty;
27. Recognizes the necessity of providing appropriate technical cooperation and other forms of assistance to the countries with economies in transition, as set out in the provisions of the Declaration and Programme of Action;
Involvement of civil society and other actors
28. Reaffirms the need for effective partnership and cooperation between Governments and the relevant actors of civil society, the social partners, the major groups as defined in Agenda 21, (7) including non-governmental organizations and the private sector, in the implementation of and follow-up to the Declaration and Programme of Action of the World Summit for Social Development, and for ensuring their involvement in the planning, elaboration, implementation and evaluation of social policies at the national level;
29. Encourages non-governmental organizations to participate in the work of the Commission for Social Development, in accordance with Economic and Social Council resolution 1996/31 of 25 July 1996 and decisions 1996/315 of 14 November 1996 and 1997/298 of 23 July 1997, and in the implementation process related to the Summit to the maximum extent possible;
The role of the United Nations system
30. Recalls Economic and Social Council resolution 1996/7, by which the Council decided that the Commission for Social Development, as a functional commission of the Council, shall have the primary responsibility for the follow-up to and review of the implementation of the outcome of the Summit;
31. Invites Governments to support the work of the Commission, including through the participation of high-level representatives on social development issues and policies;
32. Takes note of the request made by the Commission for Social Development to the Secretary-General, in the framework of United Nations system-wide coordination, to assist the Commission and the Council to broaden and deepen the policy debate on employment issues;
33. Welcomes in this regard resolution 35/2 adopted by the Commission on the priority theme "Productive employment and sustainable livelihoods" and the agreed conclusions contained therein, (8) in which the Commission recognized, inter alia, the importance of full, productive, appropriately and adequately remunerated, and freely chosen employment as a central objective of economic and social policies; defining time-bound goals and targets for expanding employment and reducing unemployment; and preparing policies for the achievement of those goals and targets;
34. Also welcomes agreed conclusions 1997/1, adopted by the Economic and Social Council at its high-level segment on the theme "Fostering an enabling environment for development: financial flows, including capital flows, investment and trade" and calls for their implementation;
35. Further welcomes also Economic and Social Council resolution 1997/60 of 25 July 1997, entitled "Eradication of poverty", and the decision of the Council therein to carry out in 1999 an overall review of the theme of poverty eradication in order to contribute to the special session of the General Assembly in 2000 for the overall review of the Summit and to the five-year review of the Beijing Platform for Action; (9)
36. Welcomes Economic and Social Council resolution 1997/61 of 25 July 1997, on integrated and coordinated implementation and follow-up of the major United Nations conferences and summits, in which the Council reaffirmed the need to continue to ensure the harmonization and coordination of the agendas and work programmes of the functional commissions by promoting a clearer division of labour among them and by providing clear policy guidance to them;
37. Welcomes Economic and Social Council decision 1997/302 of 25 July 1997, on the convening of a session of the Council in 1998 to consider further the theme of integrated and coordinated implementation and follow-up of the major United Nations conferences and summits;
38. Renews its call to all relevant organs, organizations and bodies of the United Nations system to be involved in the follow-up action to the Summit, and invites funds and programmes, specialized agencies and related organizations of the United Nations system to strengthen and adjust their activities, programmes and medium-term strategies, as appropriate, to take into account the follow-up to the Summit;
39. Takes note with appreciation of the work of the inter-agency task forces established by the Administrative Committee on Coordination, as contained in the report of the Secretary-General on integrated and coordinated implementation and follow-up of the major United Nations conferences and summits; (10)
40. Takes note of the emphasis placed by the Economic and Social Council in resolution 1997/61 on the need for the Administrative Committee on Coordination to ensure that there is effective inter-agency support for the work of the intergovernmental bodies dealing with conference follow-up, including the Council and its functional commissions, that there is regular updating and feedback on the incorporation of the work of the task forces at the country level, and that the Council is kept fully informed of the work and decisions of that Committee concerning integrated and coordinated implementation and follow-up of the major United Nations conferences and summits;
41. Urges the continued involvement and support by the regional commissions in the promotion of the implementation of the objectives of the World Summit for Social Development at the regional and subregional levels, and reiterates its invitation to the commissions, in accordance with their mandates and in cooperation with the regional intergovernmental organizations and banks, to convene on a biennial basis a meeting at a high political level to review the progress made towards implementing the outcome of the Summit, to exchange views on their respective experiences and to adopt appropriate measures;
42. Welcomes in this context the convening by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean of the first regional meeting to evaluate the World Summit for Social Development, held at São Paulo from 6 to 9 April 1997, with the participation of high-level representatives of Latin American and Caribbean countries and takes note with appreciation of the final document of the meeting, known as the São Paulo Consensus;
43. Also welcomes the convening by the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific of the Fifth Asian and Pacific Ministerial Conference on Social Development at Manila, from 5 to 11 November 1997, to review national progress achieved and regional action taken in the implementation of the outcome of the Summit;
44. Further welcomes the convening of the expert group meeting on employment questions at Vienna, from 2 to 6 February 1998, as a follow-up to the Summit in the European region;
45. Urges the Economic Commission for Africa to convene in the forthcoming year a regional meeting to evaluate the follow-up of the World Summit for Social Development in the African region;
46. Welcomes the efforts of funds and programmes in assisting countries in implementing all Summit commitments at the national, regional and international levels;
47. Also welcomes the efforts of the United Nations Development Programme in the implementation of Summit commitments aimed at poverty eradication in developing countries, particularly in Africa and the least developed countries;
48. Takes note with appreciation of the contribution of the International Labour Organization to the consideration by the Commission for Social Development, at its thirty-fifth session, of the theme "Productive employment and sustainable livelihoods" and reiterates its invitation to the International Labour Organization to continue to contribute to the implementation of the Copenhagen Declaration and Programme of Action and to the work of the Commission for Social Development;
Special session of the General Assembly in 2000 for an overall review and appraisal
of the implementation of the outcome of the Summit
49. Recalls its resolution 50/161, in which it decided to hold a special session in 2000 for an overall review and appraisal of the implementation of the outcome of the Summit and to consider further actions and initiatives;
50. Also recalls its resolution 51/202, in which it decided on the preparatory process of the special session;
51. Decides to establish a Preparatory Committee open to the participation of all States Members of the United Nations and members of the specialized agencies, with the participation of observers in accordance with the established practice of the General Assembly, and that the Preparatory Committee will hold an organizational session of four days' duration, from 19 to 22 May 1998;
52. Also decides that, at its organizational session, the Preparatory Committee will consider and decide on the process to be followed to achieve the purpose of the special session with respect to an overall review and appraisal of the implementation of the outcome of the Summit, and the consideration of further actions and initiatives; in this context, the Preparatory Committee will decide, inter alia, on the programme and organization of its work, including issues such as documentation, national contributions and input from the United Nations system, the election of its Bureau, the participation of non-governmental organizations, the dates for the special session and other organizational issues;
53. Reaffirms that the Preparatory Committee will initiate its substantive activities in 1999 on the basis of input by the Commission for Social Development and the Economic and Social Council, and that account will be taken of contributions by all relevant organs and specialized agencies of the United Nations system;
54. Requests the Secretary-General to prepare the necessary documentation for the Preparatory Committee at its organizational session and in particular to present a report at the organizational session, containing recommendations and proposals on the organization of the work of the Preparatory Committee;
55. Reaffirms that the follow-up to the Summit will be undertaken on the basis of an integrated approach to social development and within the framework of a coordinated follow-up to and implementation of the results of the major international conferences in the economic, social and related fields;
56. Invites Governments to contribute to the Trust Fund for the Follow-up to the World Summit for Social Development in support of the implementation of the Copenhagen Declaration and Programme of Action, including the preparation for the special session of the Assembly;
57. Requests the Secretary-General to ensure that the preparatory process for the special session benefits from the active involvement of all concerned and that the secretariat is adequately supported;
58. Also requests the Secretary-General to report to the Assembly at its fifty-third session on the implementation of the outcome of the Summit;
59. Decides to include in the provisional agenda of its fifty-third session the item entitled "Implementation of the outcome of the World Summit for Social Development".
1. Report of the World Summit for Social Development, Copenhagen, 6-12 March 1995 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.96.IV.8), chap. I, resolution 1, annex I.
2. Ibid., annex II.
3. A/52/305.
4. A/52/573.
5. A/52/203-E/1997/85.
6. See A/51/140, annex.
7. Report of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, Rio de Janeiro, 3-14 June 1992 (A/CONF.151/26/Rev.1 (Vol. I and Vol. I/Corr.1, Vol. II, Vol. III and Vol. III/Corr.1)) (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.93.I.8 and corrigenda), vol. I: Resolutions Adopted by the Conference, resolution 1, annex II.
8. Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 1997, Supplement No. 6 (E/1997/26-E/CN.5/1997/11), chap. I, sect. D.
9. Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, 4-15 September 1995 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.96.IV.13), chap. I, resolution 1, annex II.
10. E/1997/73.