Panel of Eminent Persons on United Nations-Civil Society Relations
Meetings of the Panel
Summary of first Panel meeting, June 2-3, 2003, New York
Welcome statements by the Chair of the Panel, Mr. Cardoso, and the UN Deputy Secretary General,
Ms. Louise Fréchette.
Panel’s terms of reference and timetable; in particular the panel affirmed a strong commitment to
using transparent and consultative processes, within the constraints of the panel’s budget, and
highlighted the importance of information outreach including translation of key documents into the
major UN languages. The panel recognized the importance of using innovative approaches to cast its
net wide and take a broad view while in the end producing a set of practical recommendations for the
consideration of the Secretary General.
Contextual paper: authored and presented by the Chair; panel members expanded on some themes of this
paper and injected new ones such as: the influence of globalization and new communications technology
on democracy and inter-governmental processes; the lack of public trust in the processes and
institutions of global governance today; the important place of world public opinion; and concerns
about growing “unilateralism”. (The revised paper is now publicly available on the UN’s web.)
Importance of civil society in today’s geopolitical context: panel members described the growing
importance of civil society today – including: as a buffer or conduit between people and States,
as a support for citizens, a mobilizer of public opinion, and a buttress for participatory democracy.
However civil society is also highly diverse internationally and within nations (influenced by history
and culture). As civil society organizations (CSOs) become more influential, questions concerning
their own governance and representativity will grow.
Background paper: authored and presented by the panel secretariat; this provided a history of UN-civil
society relations and related concerns articulated by different stakeholders as well as an account of
some of the innovations and reform proposals for addressing the concerns; discussion led to some
revisions. (The revised paper is now available on the UN’s web.)
Definitions: Panel members agreed that civil society is distinct from the private sector (although
both are non-state actors) and that parliaments are state- rather than non-state actors. A possible
classification of actors relating to the deliberative processes of the UN was discussed, emphasizing
the distinction between state/government, non-profit and profit-related organizations (a revised
informal note on this is now available on the UN’s web).
Modes of UN-civil society engagement: the panel listed various ways in which CSOs engage with the UN;
these can be grouped into three categories: project and operational level; policy deliberation at
national and international levels; interaction on issues of global governance (the micro-, meso- and
macro-levels) (a revised informal note is also now available).
The UN’s relations with CS: has become more pivotal for good reasons, and the major conferences have
been an important conduit for this; now that there are fewer such events on the horizon, new avenues
are needed within the “standing” instruments. From their personal connections, panel members
described concerns of many NGOs who are close to the UN: they question the seriousness of the
engagement – there are new modalities to speak but is there less likelihood of being heard? Why isn’t
civil society given greater access routinely to UN processes other than those of ECOSOC? Are the
security issues and pressure of numbers seeking UN access used as an excuse to resist CSO involvement?
What the panel can contribute: panel members suggested that the panel could identify where problems
lie and how these could be fixed; where there are opportunities (perhaps based on tested innovations)
and how these could be harvested; how the voices of southern and grassroots voices could be
strengthened.
Further reaching contributions the panel might make: panel members spoke of important ideas to which
the panel might contribute as ancillary to its main focus and mandate – i.e. UN-civil society
relations; these include strengthening norms for the freedom of association and enabling laws for
CSOs; enhancing the capacity of Southern civil society to engage in deliberative processes both at
home and internationally; encouraging more constructive government-civil society dialogue.
The future work-programme: the panel agreed that the next 6 months would largely be devoted to a
consultation process, gaining from the views and experience of those having different perspectives
(different types of CSOs, people in governments or the private sector, parliamentarians, UN officials
etc); the panel would reconvene for its second meeting in early to mid December to review the messages
heard and start mapping out its broad recommendations; the report drafting phase and panel
deliberation would continue for the next 2 months and in its third meeting (late February) the main
elements of the report would be agreed; this would be refined over the ensuing weeks and presented
to the SG in April.
The consultation strategy: the panel spent much time discussing the consultation strategy; this is
set out in the accompanying note; in particular these principles were agreed:
- special efforts are to be made to hear southern voices including those of marginalized groups that have not had previous access to UN consultations or structures – hence the importance of panel members travelling to these regions;
- the panel will have both a broad outreach strategy (so that all interested CSOs have a chance to learn what the panel is doing and contribute their experience and ideas) and a targeted strategy so that the panel members have a chance to hear from those who they believe offer particularly valuable experience;
- full use will be made of meetings organized by others to which important constituencies from the panel’s perspective will gather – where the meetings organizers agree;
- however the panel will also have the capacity to organize its own regional hearings to supplement this; focus group meetings with specialist communities (such as local authority leaders and speakers of parliaments) will also be convened;
- an easy-to-find section of the UN’s website will be used to assist with outreach and for electronic consultation.
Constraints: The modest resources at the panel’s disposal and the one-year time horizon are
limitations on how extensive the consultation can be and the panel must avoid creating inflated
expectations. Moreover, this is a panel not a commission; the panel members have been assembled
because of their own expertise; this will be enhanced through consultation but ultimately it is their
ideas and judgment that the SG is asking for (hence on-going exchange of ideas within the panel is
needed as well as external consultation).
Lunch meeting with UN Under-Secretary, Mr. Nitin Desai, at which he emphasized that – with the close
of the big global conference era – more attention is now needed on engaging civil society in the
standing UN processes. The Panel should be bold, consider the processes of global change, and not be
overly constrained by the limitations of the UN’s decision-making reach.
Lunch meeting with the UN Secretary General, Mr. Kofi Annan, at which he underlined the increasing
importance of civil society and world public opinion to the work of the UN and therefore the important
contribution the panel could make to the UN reform process. On receiving the panel’s report he will
decide which proposals he can act on directly and which to send to governments for their
deliberation, in particular looking towards the 2004 General Assembly as an opportunity for discussion
on these items.