Bill Orme

Bill Orme is an author and strategic communications consultant who worked for the United Nations over the past decade as a leader of global advocacy campaigns and efforts to support independent journalism in emerging democracies. Orme is a former director of the Committee to Protect Journalists and a correspondent for The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times and The Economist. In addition, he was a spokesman and external communications chief for the UN Development Program and an adviser on media projects in Africa for the Gates Foundation and the UN Peacebuilding Office.

The General Assembly Blesses a New Set of Universal Development Goals

Bill Orme

• August 8, 2015

For some time, it seemed that United Nations debates over a new set of 15-year global development goals would last nearly as long as the goals themselves. But nearly three years of formal, informal and “informal informal” negotiations finally came to a close on Aug. 2, with agreement by General Assembly consensus on this …

Sustainable Development Goals

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The Sustainable Development Goals May Be in Place, but Dissent Was Apparent

Bill Orme

• June 14, 2015

It’s all over but the shouting. But the shouting is still loud, and it’s mostly about the indicators. And the indicators, ultimately, may be all that matters about the United Nations’ new Sustainable Development Goals. After more than two years of complex, contentious negotiations, the essential content and most of the actual text of …

Development, General Assembly, Sustainable Development Goals

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Will Statisticians Get the Last Word on the UN’s New Development Goals?

Bill Orme

• March 9, 2015

There are three things you need to know about the negotiations over the United Nations’ next set of global development goals, which will be adopted by world leaders at the General Assembly this September and remain in effect for the next 15 years: Almost everybody agrees that the proposed 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) …

Sustainable Development Goals

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Can Good Governance Become a Global Development Goal?

Bill Orme

• October 28, 2014

British Prime Minister David Cameron had two clear messages when he spoke at a post-2015 global development goals forum on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly last month. The first was his emphatic view that the General Assembly panel’s proposal for 17 Sustainable Development Goals with 169 associated “targets” was too unwieldy …