Development

The US-African Leaders Summit in Washington Leaves Malians Blasé

• August 3, 2014

BAMAKO, Mali — As the first United States-African leaders summit opens this week in Washington, D.C, it is hard to hear Malians in their capital drum up enthusiasm for it. President Barack Obama has invited 50 African heads of state — excluding those from Central African Republic, Eritrea, Sudan and Zimbabwe — to meet …

Africa, Development, Governance, UN Peacekeeping, Women

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Developing Nations Take Aim at the World Bank

Barbara Crossette

• July 16, 2014

In a direct challenge to Western control of two major international financial organizations, the five countries known as the BRICS — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — announced on July 15 the formation of a new development bank that they will control. The final plans to establish the bank, to be named …

Development

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Is a Better UN System Possible? Global Experts Respond to an Independent Survey

Barbara Crossette

• May 26, 2014

An unusual survey of 3,400 people worldwide who know the United Nations has found strong support for some basic rethinking over the next decade on the organization’s work in development. Among the recommendations, over two-thirds of respondents suggested adding more nongovernmental representatives to governing bodies and better consolidating both organizational representation and programs in …

Development

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Vijay Nambiar, UN Envoy, Untangles the Problems Plaguing Myanmar

Barbara Crossette

• May 19, 2014

The surprising move in 2010 by a repressive Burmese military regime to begin ceding power to the nation’s people was just the beginning of a tangled story. The new democracy held its first credible election less than two years later — an election that catapulted Aung San Suu Kyi, barely 18 months free of …

Asia, Development, Myanmar

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To End Deep Inequalities, Say Doyle and Stiglitz, Create a Ninth Development Goal

Barbara Crossette

• May 7, 2014

Two leading international policy experts at Columbia University are calling for more action from individual governments to address inequalities within their borders, in effect adding a bold new goal to the eight measurements of progress reflected in the Millennium Development Goals. Their proposal comes as debate swirls around what the United Nations needs to …

Development, Poverty, Responsibility to Protect

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Solving Bangladesh’s ‘Living Wages’ Problem Demands Global Support

Shiwani Neupane

• March 18, 2014

The dialogue on living wages has come a long way since the Rana Plaza collapse in Bangladesh that killed more than 1,000 people in 2013, but there will be no solution to the living wage problem until all parties involved work together, a diverse group of panelists agreed at a panel on the topic, …

Development, Women

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Women, Girls and Their Sexuality in the Next MDGs

Denis Fitzgerald

• March 13, 2014

The future global development agenda must include a standalone goal for gender equality, and United Nations member states, who will have the final say on the successor to the Millennium Development Goals, should not use culture or ideology as an excuse for failing to include sexual and reproductive rights of women and girls among …

Development, Women

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The UN Has Lost the Aid-Effectiveness Race: What Is to Be Done?

Robert Piocciotto

• March 5, 2014

Recent events have confirmed that the United Nations has a deep reservoir of good will worldwide. But its reputation is undermined by the ineffectiveness of its development assistance. UN agencies could improve their performance by implementing effective evaluations. However, the UN cannot be judged solely on the basis of its development assistance because the …

Development, Humanitarian Aid

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Jan Eliasson Explains His Role as No. 2 at the UN

A. Edward Elmendorf

• January 19, 2014

Jan Eliasson has been the deputy secretary-general of the United Nations since July 2012, the second in command after Ban Ki-moon. Eliasson, 73, is a former Swedish foreign minister and was ambassador to the United States twice, among other foreign postings. He was also president of the UN General Assembly and a key UN …

Development, Peace and Security

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World Bank, WHO and Japan Seek Full Health Coverage in All Nations

Barbara Crossette

• December 23, 2013

While Americans quarrel over the Affordable Care Act — Obamacare — much of the rest of the world has established or is moving toward universal health care for all citizens, and the World Bank is taking a lead in setting measurable targets for meeting that goal as a priority in human development. “The quest …

Development, Health and Population

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The UN Development System, Taking It Local

Leelananda De Silva

• November 14, 2013

The United Nations development system is part of the new global order emerging in the 21st century. But interdependence has brought changes. Earlier international relations addressed issues in intergovernmental relations. National political, economic, social and environmental issues were largely left to national governments. Now national policies and issues — on economic management, poverty reduction, …

Development

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Bangladeshi Pioneer Invests in Women From the ‘Ultra-Poor’

Barbara Crossette

• October 27, 2013

Fazle Hasan Abed runs the world’s largest nongovernmental development organization. He has garnered numerous international prizes, honorary degrees, very important friends and a British knighthood. Yet in the United States, Abed’s successes, won through a creative self-help program centered on mothers and their families, are virtually unknown. So here is his story, and BRAC‘s. …

Asia, Development, Women

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Rebuilding War-Torn States: Is the UN System Up to the Challenges?

Graciana del Castillo

• October 24, 2013

Despite the peculiarities of each particular case, when civil wars or other chaos end, countries need to address the root causes of the conflict to make the fragile peace sustainable. In this context, countries need to establish public security; to create participatory political systems with good governance and respect for the rule of law …

Development

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Where’s the Money? Funds for Millennium Development Goals Lag

Alice Speri

• September 25, 2013

With 827 days to go until the 2015 deadline for the Millennium Development Goals — the United Nations’ flagship agenda for global development — the buzzword at the General Assembly’s annual opening debate in New York this week was “acceleration.” A clear sense of urgency dominated many talks, particularly as the world body prepares to …

Africa, Asia, Development, General Assembly, Health and Population

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The Post-2015 UN Development Agenda

Jose Antonio Ocampo

• September 22, 2013

One of the success stories of the United Nations has been its capacity to serve as a forum to agree on global development goals. They include not only those set in the UN Development Decades, but also in the series of UN conferences convened since the 1970s and particularly the series of summits that …