On 29 September 2009, International IDEA’s Permanent Observer to the UN, Massimo Tommasoli, made a statement on behalf of the Institute at the Ministerial Meeting of the Conference on New or Restored Democracies, held at the UN Headquarters in New York.
The meeting was chaired by Dr Khaled M. Al-Attiya, Minister of State for International Cooperation of the State of Qatar, and examined a proposal submitted by the Philippines on the institutionalization of ICNRD by means of establishing a light secretariat support, based in New York, a trust fund to resource its operations, and a steering mechanism of Member States to ensure continuity between conferences. The meeting discussed also means for enhancing more integration between the three components of the ICNRD: governments, legislatures, civil society.
Many countries welcomed the candidacy of Venezuela, supported by the Latin America and the Caribbean regional group at the UN, as the next chair of the ICNRD. The UN General Assembly will deliberate on this matter in November.
In his statement, Mr Tommasoli commented on how to improve the effectiveness of the ICNRD process. He underlined the need to ensure effective follow-up between ICNRD conferences; and the importance of sharing experience on democratization efforts, so as to move beyond conferences and link them to actual democracy-building efforts on the ground.
On providing continuity to the ICNRD process between conferences, Mr Tommasoli remarked that the initiative of the State of Qatar to establish the Advisory Board of the ICNRD-6, at which International IDEA is invited as observer, and the three-year ICNRD Programme of Work 2007-2009 are right steps in this direction. Another example of follow-up actions is the implementation of self-assessments of the state of democracy by member states with the aim of identifying areas for action and entry points for policy reforms. He noted that the experience of Mongolia, host of ICNRD-5, is relevant in this respect: they developed nationally-owned Democratic Governance Indicators, defined a National Plan of Action to Consolidate Democracy in the country, and adopted an MDG9 specifically focused on democracy and human rights. At the request of Mongolia, International IDEA provided technical advice to such process, based on IDEA’s State of Democracy assessment methodology.
On the need to share democratization experiences, the ICNRD process to make better use of concrete experience sharing, including in a South-South perspective, on the challenges and successes of democratic reform processes. This could build on a more systematic articulation between the governmental, parliamentary and civil society segments of the ICNRD, based on a multi-year strategy, with a clear definition of roles and responsibilities for all the actors involved in the NRD process. The celebration of the International Day of Democracy is an excellent opportunity for further fostering dialogue among national actors, thus contributing to democracy building on the ground.
Such an approach could facilitate strategic and operational links between periodic high-level forum, like the ICNRD, and the mainstream work of agencies engaged in democracy building. This would enhance the policy and strategic relevance of the New or Restored Democracies process, by taking fully into account the broader issue of how to pursue a revitalized democracy building agenda at the UN, and how to increase the effectiveness of the UN system in this respect. Effective experience-sharing could be based on the following criteria:
- To make use of, and capitalize, existing knowledge bases, practitioners’ networks and institutional capacity building tools, particularly those that are already the result of effective partnerships among institutions engaged in the democracy building arena;
- To define focused agendas for the high-level segment of the process, and make sure that action plans originated by them are shaped in clear and measurable frameworks, with responsibilities assigned to relevant actors, both within and outside of the United Nations, for funding, implementation and follow-up.
