2 -Introduction
The UN World Summit for Social Development (WSSD) held in Copenhagen (Denmark) from 6-12 March 1995 was attended by a 117 governments, and was the greatest gathering of Heads of State so far in history. The world leaders committed themselves to a Declaration and Action Programme covering the broad spectrum of political, economic and social measures necessary to eradicate poverty. It was a landmark, not only in terms of the size of participation, but also in terms of the depth of issues dealt with. It was the first time that the international community committed itself to the eradication of poverty.
In the Social Summit, as it was more commonly referred to, around 20.000 people from 180 countries participated. Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs) had played a crucial role in the preparations of the Summit, which, therefore, was not only a landmark at the official level but a marking point for the relations between the UN and NGOs:
"The landmark World Summit for Social Development (WSSD) was many things to different groups and actors. In terms of NGO-UN relations, it was a turning point."1
Social Watch emerged from this process in which NGOs from South and North co-operated in a strong coalition with the goal to influence the positions of their respective governments in order to improve the substantive outcome of the Summit. At the Summit many realised that its worth was not in the event itself, important as it may have been, but in the follow-up. Ambassador Juan Somavía, Chairman of the Preparatory Committee for the World Summit for Social Development, stated in his inaugural address to the thousands of participants at the Summit:
"I am here to say that without you - all of you present here today and the millions that you represent - the World Summit for Social Development would not have been possible. (..) I congratulate you on what you have done. I invite you to grasp the banners of the Social Summit to help make it a reality."2
Max van den Berg, the Director of Dutch NGO Novib at the time, responded to this invitation in his address to the Summit as follows:
"We once warned Chairman Somavía that the summit would become a lion which could roar but had no teeth. Tonight, on the eve of the Summit, we feel we are the teeth of a very large lion lying before us. The lion, which is called the Social Summit, is full of royalty and highness. It looks beautiful and important, but in reality its only strength lies in its teeth. That is what we will be. That is both an offer and a promise."3
The following morning Novib Director Max van den Berg announced in a press release the establishment of a follow-up co-ordination, which would be called 'Social Watch'4. This formally marks the beginning of Social Watch although participants of the Development Caucus had developed the idea. The core of this idea was to monitor the implementation of the international commitments at national level.
In many ways the idea of a Social Watch was an obvious one, an idea "that had to emerge". Amnesty International had been reporting for decades on the fulfilment of the obligations of governments under the UN Convention on Civil and Political Rights. Other groups such as the Reality of Aid group monitored the implementation commitments made by OECD countries with regards to aid. Some national groups did some work on the UN Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, but a systematic reporting and engagement linking national level to international commitments on social development was inexistent. Roberto Bissio, the founder and Director of the Social Watch secretariat put it as follows:
"The Social Watch is an effort to do what obviously needs to be done."5
Social Watch evolved naturally from the ongoing engagement of national NGOs with their governments within the context of international negotiations on social development. In other words, what was to become Social Watch had already emerged over a period of almost four years. To appreciate Social Watch as it manifests itself today, it is helpful, if not imperative to understand where it came from. This analysis intends to present the genesis of Social Watch. It will attempt to answer questions such as how was it created? Where did the idea stem from? What were the initial visions and aspirations behind it? How did Social Watch become a reality?
In section 3 the background to the Social Summit itself will be described, and the context in which the NGO participation in the Summit evolved. In sections 4 and 5 I will analyse how, and with what agenda, different NGOs and NGO-groupings became involved in the Social Summit. In section 6 I will analyse the role of Novib in promoting NGO involvement in the Summit, and how this relates to the establishment of Social Watch. In section 7 I will analyse the interaction between different NGO alliances out of which Social Watch emerged. This includes the innovation to utilise electronic communications in NGO interaction with the UN. In section 8 the changing mechanisms for coordination will be discussed - partly resulting from the possibilities created by new communication technologies. In section 9 will discuss the organisation of NGOs in caucuses, enabling a stronger regional and sectoral joint input by interested NGOs. In section 10 the creation of a large programme supported by all the Caucuses in the 'Quality Benchmark for the Social Summit will be described. In section 11 I will discuss how Social Watch transformed from an idea into reality, and finally I will examine the actual realisation of Social Watch with a structure that supported its existence.
This history is told from the perspective of clarifying the background of Social Watch, as it exists today. Hence it leaves out activities by NGOs that may have been relevant to the Summit, but were not crucial to the establishment of Social Watch. In particular the relatively prominent role of the International Council of Social Welfare (ICSW) - one of the CONGO organisations, in influencing the text on the Programme of Action will not be analysed in detail, since its process worked more in parallel with the Social Watch related activities. ICSW kept a fairly individual profile, though it subscribed to many overall statements that the Women's Caucus and Development Caucus would produce.
The events around the Copenhagen Alternative Declaration by the NGOs participating in the NGO forum during the Copenhagen Summit are equally not detailed in this account. The process of the Alternative Declaration was undoubtedly very important as a broad NGO statement, which expressed dissatisfaction with the way in which the Summit dealt with issues crucial to Social Development. Nonetheless, Social Watch developed as a process of engagement to the official process. In this account I have tried to look at what defines Social Watch, and it is not intended, therefore, to be a comprehensive analysis of NGO activity around the Summit.
