By Rosa Belen Agirregomezkorta
WIDE+ participated in CPDE`s (Civil Society Organisations Partnership for Development Effectiveness) 7th Coordination meeting, which was preluded by a Strategic Planning workshop. These events were planned to take place at the end of 2015 but were postponed to January 2016 due to the Paris terrorist attacks and the following security alert level 4 in Brussels.
WIDE+ has been involved in the CPDE since its beginning, contributing to the advancement of a development model based on human rights and feminist values. It is a member of the CPDE`s Feminist Group.
The CPDE came about in February 2012 as a global open platform for civil society organisations in advancing effectiveness principles in Development. It was the result of the unification of the Better Aid network and Open Forum for CSO Development Effectiveness. The Nairobi Declaration for Development Effectiveness (9 December 2012), laid down the Values, Principles and Structure, including the Feminist approach within the CPDE.
The CPDE met in order to review the Development Effectiveness agenda, the role of CPDE, and to renew its strategy for carrying out its objectives. The meeting will inform CPDE plans in the coming years, enabling the platform to better organise itself, politically and programmatically.
Some of the debates focused on the following issues:
– A reflection on the CPDE`s changing landscape that poses important challenges for 2016: migration and refugees crisis, increase of racism and populist parties, de-legitimation of the OSCs as well as Human Rights and gender equality agendas.
-The Role of the Private sector: we are facing a new multilateralism where private experts are setting the agendas.
– The overhaul of the ODA (Official Development Assistance) system.
One preliminary conclusion to take away from the meeting is that the CPDE needs to position itself beyond the Development Efficiency agenda and connect to other global agendas. Development Efficiency is not an isolated issue, but relates to the 2030 agenda (SDGs) and financing development (FfD) agenda, COP21, etc. It is not clear how much the CPDE want to advocate and get involved in these ongoing processes.
Many of the concerns expressed are shared by other platforms and networks, like WIDE+, that are facing similar challenges and difficulties in order to advocate wider agendas.
It is our task as social actors to be able to articulate bridges to strengthen our values and principles (social, environmental and gender justice). We need to improve our action in the construction of alternatives and the challenging of hegemonic models. And the questions are: ‘how can WIDE+ support these efforts?’ and ‘how can the CPDE help WIDE+ efforts in building a more equal and just world?’.