Presidential Statements

DEMYSTIFYING WSIS:
History of the World Summit on Information Society and
WSIS+20 Review Opportunities

Intervention by Liberato Bautista^[1]

February 17, 2025 | 13:15 -14:30 EST | UN HQ New York

Excellencies, ladies, and gentlemen:

1. Thank you for inviting me to speak at this event, “Demystifying WSIS: History of the World Summit on Information Society and WSIS+20 Review Opportunities.” I also appreciate the moderator’s kind introduction and the question that allows me to highlight how CoNGO has connected with the broader landscape of internet governance in relation to the WSIS process.

2. CoNGO, the Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations, and I are familiar with the WSIS Process. CoNGO participated in both the Geneva (2003) and Tunis (2005) conferences. At these events, CoNGO emphasized the importance of civil society’s access to the conference, as it established the groundwork for a multistakeholder framework for internet governance. During those two conferences, I had not yet become president of CoNGO; instead, I represented the General Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church. As a faith-based actor, I was deeply involved in developing what are now known as the WSIS Action Lines, especially Action Lines 9 (Media) and 10 (Ethical Dimensions of the Information Society), along with the digital solidarity agenda.
3. CoNGO reaffirms its commitment to the WSIS Process. Since Geneva and Tunis, CoNGO has participated in the WSIS Forum and subsequent High-Level Events. CoNGO has actively engaged in these Forums and HLEs by organizing side events. As the president of CoNGO, I have served as a High-Level Track Facilitator for the past three WSIS High-Level Forums. CoNGO’s involvement in these events is significant because it reflects the genuine recognition of the vital role that civil society and NGO actors play, as acknowledged by the leadership and secretariat of the WSIS Process at ITU, UNDP, UNESCO, and UNCTAD.
4. The WSIS Process has reached a mature stage, and CoNGO has concentrated its primary efforts on internet governance and the fundamental principles it must uphold. In December 2010, the Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) organized an “Open Consultation on the Process Toward Enhanced Cooperation on International Public Policy Issues Pertaining to the Internet.” The USG requested my participation, as President of CoNGO, to submit a summary of a survey conducted by his office involving accredited civil society entities regarding their perspectives on internet governance. The responses from civil society contributed valuable feedback concerning Paragraph 61 of the WSIS Tunis Agenda, which recognizes “the need to initiate and reinforce, as appropriate, a transparent, democratic, and multilateral process involving governments, the private sector, civil society, and international organizations in their respective roles. This process could envisage a suitable framework or mechanisms, where justified, to stimulate the ongoing and active evolution of current arrangements to synergize efforts in this regard.” It is crucial to highlight ECOSOC Resolution E/Res/2024/13 for its acknowledgment of the WSIS Process and its commitment to open and multistakeholder consultations “on achievements, key trends, challenges, and opportunities on World Summit action lines for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.”
5. CoNGO engages with the WSIS Process because we recognize that WSIS, ITU, and its stakeholders have established exemplary procedures that enable an open and transparent participatory process that could serve as a model across the UN System. The WSIS Open Consultation Process has been vital to the inclusive and participatory character of the multistakeholder platform. CoNGO views the WSIS Process as the global forum for information, communication, and digital technology policy.
6. We participate in the WSIS process because, at CoNGO, we prioritize access to the UN’s substantive agenda, which includes digital information and knowledge, as well as entry to the UN’s physical premises and meetings. I refer to this as access to the premises (physical) and promises (agenda) of the UN. The current ICT framework under WSIS is vital to our pursuit of digital solidarity and communication justice. The involvement of NGOs and civil society organizations in this mission is essential. In my remarks at the side event organized by the UN Group on the Information Society during the UN High-Level Political Forum 2024 (WSIS Toward the Summit of the Future and Beyond), I discussed WSIS’s groundbreaking mission to “achieve a shared vision, desire, and commitment to build a people-centric, inclusive, and development-oriented Information Society.” This is a mission and a proven legacy that civil society hopes WSIS will uphold—beyond Agenda 2030, beyond the Pact for the Future and its annexes, into a future that is not only time-bound but also visionary.
7. CoNGO welcomed the UN General Assembly’s action on March 11, 2024, regarding “Seizing the opportunities of safe, secure, and trustworthy artificial intelligence systems for sustainable development” (A/78/L.49). This GA resolution thoroughly recognizes the WSIS Process and the relevant documents associated with it. CoNGO eagerly looks forward to contributing to the overall review of the “progress made since the World Summit on the Information Society” in 2025. This review is essential, as the recently adopted Global Digital Compact reaffirmed that “internet governance must continue to be global and multistakeholder in nature… and that it must continue to follow the provisions outlined in the outcomes of the summits held in Geneva and Tunis, including those related to enhanced cooperation” (GDC 27).
8. The WSIS Process is not only mature, but it is also the most widely recognized multistakeholder process currently in existence, and it must be maintained. We should focus on sustaining this process rather than considering a replacement. This aligns with the spirit of UN reform, which aims to make the multilateral system transparent, accountable, and inclusive. This brings me to the topic of this event, which is demystification—a very intriguing concept. During the 2010 DESA open consultations, I emphasized the importance of internet governance for democratic governance. At that time, I envisioned a world where we could capture our smiles and laughter, our adventures and exploits, along with our cries and challenges, as well as our discoveries of foibles and mistakes on social media platforms. I wondered which vital aspects of life should be shared so we can all live more fully, humanely, adequately, meaningfully, and sustainably. This approach would prevent us from feeling that many other conversations are happening in the digital realm of which we are unaware and excluded. Multiply this imagination countless times by what digitalization and cybernetics have achieved. Technology has advanced exponentially, but is access to it—in its many forms—sufficiently governed to ensure democratic access? I worry and wonder.
9. Now, for the myth. If Prometheus, the Titan, had not stolen fire from the gods and given it to humanity, our technological knowledge might not exist as we know it today. Prometheus is known for defying the Olympian gods by taking fire from them and giving it to humans, which led to technological progress, knowledge, and, more broadly, civilization.
10. Internet governance raises concerns about democratic principles, including issues of inclusion and exclusion. WSIS must ensure safe and equitable access to the devices and applications that connectivity provides. Inclusion and access are essential because the growing digital divide and the uneven development of economies threaten our hopes of universalizing the benefits of connectivity.
11. Internet governance must expand beyond its many concerns about access to technologies increasingly linked to capital and profit. Moreover, no one should be allowed to claim digital knowledge or technology without facing consequences from those who control technology and capital. This idea causes me anxiety as technology and market interests intertwine and influence our democratic institutions, especially in democratic processes such as elections and discourse at all levels of human life and planetary sustainability. I question whether WSIS is a Promethean task, perhaps also a Robin Hood effort of technology, ensuring that its benefits reach everyone—not just the rulers of technology and capital, but also vulnerable and marginalized populations who currently lack access to technology and the electricity that powers their daily lives and chores.
12. To achieve these goals and more, we must collaborate to advance the WSIS mission of developing and improving meaningful internet governance and promoting cooperation. We need to work together to provide WSIS with the resources required to build a truly global framework that is open, inclusive, people-centered, human rights-focused, participatory, fair, and democratic, covering the essential infrastructure and technological architecture. This spirit must flourish, making the practice of universal human rights and the pursuit of sustainable development a reality.
13. No one controls the future, but technology and digital tools, including cybernetics, will heavily influence it. The ITU and its partners within the UN system have a proven track record of developing regulatory policies through extensive multistakeholder consultations. The existing digital divide and widespread disinformation on social media do not bode well for a world already overwhelmed by fear and anxiety. I hope that WSIS will address this excess of fear and lack of hope, aiming to establish digital and communication justice now and in the future.

How Can AI Accelerate the Nation-
Building and Modernization Process? M
ore Questions than Answers

A Presentation by Liberato C. Bautista^[1] 

at the

XXIV Infopoverty World Conference under the auspices of the Observatory for
Digital Communications (OCCAM) and collaborators

11 April 2025 | CR11 | UNHQ New York

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,

Thank you, Mr. Celik, Chair, for the kind introduction.

1. I want to once again thank Pierpaolo Saporito, president of OCCAM and the intellectual architect behind the Infopoverty Conferences, for including me and the Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the UN (CoNGO) in this year’s Infopoverty World Conference. This conference is now in its twenty-fourth edition, and this marks my eleventh time participating.

2. There is a saying: “Constant repetition carries conviction.” Pierpaolo’s emphasis on a recurring theme—the eradication of poverty through the mediation of information and communications technology, including artificial intelligence—embodies the notion that “constant repetition” conveys conviction.
3. This year’s Infopoverty conference consistently emphasizes multilateral cooperation: implementing the UN Agenda 2030 and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. These goals were prominently reaffirmed at the Summit of the Future in September 2024, where the Pact for the Future and its two annexes, including the Global Digital Compact, highlighted the importance of interdependence and multilateral collaboration, as stressed in the opening and first sessions of the conference.
4. My intervention last year was titled “Artificial and Yet Real: AI from Warfare to Welfare.” The ideas I shared then, and still believe today, focus on how AI is mainly driven by market interests rather than welfare goals. Its use in defense and warfare tends to surpass its applications in any other human activity. Given this reality, how can digital governance work toward digital equity, making technology serve all of humanity and the planet?
5. AI and its related ICTs must be rooted in the multilateral values of human dignity, human rights, peace and security, and sustainable development to close social and economic gaps, including the digital divide. This highlights the vital role of digital governance on the multilateral agenda.
6. That multilateral agenda must address the digital divide to ensure that the digitization of information and the digitalization of knowledge contribute to achieving digital justice, which is part of the broader cause of social justice. In turn, digital justice contributes to the larger cause of social and economic justice. If done right, AI may yet bridge the development financing gap at a time when official development aid (ODA) is declining.
7. The eleventh annual symposium on the role of religion and faith-based organizations in international affairs took place last week, on April 3, 2025. This event was organized in partnership with the UN Inter-Agency Task Force on Religion and Development.
8. This panel’s theme is similar to the one I moderated at last week’s eleventh annual symposium on the role of religion in international affairs. Combined with our panel’s theme, both phrased as questions, it states, “The AI Genie is Out of the Bottle: Can Digital Governance Keep Up? How can AI accelerate the nation-building and modernization process?”
9. Instead of just answering the question, let me pose more similar questions. This technology will undoubtedly shape the future world order and geopolitics, influencing democratic participation and decision-making if we can predict its effects. Such developments will greatly impact nation-building. Likewise, those without the resources to access and engage with this technology will probably be left behind in the modernization process envisioned by this panel.
10. In her 2021 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, my fellow countrywoman Maria Ressa said: “Without facts, you can’t have truth. Without truth, you can’t have trust. Without these three, we have no shared reality, no rule of law, no democracy.” So, will AI be a vehicle, a medium, or a harbinger, if you will, of facts, truth, and trust, or a peddler of their opposites, such as misinformation and disinformation? Can AI serve democratic purposes? Will it help reverse or worsen the shrinking public space for democratic discussion and involvement?
11. So, how can we keep up with this rapidly advancing and innovative technology? Is drafting a UN Convention on AI a viable option? AI is evolving quickly and becoming expensive for struggling economies to support. Without regulation, it risks leaving some people behind, worsening existing social, digital, and gender gaps and inequalities, and jeopardizing any efforts for nation-building and modernization.
12. Do we have the necessary tools to start shaping digital governance? Are our efforts aligned with the commitment made at the World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis in 2005, which stated, “We reaffirm our desire and commitment to building a people-centered, inclusive, and development-oriented Information Society, grounded in the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, international law, and multilateralism, fully respecting and upholding the Universal Declaration of Human Rights…?”, and more?
13. Consider the remarks made by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to the UN Security Council about Artificial Intelligence, dated July 18, 2023:

“We need a race to develop AI for good. To develop AI that is reliable and safe and that can end poverty, banish hunger, cure cancer, and supercharge climate action. AI that propels us towards the Sustainable Development Goals. That is the race we need, and that is a race that is possible and achievable…”

But the SG also warned: “AI tools can also be used by those with malicious intent. AI models can help people to harm themselves and each other at a massive scale…I urge you to join forces and build trust for peace and security.”

14. How far along are we in developing the multilateral digital regime following the UNSG’s remarks and the landmark resolution adopted on March 21, 2024, by the UN General Assembly titled “Seizing the Opportunities of Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence Systems for Sustainable Development”?
15. From the discussions at last week’s symposium, I learned that AI governance has progressed much more rapidly than other digital technologies. This shows that values and assumptions are already shaping how AI is managed.
16. Key concepts in AI governance remain unresolved, and there is a significant lack of representation from the global majority. Governance mechanisms must acknowledge cultural differences in values, requiring the inclusion of diverse voices in policymaking.
17. Human rights establish a common language and provide a solid foundation for governance, improving the interoperability of various approaches. We commend the UN for creating bodies that address the need for increased global participation in AI governance. However, we hope to see more clarity and coherence across various governance initiatives. Past digital policymaking efforts became disjointed and hard to navigate, raising concerns that this problem could happen again.
18. A strong moral compass is essential for guiding digital communication toward an ethical true north, defined by respect for peace and fundamental values such as freedom, equality, solidarity, tolerance, shared responsibility, and respect for nature. Thanks to OCCAM and the Infopoverty Conference, this moral compass effectively reflects these values.

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Accelerating Gender Equality in the Digital Age:
Leveraging WSIS+20 Milestones and Beyond

Intervention by Liberato Bautista

March 20, 2025 | 13:15 -14:30 EST | UN HQ New York

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen:

1. Thank you so much, Gitanjali, for inviting me to speak at the upcoming ITU event: “Accelerating Gender Equality in the Digital Age: Leveraging WSIS+20 Milestones and Beyond.” I also appreciate Caitlin’s thoughtful question about how civil society organizations can play a role in advancing and advocating for gender equality, especially in the digital world, and the steps we can take to support their efforts in this important area.

2. I want to emphasize that the extensive preparations for the meaningful involvement of civil society in CSW69 have been supported by the NGO CSW Forum. This achievement results from the perseverance and dedication to gender equality and inclusion demonstrated by the NGO Committee on the Status of Women in New York, which organized both the Forum and the NGO Consultation, with the participation of the NGO CSW in Vienna and Geneva. NGO CSW New York is one of more than 30 NGO committees based in New York, Geneva, and Vienna that focus on specific geographic and thematic issues within the multilateral agenda, overseen by various United Nations agencies, especially the UN Commission on the Status of Women.
3. Numerous side events offered through the NGO CSW website focused on issues of digital and communications justice. Just over an hour ago, I spoke at a side event co-organized by the Permanent Mission of Romania, Soroptimist International, and CoNGO, which focused on the evolving nature of violence against women, with technology playing an increasingly important role.
4. I wish to emphasize the importance of CoNGO’s focus on information and communication technologies (ICTs) and, more recently, artificial intelligence (AI) in all aspects of human life and our planetary existence. This emphasis is not entirely new, although it continues to develop with each technological advancement. CoNGO actively participated in the Geneva (2003) and Tunis (2005) conferences of the World Summit on the Information Society. Since those events, CoNGO has been involved in the WSIS Forum and subsequent High-Level Event Forums. We now anticipate the collaboration fostered by the historic WSIS and the emerging Global Digital Compact.
5. In December 2010, the Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) held an “Open Consultation on the Process Toward Enhanced Cooperation on International Public Policy Issues Pertaining to the Internet.” At that time, civil society organizations acknowledged “the need to initiate and reinforce, as appropriate, a transparent, democratic, and multilateral process involving governments, the private sector, civil society, and international organizations in their respective roles. This process could envision a suitable framework or mechanisms, where justified, to stimulate the ongoing and active evolution of current arrangements to synergize efforts in this regard.”
6. It is essential to recognize ECOSOC Resolution E/Res/2024/13 for acknowledging the WSIS Process and its open, multistakeholder consultations, which have led to achievements, key trends, challenges, and opportunities related to the World Summit action lines aimed at reaching the Sustainable Development Goals. Currently, initiatives similar to those within the scope of WSIS must address the growing concern about the digital divide and its deep connection to gender and economic disparities.
7. This is precisely what CoNGO and Soroptimist International did on March 8, 2025, during International Women’s Day (IWD). Together with 124 NGOs worldwide, 99 of which hold ECOSOC consultative status, we declared, “While some progress has been made, the harsh reality remains three decades later. Violence against women and girls continues to be a global emergency, with one in three women worldwide facing some form of physical, psychological, emotional, economic, or sexual violence during their lifetime. Addressing this crisis requires confronting systemic violence and dismantling harmful, deeply rooted gender norms in both public and private spheres, online and offline. In today’s digital age, the misuse of technology, including artificial intelligence (AI), worsens the dangers that women and girls face daily… The future of information and communication technology (ICT), including digital and AI systems, must emphasize inclusivity, ethical issues, and the diverse needs of all women, girls, and marginalized groups. Creating and implementing these systems to ensure equal representation of women and girls in technological development will produce ICT and AI systems that better mirror our global society, encompassing various cultures, experiences, and values. It is also vital to educate all users of online platforms about new forms of online and offline violence to help prevent harm and safeguard themselves from becoming victims. This focus is especially critical for marginalized groups who are most vulnerable to online abuse, including women and girls, youth, and indigenous peoples.”
8. I thank the ITU Secretary General, Madam Doreen Bogdan-Martin, for acknowledging the statement and replying with a letter in which she admitted that “while AI offers transformative opportunities in education, healthcare, and economic growth, we must also stay alert about potential risks, including algorithmic biases.”
9. The current Information and Communication Technology (ICT) framework, under the auspices of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), is essential to our pursuit of digital solidarity and communicative justice. The involvement of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and civil society actors in this effort is crucial. Additionally, I want to highlight three provisions within the CSW69 Political Declaration that underscore our focus and concerns regarding technology, especially as a tool for new forms of violence against women and girls. The declaration states that we must ensure that “women and girls have equal access to safe, accessible, and affordable digital technology.” In a broader sense, we should interpret access as a means of empowerment and capacity building for women and girls, which ultimately transforms access into a way to uphold their human rights and fundamental freedoms, including participation in all decision-making processes that affect them, their bodies, and their communities.
10. Digital access is essential; however, its meaningful and sustainable realization depends on fair, sustainable, and equitable economic conditions, along with democratic and peaceful political environments. Access thrives in settings that protect civil and democratic rights, as well as justice in information and communications. Economic disparities greatly threaten all aspects of this access, with women and girls facing even greater disadvantages under such conditions. Addressing the digital divide must align with the larger goal of achieving social and economic justice. These issues are connected to gender, communication, and digital fairness. No single plan can succeed without others’ support, as the root causes of social injustice, including deep-rooted patriarchy, continue to marginalize women and girls.
11. In my remarks at the side event organized by the UN Group on the Information Society during the UN High-Level Political Forum 2024 (WSIS Toward the Summit of the Future and Beyond), I emphasized the milestones of WSIS to “achieve a shared vision, desire, and commitment to build a people-centric, inclusive, and development-oriented Information Society.” This mission represents a proven legacy that civil society strives to uphold through WSIS—extending beyond Agenda 2030, far surpassing the Pact for the Future and its annexes, into a more distant future that is not only constrained by time but also visionary.
12. CoNGO expressed appreciation for the United Nations General Assembly’s resolution adopted on March 11, 2024, concerning “Seizing the Opportunities of Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence Systems for Sustainable Development” (A/78/L.49). This resolution fully recognizes the WSIS Process and its related documentation. CoNGO looks forward to actively participating in the comprehensive review of the “progress made since the World Summit on the Information Society” scheduled for 2025. This review is very important, as the recently ratified Global Digital Compact reaffirms that “internet governance must continue to be global and multistakeholder in nature… and that it must adhere to the provisions outlined in the outcomes of the summits held in Geneva and Tunis, including those related to enhanced cooperation” (GDC 27).
13. Internet governance is closely connected to democratic principles, especially inclusion and exclusion. The WSIS must guarantee safe and fair access to the devices and applications needed for connectivity. Inclusion and access are crucial, particularly because the growing digital divide, combined with uneven economic development, threatens our hopes for universal connectivity benefits. Internet governance must address the issue of access to technologies that are increasingly tied to capital and profit. Furthermore, no individual should be allowed to claim digital knowledge or technology without facing the proper consequences from the powers of technology and capital. This concern makes me very uneasy when technology and market interests come together, affecting our democratic institutions, especially in democratic processes like elections and public discourse, at every level of human life and planetary sustainability. When such convergence happens, the existing divides—gender, digital, and economic—are likely to deepen and grow, thereby negatively impacting already marginalized populations, including women and girls.
14. For these and other reasons, CoNGO advocates for collaboration to advance the WSIS mission of developing and improving meaningful internet governance and promoting cooperation. Collective efforts must be made to provide WSIS with the necessary resources to build the infrastructure, technological architecture, and ethos of a truly global framework that is open, inclusive, people-centered, gender-just, human rights-focused, participatory, equitable, and democratic. Such an ethos must thrive, making the practice of universal human rights and the goal of sustainable development both tangible and accessible.
15. The current digital divide and widespread disinformation on social media do not bode well for a world already overwhelmed by fear and anxiety. In one of only three instances in the CSW69 political declaration where the welfare of women and girls is mentioned as part of the UN member-states’ “political will and firm commitment” in addressing “existing and emerging challenges,” it states. I conclude: “Adopting a comprehensive approach to eliminating violence that occurs through or is amplified by the use of technology, including its design, development, and deployment. This involves fighting against the use of digital tools, such as social media, online platforms, and artificial intelligence, for harassment, racism, trafficking in persons, and all forms of sexual exploitation and abuse of women and girls.”

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References:

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_______________________________________

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Artificial and Yet Real: Artificial Intelligence—From Warfare to Welfare

A Presentation by Liberato C. Bautista at the XXIII Infopoverty World Conference under the auspices of the Observatory for Digital Communications (OCCAM) and collaborators

“A.I. turmoils digital processes: how to act to ensure human rights and provide e-welfare for all?”

12 April 2024 | CR11 | UNHQ New York

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,

Thank you, Mr. Civili, chair, for the kind introduction.

I want to thank Mr. Pierpaolo Saporito, president of OCCAM and the intellectual architect behind these Infopoverty Conferences, for including me and the Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the UN (CoNGO) again in this year’s conference. I cannot recall how many times I have spoken at these conferences, possibly 10 of the 23.

This year’s infopoverty conference theme continues the orientation toward human rights, global solidarity, and e-welfare, which are crucial if we address what this conference’s objectives describe as “critical gaps,” naming, among others, food security, health, and education.

I cannot agree more. The twin foci of eliminating hunger and eradicating poverty distill the 17 SDGs into a framework that matters to humanity’s survival and the planet’s sustainability. Hunger and poverty, peace and sustainability are words comprehensible to ordinary people experiencing economic hardships, political instabilities, and social and health inequalities.

How exciting it would be if AI were oriented to achieving these!

The digitization of information and the digitalization of knowledge must be oriented to the specific proposition of communications justice and the larger social justice project.

AI is fast-moving and expensive for struggling economies to fund. Unless regulated, it will leave others behind, widening existing social, digital, and gender gaps and inequalities.

Indigenous peoples, whose indigenous knowledge is digitally archived, are asking—with no electricity and computers on the reservation—will we have access again in the future to our knowledge base, which is being digitalized?

Some young people in Africa are asking their governments—by digitalizing information on the SDGs, isn’t it a violation of our human rights if we did not have electronic access to such information due to lack of electricity and computers in our homes and villages?

As this panel suggests, a holistic approach is needed, but even more so, one that ingrains human rights and social justice values to ensure e-welfare is true welfare for all.

Could A.I. be harnessed to achieve such ends?

The theme and argument for this opening panel point to the necessity of a “holistic approach” to AI, recognizing that it “presents both risks and opportunities for human well-being.” The use of the word “turmoils” in the conference’s theme caught my attention, asserting what it said is the predominant use of AI in warfare {and surveillance } rather than in welfare. Indeed, today, military and defense spending (warfare) far exceeds by leaps and bounds spending in social safety nets (welfare).

How can we use ICTs, including AI, in the service of humanity? How can we use these technologies to serve humanity and people’s longings for economic justice, human rights, participatory democracy, and more?

In a world where fear is in excess, and hope is in deficit, the use of technologies, including AI, when they multiply such fear and deflate such hope, does not augur well for achieving peace and prosperity for people and the planet—the Agenda 2030 mantra.

Such thinking is on the agenda of CoNGO when it meets on April 28 in Bangkok during the UN ESCAP annual meetings. A panel will address the topic AI: Artificial and Yet Real,” exploring how AI might serve humanity’s survival and the planet’s sustainability.

At the 2021 Infopoverty conference, I posited that “the digitization of knowledge and information and the digitalization of the same are fraught with moral and ethical considerations.

Talking about the digital divide and digital inequalities points to some of these moral and ethical issues because they intersect with larger economic, political, social, and cultural divides.

“Because communication is intrinsic to our humanity and the relations we build, the right to communication and access to information are “basic human rights, essential to human dignity and a just and democratic society.”

Building a future with technologies changing by the second and a future besieged by intersecting health and social pandemics is commendable at best and mission impossible at worst.

I am pleased that both CoNGO and OCCAM are conduits of the ongoing multilateral processes arising from the World Summit on Information Society in Geneva (2003) and Tunis (2005). We have joined forces at the annual WSIS Forums in Geneva, where issues such as ICTs for SDGs are prime agenda items.

CoNGO welcomes the UN General Assembly resolution on “Seizing the opportunities of safe, secure and trustworthy artificial intelligence systems for sustainable development,” issued on 21 March 2024. I hope today’s deliberations provide input to the Summit of the Future in September, including the Zero Draft of the Pact for the Future, primarily as it addresses the digital society through a Digital Compact.

CoNGO is drafting a working paper on the Summit of the Future, with the placeholder title, “The Present in the Future Tense: The Grammar and Implements of a Just, Peaceable, Inclusive, and Sustainable Future.” This conference will inform the drafting.

These ethical lenses bring subsidiary but intrinsic values to “Information Communications Technology.” Justice, sustainability, and participatory democracy are ethical values at the core of the voice and agency of human beings who are conscious producers and consumers of digitalized knowledge and information.

A strong moral compass is needed to direct digital communication to the ethical true north whose elements constitute the respect for peace and the fundamental values of freedom, equality, solidarity, tolerance, shared responsibility, and respect for nature.

Crucial to the principle of access and stewardship in the use of information communications technology is the recognition of vulnerable and marginalized peoples, especially migrants, internally displaced peoples, older persons, people with disabilities, and refugees. Will their real knowledge figure in artificial intelligence?

Ladies and gentlemen,

The Digital Society we ought to foster must be peaceable and secure—for the people and the planet. By security, I mean beyond national security into human and planetary security. I am excited about this year’s Infopoverty conference because it covers these and more.

Thank you for your kind attention.

InfoPoverty_ArtificialIntelligence__OCCAM.12April2024

The Crucial Role of NGOs at WSIS+20 and Policymaking on ICTs

Intervention by Liberato Bautista

SPECIAL WSIS+20 FORUM HIGH-LEVEL EVENT SESSION
26 March 2024 | 14:00 -15:00 CET | ITU Geneva

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen:

1. The Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations (CoNGO) reaffirms its commitment to the WSIS Process. We attended the two world conferences in Tunis and Geneva and the subsequent WSIS Forums. We confirm our participation in the WSIS+20 High-Level event. It is a commitment and a recognition of the critical role of civil society and non-governmental actors in the WSIS Process.
2. We engage in the WSIS Process, recognizing that “ITU and WSIS have established exemplary procedures enabling a most open and transparent participatory process that could well be emulated elsewhere throughout the UN System” (C. Ritchie). The Open Consultation Process has been crucial to the inclusive and participatory character of the multistakeholder platform modeled by the WSIS Process.
3. We join the Swiss Ambassador’s statement at this meeting, reiterating the WSIS Process as the global venue and forum for information, communication, and digital technology policy. CoNGO has made several interventions at WSIS Forums on many action lines, especially the ethical dimensions and challenges that ICTs bring.
4. We engage the WSIS process because, at CoNGO, we prioritize access to the UN’s substantive agenda, including digitized information and knowledge and access to the UN’s physical premises and meetings. The ICT regime currently in place within the ambit and mandate of WSIS is foundational to this direction toward digital and communications justice. The involvement of NGOs and civil society actors in such a direction is critical.
5. CoNGO welcomed the action taken on 11 March by UN General Assembly entitled “Seizing the opportunities of safe, secure and trustworthy artificial intelligence systems for sustainable development” (A/78/L.49 ). In this GA resolution, the WSIS Process and relevant documents related to it is amply acknowledged. CoNGO looks forward to contributing to the overall review of the “progress made since the World Summit on the Information Society” in 2025.
6. This coming April, CoNGO’s Regional Committee in Asia-Pacific will meet in Bangkok during the annual meeting of UN ESCAP. It will also convene a panel on “Artificial and Yet Real: Artificial Intelligence for Sustainable Development and Humanity.” This event will engage the ITU-led Artificial Intelligence for Good Platform.
7. I look forward to meeting as many of you in Geneva this May at the WSIS+20 High-Level event.

Intervention_WSIS+20_HighLevelEvent_26March2024

Taking Stock and the Way Forward for Civil Society in International Drug
Policymaking: Commemorating the NYNGOC’s 40th Anniversary

Speech by Liberato Bautista

March 19, 2024 | Room M6 | Vienna International Center

UN Office at Vienna

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, good morning. I want to thank all governments, UN entities, and civil society groups collaborating on this side event at CND67.

1. Congratulations, New York NGO Committee on Drugs, on passing a significant milestone after forty years of supporting civil society in engaging with the UN system! As the only committee of the Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the UN working on drug and drug policy issues and practice, I extend CoNGO’s thanks for all your contributions to these issues and concerns.
2. The NYNGOC has played an essential role over the last four decades in supporting the work of the CND and UNODC, including during the “Beyond 2008” NGO forum, which preceded the 2009 High-Level Meeting on Drugs, as well as more recent examples of the Civil Society Task Force, which facilitated global NGO participation at the 2016 UNGASS and the 2019 Ministerial Segment, and by facilitating global civil society participation for the 2024 mid- term review.
3. These civil society engagements are examples of the essential role of civil society in multilateral and global governance, which are in keeping with the implementation of ECOSOC Resolution 1996/31 governing NGO participation at the UN, especially in all ECOSOC functional commissions, including CND, and not just in Vienna but UN systemwide worldwide.
4. Our advocacy for robust NGO engagement with the UN and its member states occurs against a backdrop of shrinking civic space. CoNGO’s constant refrain is for equitable access to the physical premises and the substantive agenda of the UN.
5. Effective collaboration among diverse entities can enhance system-wide coherence between drug control and the UN pillars of peace and security, human rights, and sustainable agenda, including Agenda 2030 and the SDGs. Such collaboration is critical to crafting a pact for a shared and collective future.
6. CoNGO looks forward to continued UN and NGO collaboration, including NYNGOC’s crucial role for the next forty years and beyond!

Taking_Stock_NYNGOC_40_CND.Vienna

Partnerships and solidarity are meaningful ways to face the present and the future together

Speech by Liberato Bautista

ECOSOC PARTNERSHIP FORUM 2024

30 January 2024 | ECOSOC Chamber | UN Headquarters | New York

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen:

1. Madam ECOSOC President, Ambassador Paula Narvaez, thank you for having the Conference of Non-Governmental Organizations in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations, also called CoNGO, address this 2024 ECOSOC Partnership Forum.
2. This Forum’s focus is timely if urgent. Any discussion of eradicating poverty, eliminating hunger, acting on climate change, achieving peace and justice, and growing partnerships for the goals must involve collaboration and partnerships among all peoples, nations, and institutions. Nothing less will work if we are to make progress with Agenda 2030 and the SDGs.
3. At the Conference of NGOs, consultation, collaboration, and cooperation undergird our advocacy for meaningful access to the physical premises of the UN and to the substantive promises of sustainable development, peace and security, human dignity, and human rights, which are the very pillars of the UN System.
4. Over the years, I have advocated for NGOs and civil society to be assured of time and space to address UN bodies, especially ECOSOC. Today, Madam President, you made it possible in a more meaningful way by interspersing our interventions between member state and UN entity speakers, ensuring time no longer runs out on us. This is part of a true partnership—indeed, of multilateralism—that I hope grows and continues.
5. I hope the strong statements in support of civil society delivered here by many will be reflected better in the ongoing deliberations leading to the Summit of the Future and in the text of the Pact for the Future.
6. Excellencies and colleagues, even as we address the Agenda 2030 and the SDGs, we recognize the poly-crises and intersecting pandemics- not just health but social pandemics—we face today under conditions of uneven economic development. Partnerships and solidarity are meaningful ways to face the present and the future together. Let’s muster the courage and resources to make them real.
7. I thank you for your kind attention.

CoNGO_President_ECOSOC_Partnership_Forum_2024

Healing and Wholeness for Biological Bodies and the Body Politic
The Case for Advancing Gender Equality and Economic Empowerment Through Health Worker Migration and the Role of Civil Society and Nurses in Advancing Health and Other Global Public Goods at the UN and Worldwide

A Presentation by Liberato C. Bautista

11 March 2024 | Salvation Army Auditorium | New York City

Excellencies, distinguished representatives from the UN System, esteemed NGO colleagues, ladies, and gentlemen:

1. Thank you, Dr. Peter Preziosi—President and CEO of CGFNS International—for this singular honor to speak at this CSW68 parallel event on such an essential topic as advancing gender equality and economic empowerment through health worker migration. I treasure this occasion as CoNGO President. CGFNS is the Secretary, and thus an officer, of the Board of CoNGO—the Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations. The participation of CGFNS in the life of CoNGO is a prime example of the power and importance of consultation, collaboration, and cooperation in our interlocutory role vis-a-vis the United Nations System.
2. At the outset, I also want to say that holding this event at the Salvation Army Auditorium—part of the building that houses the International Social Justice Commission of the Salvation Army—evokes special meaning and emotion. Sixteen years ago, 2008 to be exact, this building was inaugurated, and I was invited to deliver an inaugural speech—both in my capacity as CoNGO President and as the Main Representative at the UN for the General Board of Church and Society of The United Methodist Church. You may not know that the Methodist family and the Salvation Army trace their roots to John Wesley and the holiness movement. Why do I mention this at a CGFNS event? This shared Wesleyan ethos is steeped in the “joining of mercy and justice, of heart and hand, and witness and service.” Thank you, Salvation Army, for making this facility available as an extension of NGOs’ physical access to the UN’s thematic agenda.
3. I refer to the joining of works of mercy and works of justice because it provides a theoretical handle to place the role of healthcare in achieving health, healing, and wholeness and advancing gender equality and economic empowerment. I put this framework up front to say that the healing and wellness of the biological body and the body politic are critical discourses in sustainable development, if not healthcare. This is why I welcome the complexity of your theme. The health sector, especially nursing, is a predominantly women’s profession and, therefore, must be naturally concerned about achieving gender equality and economic empowerment. This is crucial to attaining women’s human dignity and rights, if also for everyone.
4. Last week, I was in Jakarta, Indonesia, where I keynoted an international consultation of a tripartite gathering of migrants, refugees, asylum seekers, domestic workers, and people caught in the many forms of trafficking (human, labor, sex, drug, and trafficking in human organs), accompanied by migrant and refugee service agencies and several religious institutions from around the world. This group has met regularly for the last 12 years. They offer a viable formulation to address migration and its attendant challenges and advance gender equality and economic empowerment. This tripartite gathering in Indonesia has been developing this framework over the lifetime of its work, which refers to building infrastructures of welcome and hospitality and creating an architecture of protection and solidarity. The infrastructure refers to immediate acts of mercy or the need to attend to the immediate healing of the human body. Architecture refers to the need to develop, institute, and systematize legislation and public policy to ensure social justice, including gender justice, economic justice, labor and migration justice, climate justice, and so much more.
5. I submit that advancing gender equality and economic empowerment through health worker migration cannot be addressed in isolation from the more significant political and economic empowerment issues for all people. I say this as someone from the Philippines, where many of the world’s healthcare workers—nurses, doctors, and medical technologists come from. In my discussion with Dr. Preziosi and his CGFNS teams, I have mentioned the dual challenge of brain drain from migrant-sending countries and brain gain in the receiving countries. Alas, brain gain is not the dominant vision of health worker migration, but rather, in the general public’s view, it is just one more instance of local employment grabbed by a foreign worker. Education about migrant justice must form part of our advocacy for gender equality.
6. I am especially pleased with the number of NGOs in the health profession, especially nurses who are members of CoNGO. Aside from CGFNS, there is the ICN, SONSIEL (Society of Nurse Scientists, Innovators, Entrepreneurs, and Leaders), the Katharine J. Densford Center for International Nursing Leadership at the University of Minnesota School of Nursing, and NIGH (Nightingale Initiative for Global Health). The nursing profession can genuinely be on the mission to “heal bodies” as much as to “heal nations”—the body politic and the citizenry, if you will. A healthy people make for a healthy nation. However, healthcare must benefit from robust public funding. Otherwise, this health, which should be a commonwealth, is imperiled, unraveling inequalities in health care and access to the necessities that make for just, resilient, and inclusive health for all, not to mention health as a human right.
7. Consider this: migration today is mainly about labor chasing significant capital and capital chasing cheap labor. In this dynamic, it is crucial not to commodify the human body and commoditize their labor and services. Academic studies have shown that in the globalization of labor, migration has been gendered and sexualized, racialized and ethnicized, 3) even militarized and securitized. Migrating nurses and all people in situations of mobility must be spared and protected from this exploitative and oppressive dynamic. This is a matter of concern not just in migration and labor justice but also in the framework of “brain drain, brain gain.” Consider, too, that the labor export policies of certain countries are critical in ensuring the steady flow of hard currency, which is crucial, for example, to a country like the Philippines. The massive movement of labor across borders, including forced movement–requires a just, durable, and sustainable solution, especially under conditions of uneven development of economies and structural inequalities within and among countries. The demographics of migration—which countries are the biggest nurse-sending and nurse-receiving—give us a pretty good idea about the politics and economics of labor migration today. Just the remittances of healthcare workers to their countries of origin is an economic narrative one cannot ignore just because of the sheer amount they contribute to national economies.
8. Consider this larger picture borrowed from another keynote speech in the Jakarta meeting I attended. Joanna Concepcion, the Chairperson of Migrante International, said, “Around 60% of developing countries are in debt or high risk. The latest data in 2021 shows that 39 countries paid more in principal and interest than the new loans they received. The United States has even raised interest rates, and indebted countries will have to pay more to borrow and pay off their debts. Sixty-two countries in the world are now spending more on foreign debt than on healthcare. While public debt continues to rise, budgets for critical, vital social services, education, healthcare, support for farmers and local agricultural production, and support for workers and laborers are cut, severely impacting the poorest communities. We have been hearing the phrase “post- pandemic recovery.” Still, for the world’s working people, it has only meant that the inequalities they have already faced before the pandemic are only worsening daily. While big businesses continue to reap higher profits, billions of workers are paid slave wages. The wages of billions of workers cannot keep up with inflation, rising energy costs, and essential goods. In 2022, the average global inflation reached its highest level in two decades. More and more people do not have long-term job security or are underemployed. The number of unemployed globally rose to 207 million in 2022, increasing by 21 million compared to 2019. At least 435 million more women and girls have been pushed to extreme poverty. Women and girls in the global South particularly bear the worst impacts of the rising living costs, and the majority of them are forced into informal employment. (IBON) This is the context in which economic empowerment and gender equality must be seen—for the healthcare worker as much as any other migrant worker. Their hard-earned dollars are crucial in the uneven development of economies. This is why achieving the 17 SDGs is vital, even as they are not the entirety of what needs to be done.”
9. Nurses and nurse practitioners are prime deliverers of an infrastructure of healing and wholeness, which you excel in doing in your workplaces. But you are essential interlocutors in the development at the UN of international norms and standards that compose the architecture of solidarity and protections, which are the legal frameworks and arrangements that protect and promote all human rights for all, including health rights, women’s rights, and worker’s rights, including the ones that protect you in the workplace, in the recruitment process, and the migration route from origin to destination. This is why I am continually encouraged and impressed with the work of CGFNS in developing and flourishing ethical recruitment policies for healthcare workers.
10. I am also excited at the launch today of CGFNS Insights Brief – Advancing Gender Equality and Economic Empowerment Through Nurse Migration, which, among others, highlights the following:
    1. As the most significant profession within healthcare, nursing is pivotal to a country’s ability to provide essential and comprehensive care. As a female-dominated profession, it offers unique economic opportunities to women, and nurses are often seen as beacons of female empowerment within their communities.
    2. As a female-dominated profession, the status of women and nurses are closely intertwined. Nurse migration enables women to bring their expertise across borders, benefiting individuals, families, and economies in both source and destination countries.
    3. Although gender disparities, discrimination, and lack of leadership positions persist for women in the nursing profession, recognizing the pivotal role of nursing in advancing gender equality and economic empowerment for women and girls worldwide underscores the need for concerted efforts to support and empower this profession.
11. Friends and colleagues, I want to repeat what I said to you in 2022. The nursing profession is in a strategic place to address the social inequalities, not just in health but in other aspects of society. This is to say that the biological body’s health, healing, and wholeness are equally dependent on the health, healing, and wholeness of the body politic and the planet Earth. I have in mind nurses being crucial partners in building back better and justly from the ravages of intersecting pandemics in health, the economy, and our environment, including from the pandemic of violence and gender inequality. This, even as I also hasten to add that nurse and health worker migration is part of that transborder and transnational movement of peoples, which should be protected within the framework that the freedom of movement is a protected human right.
12. Justice is at the heart of health for all. Health for all is a principle underlying the more excellent principle that health is a global public good and that all those who work to protect and promote health play crucial roles in the public’s overall health. Today, I want to thank the nurses who chose to move. Human mobility is more than just a biological function. Where we stay, as much as why we leave places of meaning and memory in our lives and relations, are decisions of geopolitical import. For every migrant nurse attending to your care and well-being, please always thank them. They left places of meaning and people they love so that they can earn with dignity and respect and remit some of their earnings to their families and loved ones. In the same vein, I want to thank CGFNS International again for its work of flourishing the voice and agency of nurses in achieving gender equality and economic empowerment so that they can do and do best what their profession has trained them for—helping people and their relations heal, including their relation to the planet, for themselves, their families, and their communities. Thank you for your indulgence.

CGFNS_CSW68_11March2024

Sharing: To Eradicate Poverty, Strengthen Institutions and
World Education for Reconciliation and Peace
A Presentation by Liberato C. Bautista1
at a Side Event organized by the

Foundation for Subjective Experience and Research (Germany)
on the sides of the 68th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women

13 March 2024 | CR10 | Church Center for the UN | New York

1. Thank you, Josefine Brecht, for having me on this panel on a crucial and urgent topic, such as eradicating poverty, strengthening institutions, and the need for peace and reconciliation in the world, and achieving them through education that is at once local and global—which global citizenship education must be about. I am especially delighted that the Foundation for Subjective Experience and Research is a member of CoNGO. I have been involved in their programs in New York and Germany, including their network, which includes the Baltic Sea Forum.
2. The theme for today’s discussion is at once simple and complex. Simple because who can disagree with the urgency of eradicating poverty or the need for education (local, global, and perhaps education for global citizenship, too)? And who can disagree with the need for reconciliation and peace today? Possibly, no one disagrees with these aspirations, but how and what kind of resources we must gather and mobilize, and who must do them and make them possible, is the more challenging part of the theme. The organizers suggest that SHARING is that value that makes it possible. I agree.
3. Let me characterize the social, economic, and political context in which we are and why eradicating poverty and achieving gender equality and gender justice are urgent. Today, there is a surplus of fear and a deficit of hope among the world’s people. I have often spoken about fear and hope because people’s futures and those of our planets are at stake. That future is imperiled. People and the planet are imperiled. It is so imperiled that forecasting the future might require an immediate and minimal undertaking—eliminating hunger and eradicating poverty. Even as we affirm the interdependence and interrelatedness of the 17 SDGs, these and other development goals revolve around an ethical imperative that if we fail it, all else will fall short— and that ethical imperative is eliminating hunger and eradicating poverty. As governments, civil society groups, and the UN System get closer to the UN Civil Society Conference (Nairobi, May 9-10, 2024) and the Summit of the Future (New York, September 22-23, 2024), and as multiple stakeholders engage in the Zero Draft of the Pact for the Future, I dare say that the future will get bleaker before it gets better unless we address hunger and poverty which mires the lives and livelihoods of the majority of the world’s people.
4. Today’s theme implies the importance of strengthening multilateral institutions, which I agree with. But with caveats, to include for now the importance of revisiting the institutions that have been put in place to check the excesses of national assertions of sovereignty (transborder aggression and wars, colonialism and imperial conquest) but also to harness the power of working together under the rule of law, both national and international law. The aspect of sharing in the theme must animate this imperative to strengthen institutions so that even as nation-states assert sovereignty, such sovereignty must be in the interest of building a world animated by peace and security, human dignity and human rights, sustainable development and human progress—to quote the pillars of the UN.
5. Civil society formations, primarily organized into NGOs, are crucial in bettering our world—be it the relations of nations or the relations of peoples. Each stakeholder must play their parts—singly in their mandates and jointly with others in addressing issues that impact the well- being and dignity of populations through acts of solidarity that aim for the achievement of social justice in all its forms—gender justice, climate justice, intergenerational justice, economic justice, migration justice, climate justice, and so much more. Social justice and social solidarity are aspirations that must be pursued if peace among people, nations, and the planet is to be achieved.
6. This is why when we imagine what future we might help to carve for ourselves and future generations already born and yet to be born, our imagination of that future must include the creation of inclusive and resilient communities where livelihoods are sustainable, with decent jobs and living wages. The well-being and dignity of people and their communities are ensured. Even as we must move away from continually blaming the COVID-19 pandemic as responsible for the health dilemmas and economic problems we face today, we must still look at health justice as a critical component of social justice, without which the value of sharing will falter and not flourish.
7. Sharing can thrive and prosper when we foster transformative social protection systems in national and international policies. But even more, when we add to these arrangements the right to development that includes socially just international trade agreements, financial architecture that advances human rights, and, I must add, promotes the concept and practice of food sovereignty, which is foundational to what makes for resilience and inclusion in society, and crucial to the eradication of poverty. The survival of humanity is at stake in an ever more imperiled and unsustainable natural ecology. Intersecting crises endanger the health of people and the planet, not the least brought about by the health and social pandemics, global violence and wars, global forced migration, climate crisis, racial injustice, and so much more.
8. To decrease fear, we must affirm the fundamental principle that human dignity and human rights are non-negotiables. To increase hope, we must build a shared future for all the inhabitants of the earth and their natural ecology by promoting and safeguarding the common public goods and services indispensable to human life, their livelihoods, and their neighborhoods. At face value, you may think that decreasing fear and increasing hope are fundamental tasks of nation-states. Nay—it is a task for all. Recovery from the intersecting pandemics that people and the planet face today must not only be inclusive of and resilient for people and the planet but also just. Justice must be at the heart of recovery. After all, we are recovering from past historical injustices, including slavery, colonialism, and racism, that have marginalized peoples, plundered their lands and resources, and subverted their human dignity and their communities, primarily indigenous communities. When inclusion, resilience, and justice unite, we can move away from the prevalence of fear and transition into the resurgence of hope.
9. Justice is what rights and wrongs pandemics are made of. When justice is pursued, resilience goes beyond the human capacity to adapt. When people who have undergone injustices for centuries and among generations in their families and communities undertake acts to unyoke themselves from such injustices, I refuse to call that recovery. It is transformation in its most fundamental, if revolutionary, sense. We must not consign resilience to resignation as if we will weather every climate and economic crisis without structural and systemic changes. Nay, resilience must be about uprooting the intersecting social pandemics and injustices that have entrenched people and the planet in hunger and poverty.
10. The impoverization that has resulted from shameful acts of injustice in human history has plunged our planet into the precipice of unsustainability and the resulting dehumanization and commodification of people and populations everywhere. The concerns of this side event are most commendable because they can summon and mobilize both material and moral resources to undo the entanglements of public policy with such injustices that allow for poverty and hunger and for wars and violence to linger longer. And if this happens, our yearnings for successfully implementing the SDGs and achieving gender justice will have come to naught.
11. We must increase hope and decrease fear through arrangements that genuinely put people and the planet at the center of the local and global public imagination and public policy action. We certainly need global leadership—and global citizenship education—to help identify catalytic action and strategies for transformative change. Multilateralism and sovereignty as we know them today must be reformed if reformulated, as they will no longer suffice for that catalytic and transformative change I have described.
12. The challenge to multilateralism today is not only that the world’s problems have exponentially multiplied over as imagined since the Peace of Westphalia in the early 17th century that endowed us with the notion of sovereignty and sovereign nation-states who can contract treaties between and among them. The true challenge to multilateralism lies in the urgency that these sovereign nation-states recognize how each of their people and their natural ecology is tied to the survivability and sustainability of all others and that acting together globally is in their local and national interest. Doing so makes for that peace and reconciliation conceived in this side event’s concept note.
13. In my former office at the National Council of Churches in the Philippines hangs a poster produced by the Peace and Justice Center in Marin, California. The text on the poster said these words that continue to influence my thinking and doing: “At the table of peace shall be bread and justice.” Food invokes images of a table where we break bread together, tell stories of lives and living, families forge solidarity, and peace talks are held. I agree with this image because the peace we seek needs women and youth to populate the tables of peace where bread and water, peace and justice, are served.

Thank you for your kind attention.

SER_CSW68_13March2024

Strengthen Social Justice and Solidarity at the Core of ECOSOC and HLPF’s Mandates

Speech by Liberato Bautista

At the second informal consultation to review the General Assembly resolutions 75/290 A and 75/290 B and their annexes on strengthening the Economic and Social Council and the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development

7 March 2024 | ECOSOC Chamber | United Nations, New York

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen:

1. The Conference of NGOs in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations, also called CoNGO, which is in general consultative status with ECOSOC, thanks the distinguished Co-Facilitators, the Permanent Representatives of the Republic of Latvia and the Republic of Guinea, for inviting me to this second informal consultation to review the General Assembly resolutions 75/290 A and 75/290 B and their annexes on strengthening the Economic and Social Council and the High-level Political Forum on sustainable development. This is a necessary process, and I thank you for continuing to include civil society participation, especially NGOs accredited by ECOSOC.
2. The pulse and life of society are its people. Civil society is constitutive of that pulse and life beat. People’s life stories and flourishing, as much as their struggles and strivings, must go beyond footnotes into main notes in multilateral texts. This understanding will be reinforced in Nairobi this May at the UN 2024 Civil Society Conference supporting the Future Summit of the Future. I read the Elements Paper with such a view.
3. Reading the Elements Paper, I was struck by how many items we could express our complete agreement on. Let me emphasize a few, hoping they do not get deleted along the rough and stony road of negotiation.
   1. In the Chapeau (pt. 6), we welcome the text “strong commitment to multilateralism and to accelerating implementation of the 2030 Agenda and SDGs,” even as we urge continued review of multilateralism as a crucial venue not just for addressing the future but also for the continuing past, not the least the legacies of slavery, colonialism, and racism that continues to slow down efforts to address the uneven development of peoples and nations and their economies, even political cultures. These reviews should examine how multilateral processes and ECOSOC and HLPF themes address global poverty, forced migration, health injustice, peace, violence, and the need to demilitarize national and international relations. All these, even as we affirm the interrelatedness and interdependencies of all the SDGs and the coherence of the Agenda 2030.
   2. In the Review of ECOSOC: We welcome the text related to the enhancement of the engagement of civil society…in ECOSOC meetings (Gaps. Pt. 3). But this has been said many times in as many multilaterally negotiated texts. For NGOs to contribute meaningfully to the recovery of people and the planet from the pillage of social and health pandemics, including climate change, NGOs must be afforded access to both physical premises and the promises of the UN for their voice to be heard and their expertise tapped in achieving Agenda 2030–and the promises that are about peace and prosperity, progress and partnerships, for people and the planet. This concern is underscored in the review of the HLPF Programme “Fully implement provisions of previous GA resolutions on strengthening the contribution of MGOS and NGOs to the HLPF” (Point 5), in the text “Facilitate ongoing dialogue between governments, civil society, and other stakeholders, and share best practices and lessons learned” (Pt. 6), and in the review of the HLPF, the text “Encourage the involvement of relevant stakeholders in a whole of society approach, and include stakeholders in deliberations at the national, regional and global levels” (VNRs, Pt.5).
   3. Much progress has been achieved in civil society participation and expertise in the systemwide multilateral agenda at the UN. Much more remains to be done. In this case, the ECOSOC’s Committee on NGOs is primarily responsible for advancing the implementation of ECOSOC Resolution 1996/31, which governs the consultative status of NGOs, UN systemwide, including in ECOSOC’s functional bodies in Geneva, Vienna, and the regional commissions. The Elements Paper must include this resolution regarding NGO engagement with ECOSOC. This resolution, adopted by governments, is a commitment by those same governments to ensure the optimal contribution of civil society in the work of ECOSOC. This includes accrediting NGOs from vast and varied geographic locations worldwide, but especially from underrepresented groups and regions of the global South, and in a fair, safe, inclusive, and timely manner to ensure NGOs can fully exercise their consultative status. We recognize that the ECOSOC Committee on NGOs is overworked, and its DESA Secretariat needs to be funded. It would also benefit from much more significant and timely funding of the United Nations by its member governments, a call CoNGO has frequently advocated for.In the Review of HLPF, we welcome the statement that HLPF “Themes should be informed by the recommendations of the Global Sustainable Development Report (GSDR) of 2023.” Including the “issue of internal displacement in the ECOSOC agenda” (Review of ECOSOC, Point 7) is essential and must remain in the text. Global migration, especially force and massive displacement, dispersal, and dislocation of peoples and communities, are existential threats to the flourishing of people and the planet and must be at the forefront of the ECOSOC agenda.
   4. In the Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs) section of the review of the HLPF, we welcome the text “Encourage the involvement of relevant stakeholders in a whole-of-society approach” (Pt.5). This follows the same theme as our view about participation and partnerships with civil society. Much more can be said here, but I would like to highlight for now the importance of not just the VNRs but also the work of the UN systemwide—and that is our concern for linguistic diversity and language justice. As enshrined in various rights instruments, from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, among others, human rights include linguistic human rights. We cannot forget about multilingualism as we prepare for the High-Level Political Forum and the Summit of the Future. Multilingualism is a core value of the United Nations, so it must be a core consideration when implementing sustainable development. About SDG 1, in particular, let us take stock of how linguistic discrimination exacerbates poverty by excluding people from employment opportunities and other life chances. Concerning SDG 16, let us reflect on how language rights are being respected on all levels in ways that support inclusive societies and equitable institutions. Let us ensure that multilingualism for sustainable development receives the attention it deserves in the Pact for the Future.
4. Excellencies and colleagues, I conclude by expressing concern that there does not appear to have been an assessment and analysis of the implementation of the recommendations in Resolution 75/290 A and B to provide a basis for new recommendations. For example, Para. 15 of resolution 75/290A required the promotion and review of the implementation of the ministerial and political declarations – was this done? What review was carried out to facilitate the recommended improvements? New recommendations will need to be more precisely defined. Given the urgency to meet the SDGs, there is no time for generalities.
5. We are way behind in the SDG implementation. The HLPF must fulfill its mandate under resolution 67/290 when the General Assembly decided that the HLPF “shall provide political leadership, guidance and recommendations for sustainable development.” And yet, we still need to be on track to meet the goals. It is time to stop using COVID-19 as an excuse. We were off-track even before the pandemic. Moving forward, we must be bold and unflinching and leave no one behind. We need to be more explicit, more precise, more ambitious. The Elements Paper provides good ideas, but the recommendations must be specific. Ideas must now turn into transformative action.
6. As we review the work of the Council and the HLPF, our moral compasses must not veer away from justice and solidarity, indeed even compassion, as we feel the brunt of the poly- crises and intersecting health and social pandemics and face conditions of uneven economic development. ECOSOC and its leadership are in an unenviable position to lead us to a common agenda to establish a just, peaceable, and inclusive future. In line with recommendations of the UN Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on the Teaching Profession, the role of educators and the academe in teaching and enjoining all peoples of the world, diverse partners, and stakeholders in the work to achieve the SDGs and realize Agenda 2030 is crucial and necessary. Civil society can do its share in this shared work on this common agenda. I thank you for your kind attention.

CoNGO_President_ECOSOC_7March2024