Linking poverty, inequality, global justice – are the SDGs serious?

Gabriele Köhler

Senior Research Associate, UNRISD, Geneva

www.gabrielekoehler.net

1.) Poverty, inequality, global justice

3

Income poverty ($1,25)

1990 1993 1996 1999 2002 2005 2008 2010 20110

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

Sub-Saharan Africa (developing only) East Asia & Pacific (developing only)

China Low income countries

Source: Ortiz and Cummins. 2011. Global Inequality. UNICEF

Con

stan

t U

S$

, Ye

ar

200

0 v

alu

e

Income inequality

7

Overstretched eco-system

2.) Are the SDGs serious?

Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDGs)

UN reawakened?

“The stars are aligned for the world to take historic action to transform lives and protect the planet.”

Ban Ki-moon 2014

3. SDGs – the good stuff

Progressive, nuanced positions

• Rights and Universal Declaration of Human Rights• Gender equality and empowerment• Universal – ALL countries • Multidimensional poverty• Awareness of inequalities within and among countries• Goal of sustainable consumption and production• 3 entire goals specifically addressing climate change • Social protection floor• Development, infrastructure and industrial strategy• Relatively inclusive negotiations process

4.) SDGs: the bad parts

Fatal errors and omissions

• Lack of analysis – no political economy• Oblivious to power relations• Nil ambition vis-à-vis income poverty• Weak goals on global economic architecture• Weak notion of redistribution• Policy vacuum: no decent work policies • Issue blindness: refugees do not feature• Misleading partnerships: Public private

partnerships• Erroneous links: GDP growth and sustainability

5.) The alternatives

Regarding analysis

Employ the concept of “capitalism” to explain public poverty

juxtaposed with concentrated private wealth and planetary destruction

Regarding principles

Replace the primacy of the profit motif with ecological sustainability and social equity- a reversed hierarchy of social equity norms

Reversed normative hierarchy• Eco-social rational: economic decisions

subordinated to ecological and social justice considerations • Internalising planetary boundaries• From production of material goods to systematic

recycling• From production of material goods to provision of

services• Valorise the care economy, including care for

children, elderly, persons w special needs, refugees, migrants • Expand eco-management of cities and spaces,

of production and consumption processes

“Post growth” and sharing economies

Regarding policy: Eco-social policy1. Peace and security

2. Rights-based, universal social policies

3. A shifted economic rationale

4. A renewed attention to decent work

5. Integrated ecology policy

6. Democratic developmental welfare state and enlightened public sector

7. A new fiscal compact

8. A coherent, consensual policy agenda

9. International responsibility for social, economic and ecological justice

10. A fundamental re-think Katja Hujo and Gabriele Koehler. 2015.

6.) The initial question

Linking poverty, inequality, global justice:

are the SDGs serious?

Double character of the SDGs:

•Appropriation of transformative aspirations by the capitalist rationale and hierarchical power relations

but also•An anchor to claim rights – the role of declarations of visions and principles

Use the SDGs

•Harvest the 17 goals •Reinterpret them – use them subversively •Make sure they are achieved and overachieved•Transform global relations for a just world

Further reading• Alberto D. Cimadamore, Gabriele Koehler, Thomas Pogge, eds..2015. Poverty and the Millennium

Development Goals: A critical look forward. CROP. London: ZED Books. (forthcoming)• Peter Edward and Andrew Sumner. 2015. Philanthropy, Welfare Capitalism or Radically Different Global Economic

Model: What Would It Take to End Global Poverty within a Generation Based on Historical Growth Patterns? Working Paper 413. Centre for Global Development. http://www.cgdev.org/publication/end-global-poverty-within-generation-historical-growth

• Okwui Enwezor. 2015. All the World’s Futures, Biennale Venice. http://www.labiennale.org/en/art/exhibition/enwezor/• Jayati Ghosh. 2015. The Poverty Alleviation Way to Development. Frontline. Delhi. September 4, 2015.

http://www.frontline.in/columns/Jayati_Ghosh/the-poverty-alleviation-way-to-development/article7549958.ece• Katja Hujo and Gabriele Koehler. 2015. Welcoming a new global agenda. UNRISD SDG policy brief. www.unrisd.org

(forthcoming)• Naomi Klein. 2014. This changes everything. Capitalism vs. The Climate, New York: Simon & Schuster.• Gabriele Koehler. 2014. Some preliminary reflections on development, public policy and welfare states. in

Development and Welfare Policy in South Asia, Gabriele Koehler and Deepta Chopra, eds. London: Routledge. 9-24• … . 2015. Human rights, human security and gender: Stitching the pieces together, in Gender and Human Security,

edited by Zaneta Ozolina. Riga: Zinatne. 43-69• … . 2015. Seven Decades of Development and Now What? 2015. Journal of International Development. Special DSA

Issue. UNRISD (2010) Combating Poverty and Inequality. Structural Change, Social Policy and Politics, (Geneva: UNRISD). www.unrisd.org

• Thomas Piketty. 2014. Capital in the Twenty-First Century, Boston, Harvard University Press.• Pope Francis. 2013. Evangelii gaudium. Apostolic exhortation.

2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium.html

• United Nations. 2015.. Draft outcome document of the United Nations summit for the adoption of the post-2015 development agenda. Draft resolution submitted by the President of the General Assembly. New York. http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/69/L.85&Lang=E

• UNRISD. 2010. Combating Poverty and Inequality. www.unrisd.org• Peter Utting. 2015. Social and Solidarity Economy: Beyond the Fringe? London: ZED• Pascal Van Griethuysen. 2012. Bona diagnosis, bona curatio: How property economics clarifies the degrowth

debate. Ecological Economics. Vol 84 (2012): 262-269