The Ins and Outs Again?

  
The United Nations Conference on Development Assistance in Monterrey, Mexico gave another glimpse into the ins and the outs of civil society. The following is an assessment of the civil society conference that preceded the official event from the point of view of one of the "outs," the Mexico Solidarity Network:
 

GOVERNMENT-SPONSORED NGO MEETING LARGELY FAILS
A meeting of NGOs, financed in part by the Mexican government and the United Nations, largely failed in its stated efforts to provide genuine alternatives to next week's United Nation's conference on development in Monterrey, Mexico. The final declaration of the NGO conference called for modifications in the WTO, World Bank and IMF, but did not demand that the so-called "Monterrey Consensus," which has already been written for the official conference next week, be re-opened for input from civil society.

Some participants characterized the final declaration as "light." Only about half of the registered participants in the NGO forum bothered to show up, and none of the hemisphere's mass peasant, indigenous or worker movements were represented. The forum cost US$730,840, of which the Mexican government provided almost one-fourth. Additional financing came from the MacArthur Foundation, the Ford Foundation and Oxfam-Great Britain.

Non-governmental organizations and social movements are planning a much broader alternative conference next week entitled "Another World is Possible." In addition, massive demonstrations are expected to protest the official conference, which will include George Bush, Vicente Fox and other world leaders.

  
See the website of the Mexico Solidarity Network (www.mexicosolidarity.org),whose director, Tom Hansen, is the domestic coordinator of the Alliance for Responsible Trade of the Hemispheric Social Alliance.