Kategorie: Allgemein

UN reform and the COVID-19 pandemic – what role for the UN to better serve the world?

By Allgemein, Future of Globalisation, , ,
Photo: Construction Site, as a symbol for “UN reform and the COVID-19 pandemic”

By Artodidact on Pixabay

The Covid-19 pandemic not only threatens to undo development gains and reverse progress in achieving the sustainable development goals of the 2030 Agenda. It also presents an early and serious test for the reform of the UN development system (UNDS), where major reform decisions were taken in 2018 to reposition the UNDS for improved, integrated and strategic support in line with the 2030 Agenda’s interlinked nature.

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Multilateral Negotiations and ‘social distancing’

By Allgemein, Future of Globalisation, ,

Photo: Empty Benches in a Park as a symbol for social distancing

The year 2020 should have seen many major international conferences, mandated to take especially important decisions to protect the environment. The Convention on Biological Diversity was set to convene in China in October for its 15th conference of the parties (COP). The 26th Climate Change Conference (COP26) should have met in the United Kingdom in November and the World Trade Organization (WTO) was supposed to hold its Ministerial Conference in June. However, since March 2020, COVID-19 has led to the cancelation or postponement of those meetings. Many other multilateral conferences have been victim of the spread of COVID-19, with governments being forced to close borders and cancel conferences. Others, such as the G7, G20, the Petersberg Climate Dialogue or European Council meetings are taking place as video conferences. Whereas a teleconference with seven leaders might be a feasible solution, the two main options for multilateral negotiations – either delaying meetings or moving them online – both pose major challenges.

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Curb your enthusiasm: Corona may slow down multilateral process, but must not derail global climate policy

By Allgemein, Future of Globalisation, , , , ,

Photo: Railroad Tracks detour, Image by Gerald Friedrich on PixabayLast night the UK government together with UN climate officials announced that the UN climate change conference “COP26” that was set to convene in Glasgow, Scotland, in November 2020, will be postponed into 2021 in response to the ongoing Corona crisis. …

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Lessons for Global Cooperation from the COVID-19 Pandemic

By Allgemein, Future of Globalisation, , , ,
Image: Numbers on a table of a stockmarket

Picture by Gerd Altmann on Pixabay

The COVID-19 (or coronavirus) disease has led to a major pandemic that has spread to virtually all countries of the world. Although at the time of writing the epidemic has mainly hit South East Asian and Western countries (see Figure below), it is likely that Developing Countries (DCs) will also be heavily affected in the weeks to come.…

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Photo: Sculpture "Tug of War", by falco on Pixabay

A quid pro quo to save the WTO’s Appellate Body

By Allgemein, Future of Globalisation, , ,

Emerging countries such as Brazil, Mexico, India, China, Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and to a lesser degree, Vietnam and Turkey have actively and successfully invoked the World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute settlement system (DSS) to defend their commercial interests. With increased participation in world trade, their stake in an effective compulsory and binding mechanism for resolving…

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