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This is the United Nations: The U.N. and Human Development
February 21, 2008
By Zainab Abdul-Rahim
As the third event in the United Nations Association’s Council of Organizations’ seminar series, a lecture was held on February 21 regarding the U.N. and human development. The featured speakers were Fred Tipson, the director of the United Nations Development Program’s (UNDP) Washington office, and Kenneth Wollack, the president of the National Democratic Institute (NDI).
Tipson discussed the nature of UNDP’s work as a development organization, where grassroots work is connected with democratic issues. He cited the recent elections in Iraq as an example. Another election success occurred in Afghanistan in 2003, he said, when UNDP designed a process to acquire resources for the construction of electoral machinery.
UNDP is a coordinating agency for the U.N., Tipson explained, calling it the “nuts and bolts coordinator for the United Nations system.” In addition to being the head of the U.N. volunteers program, Tipson is also the head of the liaison office. He said that UNDP is a resource to other groups that work around the U.N.
Tipson went on to describe the four program areas within UNDP. The first involves democratic governments and elections, meaning that UNDP works to improve government agencies in developing countries. The second program involves poverty reduction, which handles issues regarding the quality of life as explicated in the Millennium Development Goals. Tipson called attention to a site, www.mdgmonitor.org, which tracks countries’ progress towards meeting these goals. The third program involves crisis prevention and recovery, and the fourth involves energy and the environment, Tipson added.
Wollack began his presentation by discussing NDI’s history, noting that the organization was created in response to the authoritarianism in Germany in the 1970s. He also spotlighted two other major episodes: the 1956 election in the Philippines, and communism in Chile. Both of these led to authoritarian extremes, he said. However, he argued that when democracy in those countries was supported, peace and stability were the end results.
Wollack called democracy “hard work,” because it is about a lot more than just elections. He said he believes that caution must be exercised when relying on democratic leaders.
Wollack concluded by saying that there is a growing commitment in the U.N. system and urged those attending to read the 2002 UNDP Human Development Report, because it shows that human, economic, and democratic development have to be conducted in concert with one another. He added that human development is an international duty, and not simply a U.N. effort. |
