Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 05/2013

Goals in a Post-2015 Development Framework: Options and Strategic Choices

David Steven

February 2013

Center on International Cooperation

Abstract

The Millennium Development Goals are a framework of eight goals , twenty-one targets , and sixty indicators .  The goals express ambitious commitments to “freeing the entire human race from want” (for example, eradicate extreme poverty and hunger ).  Targets are used to quantify each goal ( halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proporti on of people whose income is less than one dollar a day ), while indicators enable progress against these targets to be measured. Most of the MDGs focus directly on delivering outcomes for people across multiple dimensions of poverty. Meeting these goals would fulfill the commitment to freeing all “men, women and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty.” The Millennium Declaration also aimed “to create an environment ... which is conducive to development and to the elimination of poverty.” The right to development can only be delive red through “good governance within each country,” for example. Specific action is also needed to protect civilian populations from natural disasters, genocide, armed conflicts and other humanitarian emergencies. The MDG framework, however, largely excludes targets for building the effective societies on which poverty reduction depends. Some global targets are included in the framework, with poten tial benefits that stretch far beyond the poor. An open, rule-based, predictable, non-discrimi natory trading and financial system is important to “ensur[ ing] that globalization becomes a positive force for all the world’s people.” The target on biodiversity loss aims to protect both this, and future, generations “from the threat of liv ing on a planet irredeemably spoilt by human activities, and whose resources would no longer be sufficient for their needs.”