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ZERO IN ON THE EMPTY CHAIR

New study sponsored by UNDP recommends a "Participation Watch" to monitor who makes the decisions at the global level.

Facility to be run by non-governmental organizations

Embargoed until 10 May 1999, 12.00 EST

New York – More and more decisions are being made at the global level, which will affect millions of people world-wide. Yet, little is know on exactly how these decisions are taken.

Most people think, for example, that the WTO has a world-wide membership and makes decisions by consensus. In fact, many developing or transition countries are not members, and decisions are made in smaller, self-selected groups.

A new study, commissioned by UNDP and entitled Global Public Goods suggests the creation of a "Participation Watch", whereby non-governmental organizations undertake an ongoing and systematic evaluation of the degree of participation and representativeness of international organizations.

This is all the more important, the editors argue, because the provision of public goods has gone global. In a democratic country, a representative body (the legislature) makes decisions on which public goods to finance, how and how much – whether to allocate resources to education, market efficiency, a clean environment, etc.

At the global level, the provision of public goods is more decentralized. But the question still remains: "Whose public goods should we finance first?" Free trade? An intact ozone layer? A world free of chemical and biological weapons? Stable financial markets? How large should the effort be? Can any one person or country speak on behalf of the "global public"?

It is urgent, therefore, to improve our systems of decision-making, and a first step would be for impartial observers to monitor the decision-making processes at the global and regional levels. Non-governmental organizations could be joined by a network of academic political scientists who would analyze the information and undertake quantitative analysis if needed. The results would then be disseminated by NGOs and their grass-root activities, and would feed the debate on a new architecture for the world.