What: High Level Political Forum (HLPF) 2018 Side Event 

Where and when: 16 July 2018, 18.30: Conference Room 4, UN Building, New York
Government co-sponsors:  Norway, Ecuador (tbc)

Civil Society Partners: Together 2030, Norwegian Forum for Development and Environment, CEPEI, JDPC, Leonard Cheshire Disability, PhilSEN, Save Matabeleland Coalition, Sightsavers, World Vision International.

Email: psm@cepei.org; arelys_bellorini@wvi.org ; borghild@forumfor.no

Organization name: Together 2030 (proposal submitted on Together 2030’s behalf by CEPEI)

Type of organization: Accredited NGO

Complete name of the contact person: Philipp Schönrock

I.          Background

The side event is organized by the global civil society coalition Together 2030, a member of the Steering Group of the Major Groups and other Stakeholder Coordination Mechanism.

Climate change and other global challenges demand societies to become more flexible to withstand crises, reinventing themselves in resilient, integrated, sustainable, multi-dimensional and inclusive ways. The Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development recognizes the importance of this approach, but more is needed in order to identify concrete, collective action that move societies to be more sustainable, inclusive and resilient.

One critical element of a resilient community is the open participation of civil society. This event builds on a new report from Together 2030 on Civil Society SDG coalitions and the challenges that they face in in promoting the participatory implementation of the SDGs at national level. The survey identified that capacity, the role of multi-stakeholder partnerships and the role of government in creating a participatory environment were critical. These themes are reinforced in the 2018 Together 2030 Perceptions Survey on Stakeholder Participation in the 2030 Agenda Follow Up and Review, which will be launched at the HLPF. As the 2030 Agenda makes clear the SDGs are interlinked, and the participation of civil society in issues such as those covered in SDG 15 is as critical as on SDG 6 or 17.

The event will explore the pressure placed on civil society by government, corporations and other actors, including the opposition to the integration of a human rights agenda into the implementation of the SDGs. We will be hearing from a range of stakeholders and how their agenda can support, or hinder, the inclusion of the voice of civil society in national discussions.

II.         Panel:

• Government: Jens Frølich Holte, State Secretary at the Norwegian MFA (10 mins)
• Enablers or disrupters: private sector and development banks: Youth delegate representative, supported by World Vision International (tbc – visa permitting) (10 mins)
• Stakeholders under pressure : Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples (tbc – on timing) (10 mins)
• Enabling environments for stakeholder engagement: H.E. Mr. Diego Morejón Pazmiño, Permanent Representative to the UN, Mission of Ecuador/ member of Ecuador delegation to the HLPF (tbc) (10 mins)
• Ideas for improving the implementation and monitoring process: Jean Patrice Ngoyi, Executive Director, Justice, Development and Peace Commission of Nigeria and Together 2030 Core Group member (10 mins)
• Discussants: The Environment and Society Association (AAS, Colombia) Alliance Sud – Swiss civil society perspective; tbc – another civil society coalition from Africa or Asia (15 mins)
• Q&A (20 mins)

III.        Key Questions

• How can governments work in a more collaborative way with civil society to increase participation of people in SDG implementation, follow up and review?
• Is the civil society perception that they are not being meaningfully included in SDG implementation, follow up and review right?
• What can civil society learn from the first 3 years of implementing the SDGs about how to work in a multi-stakeholder environment?
• What can the international community do to reduce the pressure on human rights defenders who work on SDG implementation?
• What are the evidence gaps for a multi-stakeholder approach and how should we look to fill them?
• What are the mechanisms we need for understanding other stakeholders? Are we speaking the same language, and how do the SDGs provide a frameworks for multi-stakeholder engagement for development?