EU ACP > Forum > Summaries > Monthly Summary 2 (5 July

Summaries of the debates on the forum

Monthly Summary 2 (5 July - 6 August)

FOLLOWING IS A MACHINE TRANSLATION OF THE ORIGINAL IN FRENCH. IT HAS BEEN EDITED FOR MISTRANSLATION ONLY. THE ORIGINAL IN FRENCH IS AVAILABLE ON THIS WEB SITE AT: <http://www.ue-acp.org/fr/forum/syntheses/syntm2.html>

KEY WORDS: PROGRESS OF THE DEBATE

* * Title: Monthly Summary 2 (5 July - 6 August) * *
by: Anne SIMON <anne.simon@skynet.be>
<http://www.ue-acp.org/fr/forum/presentations/simon.html>
°°° Summary: The second monthly summary focuses on the second set of 3 topics discussed. This month of July, we reached about hundred participants and many English-speaking joined us (26 out of 100 participants on August 6). contributions point all simultaneously to ethical aspirations and concrete proposals on the organization of of EU-ACP relations but also to a necessary evolution of mentalities. A publication agreement has been given concrete expression with Euforic <http://www.euforic.org> to provide to participants a direct access to numerous EU-ACP documentary sources via the Web site.
Topic 3.4 - Giving Partnership back its Meaning: the dialogue and the respect are the main words. It is not about imposing one's vision but to find the common challenges and to define a new " deontology of the continued support ".
Topic 3.5 - Globalization wih a human face: a rebalancing or a dialogue on the founding values? The development cooperation must make possible such a dialogue; it is bearing of a real political project. The European Union could take this direction.
Topic 3.6 - Putting Actors at the Heart of European Co-operation: it must be translated to all phases of the life of a project. It supposes a change of mentalities as much in the North as in the South. The reflection on actors is indissociable of the one on mediators. It is necessary to redefine the role of the different actors of cooperation progressively and to give to the " beneficiary " actors the responsibility of their acts and the management of funds that are confided them. A series of modifications in practices is necessary. °°°

Spirit of the discussion
Contributions point all simultaneously of the ethical aspirations and concrete proposals for the organization of of EU-ACP relations. A strong claim dimension appears, calling on Europeans to participate themselves in the evolution of mentalities. A bigger reciprocity seems expected.
The nearly totality of contributions of this month has been published by the French-speaking. We expect with interest the opinion of English-speakers to balance the discussion with other ways of seeing.
State of the participation
On August 6, we are precisely 100 people to participate in the EU-ACP debate, of which 75 French-speaking and 25 English-speaking. A ratio that restores an equilibirum to the profit of English-speakers. 40 messages have been published during this month of which 17 contributions, 13 presentations and 10 messages of moderation of the debate.
It is always possible enter the the discussion at any moment. Participants receive in this case, as they are sent in, the new introductions. We invite those who didn't introduce themselves to do so.
" To catch up " on the discussion in the process, the Web site makes possible to be informed of all that happened week after week.
The Web site in partnership with Euforic
The Web site <http://www.ue-acp.org> is at your service to have an overall view of the debate (introductions, summaries, archive of contributions classified per month) and to access the documentation useful to the discussion.
To the documents resulting from the seminar of Brussels in April 99 (diagnosis, proposals, case reports), are added the personal contributions of participants. It is possible for you to send documents in relation with the discussion at any moment so that these are made available on the Web site on <http://www.ue-acp.org/en/documents/contributions.html>.
The documents section of the EU-ACP Web site is enriched with a new page which presents links to the Web-based resources. Euforic – European Forum on International Cooperation - offers this service as a targeted contribution to facilitate the discussion. Per topic of discussion, the publisher of Euforic will update the page, including links to the suitable resources. See <http://www.ue-acp.org/en/documents/ressources.html>.
Topics of discussion that have been discussed in the month of July
During the month of July, 17 contributions focused on the following topics:
3.4 - Giving Partnership back its Meaning
3.5 - Globalization wih a human face
3.6 - Putting Actors at the Heart of European Co-operation
Contents of discussions on the 3 topics
3.4 - Giving Partnership back its Meaning:
The consensus is clear on the need to make "true partnership". Today, it is rather an "appearance of partnership" or a "fool's bargain". The question of partnership is considered at the level of meaning and at the level of cooperation practices.
The true partnership is built on the sharing of common visions, the acceptance and the respect of values of others, and the reciprocity of exchanges ("of material values but also and especially immaterial"). (see above "Globalization with a Human Face)
At the level of actions of cooperation, a true and non asymmetric partnership means to come out of exclusive bilateral relations (for example an institutional lessor, an NGO, a farmers' organization). Actors must multiply the number of their partners. On their side, agencies of aid and their representatives must change and accept not to possess "the solution" and know how to question themselves facing their interlocutors. The dialogue between decision-makers of cooperation and actors must make possible to come out of mistakes of appreciation and out-of-date cliches that are harmful to partnership.
Following the example of a recent reflection on farmers' organizations proposed by a network facilitated by the World Bank, the idea is to define a "new deontology of continued support to social movements". Support brought by cooperation must give the keys of development. They should not concentrate anymore on the technical learning, open up to the learning of strategic capacities, to the access to quality information.
3.5 - Globalization wih a human face:
A simple question of rebalancing or a dialogue on the founding values?
For some, "Globalization wih a human face" especially has as its object to restore an equilibirum in economic globalization, which is "one-way" (in reference, among others, to the situation of Africa, to strategies of "monopolization").
For others, it is more about refounding the philosophical and cultural ethical values that underlie our model of society (for example our relationship to consumption and money) and in any case the one that is advocated by cooperation. The example of food security at the global scale is mentioned, the excessively output-intensive and technological production model concerns the North as much as the South when its drifts entail an inequity in the distribution of food resources and qualitative perversions (poisoned or non-edible food). If it accepts to learn from the South, the North could review this model.
Globalization with a human face also supposes opening to others: "the rich must not shut themselves in". Cooperation can offer and can encourage such a dialogue between peoples at different geographical and institutional levels. Several intervening parties propose as well that European cooperation contributes to this (before negotiations of agreements of general cooperation or sectoral policies for example).
Cooperation, to really contribute to development, must lean on the conscience of shared values and common objectives in the North and the South. One has to recognize its political dimension (" a strong political project"). In the same way, an intervening party recalls the emergency of developing world mechanisms for the political regulation of the economic sphere in favor of resourceless countries.
3.6 - Putting Actors at the Heart of European Co-operation (or "putting an end to a logic of incomplete cooperation as to the partners" through the development of decentralized cooperation):
For the majority of participants, it is the "beneficiary" actors (individual, groupings, local NGO...) who should be at the heart of cooperation at phases of conception, execution and assessment of projects but it supposes to also re-consider the role of the whole of intervening parties (agencies of aid, states or administrations, nonprofit or private mediators). Yet, the role of the state must not be for all that overlooked. Several lines of discussion and proposals have been considered.
During the phase of preparation of actions, the identification of actors is in general insufficient. This primordial stage is very difficult to carry out. It must focus simultaneously on the beneficiary actors (skills, institutional network, local knowledge, etc…) and on the other actors and relations with these (forms of actions, interests). It is indissociable form a consultation phase between all implied actors.
The question of the role of operators who are designers or executors of programs (mediation) is permanent. Agencies call upon operators for the implementation because of the "need of guarantees for the important financial volumes" or because they "control the desired procedures better". But in doing that the actors are confined to "a role of spectators" of actions that involve them.
Some wish "that one calls less upon mediators" by establishing direct relations between actor-recipients and Delegations of the European Commission or by simplifying procedures and rules ".
Others also propose to improve the system of mediation: The operator can become a facilitator while it is the beneficiary that must become backer and assume the responsibility of contracts. This new type of relations supposes setting up a series of administrative arrangements (flexibility of deadlines, putting an end to pressures to commitment), financial ones (possibility of direct contract), legal ones (legal personality of the beneficiary, insertion of cooperation processes in the national legislation) and of accounting control (private external audit).
Information must be clear and be distributed extensively with regard to all on the type of cooperation agreements that were made.
The beneficiary actor must be also concerned at the time of the assessment of the action that has been completed (several degrees of implication are possible).

Reminder of topics of the previous month
3.1 - Moving from Project Support to Supporting Processes:
At the end the last month, still some contributions on the passage of the project logic to process logic. The need to change the project approach in its current methods of application seems to meet with consensus. On the basis of some experiences (Douala, traditional fishing project), the project approach doesn't make possible to propose a "product" adapted to the expectations and the features of the actors-recipients of cooperation.
An intervening party expresses his doubt however as to process approach, which, if it means long-term support, could risk increasing the dependence of recipients. Others answer that in fact there is a distinction between the project that is a tool (which in this sense does not have to be suppressed) and a process approach that is a principle of cooperation with organizations and individuals, whose aim is to give them the capacities to develop themselves on their own. The project as a tool can be put at the service of a process of development but it must not become an objective in itself.
Such a change of cooperation practices requires a change of mentality as much "among recipients as among financial backers and supposes a big mobilization of all therefore".
3.2 - Backing a Twofold Dynamics of Decentralisation and of Regional Integration:
At the end the previous month, to close the discussion on the role that can or must play cooperation to encourage "processes of decentralization" and governance, it is proposed to consider the territory (as geographical term) as a place of development that the actors know and master. An intervening party also proposes a list of performance criteria which he hopes will be studied thoroughly and enriched by the forum
3.3 - Transforming Procedures and Practices:
Intervening parties accepted that this topic should be pursued all during the debate. It is a bit the meaning of one of the last messages of this month that recalls that beyond the Convention texts, it is the reality of the putting into practice that is primordial on the field.
It is also the meaning of the contribution of a European Parliamentarian who invites to the dialogue between actors and European institutions in order to attack several lines of procedure reforms. The ACP Secretary General, pronounces himself in favor of the maintenance of privileged relations between the European Commission and the ACP Group that seem to be put in a difficult stance by the reorganization of outside services.

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