{"id":83,"date":"2025-10-02T03:35:38","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T03:35:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/goalposts-what-next-for-the-mdgs\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T03:35:38","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T03:35:38","slug":"goalposts-what-next-for-the-mdgs","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/articles\/goalposts-what-next-for-the-mdgs\/","title":{"rendered":"Goalposts What Next For The Mdgs"},"content":{"rendered":"<section class=\"content column wide left article content view\" id=\"content\">\n<div class=\"edit image\">\n\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/files\/var\/broker\/storage\/images\/images\/broker-22\/p19-goalposts\/725187-1-eng-gb\/p19-goalposts_full_view.jpg\" alt=\"Broadway at the time of the MDG conference, New York, USA, September 2010\">\n\t<\/div>\n<article class=\"fader  Research article\">\n<header class=\"contents\">\n<div class=\"share\">\n\t\t\t<script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n    var addthis_config = {\n        ui_language = 'en'\n    }\n<\/script><\/p>\n<div class=\"addthis sharing\">\n\t<!-- AddThis Button BEGIN --><\/p>\n<div class=\"addthis_toolbox addthis_default_style addthis_32x32_style\" addthis:title=\"Goalposts: What next for the MDGs?\">\n\t<a class=\"addthis_button_twitter\" tw:via=\"thebrokeronline\"><\/a><br \/>\n\t<a class=\"addthis_button_facebook\"><\/a><br \/>\n\t<a class=\"addthis_button_pinterest_share\"><\/a><br \/>\n\t<a class=\"addthis_button_preferred_4\"><\/a><br \/>\n\t<a class=\"addthis_button_compact\"><\/a><br \/>\n\t<a class=\"addthis_counter addthis_bubble_style\"><\/a>\n\t<\/div>\n<p>\t<script type=\"text\/javascript\">var addthis_config = data_track_addressbar;<\/script><br \/>\n\t<script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/files\/js\/300\/addthis_widget.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n\t<!-- AddThis Button END -->\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"addthis article_options\">\n    \t\t\t\t\t\t<a class=\"pdf\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/files\/var\/broker\/storage\/original\/application\/db35e97808447518ee604549c2bc1299.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"view\/print PDF\"><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"clear\"><\/div>\n<h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGoalposts: What next for the MDGs?<br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n<div class=\"clear\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"pubDate\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/experts-and-authors\/bieckmann-frans\/\">Frans&nbsp;Bieckmann<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/experts-and-authors\/meijer-van-putten-anna\/\">Anna&nbsp;Meijer van Putten<\/a>\t\t|<br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOctober 06, 2025\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"intro contents\">\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\"><i>The Broker <\/i>was in New York to blog from the United Nation&#8217;s (UN) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" target=\"_blank\">Summit on the Millennium Development Goals<\/a> (MDGs). We invited policy makers, academics and representatives from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to discuss the Summit and long-term strategic choices. Their thoughts are briefly summarized here. Two separate narratives have emerged from this. The mainstream debate focuses on details, statistics and methods to refine the current MDG approach. More critical voices want to replace the MDGs after 2015 with a more comprehensive development strategy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\"><i>Visit the special blog &#8216;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/en\/online-discussions\/blogs\/goal-posts-what-next-for-the-mdgs\/\" target=\"_blank\">Goal Posts &#8211; What next for the MDGs?<\/a>&#8216;<\/i><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"body contents\">\n\t\t<!-- body --><\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">In 2000, eight goals were set to change the lives of the global poor. With only five years left to meet these objectives, MDG advocates drew up the balance at the UN Summit held on 20-22 September 2010. <i>The Broker<\/i> went to New York to see who was looking beyond the short-term, direct interests and political aims of official delegations and lobbyists, to discover whether there were initiatives that transcend the current institutional aid framework and propose viable alternatives. The burning question is: where should the world head, in terms of development, after 2015?<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">What is currently being discussed in mainstream forums like the MDG Summit raises the suspicion that post-2015 policies are likely to be more of the same, with minor changes to the prevailing narrative. This mainstream debate focuses on details, statistics and methods for refining the current technical, top-down and aid-oriented MDG approach. &#8216;Partnerships&#8217; with the business sector are becoming increasingly influential and are driven by a discourse that favours terms like \u2018innovation\u2019 and promotes a distinctly action-oriented approach of \u2018helping\u2019 people and arranging necessary services for the poor.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">However, approaches more critical of this traditional aid viewpoint are also emerging here and there. They could lead to a more comprehensive and policy-oriented alternative narrative that could hopefully be endorsed at the next MDG summit in 2013. These critical voices discuss how to develop alternative strategies that combine government and multilateral policies with grassroots activism and global movements. They focus on broader, less segmented development, poverty and change concepts, and try to include ecological goals and (human) security needs. They address political, social and economic obstacles for development, and also look at global processes and the root causes of the global financial, food and climate crises.<a name=\"eztoc56809_0_1\" id=\"eztoc56809_0_1\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2>The mainstream debate<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Negotiations between the UN member states before the summit resulted in an &#8216;outcome document&#8217; that was presented at the MDG Summit: <i>Keeping the promise: united to achieve the Millennium Development Goals<\/i> (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/files\/en\/mdg\/summit2010\/pdf\/mdg outcome document.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">View PDF<\/a>). The document reaffirms member states&#8217; commitment to achieve the MDGs by their target date. There was already advance consensus about the political message that the summit would make: the glass is half full. In other words, while a great deal has been achieved, a much more concerted effort is needed to achieve the development goals by 2015.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Most civil society and advocacy organizations do not share the member states\u2019 optimism. They criticize the dearth of financial pledges needed to halve extreme poverty and reach the other goals. \u2018You come out of the summit with a draft outcome document that has a very long laundry list with many wonderful aspirations,\u2019 says Joanna Kerr from ActionAid, an NGO with its international head office in Johannesburg, South Africa. \u2018But you can\u2019t eat an aspiration. At the end of the day, nearly one billion are still going to be hungry.\u2019 According to Social Watch, a network of national coalitions of civil society organizations, social indicators show that progress has actually stagnated since the MDGs were announced in 2000 (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/files\/sites\/default\/files\/social-watch-report-2010.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">View PDF<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">The point of the MDG Summit was to accelerate progress on the development goals front, and yet a \u2018business as usual\u2019 mentality seems to have dominated proceedings, Roberto Bissio of Social Watch said during the summit.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">A number of side discussions took place in and around the UN premises, and on websites. Most of them go beyond the summit&#8217;s political rhetoric, and yet they fit neatly into the current MDG narrative. They focus on concrete policies for achieving the different MDG goals in the next five years \u2013 policies that have generated a debate about numbers and statistics: how do we measure poverty or the extent to which it has been eradicated?<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">For example, there was the predictable discussion of traditional aid problems, along the lines of the 2005 Paris Declaration and 2008 Accra Agenda for Action. This discussion about aid effectiveness emphasized themes such as ownership, coordination of donor support, mutual accountability and transparency. While this too is necessary, it is not enough. Increasingly, alternatives to these traditional arguments began to rear their heads at the side events. For example, several actors made an argument for more \u2018policy space\u2019 for countries and their populations to determine their own course and priorities. Others advocated results-based financing methods or transparent tax systems.<a name=\"eztoc56809_0_2\" id=\"eztoc56809_0_2\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Narrative shifts?<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">There are several signs that the MDG narrative, with its technical approach, is losing ground in the official aid community. An important novelty of the MDG outcome document is that it explicitly mentions fragile states. About one-third of developing countries are fragile states, and it is precisely these states that are largely responsible for the MDGs not being met. The violence and conflict in these complex environments stands in the way of sustainable development, presenting policy makers with a very different set of requirements in terms of aid and development. The mentioning of fragile states is an implicit criticism of the MDG narrative, because it acknowledges that at least in these states the segmented MDG approach yields little result.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">These criticisms were also raised on <i>The Broker<\/i> blog, for example by Phil Vernon, director of programmes at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.international-alert.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">International Alert<\/a>, an independent peace-building organization. The current aid structure is generating the wrong course of action, particularly in fragile states, according to Vernon. \u2018People in the sector know this, but they are constrained by the institutional framework within which they work, rather like surgeons operating in a dimly lit room,\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" title=\"Phil Vernon: Putting the ideology back into development\" target=\"_blank\">he says<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Another critic of the MDG narrative, in particular of its focus on statistics and (poverty) measures, is David Hulme, professor of development studies and head of the Institute for Development Policy and Management at the University of Manchester. Hulme criticizes \u2018the pretence that a science of poverty reduction will yield &quot;evidence-based policy&quot;\u2019. He argues that the focus has shifted. Whereas previously it was an action-oriented era \u2013 with summits, conferences, campaigns and social movements \u2013 now it is an era fixated on \u2018a sophisticated but arbitrary hyper-measurement (from dollar-a-day to happiness)\u2019 and \u2018a bewildering number of reports\u2019. Hulme stresses the importance of measuring social and economic progress, but questions the objectivity of such an exercise since \u2018there is no evidence that is not based in some way on value judgements and theory\u2019 (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" title=\"David Hulme: The future of the MDGs \u2013 from global poverty to national development?\" target=\"_blank\">view his blogpost<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">One of these reports \u2013 and Hulme witnessed its presentation at a summit side event \u2013 <i>Combating poverty and inequality<\/i>, a flagship report written by the UN Research Institute for Social Development (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" target=\"_blank\">UNRISD<\/a>), actually criticizes the goals: \u2018The MDGs focus on measuring things that people lack to the detriment of understanding why they lack them.\u2019<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Andy Sumner, from the UK research organization Institute of Development Studies, argued in his article <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" target=\"_blank\">&#8216;Beyond 2015&#8217;<\/a> in issue 14 of <i>The Broker<\/i> that it is not just a question of which indicators of well-being or poverty to emphasize, or on which targets to focus, but also of defining the process we should promote to produce any new set of targets.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Another recent report, by Lancet &#8211; the London International Development Centre Commission, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.scribd.com\/doc\/37601974\/The-Millennium-Development-Goals-a-cross-sectoral-analysis-and-principles-for-goal-setting-after-2015\" target=\"_blank\"><i>The Millennium Development Goals: a cross-sectoral analysis and principles for goal setting after 2015<\/i><\/a>, provides an analysis of the MDGs and proposes a holistic, interdisciplinary approach to development. Synergy is key. Elaine Unterhalter, one of the authors of the report, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" title=\"Elaine Unterhalter: Equity takes us further\" target=\"_blank\">writes on <i>The Broker <\/i>blog<\/a> that the \u2018MDGs were not derived from an inclusive analysis and prioritisation of development needs\u2019. The commission highlights the absence of a range of key values, such as equity, a notion that promises to be a central concern in future debates.<a name=\"eztoc56809_0_3\" id=\"eztoc56809_0_3\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Towards a new narrative<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Not many of the critics of the MDG narrative were actually at the MDG Summit. But some did follow the proceedings in New York. Aware that the power and money needed for change was converging at the summit, they seized the opportunity to develop a new narrative that turned away from mainstream policy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">Francine Mestrum, lecturer at the Universit\u00e9 Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium, makes a case for rethinking real development goals, not just poverty goals. \u2018The existing MDGs may be useful as indicators, but they are not ambitious and they cannot be met with the current policies\u2019 (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/blogs\/goal-posts-what-next-for-the-mdgs\/too-much-talk-of-poverty-and-aid\/\" target=\"_blank\">view her blogpost<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">\u2018We have to take a radical turn\u2019, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" target=\"_blank\">Phil Vernon writes<\/a>. The MDGs are \u2018too narrow\u2019 and \u2018too technical\u2019. \u2018Instead of asking \u201chow can our existing institutions implement this new approach\u201d, we need to ask \u201cwhat kind of institutions do we need, to do so?\u201d\u2019 Major changes are needed in the way our international institutions are organized to make them fit the new purpose. \u2018It is time to put the ideology back into development,\u2019 Vernon continues. \u2018Let\u2019s start working now to have a more genuine discussion about what human progress actually means, instead of going along with the idea that history can be described, and progress measured, only in terms of poverty, health, schooling and the like.\u2019<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">With the 2015 target date fast approaching, it is time for MDG critics and sceptics to join the debate. One of them has already. Michael Edwards, from distinguished senior fellow at Demos, a non-partisan public policy research and advocacy organization in New York City, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\" target=\"_blank\">was never that interested in the MDGs<\/a>: \u2018Picture me and a few other ugly ducklings standing at the edge of the dance hall while Bono, Bill Gates and the rest of the in-crowd party the night away in New York City \u2013 that just about sums it up.\u2019 But Edwards realized that over time, it is politics and state building that generate the best results. \u2018I\u2019ve no idea what that would mean for the detailed goals and mechanisms of the MDGs,\u2019 he writes, \u2018but I\u2019m pretty sure that they would be more effective as a result. Maybe it\u2019s time I entered the dance floor after all?\u2019<\/p>\n<p class=\"yunu3cvqabft7vifv\">\n\t\t\tOne thing is certain. A new course needs to be charted right now. It is likely that the post-2015 targets will be agreed upon at the follow-up MDG Summit, planned for 2013. The MDG Summit&#8217;s outcome document asks \u2013 read: orders \u2013 UN Secretary-General Ban-Ki-moon to start investigating a new course of action. So the debate is starting now. This will be an opportunity for both supporters and critics of the MDGs to push things in the right direction.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"credit\">\n\t\t\tPhoto credit main picture:<br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe Broker \/ Frans Bieckmann\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t<!-- body --><br \/>\n\t\t<!-- footnotes --><br \/>\n\t\t<!-- footnotes -->\n\t\t<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<div class=\"clear\"><\/div>\n<section class=\"commentform content column wide left\">\n<div class=\"disqus_content\">\n\t\t\t<a name=\"comments\" id=\"comments\"><\/a><\/p>\n<div id=\"disqus_thread\"><\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t<script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n\t\t\t\t\/* * * CONFIGURATION VARIABLES: EDIT BEFORE PASTING INTO YOUR WEBPAGE * * *\/\n\t\t\t\tvar disqus_shortname = 'broker'; \/\/ required: replace example with your forum shortname\n\t\t\t\tvar disqus_identifier = '5609';\n\t\t\t\t\/* * * DON'T EDIT BELOW THIS LINE * * *\/\n\t\t\t\tfunction trackComment(comment)\n\t\t\t\t{\n\t\t\t\t\tconsole.log(comment);\n\t\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t\tfunction disqus_config() {\n\t\t\t\t\tthis.callbacks.onNewComment = [function() { \n\t\t\t\t\tconsole.log(comment);\n\t\t\t\t\t}];\n\t\t\t\t}\n\t\t\t\t(function() {\n\t\t\t\t\tvar dsq = document.createElement('script'); dsq.type = 'text\/javascript'; dsq.async = true;\n\t\t\t\t\tdsq.src = '\/\/' + disqus_shortname + 'https:\/\/www.thebrokeronline.eu\/files\/articles\/.disqus.com\/embed.js';\n\t\t\t\t\t(document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0] || document.getElementsByTagName('body')[0]).appendChild(dsq);\n\t\t\t\t})();\n\t\t\t<\/script><br \/>\n\t\t\t<!--\n\t\t\t<noscript>Please enable JavaScript to view the <a href=\"http:\/\/disqus.com\/?ref_noscript\">comments powered by Disqus.<\/a><\/noscript>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"http:\/\/disqus.com\" class=\"dsq-brlink\">comments powered by <span class=\"logo-disqus\">Disqus<\/span><\/a>\n\t\t\t-->\n\t\t<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false,"raw":""},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Goalposts: What next for the MDGs? 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