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Tag: Theme: Institutional Reform

Announcements

Press Release: UN Goals Should Do More to Curb Tax Dodging that Has Cost Poor Countries Trillions

The United Nations\’ proposed global goals for poverty reduction miss much of the story when it comes to trade-related illicit flows — which drain tens of billions of dollars from the world\’s poorest countries ever year. A new ASAP study identifies a set of simple reforms that could drastically reduce such outflows and can guide the UN\’s efforts as it develops its new Sustainable Development Goals.

Announcements

Pogge Co-Edits Special Issue on Tax Justice

Concerns over extreme poverty and inequality have led to a number of proposals for the reform of global taxation policy. Such proposals are enjoying serious analysis and, in some cases, implementation. While issues concerning national taxation have long concerned philosophers — invoking core questions about the legitimacy of governments and their appropriate functions as well as about the nature of freedom, coercion, and property rights — issues of global taxation and international tax fairness have not received anything like the same attention. Through a special issue of the journal Moral Philosophy and Politics, co-editors Gillian Brock, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Auckland, and Thomas Pogge, ASAP President and Leitner Professor of Philosophy and International Affairs at Yale, aim to remedy such neglect, stimulating further interest especially among moral and political philosophers who we hope will be motivated to turn their attention to many of the important normative questions that deserve more sustained analysis.

View the special issue on the De Gruyter website.

Announcements

ASAP Study: Curbing Illicit Financial Flows Post-2015

Illicit financial flows are gaining recognition as an important issue for development. As 2015 and the expiration of the Millennium Development Goals draws nearer there are calls both from civil society and from within the UN system to make control of such flows a priority within the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). There is still an open debate as to the role they should play in the world’s sustainable development agenda.

Impact Interviews

Prof. Jason Sharman on Pressuring Governments and Banks on Corruption

This latest ASAP Impact Story profiles Prof. Jason Sharman of Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia, whose recent work has been instrumental in exposing widespread corruption among Papua New Guinea (PNG) government officials. Millions of dollars, Sharman has found, are being siphoned from PNG government accounts into private bank accounts and investments in Australia, many of which belong to government officials.

Announcements

Jeffrey Sachs Speaks on Future of Sustainable Development

Jeffrey Sachs at Yale

The Yale Global Justice Program and ASAP hosted Dr. Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University for a special lecture, \”Sustainable Development Goals: The Emerging Global Agenda.\” Critical responses were given by Dr. Dean Karlan, Professor of Economics at Yale and President and Founder of Innovations for Poverty Action and Thomas Pogge, Leitner Professor of Philosophy and International Affairs and Director of the Global Justice Program and President of ASAP.

Videos are available of Dr. Sachs’s lecture, responses from Dr. Karlan and Dr. Pogge, and audience Q&A. Photos from the event are also available.

Dr. Sachs has been a leading figure in the effort to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, an eight-point framework for promoting poverty alleviation and development worldwide, agreed to by all the world\’s countries and leading development institutions. The Millennium Development Goals will expire in 2015, and the framework that replaces them will shape poverty alleviation and development efforts for the next fifteen years. Dr. Sachs\’s is an important voice in the global debate over priorities for the next phase in international development.

Dr. Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 80 countries.

Dr. Sachs serves as the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. He is Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on the Millennium Development Goals, having held the same position under UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He is Director of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He is co-founder and Chief Strategist of Millennium Promise Alliance, and is director of the Millennium Villages Project. Sachs is also one of the Secretary-General’s MDG Advocates, and a Commissioner of the ITU/UNESCO Broadband Commission for Development. He has authored three New York Times bestsellers in the past seven years: The End of Poverty (2005), Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet (2008), and The Price of Civilization (2011).

Impact Interviews

Impact Stories: SOAS PhD Student Robtel Neajai Pailey Uses Innovative Methods to Tackle Corruption in Her Native Liberia

Elaine Kellman speaks with Robtel Neajai Pailey, a Mo Ibrahim Foundation Ph.D. Scholar at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, who is battling corruption in Liberia.

Announcements

New Legal Reference: Human Rights and Climate Change Policy-making

The Center for International Sustainable Development Law, Academics Stand Against Poverty, and the Governance, Environment & Markets Initiative at Yale University have developed a new legal reference guide that examines the connections between climate change and human rights, with a particular focus on the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR).

The legal reference guide can be downloaded here.

Given the serious human rights ramifications of climate change, States are obliged to take all appropriate means to avoid and mitigate climate change and its harmful consequences, as well as assist vulnerable communities in adapting to its consequences. States are also required to ensure that their responses to climate change are consistent with their human rights obligations under domestic and international law. This introductory legal reference guide seeks to provide policy-makers, advocates, and experts with basic knowledge of obligations and principles related to international economic, social, and cultural rights in the context of new challenges brought by climate change, as well as to highlight opportunities for policy-makers worldwide.

Part I of this manual provides a general introduction to human rights and the international climate change regime, including the relationship between climate change and human rights. Part II surveys basic concepts of international human rights law. Part III examines the ICESCR more specifically, including its structure, the nature of its obligations, means of implementation, and compliance mechanisms. Finally, Parts IV through X discuss specific rights enumerated in the ICESCR, including: the right to equality and non-discrimination; the right to work and social security; the right to family life; the right to an adequate standard of living; the right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health; the right to education; and the right to culture. These sections also provide case studies illustrating how climate policies are being implemented to concomitantly address climate change and enhance the realization of human rights.

The legal reference guides was edited by Sébastien Jodoin and Katherine Lofts and includes a foreword by Thomas Pogge. The contributing authors include: Christiane Bossé, Christopher Campbell-Furuflé, Benoît Mayer, Karine Péloffy, Patrick Reynaud, and Sean Stephenson.

For more information regarding this publications, please contact Ms. Katherine Lofts at klofts@cisdl.org.

EVENTS

Where Does the Movement to Curb Illicit Financial Flows Go From Here? ASAP UK Workshop Outcome Document Now Available

Academics and activists debated the future of the movement to curb illicit financial flows at an ASAP UK workshop in London on October 23, 2012. Event speakers Martin Kirk, Global Campaigns Director at The Rules, Toby Quantrill, Policy Advisor on Tax Justice at ActionAid UK, Alice Lépissier, Research Assistant at the Center for Global Development, and ASAP President Thomas Pogge offered diverse proposals for how activists might capitalize on political momentum coming out the G8 and G20 summits.

Announcements

In Conversation with Stephen Lewis

In conversation with Stephen Lewis, Distinguished Visiting Professor, Ryerson University and former UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa. Lewis gives his assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the Millennium Development Goals.

Produced by: Mitu Sengupta (Director, ASAP Canada) & James Loney

(0:16): Aspirations

(2:00): Gender Equality

(5:09): On Process

(8:06): MDGs Replacements

(9:30): Who is Responsible?

(12:31): Accountability

(14:24): Naming and Shaming

(16:22): Three Must-Have Features

(21:10): Why Global Poverty Persists

(23:32): Opportunities for Advocacy

(27:11): MDGs and Human Rights

(28:50) Three Ways to Beat Global Poverty

(32:13): What Canadians Can Do

EVENTS

Rights & Justice 2015 Kicks Off at Yale

The fifth annual conference on illicit financial flows and financial transparency at Yale kicked off this Friday. ASAP, the Yale Global Justice Program, and Global Financial Integrity co-hosted the event.