Abstract
Sustainable Development Goals as global social policy
In October 2016, the heads of the governments of more than 190 countries endorsed the new global development agenda at the United Nations General Assembly, the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development, and subsequently decided a new set of goals, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It was a historic moment in which the world embarked on a new global development initiative following the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which ended in 2015 with mixed results. The SDGs aim to bring about positive changes for sustainable development at the global and national levels, especially by incorporating environmental sustainability and social development into an overarching framework of global goals. Before the final submission to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly, the UN task force went through a widespread and open consultation process on the draft proposal for the SDGs. The UN spent more than 3 years in consultation, listening to various ideas and suggestions from national governments, civil society groups and other stakeholders. The open global consultation toward the final agreement was a clear difference in the formulating of the SDGs from the technocratic process of preparing the MDGs more than 15 years ago (Saith, 2006).
The SDGs comprise 17 goals and 169 targets, and there will be many more indicators which will enable various policy stakeholders to monitor the progress of implementation. The SDGs include goals concerning global climate change and urban development as well as goals on social development, such as poverty eradication and social justice. According to the UN report entitled ‘The Road to Dignity by 2030’, the SDGs are based on six principles: people, dignity, prosperity, justice, partnership and planet (United Nations, 2014). Indeed, the SDGs are broad and comprehensive in terms of scope and targets compared to the MDGs. There are a broad range of goals, but social development goals, such as poverty, health, and gender equality, are among the particularly prominent features of the SDGs. Decent work and migration as well as social justice and equality are newly emphasized in the SDG framework. It is clear that the SDGs will be a crucial set of benchmarks for global social policy in terms of ambition, goals, and implementation. In this context, this Global Social Policy Forum in this issue examines the SDGs as global social policy through different dimensions of social policy: poverty, education, health, migration, and gender.
Challenges and implications of the SDGs as global social policy
In this forum, the Global Social Policy (GSP) invites contributors with expertise in different global social policy areas to discuss challenges and implications of the SDGs as global social policy for the next 15 years. While the MDGs had 8 goals, the SDGs have 17 goals and 169 targets, each goal with a different number of targets. These goals and targets are set to address different policy objectives, and most of them are concerned with specific policy issues. Since the SDGs include a broad of range of goals, it is important to question whether these goals and targets are consistent with each other and pointing to the same direction rather than contradicting each other. Most notably, it is vital to align environmental sustainability and the development agenda so that these two main concerns of the SDGs do not conflict. There are also questions regarding the framework of implementation. Setting the global agenda is one thing, and implementing at the local level is quite another.
In this GSP Forum, the global social policy experts who have closely monitored the SDG process discuss issues specific to each field of global social policy. The following questions were put to contributors at the onset of the process of preparing their contributions to the GSP Forum. How are the SDGs different from the MDGs from the perspectives of different subfields of social policy? What are the strengths and weakness of the SDGs? What are the challenges for achieving the SDGs over the next 15 years?
In her contribution on poverty, Gabrielle Koehler reviews the UN development agendas over the last 50 years in order to provide the context for the MDGs and SDGs. She recognizes that the MDGs signified a new direction in the development agenda, shedding light on the livelihood of poor people in the South. However, the remit of the MDGs was narrow, setting the reduction of poverty by half as a goal without resorting to a rights-based idea of social protection. Koehler believes that the SDGs have made progress in the right direction by acknowledging the multi-dimensions of poverty and a rights-based approach to poverty eradication. She raises, however, the question of whether the SDGs will realize a transformative potential, and she proposes a more systemic framework to realize its potential.
Meri Koivulsalo examines the SDGs from a perspective of global social policy. Although health was prominent in the MDGs, Koivulsalo points out that the MDGs did not provide a good framework for global health policy nor pay necessary attention to health systems. She reveals the divided views on global health policy: giving priority to universal coverage and health systems, on one side, and population health, on the other. In the end, population health was set as an overarching goal, while universal health coverage became one of the sub-targets in the SDG structure. She raises the question of health governance, which will be crucial in achieving health-related goals. Within the SDG framework, the roles of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the UN remain poorly defined.
In her article on early childhood education (ECD), which is SDGs sub-goal 4.2, Helen Penn explains the rationale and background of making ECD one of the prominent SDGs. Early child education has been promoted as a high return on investment, and the importance of universal access to early child education and care has been recognized. Other than in affluent countries, however, there has been relatively little hope in middle- and low-income countries that the government will set the goal as a priority. Penn also points out risks posed by private consultancy and philanthropic organizations in the field of early child education and care. Some private consultant companies that pursue tenders and carry out projects with planning, implementation, and evaluation funded by different donors in developing countries without long-term commitments; philanthropic organizations run by powerful and/or wealthy individuals are often unaccountable for their work to the public. It is a timely reminder not to be overly enthusiastic about glowing global projects.
One of the new features of the SDGs compared to the MDGs is migration, which is incorporated explicitly into the global development agenda. In her contribution on migration, Nicola Piper sees the global discourse on migration consisting of two dominant paradigms: management of migration and the migration-development nexus. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) regards SDG target 10.7 as the main policy objective for migration. Piper is critical of such a management approach to migration and suggests broad approaches to migration such as perspectives of decent work, care, inclusion and human rights.
On gender and sustainable development, Eun Mee Kim maintains that there are two important gender goals, reducing child mortality (goal 4) and improving maternal health (goal 5). She argues that poor outcomes were related to misunderstandings of the reality with which women are faced. For example, there are young girls at high risk of pregnancy and childbirth in developing countries, but policies for maternal health and child mortality target mainly adult women. Kim also reminds us of the persistent gender gap, even in countries with high economic growth and progress in women’s education. She argues that education, employment, and empowerment are all necessary components to reduce the persistent gender gap. Education or employment alone cannot reduce this gap. Kim’s points clearly show the challenges ahead to meet the gender goals in the SDGs.
All contributors in this Forum give us important advice in order to achieve the SDGs. Despite the comprehensive nature, rights-based approach and transformative potential, it is necessary to be realistic about the final outcomes of the SDGs. We need to find rigorous policy instruments to meet the targets. In the SDGs, there is a clear emphasis on social justice, strong institutions, and social equality. Some recent research has highlighted that economic inequality and the deep-rooted social structure of injustice has limited the extent of poverty reduction (Kwon and Kim, 2014). If we had addressed the issues of social inequality and political injustice effectively, the MDGs could have been achieved to a greater extent. In this respect, the SDGs have made important progress in the evolution of global social policy. At the same time, however, raising issues of political injustice and social inequality can lead to very difficult political challenges in many developing countries and may leave their governments out of the SDG efforts. How should we address these difficult political challenges?
There is also a concern about the broadness of the SDGs, as there is potential to lose focus with competing priorities. In the framework of the SDGs, issues concerning environmental protection and sustainable development are included together with social development and social justice goals. Could such a wide range of goals and targets be a weakness or a strength? The global community will work together to eradicate poverty and to protect our environment at the same time. For the last 15 years while the MDGs were implemented, there were criticisms that the social development community and stakeholders concerned with environmental sustainability had not talked to each other. More dialogue and collaboration could have produced better development outcomes. What is clear at this moment is that setting the goals does not necessarily lead to outcomes. We need to devise appropriate policy instruments and find necessary financing and implement them effectively.