{"id":1636,"date":"2012-12-03T12:55:32","date_gmt":"2012-12-03T17:55:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/onthinktanks.org\/articles\/\/"},"modified":"2016-01-23T12:57:05","modified_gmt":"2016-01-23T17:57:05","slug":"should-think-tanks-be-looking-into-the-global-development-agenda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/onthinktanks.org\/articles\/should-think-tanks-be-looking-into-the-global-development-agenda\/","title":{"rendered":"Should think tanks be looking into the global development agenda?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last month took place the\u00a02012 Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group (WBG)<\/a>. Within an extensive agenda of topics, the\u00a0Program of Seminars<\/a>\u00a0joint a wide range of leaders to discuss global issues such as the current crisis, the management of natural resources and the development agenda beyond 2015. The meetings also included the\u00a0Civil Society Policy Forum<\/a>, a series of panels organised by the multilaterals or Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) to discuss an even wider range of social, economic and governance issues.<\/p>\n

In this context, the\u00a0Think Tank Initiative (TTI)<\/a>\u00a0organised a panel in which I participated, sharing research on the work influencing policy that think tanks in the south carry out. Besides participating in the panel, I had the opportunity of attending a variety of conferences and getting a general impression of where the global agenda is heading.\u00a0 My main questions during the event were: Do think tanks participate in these events? Is there any value for southern think tanks to participate (both for their own agendas as for the events and participants)?<\/p>\n

A glance at the agenda of the program of seminars and the civil society agenda revealed that it indeed included think tanks or other CSO\u2019s that carry out research for development. However, the majority of the ones participating were international in nature: Brookings, CIGI, Save the Children, Oxfam among others. This is especially true on the Seminars that were intended as high-level conversation on global issues.\u00a0 In one of these panels, for example,\u00a0Homi Kharas<\/a>\u00a0from the Brookings Institute shared his vision on what the next development goals should look like, and what the measuring method should encompass.<\/p>\n

One could argue that this is a natural space for these international think tanks, and that maybe they are better suited, in terms of their research agendas and priorities to comment on global issues. I am not content with this answer. Something about this view bothers me.<\/p>\n

Well, it was expected that the international or development think tanks would be present, but the voice from what we normally call \u2018the south\u2019 was missing. Think tanks that view the development world as a whole are usually based in the \u2018north\u2019.\u00a0 This reminds me of a friend\u2019s comment on Latin American Studies. He said that there is no such thing as Latin American Studies in our universities; to study that, he said, you have to go Miami or further north. He was getting to the point that national issues tend to overtake our research agendas leaving little or no space for regional or global debates. Things are changing, but in the think tank world, it still seems that we are missing think tanks in the global south, focusing on global issues from a different perspective and taking them to these venues.<\/p>\n

The other concern that worried me \u2013and I think also worried many of the panelists who commented on it directly or indirectly\u2013 \u00a0is the disconnection between local and global agendas. At the end of the day, once we have a new global development agenda, who is going to make those changes happen? How can global goals be intertwined in national politics and policies?\u00a0 This was an unanswered question that lingered throughout the different panels. Here I think that think tanks with experience on national politics and policy may have some ideas to share.<\/p>\n

It has already been said how think tanks can be like a\u00a0window for local politics<\/a>, bringing new ideas from abroad. They could, however, also do the opposite work and\u00a0inform global debates\u00a0<\/a>on the reality of carrying out reform at the national level. They could shed some light on the peculiarities of implementing policies locally or nationally which is crucial to the success of the next development agenda but that is a distant topic to global policymakers. Think tanks\u2019 involvement, therefore, could not only entail the definition of specific goals but outlining the strategies to achieving them.<\/p>\n

This might sound, to some national think tanks, as work they did not sign up to do when they began their careers: focusing on yet another audience to influence.\u00a0 In fact,\u00a0influencing the global agenda could be a full time job in itself<\/a>, and not all think tanks will prioritize this in their strategies. Even so, it is still essential for think tanks working locally to follow the international agenda for even more pragmatic reasons:<\/p>\n