Pointless NGO campaign of the year Alex Evans

February 12, 2009 | More on Influence and networks, London Summit | 7 comments

Yes, it’s only February, but it seems pretty unlikely that anything will top this for sheer pointlessness and banality.  Here’s the pitch from the “Put People First” march that will be taking place in London on 28th March:

On 2 April the leaders of 20 of the world’s biggest economies meet in London to tackle the recession and global financial crisis..

But even before the banking collapse caused recession, the world suffered vast poverty and inequality and faced the looming threat of climate chaos.

Governments, business and international institutions have followed a model of financial deregulation that has encouraged short-term profits, instability and an economy fuelled by ever-increasing debt, both financial and environmental.

There can be no going back to business as usual. The only sustainable way to rebuild the global economy is to create a fair distribution of wealth that provides decent jobs and public services for all, ends global inequality and builds a low carbon future.

Wow. That’ll tell the politicians.

But, er, what is it telling them, exactly?

Sure, it’s not exactly a newsflash that the last few years have seen a pronounced move among NGOs away from having actual policy, and towards big campaign platforms that are much more about maximising participation (and hence donations and membership).

But even so, this is a new low. Make Poverty History may not have had the most sophisticated of policy platforms, but it looks like a doctoral thesis in comparison to this.  The coalition of participating organisations haven’t even bothered to put together a position paper to explain what they want.  Instead, there is simply this one liner:

Our message is clear. We must put people first.

The only clear message I can make out is the one that says “NGOs are hellbent on political irrelevance”.

(See also: Where next for NGOs?)

7 comments »

1. Richard Gowan on February 12th, 2009 at 10:44 pm:
   

   Alex: your wrath against the NGOs leads you to overlook the fact that drivers of this campaign include the big unions (and, er, the Musician’s Union). A quick look at the website reinforces the impression that it’s in large part a union initiative. The sloganeering makes more sense when read in those terms: i.e. this is all about the various strands of the British Soft Left (post-Thatcher unions and post-Blair NGO community) struggling to find a common narrative about Social Democracy in the current crisis, rather than actual policy stuff. It’d be interesting to know if the Hard Left, anarcho mob is planning something around the London Summit too – this initiative may also be an effort to reduce the risks of that by offering a low-intensity demo…

2. Alex Evans on February 13th, 2009 at 10:17 am:
   

   Au contraire, I do understand that the unions were involved. But that’s part of the reason why it’s so hazardous for the NGOs to get involved in this platform in the absence of a clear policy position.

   Let’s remind ourselves what the unions are all fired up about at the moment: http://is.gd/joLP. When the unions tell their members to join this march, a great number of those members will interpret it as a ‘British jobs for British workers’ march. Some of them will attempt to persuade the media to report it as such. Lots of the media probably will.

   The question then is where that will leave the development and environment NGOs in positioning terms. If there had been a clear statement of what the march was for, then the fact that the NGOs are junior partners in all this wouldn’t matter; it would be a well thought-through tactical alliance, and who knows, maybe it would deliver some actual results.

   But as it is, this march is all things to all people – with, as I say, a pretty good chance that it will be reported in heavily protectionist terms. In the background, the larger questions remain: What is this march asking for? Who is it trying to influence?

   As you say, “this is all about the various strands of the British Soft Left struggling to find a common narrative”. Too bloody right…

3. Jasper Richardson on February 13th, 2009 at 1:03 pm:
   

   Check out http://www.bond.org.uk/pages/economic-crisis-campaign.html, particularly the bit below

   “The platform is united by three linked calls: Decent jobs and public services for all, end poverty and inequality, build a green economy.

   More specific demands on the UK government are to:

   - Create a ‘Green New Deal’ to create jobs in the environmental sector

   - Invest in essential services including social housing

   - Provide emergency funding to countries that need it to protect jobs and provide social protection

   - Tackle tax havens – especially those linked to the UK

   - Insist on democratic reform of the World Bank and IMF

   - Make all financial institutions and multinational corporations transparent and accountable

   - Ensure that poorer states are allowed to take responsibility for managing their own economies rather than having liberalisation measures forced upon them

   - Introduce robust regulatory requirements and financial incentives at national level and push for them at international level to stop climate chaos
   - Commit to substantial new resource transfer from North to South to support low carbon development”

4. Zander Woollcombe on February 22nd, 2009 at 9:46 pm:
   

   The march is part of a bigger thing NGOs are doing around the G20 reminding leaders not to forget the world’s poor.

   Any big march bringing different groups together has to agree something sufficiently vague to be universally acceptable but that isn’t all that NGOs like Oxfam are doing.

   For example I’m going to Sierra Leone next week to do a case study on the impact of the Financial Crisis on the world’s poorest country to inform lobbying and media work around the G20. I’ll also be working with Oxfam’s programmes and trying to use twitter from upcountry Sierra Leone!

   No one’s got all the answers to how to respond to the credit crunch but bringing new perspectives to the debate is a start.

5. Alex Evans on February 22nd, 2009 at 10:38 pm:
   

   Jasper – The text you put in your comment only appears on the BOND website; not on that of Put People First, and certainly not on any of the unions involved. So in that sense, while it may be BOND’s interpretation of what the march is about, there’s no indication that it’s the interpretation of the other constituencies involved – which is exactly what I was concerned about in the post.

   Zander – I don’t dispute that Oxfam and other development NGOs are doing plenty of other useful stuff. What I DO dispute is that this march is useful. As you say, the platform for this march is “sufficiently vague to be universally acceptable”, and that’s just the problem with it. An illustration: the government announced today that it was imposing tougher curbs on non-EU migrant workers (http://is.gd/kttA). Presumably, the unions think this is great, while development NGOs think it’s pretty bad. But since the platform’s so vague, they can still go on the same march! That’s not a campaigning win in my book…

6. Alex Evans on February 25th, 2009 at 8:25 am:
   

   13 Feb: @putpeoplefirst tells another Twitter user that “more detailed putpeoplefirst policy asks will be going up on the site next week”.

   25 Feb: still waiting.

7. Alex Evans on February 25th, 2009 at 5:26 pm:
   

   Apparently the policy position will now be published on 13 March