HABITAT: It Isn’t Only The Size That Counts

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

ISTANBUL, Jun 6 1996 (IPS) - The “Cities Summit” has so far been the least well-attended and most controversial of the last five United Nations international conferences of the last three years, perhaps because of the complexity of the issues in hand.

Current estimates are that attendence has totalled only around 14,000 delegates, observers, experts, local authorities, members of parliament, officials from international organisations and representatives of non governmental organisations (NGOs).

The 1992 “Earth Summit” in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, and the “Women’s Conference” in Beijing in 1995, attracted nearly 50,000 participants each.

Even the Population and Development meeting in Cairo, and the Social Development conference in Copenhagen, both in 1994, were far better attended than this meeting.

Only 17 heads of state or government were expected to attend the meeting in Istanbul this week, and only 14 have confirmed their planned presence at the closing of the meeting on June 14.

However, the real importance of this world conference cannot be measured by these figures alone.

The fact that the meeting is being held in itself promotes debate, raising the public consciousness of common problems and the policies which cuase them, said Ladislas Dowbor, the United Nations consultant for Latin America and Africa.

These summits motivate the world to analyse issues like the environment, poverty, population and gender issues, all vital for the future of humanity, but which are frequently treated in a fragmented, superficial and sometimes despective manner.

The “Habitat II” conference has gone some way towards correcting this perspective, making urban issues a priority and providing an overview of the city issue as a whole, said Chilean deputy Carlos Montes.

The complexity of the issue, and the need to join together the different threads which contribute to the explosive urban phenomenon of recent decades, could be behind the less spectacular nature of this conference.

However, for some member nations, like Brazil for example, Habitat II “has already been a great success,” in promoting broad discussion on urban policy, something lacking in the nation, according to Ambassador Geraldo Holanda, present leader of the national delegation.

The final documents of the conference, which aim to provide a world plan of action, principles and commitments to be signed by all member nations, have been under discussion by the two committee team since Tuesday.

Committee 1, split into two work groups, is dealing with intergovernmental negotiations to define the text of the legal documents, and subgroups have been formed to deal with particularly tricky issues.

One of these is handling the suggestion of a right to housing, which the United States is refusing to recognise as a specific right.

The NGO action is mainly concentrated on this point, and they protested in the streets of Istanbul and other world cities, Thursday, while collecting signatures to petition for the legal acceptance of the right to housing.

Washington maintains that declaring a new right without previous strategy meetings would be foolish, comparing this to the process with the preparatory work carried out for the 1948 Human Rights agreement, said Cavalcanti.

“Their position is developing, it’s no longer the same as it was in February, but the NGOs want more,” he said.

Meanwhile, Committee 2 is made up of the non governmental representatives. The local authorities were given a chance to talk Tuesday, and the members of parliament, the scientists and professionals met Thursday.

On Friday the unions will have their chance, followed by the foundations, the entrepreneurs and the NGOs.

All these sectors met in assemblies last week to approve the suggestions of Committee 2.

However, the voting will not be carried out by a very representative group, for while there were 49 Mexican representatives present, the US only sent two observers, and Venezuela, Peru and Chile were not even there.

Meanwhile, an old university building 500 metres from the official conference is humming with the activity of 6,000 NGO representatives, from groups campaigning for human rights, the homeless, the socially, sexually and racially discriminated, and other issues from all over the world.

President of Committee 1, Shafqat Kakakhel said most of the important issues on the agenda had already received a consensus vote, with the disagreements all now in the sections in brackets.

Cavalcanti said that apart from the right to housing, international cooperation and monitoring the implementation of the agreements, are also controversial issues.

The traditional situation is for the developing nations to call for more cooperation investment while the North digs in its heels, and the conference hopes to find creative ways to overcome this and get creative financing for urban development.

There are also suggestions that the resources and rank of the UN Centre for Human Settlements be upped, making it an executive body for conference follow-up, on a par with other United Nations bodies.