At the recent preparatory session for the Fourth Financing for Development (FfD4) Conference, CESR's Co-Director of Program, Mahinour El-Badrawi, delivered a statement on behalf of CESR and the Civil Society FfD Mechanism. The intervention highlighted the urgent need for a transformative overhaul of the global financial system, calling for structural reforms to address longstanding inequalities and ensure alignment with international human rights obligations.
The statement drew attention to the systemic inequities embedded in the global financial architecture, which continue to undermine economic and social rights worldwide. Read the intervention in full here:
As we approach the FFD4 Conference, we stand at a crossroads. The global financial architecture and its governance remain inadequate. Rooted in historical inequalities and legacies of colonialism, it has imposed disproportionate burdens on developing countries, undermining their right to development and ability to meet their economic and social rights obligations towards their people. It exacerbates inequalities within and between countries, and places disproportionate burdens on women, girls, and gender and race-diverse peoples.
FfD4 must be a path towards meaningful transformation, embracing a bold, Feminist, green, anti-racist, and rights-based global financial system that advances women’s and girls’ human rights and empowerment, as mandated by the Addis Ababa Action Agenda.
The Elements Paper highlights these challenges but offers limited solutions instead of transformative measures. Outcomes must align with member states' human rights obligations, including under ICESCR and CEDAW.
Under human rights law, states must mobilize and spend Maximum Available Resources justly. We call for a UN Convention on International Development Cooperation and call for all countries to endorse the TORs for the UNTC, to ensure all states fulfill their duties to realize rights, including progressive, gender-responsive taxation…providing robust social protection, and quality public services that address unpaid domestic and care work as a systemic barrier to realizing rights.
States must ensure fiscal space for international cooperation, for access to decent jobs and universal social protection, reducing care loads and avoiding reliance on financial “inclusion” schemes that risk women’s indebtedness.Debt repayment obligations must not trump human rights obligations. IFIs & MDBs must be reformed accordingly.
A UN Framework Convention on Sovereign Debt can ensure equitable restructuring and relief, enabling countries to have the fiscal space necessary to fulfill human rights obligations and address gender justice and climate imperatives.
FfD4 must be a turning point. We urge all Member States to strengthen the Elements Paper into a blueprint for genuine transformation. By adopting these bold measures, we can build a just, equitable, and sustainable global financial system—one that rights historical wrongs, serves people and the planet, and ensures that no one is left behind.
FfD4 represents a pivotal moment to address global inequalities and redefine economic governance. CESR and its partners will continue to advocate for a financial system that prioritizes human rights, gender equality, and environmental sustainability, urging Member States to take ambitious steps toward a just and inclusive global economy.