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  2. Blog on SDG16

Blog on SDG16

Key Messages from the 2023 World Public Sector Report

It is my pleasure to share with you the key messages from the 2023World Public Sector Report. The report offers valuable insight into what Governments can do to strengthen the role of the public sector in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.Good governance and effective public institutions are not an end in themselves, but a critical foundation for securing the transformational changes required to achieve the SDGs.These transitional changes will have to be pursued in the very… Read More

Promoting the effective governance principle of participation to anchor the whole-of-society and…

The principle of participation is a fundamental principle among the 11 Principles of Effective Governance for Sustainable Development adopted by ECOSOC in 2018. It is at the heart of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and included in several Sustainable Development Goals and targets, especially SDG16.The principle of participation means that to have an effective State, all significant political groups should be actively involved in matters that directly affect them and have a chance to… Read More

Stimulating public sector innovation through digital technology and measuring the impact of digital…

Digital divide in a growing worldIn November 2022, the world population reached 8 billion and it is expected to continue to grow to around 8.5 billion in 2030. The world is also expected to continue urbanizing - from 56 per cent of the total population living in urban areas in 2021 to 68 per cent in 2050. This would result in an increase of 2.2 billion urban dwellers, living mostly in Africa and Asia. In 2022, 73 per cent of the world’s population over 10 years of age owned a mobile phone (… Read More

Changing mindsets to transform governance for SDG achievement

Mindsets are ingrained, presumptive ways of thinking. They consist of beliefs and attitudes that a person has assimilated throughout their lifetime about themselves and the world around them. As such, mindsets are reflected in the way we think and act, shaping the way public leaders and public servants behave. Changing mindsets of leaders and public servants is essential to transform governance in support of the SDGs. The necessary institutional transformation for SDG achievement needs to be… Read More

Lebanon case study: Advancing the fiscal transparency agenda

Lebanon’s recent crisis has shed light on the lack of transparency, weak fiscal discipline, and poor financial reporting and oversight that have pushed the country’s score to the bottom of the Open Budget Survey (6/100 in 2019 and 9/100 in 2021) where it stands below the regional average of countries of the Middle East and North Africa. Data on public spending is available ad-hoc, in non-searchable formats and hardly allows to make year-to-year comparisons or follow trends. Public participation… Read More

Budget credibility in times of crisis: Principle versus reality

At a time of crisis budget credibility becomes a very complex issue, especially as acute crisis normally has non-predictable impacts on government revenues and spending, which significantly influences the realization of planned figures. Changes in budgets are inevitable but should be realized via evidence-based and transparent processes.RealityIn our current world, impacted by multiple crises, such as the hopefully soon ending COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine, almost all governments do… Read More

Peace with Nature

There is a growing recognition that climate change and the environment may have a significant influence on conflict and human security, but also that conflicts significantly affect the environment. Climate change certainly affects human livelihoods and security. Impacts may vary according to context and environment, and it is certainly true that climate change can contribute to conflict but is unlikely to be the sole cause. In situations where climate change is a determinant of conflict, it may… Read More

Better Data for SDGs - empowering stakeholders and decision-makers

Halfway through the 2030 Agenda ambition and results of sustainability are still not well aligned. Calls for accelerating its implementation focus frequently on greater financial resources. But what about the backbone of sound policy-making, data and evidence? Do we really know where we stand today? Do we really know where we need to go to get there?There was a sharp awareness of the critical role of data for a successful implementation of the SDGs, when they were decided upon in 2015 and work… Read More

Can crisis governance drive out the capacity for complexity governance?

The contribution of the UN Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA) to the 2023 HLPF contains eight topical recommendations. This blog is inspired by the first recommendation, which is about the very dynamic context in which governments currently have to operate and find effective responses to a diversity of challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced governments in a crisis management mode, and many of them performed relatively well in this respect – but others did not. Meanwhile… Read More

Another take! Times of tectonic shifts and global changes: The public service and the Global South

This week, from 27 to 31 March 2023, the Committee of Experts of Public Administration (CEPA), a subsidiary body of the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations, meets.  It has been confronted by the realisation that both the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine may have transformed the world as we known it since roughly the start of the century.  Both exposed a gulf between the narratives, perceptions and needs, with lived realities and facts which, though dimly aware, we can… Read More

Connecting the “Silos” of Decision-making

  Agenda 2030In 2015, all of the UN's 193 member countries, after many rounds of negotiations, agreed on a Master plan for the survival of humanity and our planet, entitled “Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”. It is an extremely ambitious plan with 17 sustainability goals and 169 targets. What this Agenda 2030 provides is a unique, global, national, and local investment plan in three central dimensions of survival – the social, the environmental, and the… Read More

How to incorporate SDGs into national budgeting systems

The report “Emerging issues in public financial management and budgeting for the SDGs” states that “the budgeting for the SDGs as a practice is still in its infancy. Several countries have announced, through voluntary national reviews, the intention to reflect the Goals in budgetary processes but few have specified why it would be relevant to do so or how the practice could be made operational”. For most countries the simplest and potentially fast solution is to re-organise the national… Read More