Credit: Gary Raynaldo /  Achim Steiner Administrator, UN Development Program speaks at Council on Foreign Relations policy forum May 20, 2019 New York. 

By Gary Raynaldo     DIPLOMATIC  TIMES

Achim Steiner, Administrator, United Nations Development Program, discussed how development must be redefined in the twenty-first century to address the underlying causes of global crises.  Steiner spoke  at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City.   In his talk at the CFR’s annual Sorensen Distinguished Lecture on the United Nations,  Steiner cited results from the UN’s work in hotspots around the world, including Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Somalia, and the Sahel.

 “As you know, and many of you know, the last five or six years have brought the scourge of war and conflict back to our attention as probably not for the last twenty to thirty years. We have close to seventy million people who are displaced.  We have conflicts that, you know, literally span different parts of the globe, centered sometimes around the Middle East and North Africa in terms of public attention, but, you know, whether you go to Latin America, whether you go to Africa, and even parts of Asia, what is emerging is many societies are beginning to struggle with cohesion. And the drivers of that conflict are very often development failures.”

-Achim Steiner Administrator, UN Development Program

Steiner stated that development failures have to do with inequality—abject poverty.  “It can also be injustice. It can be discrimination. Discrimination by the state on the basis of your religion, or of your ethnicity. And these are the grounds into which the seed of conflict, of dissent, and then, in due course, more and more often, also violent extremism, are sown.”

Credit: Gary Raynaldo /  Achim Steiner Administrator, UN Development Program, and presider,  Ethan Bronner  Senior International Editor, Bloomberg at  CFR New York May 20, 2019. 

United States Spent $5.8 Trillion on Countering Terrorism In Past 20 Years – Yet World Not Safer   – Steiner 

Steiner noted the paradox that although the global community is  a much wealthier, healthier, better-educated generation than ever in human history, the scourge of war and conflict continues to expand.  “I mean, we often forget that in the last thirty years we’ve moved from a world where nine out of ten people used to live in extreme poverty, today a world where only one out of ten people lives in extreme poverty,” he said.  Steiner then pointed out  that the United States, since the beginning of this century, (meaning the year 2000 till 2017), spent $5.8 Trillion on countering terrorism and aggressive political extremism in eighty countries across the world.  “So here is an attempt to try and contain the seeds of violence, of extremism that lead to conflict, to displacement, to war, to destabilization across entire regions, with a very much security-focused intervention. 

“And the bitter lesson that we have learned is the world has not become safer. These problems often are not resolved. They may be contained temporarily with military and security operations, but really we have to go back to investing in development.”

-Achim Steiner

He added:  “That the military security interventions of the United States across the world over the last ten, fifteen years, have rarely yielded the straightforward result that was being looked for.  And in fact, if you then start also bringing to this discussion not only this frustration but also a realistic perspective of, you know, how else are we engaging? Because the United States now has a defense budget of $700 billion a year. The total expenditure of all industrialized countries put together for development aid, as it is called, is barely a fifth of that, for the entire world.”

POVERTY IS PRIORITY 

“Poverty is the priority, because obviously poverty is the cruelest form of development denied. So we always will have a focus on helping eradicate poverty. But, you know, sometimes you eradicate poverty by investing in tomorrow’s technologies. Education is an investment not in eradicating today’s poverty—it makes you poorer as a parent, very often. But you’re actually investing in your children in order to have a better life. Development—and especially what I am trying to do with the United Nations Development Program in this moment—in this particular moment today, is to focus on the future of development. We need to enable societies to escape poverty by being able to draw on global markets, but also on technology, use the digital economy not as something that is, you know, not just a phenomenon out there. “

The UN Development Program

On the ground in about 170 countries and territories, UNDP works to eradicate poverty while protecting the planet. We help countries develop strong policies, skills, partnerships and institutions so they can sustain their progress.