14 Jun Save the Elephants: Let NGOs Write Your Government’s Treaty Proposals
A number of key Southern African countries have agreed on a proposal that would result (eventually) in a nine-year moratorium on sales of ivory. The agreement was made during the latest meeting of state-parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).
There are of course many complex details to consider, none of which I will do here knowing little about CITES and less about international ivory regulation. But I am interested in some complaints about the rather prominent role of NGOs in the negotiations, with some governments complaining about the NGOs’ power over African governments.
Botswana’s environment minister Onkokame Kitso Mokaila was also content with the deal, and suggested it gave a chance for reconciliation between the African factions.
But he was scathing about the role that some environmental organisations had played in the process. One NGO representative had told the BBC earlier in the meeting that they had “basically written the Kenyan proposals”.
“I believe certain NGOs take advantage of Africans,” said Mr Mokaila.
“I feel where there is hunger, there is opportunity for such NGOs; a starving person will listen to anyone with money.”
But Patrick Omondi dismissed the allegation that environmental groups were controlling Kenya’s policies.
“That is not true at all,” he said. “They must have given us advice in terms of the layout, but the actual decision that we need that proposal comes from the government.”
One European delegate noted that his government would not be comfortable with allowing NGOs the amount of influence which one group in particular appeared to have with Kenya.
I would say the Kenyans should not be treated with such condescension by the commentators. They knew what they were doing. I would suspect NGO power as compared to that of large Western donor states is much more negligible.
Best,
Ben
NGOs have as much influence as states, intergovernmental organizations, the UN and its agencies, and international rules and processes permit them. See, for instance, Tullio Treves, et al., eds., Civil Society, International Courts and Compliance Bodies (The Hague: T.M.C. Asser Press; distributed by Cambridge University Press, 2005). In the introduction to same, Treves notes that “a recurrent theme that emerges in the study of NGOs in international law is the tension between the ambition of NGOs to be recognized as legitimate participants and the concern for maintaining their spontaneous character, which runs parallel to the tension between the desire for states to integrate NGOs in the legal environment in order to take advantage of their expertise, and at the same time to keep them away, in order to avoid disruption of the normal processes states are accustomed to.” The latter “tension” is clearly on display here.