International Norm Dynamics and the "End of Poverty": Understanding the Millennium Development Goals (Global Insights) (Report)

THE PURPOSE OF DEVELOPMENT AS A GLOBAL OBJECTIVE REQUIRING INTERNATIONAL cooperation can and has been defined in many ways. Such definitions depend on how political leaders envision important normative goals for the world; how economists, philosophers, and political scientists theorize the process of development; and how these ideas are utilized and adopted by key stakeholders. A significant evolution in recent years has been the emergence of a broad consensus on ending poverty as the overarching objective of development. This consensus is institutionalized in the UN Millennium Declaration adopted in 2000 and in the widespread use of the global targets that have become known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In previous decades, international development objectives were not so clearly defined nor did they focus on poverty and poor people. Although concern with widespread poverty has been a major factor for keeping development on the international agenda since the 1950s, strategies have been dominated by economic objectives ranging from building infrastructure, human capital and an industrial base in the 1960s and 1970s, to economic liberalization in the 1980s and 1990s, to institutional and governance reforms since the 1990s. (1) Civil society advocates and academics have consistently criticized these national and international strategies for their neglect of poverty and the human dimension. (2)