Inclusive Globalization
The global economy has been especially strong in recent years, with average worldwide per capita income growing as rapidly as ever before. There have also been significant improvements in global health and other broad measures of well-being, including life expectancy.
One group of developing countries, representing a large share of world population, has been at the forefront of global growth; their economies are growing faster than those of developed countries. These nations are accessing global markets for goods, capital and technology; they are trading more and more with each other as well as with rich nations. They are also starting to catch up with the wealthiest countries in terms of human development. Millions of their citizens are being lifted out of poverty every year, with life expectancy, child mortality and literacy converging on developed country levels.
Another group of developing countries—greater in number, if smaller in population —are being left behind, and are today further away economically from the richest countries than ever before. Some countries have also seen a sharp drop in life expectancy, in many cases as a result of HIV and AIDS. The poorer countries also tend to be the ones most vulnerable to the effects of climate change and least prepared to mitigate its impact.
The gap between rich and poor citizens, within both developed and developing nations, is also growing. The richest two percent of the world’s adult population now owns more than half of global household wealth. The bottom half of adults own barely one percent. So the gains from global growth are being highly unequally distributed.
What does this imply for those at the bottom? In 2007, over a billion people had almost no income (the equivalent of a dollar a day or less for each). They typically spent more than half of what they did earn on food for their families, leaving even less for shelter, water, education and health care. Most of these people pooled their incomes through work that was insecure, underpaid and at times unsafe.
In the latter decades of the 20th century, there was a widely held view that a rising tide of global economic integration would lift all boats. Some developing countries have indeed been lifted up and are now sailing ahead so fast that they are starting to catch up with developed countries. But many other poor nations have been left behind by the tide, and are not yet able to navigate global seas. A similar thing is happening within most countries: the benefits of growth are not reaching large parts of the population.
Addressing these inequalities is our era’s most important development challenge, and underscores why inclusive development is central to the mission of the UN and UNDP. In cooperation with other UN agencies, UNDP draws together governments, international organizations, the private sector and civil society groups behind efforts to establish the public policies and institutions that nations need to reduce development disparities. UNDP is a trusted multilateral partner, working with 166 countries to help them build capacity for inclusive development and fulfill the promises of the global economy.
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Why disparities matter
The reasons for addressing widening disparities among people have become startlingly clear, even beyond widely accepted notions of justice and human rights. For one thing, the wider the gaps grow, the more difficult they become to close. Ample evidence suggests, for example, that high levels of inequity reduce the rate at which even rapid economic growth translates into poverty reduction. By one estimate, it now takes three times as much economic growth to achieve the same rate of poverty reduction observed before 1990 in a typical middle-income country.
Disparities also introduce inefficiencies in economic systems, depriving national and global economies of the full range of benefits from economic integration. People can’t tap investments in education and skills, for example. Governments can’t draw upon the tax and other revenues that come from productive populations. And should a farmer cut down the trees in a rainforest simply because he has no other means of livelihood, the long-term contribution to climate change will be felt in that country and beyond.
One of the most important global disparities relates to the lack of decent work available and low incomes. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), about 200 million people don’t have any form of work. Many millions more, including some who are reasonably educated, face inadequate employment. The boom in the global economy has not strongly been translated into decent new jobs: for every percentage point of global growth, formal sector employment has risen only by 0.3 percent.
Another priority is women’s empowerment and women’s rights. Discrimination against women is a fault line running through every society in the world today, varying only by degree. Women are consistently paid less than men, have a weaker political voice, often have access to fewer educational opportunities, and generally benefit least from the use of natural resources. While 200 million women entered the global workforce in the decade before 2003, 60 percent of the one billion poorest people are women. Women perform 60 percent of under-protected and underpaid informal jobs, despite lower overall employment rates.
Today’s disparities are also closely linked to the human impact on the environment. It is the poor who frequently end up with poor quality land, water, fuel and other natural resources, which in turn limit their productivity. In trying to make a living, they may further degrade their immediate environment, leading to a vicious cycle. On the other side are the wealthiest people and countries, who are the greatest consumers of natural resources, and also have much greater power to shelter themselves from environmental impacts such as pollution, scarcity and climate change.
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What we need to do
Fulfilling the promises of an integrated and more secure world requires the political will—and concerted national and international action—to reduce these disparities. This is not primarily about charity, but about helping people develop capacities and opportunities to improve their own lives and communities in a lasting way.
There is no single recipe for success: each country needs to identify priorities and solutions appropriate to the national context. But there are some basic ingredients. Nations need institutions capable of providing sound economic governance. Democratic participation can ensure that economic decision-making and other public policies take into account the realities of people’s lives at all levels of society (not just the rich and powerful). The international community can assist national efforts (including through South-South cooperation) and promote inclusive trends in global trade and investment.
The UN system, grounded in the universal values inscribed in the UN Charter, supports collective efforts in nearly every developing country. UN research, drawing on data and analysis from around the world, can define problems and identify opportunities. UN advocacy and coordination can bring people and institutions together to solve them. Collectively, the different arms of the system have supported countries at all stages of development, from middle-income states to the least developed countries (LDCs), and across all the major sectors, from agriculture and environment to health, education and employment.
UNDP helps integrate and coordinate UN resources so that they are readily accessible, while offering its own programmes in areas where it has recognized expertise. As a trusted development partner, UNDP works towards a world where peace and prosperity are not restricted to a few but available to all.
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