Free us from the Tyranny of Governments

By Bernt Aasen

We used to say the Country Program (CP) is the heart and soul of UNICEF, but not anymore. Today’s CPs are prepared and governed in ways that have reduced them to an instrument to ensure Country Offices have an approved budget.

So, what`s the problem?

The organization has no heart and soul anymore. There is no clear purpose. No clear comparative advantage to other UN entities and child-focused, international NGOs. There is no engine-room, or narrative, that keeps the organization together and gives it a distinct identity. There is just more money. Most likely, not because UNICEF is getting better, but, simply, because the world became richer. More money makes the organization bigger, but not necessarily, more relevant. The problem is that UNICEF is about to become just another UN organization, just another UN bureaucracy.

So, what`s the solution?

Well. It is not HQs’ Strategic Plans. They are too diluted, too inclusive, and too general, because in good democratic tradition, they are negotiated internally with every corner of UNICEF and, then, with the governments that happen to sit on the UNICEF Board. It is not UNICEF’s Regional Priorities lists. Today, countries within each region are just as diverse as they are globally. I lived and worked in the Latin America and Caribbean region for 25 years, and I cannot think of a list of regional priorities that fit both Haiti and Costa Rica!

The solution is still the CP, but a very different one.

Current CPs are prepared with - and requested by - the host government and mainly aim to support short-term programs which aim to get the party in power re-elected in next national election. They support governments more than children.

Current CPs are negotiated with some 20 other UN entities, members of the UNCT, with overlapping and competing mandates and agendas to UNICEF. Current CPs are reduced to be instruments for implementing components the UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework which are approved by the host government and the Resident Coordinator. Current CPs support RCs more than children and are, finally, approved by an UNICEF Board consisting of a random collection of government representatives with a minimum interest and understanding of Child Rights.

It’s been sliding for decades, but, today, UNICEF finds itself hostage to host government’s short-term agendas, Board Members’ backwards gender and reproductive health policies and, unfortunately, too mingled up with other UN bureaucracies at HQ, regional and national levels.

UNICEF should go back and take a fresh look at the key documents that justify its existence:
  • The UN Charter
  • The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
  • The Convention of the Rights of the Child
UNICEF should reinvent itself, because it should be about “We the people of the United Nations” and “Member States”. It is about “Nations” and “State Parties”.

UNICEF is not supposed to be reduced to be just another entity supporting governments short-term programs.

States have three powers:
  • Legislative (parliaments)
  • Judiciary (courts)
  • Executive (president or prime minister and ministries)
UNICEF needs to recuperate its ability to cooperate independently with all three powers of the state on Child Right issues, regardless of the priorities of governments and other UN entities. UNICEF needs to connect closer with the members of the Committee of the Rights of the Child; the Committee of the Rights of the Child should become the new UNICEF Board. What better Board could UNICEF have than “18 experts of high moral and recognized competence in the fields covered by the convention” and who are democratically elected among all Member States? (Ref. CRC Art. 43.)

The new UNICEF CP should be based on the “suggestions and general recommendations transmitted to the State Party” by the Committee of the Rights of the Child every five years (Ref. Art. 45.), and become an instrument to support the financing and implementation the Committee’s recommendations. UNICEF’s identity should be to always promote and defend Child Rights, regardless of Governments’ and other UN entities priorities.

This approach and new governance structure would also be the basis for eliminating the current artificial distinctions between “donor and program countries” as well as “UNICEF Committees and COs”. For UNICEF, all countries should simply be Member States with an obligation to comply with the CRC.

A UNICEF presence in countries all over the world, beyond the control of host-governments and other UN bureaucracies, could also make the way for UNICEF as a “Billion People Movement”. A movement of “we the peoples” from all corners of the planet who support the CRC: The beneficiaries of our programs, our individual donors, members of civil society organizations as well as private enterprise. UNICEF needs to use its convening power and new technologies to connect all these people in a Global Movement in support of Child Rights. (Let`s build on the lessons learned from the half-hearted, abandoned intent to create a Global Movement for Children in the 90ties.)

UNICEF should not accept to be diminished to become just another UN agency, merely contributing to the plans of the winners of the last elections in programme countries. It needs to be the World Champion of Child Rights.

How much time do we have to get there? Probably, less than 10 years.

Without urgent action, before we know it: UNICEF Reps will report to RCs. Before we know it, the Board will assign UNICEF General Resources to RCs and not to UNICEF Reps.

Without urgent action, there is probably no UNICEF – as we knew it – by 2030.


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