From Rio to the Millennium Development Goals

This chapter examines the third DSD from Rio Conference until the World Summit of Sustainable Development (WSSD) of 2002. The first section observes the 19th Special Session of the UNGA (Rio+5) organised for an overall review of the implementation of Agenda 21 at its fifth anniversary. This event was historically significant in terms of NGOs’ access to the debates within the UNGA as one of the key global actors in the field of sustainable development. In addition, the outcome document of Rio+5, as well as the work of CSD were crucial with respect to the crystallisation of the primary social convention of GLSD. In the second section, I demonstrate how the WSSD contributed to this crystallisation and how the Plan of Implementation of the WSSD (“Johannesburg Plan of Implementation”) was another significant step after Agenda 21 towards the development of the substances of the SDGs. In the third section reserved for the Millennium Summit and the MDGs, I argue that the complex and sui generis process that led to the emergence of the MDGs is an excellent but a contrario affirmation of the five criteria of the primary social convention of GLSD. In addition, following a detailed examination of the MDGs, as well as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) International Development Goals (IDGs), I reveal that, in terms of style and format, the origins of the MDGs—as predecessor of the SDGS—are mainly to be found at the OECD’s IDGs. The fourth section provides an overview of some of the agreements and objectives reached in the UN conferences of the 1990s and establishes that, in terms of substance, the origins of the MDGs are to be found in these agreements. Lastly, the fifth section examines the progress made during this decade with respect to the secondary and primary social conventions of GLSD.