IASSW United Nations Team Of Representatives Newsletter .

IASSW United Nations Team of RepresentativesNewsletter—February 2021UN's Commission for SocialDevelopment to Meet February 8-17The United Nations Commission for SocialDevelopment will hold its annual session fromFebruary 8-17. Almost all sessions will be heldonline, making this meeting accessible to all.The priority theme is “Socially just transitiontowards sustainable development: the role ofdigital technologies on social developmentand well-being of all.” The theme was agreed ayear ago, recognizing the growing significanceof digital technology and serious gaps in globalcoverage. Current realities necessitate asecond theme of recovery from the Covid-19pandemic and its impact on the 2030 Agendaand SDGs.There will be five Virtual High-Level Panels aslisted below. The usual time for UN sessions isthat morning sessions begin at 10:00 EST andafternoon sessions begin at 3:00. You maywant to check the website to be sure thatstarting times have not been changed.Here are the scheduled panels:1. “Socially just transition towards sustainabledevelopment: the role of digital technologies onsocial development and well-being of all”;Monday February 8th-3pm EST2. M i n i s t e r i a l F o r u m o n “ P r o m o t i n gmultilateralism to realize inclusive, resilient andsustainable recovery from COVID-19 in thecontext of the decade of action and delivery forsustainable development and its socialdimensions”; Tuesday February 9th-10am EST3. Emerging Issues on “Social policy to promote amore inclusive, resilient and sustainablerecovery: Building back better post COVID-19for the achievement of the 2030 Agenda in thecontext of the decade of action and delivery forsustainable development ”; WednesdayFebruary 10th-10:00am EST4. Interactive dialogue with senior officials of theUN System on the priority theme; WednesdayFebruary 10th-3:00pm EST5. Multi-stakeholder Forum on the priority theme.Friday February 12th-3:00pm EST

You can watch live through UN WebTV athttp://webtv.un.org/ in all six United Nations'official languages.For more information and updates to theschedule, ted-nations-commission-for-sociald eve l o p m e nt - c s o c d - s o c i a l - p o l i c y - a n d development-division/csocd59.htmlIASSW representatives are active in the NGOCommittee for Social Development, closelyaligned with the official UN Commission. TheNGO Committee has drafted a Civil SocietyDeclaration that will be presented at theCommission meeting. IASSW has signed on tothe Declaration; it can be accessed at:www.ngosocdev.orgThe NGO Committee will be sponsoring a Forumduring the Commission. Registration is separateand can be accessed ASSW TO CO-SPONSOR SIDE EVENTIASSW has been invited to participate in a sideevent organized by the International Council onSocial Welfare as part of the UN Commission forSocial Development. It will be held online (howappropriate given the topic!) on February 9thfrom 10:00-11:15am EST (New York time).The title of the session is:“Social inclusion through digital inclusion inthe context of sustainable development:trends and challenges.”Panelists include Prof. Lynne Healy (U.S.A.,IASSW Main Representative to the UN),Professor PK Shajahan (India, Vice-President ofICSW and Member of the Board of IASSW), andICSW members Dr. Suh San-Mok (Korea,President), Prof. Antonio Lopez Palaez (Spain,Executive Director), Prof. Driss Guerraoui(Morocco, MENA Region ICSW), and Dr. SergeiZelenev, panel organizer and SpecialRepresentative of ICSW to the UN.See this link for a full draft list of side events:https://teamup.com/ksftz13i7fw9ruy2jeThe site indicates that this side event will bewebcast.Social Development SubcommitteeCompletes Inequality StudyLynne HealyTowards 2030: Grassroots Experiences withInequalities has been published by the NGOCommittee for Social Development. The reportsummarizes the findings of a survey ofgrassroots community organizations to gatherinsights about local experiences withinequalities and determine whether thesituation has improved since the adoption ofthe United Nations Agenda 2030. A number ofthe Agenda's Sustainable Development Goals(SDGs) address inequality; most notably, Goal10 is to reduce inequalities within and betweencountries. There are also Goals to eliminateextreme poverty, promote gender equality andensure access to adequate food, health care,education, water and sanitation.The survey was conducted in mid-2019 anddistributed in English, French, Spanish,Portuguese, Italian and Arabic. There were 208res p o n s es f ro m a c ro s s 4 8 co u nt r iesrepresenting all regions of the world and a mixof high income, middle income and lower

income countries. Several IASSW memberswere among those answering the survey. It isimportant to note that the survey wasconducted before the outbreak of the Covid-19pandemic. Even at that point, it was evident thatinequality is multidimensional. Respondentsreported gaps in access to education, housing,health care, and employment as well as incomeinequality. Women and children suffer the mostfrom inequalities, but many other groups arealso affected. In many countries, some groupsalso suffer from fewer opportunities toparticipate in economic, social and political life.Over 40% said that participation in economiclife had worsened since 2015 and almost asmany reported the same about politicalparticipation.A key question asked in the survey waswhether the situation with inequality hadimproved since the adoption of the SDGs in2015. Close to half of the respondents reportedthat there had been little or no change. Apositive finding was that slightly more of therest (26% of the total respondents) said thatthere had been improvements and only about afifth (21%) said that the situation had worsened.The results differed by country income level ofthe respondents. The positive news is thatabout 40% of respondents from lower incomecountries said that the situation had improved,compared to only 14% of those from highincome countries. The most frequently citedareas of improvement were education andhealth, followed by gender equality. Thesefindings suggest that the MillenniumDevelopment Goals have made an impact inpoorer countries, as these targeted primaryeducation and health services. Austeritypolicies in some high and middle incomecountries and anti-migrant policy havecontributed to more equality in these places.Among the recommendations made are toclosely monitor progress on Goal 10 withdisaggregated data, to strengthen socialprotection programs, and to prioritize the needsof the most vulnerable. Participatoryapproaches and coordinated efforts bygovernments and NGOs are needed.There is much more in the report that can beaccessed at: https://ngosocdev.orgThe Committee will sponsor a UN side event onMonday, March 1 from 1:00-2:30 pm New Yorktime. A link will be posted later on the NGOCommittee website (http://ngosocdev.org ).IASSW is an active member of the NGOCommittee on Social Development and theGrassroots Task Force, with Lynne Healy servinga s t h e a s s o c i at i o n ' s re p re s e ntat i ve .IASSW/University of Connecticut social workintern Zozan Antar also contributed to the study.UN NGO Committee on Migration: Updatesby Rebecca Thomas and Marciana PopescuThe International Association of Schools ofSocial Work (IASSW) is well represented at theNGO Committee on Migration (CoM). Dr.Marciana Popescu, Associate Professor,Fordham University and Dr. Rebecca Thomas,Associate Professor, University of Connecticutare the two faculty persons on the committeeand are our regular representatives. MarcianaPopescu was also elected as a board memberat-large for the NGO Committee on Migration,and started serving on the board in September2020. In addition, there are four social workstudents working with the CoM: KatieZabronsky, Silberman School of Social Work atHunter College, Emily Duszlack and EmmaHeintz, from the University of Connecticut, andShenae Osborn, from Fordham University.

The mission of the NGO Committee onMigration (CoM) is to encourage the protectionand promotion of migrants' human rights inaccordance with the United Nations Charter. Asa member of the Conference of NonGovernmental Organizations (CoNGO), we arein consultative relationship with the UnitedNations.In the 2020-2022 term, the CoM is focusing onfour areas, each of which is being addressed byone of the four subcommittees:Migrants in Vulnerable Situations / MixedMigration (Marciana Popescu is a co-convenerof this subcommittee)Refugee & Migrant ChildrenClimate-Induced DisplacementXenophobia & Social InclusionThe committee and respective subcommitteesmeet monthly (every second Thursday of themonth). There is a special topic selected foreach month, with invited speakers addressingdifferent aspects of migration and related issuesof relevance for the works of the committee.The first CoM meeting held in October focusedon the 2020 Global Forum for Migration andDevelopment (that took place in January, 2021).There were two speakers at that meeting: AlexZalami, head of the 2020 GFMD Taskforce, andSophie van Haasen, Coordinator or GFMDMayors Mechanism. Both speakers discussedexpanding stakeholder engagement in the 2020GFMD, hosted by the United Arab Emirates(UAE). Sophie Van Haasen spoke to theurbanization of spaces because of migrationfrom rural to urban spaces because of climatechange pushing people into the cities seekingemployment resources. Alex Zalami spokeabout his role as head of the 2020 GFMDTaskforce and his belief that cities need to buyinto their plans on migration for it to be aneffective policy.The November meeting began with committeemembers discussing the InternationalMigration Review Forum, taking place in 2022,which will follow up on how the Global Compactfor Migration is being implemented all aroundthe world. Another focus of the meeting wasyouth and migration regarding contributions tothe Global Compact for Migration (GCM) andthe impacts of Covid-19 on youth migration.There were three guest speakers presenting onthe topic: Marta Verani from Global Focal Point,Migration Working Group, and UN Major Groupfor Children & Youth; Jillian Montilla, a researchadvocate for European Network of MigrantWomen; and Violeta Gomez-Uribe, Manager ofOutreach and Organizing at the Mayor's Officeof Immigrant Affairs in New York City. Theoverall theme of this meeting focused on theimpact that young people can have onmigration, particularly youth-led activismgroups, focusing on closing child detentioncenters, and the wider need to educate youthon the issue of migration.The December meeting's topic was “RegionalSpotlight on Europe- New Pact on Migration andAsylum & GCM Regional Review”. MicheleLevoy, Director of the Platform for theInternational Cooperation on UndocumentedMigrants, and Sergio Carrera, Senior ResearchFellow and Head of the Justice and Home AffairsProgramme at the Centre for European PolicyStudies, were the speakers of that meeting.The NGO Committee on Migration (NGO CoM)is hosting a side event at the Commission for