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Mercy Global Concern - 1999 to 2001
The 52nd Annual DPI-NGO Conference
The Challenges of a Globalized World: Finding
New Directions
15 - 17 September, 1999
This year's conference promises to provide new perspectives
on efforts to strengthen partnerships that enhance globalization's
beneficial aspects in order to ensure a world in which human
rights, good governance, human security, and sustainable development
are priorities. It also seeks to advance the current dialogue
on efforts to confront some of the difficult challenges presented
by globalization.
Globalization is a long-standing process that has dramatically
accelerated in recent years, driven by many forces, including
new technologies and the increasingly free flow of capital.
There is no doubt that the dynamics of globalization are benefiting
many people, generating unprecedented wealth, and creating
new opportunities. But, it is also having adverse consequences
for many others, affecting human security, exacerbating economic
and social marginalization and raising concerns regarding
the persistence of extreme poverty.
Moving beyond the debate over what is globalization and the
ways that it affects our lives, this conference will seek
to find practical answers and strategies to question relating
to the course of globalization in years to come. Can the process
of globalization be mitigated? Can global free markets meet
the needs of pluralistic, democratic societies? What should
be the role of the United Nations in this process? Of international
financial organizations? Of non-governmental organizations?
If business has determined the direction and set the tenor
of globalization, how can other voices of civil society assume
their place in the policy-making that is shaping the future
of mankind? What roles will sovereign States, labour, consumers,
non-governmental organizations, and others play in the emerging
partnerships? What is the role of human rights in shaping
global ethics that will better guide policy-makers and planners
and ensure the benefits of globalization for all?
Reflections of Mercy Participants
Photo from the Conference
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