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Students for Development

Good Governance & Development

AUCC Public Engagement Lecture

September 18, 2008

Internship Offices Network

Internship Offices Network:Leacock Building, Room 307ion@mcgill.ca

What is the AUCC?

Provides services to member universities in three main areas:1.Public policy and advocacy2.Communications, research and

information-sharing3.Scholarships and international

programs

AUCC Students for Development Award

• Awards of $10,000 to pursue internships of a minimum of 3 months promoting good governance in developing countries.

• Designed to support senior-level university students

• Undertaken with the financial support of the Government of Canada provided though the Canadian International Development Agency

Students for Development and Good Governance

•What is governance?–How collective decisions are taken.

•What is good governance?–Attaching certain practices to the concept of governance

–Characteristics of society.

CIDA and Good Governance

“Without good governance – without the rule of law, predictable administration, legitimate power and responsive regulation – no amount of funding, no amount of charity will set us on the path to prosperity.”

Kofi Annan, former UN Secretary-General, 1997

Kristin McHale

B.C.L./LL.B. ’09, 3rd year, McGill Faculty of Law

Consortium for Development and Justice and Centre for Human Rights Studies

Caracas, Venezuela

Consortium for Development and Justice

• Umbrella NGO:– Community dispute resolution– Judicial system reform– Citizen participation.

• Current projects: – Promoting aboriginal rights– Fostering recently-established

NGOs.• My role:

– Translation and research

Centre for Human Rights Studies

• Centre promoting human rights education.

• Current Project: – Developing a human rights

manual to be distributed to universities across the continent.

• My role: – Editing and compilation of the

manual.

Venezuela: Country of Contradictions

• Prosperity; Poverty• Socialist Revolution; Threatened

Democracy• -Improved Health Care and Education;

Increased Crime and Insecurity

Chavez: Hero or Dictator?

Governance

Consortium for Development and Justice:– Capacitation training sessions for aboriginal

communities– Participants are taught about their legal rights to

local self-government through community councils.

Centre for Human Rights Studies:– Respect for basic human rights is fundamental to

good governance.

Governmental Control of Civil Society: – Serious consequences for governance and

democracy.

Visit! Volunteer! Learn!

Samuel Walker

B.C.L./LL.B. ’09, 3rd year, McGill Faculty of Law

Refugee Law Project

Kampala, Uganda

Refugees in Uganda

Refugees in Uganda260,000Congo, Sudan, Rwanda, Burundi, Kenya

Internally displaced persons

1.8 million

Northern Uganda

Who are refugees?

Refugees and Governance

• Addressing problems associated with displacement are vital to good governance in Uganda and East Africa– Displacement disrupts social cohesion and

creates a cycle of violence• A very troubled region• Huge displaced population in Uganda (1.8 million)

– Land issues– Ethnic tensions

Why refugees need special protection in Uganda

• They are deprived of important rights:

– No land rights– No political rights– No real freedom of

movement– Restricted access to

the economy– No right to eventually

become a citizen

My internship: Refugee Law Project, Legal Aid Clinic

• Local NGO, affiliated with Makerere University• Founded in 1999• Research, advocacy, education

& training, legal aid.• Legal help

–becoming a refugee– routine legal problems

Durable solutions1. Repatriation (return)

Durable solutions2. Local integration

Durable solutions3. Resettlement

Visit Uganda!

Marie-Claire St. Jacques

M.Sc. ’09, Integrated Water Resources Management

Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)

Pretoria, South Africa

South Africa since 1994:Redressing Past Inequities

• National Water Act 1998–Equity–Sustainability–Economic Efficiency

“Recognizing that while water is a natural resource that belongs to all people, the discriminatory laws and practices of the past have prevented equal access to water, and use of water resources”

Preamble to the National Water Act, 1998

My Internship

• Stakeholder workshops

• Stakeholder interviews

• Policy Research: Challenges to good water governance and poverty alleviation in the Inkomati

Stakeholders in the Water Sector

LONG PROCESSLOCAL IMPLEMENTATION IS KEY

“The water crisis is mainly a crisis of governance”

2nd World Water Forum, 2000

Christopher Mark McEwan

B.A. ’09, Economics, Political Science, Langue et littératurefrançaise

Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD)

Accra, Ghana

Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD)

• Established 1998 to “promote good governance, and liberal economic reform through research, advocacy, and consultancy services.”

• Programs Intern– Supporting CDD's Mission– Example: Political Parties

Bill

International and Regional Context

Location: Accra, Ghana–4th Republic since 1957 commenced

in 1992. • History of coups and counter coups, one

party states, and military rule.• Two party system

–Uncertain economic status

CDD – Ghana and Governance

•Collaboration•Variety, complexity

Mark McEwan speaks to disadvantaged youth about education and democracy. (Photo: Abdul Wahab Musah)

Concluding comments

• My internship was undertaken with financial support from the Government of Canada provided though the Canadian International Development Agency.

• Thank you to CIDA, AUCC, and the McGill Internship Office.

For More Information

Internship Offices Network:

Email: ion@mcgill.caWebsite: www.mcgill.ca/internships

Phone: (514) 398-2916Leacock Building, Room 307

For more information on AUCC: www.aucc.ca