Podcast Summary: Does It Matter If We Don’t Achieve the SDGs?

The CGD Podcast
Host: Center for Global Development (Rajesh Merchandani)
Guests: Nancy Birdsall (President, Center for Global Development) and Michael Elliott (President, ONE Campaign)
Date: September 21, 2015

Overview

This episode of the CGD Podcast explores the significance and implications of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as they were about to be adopted by the world’s nations. Host Rajesh Merchandani is joined by two prominent figures in international development, Nancy Birdsall and Michael Elliott, to discuss whether the SDGs set out the right global blueprint, their achievability, the shift from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and what the new development agenda means for aid, accountability, and collective action in a changing world.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Are the SDGs the Right Agreement?

• Nancy Birdsall ([00:43])
  • The SDG agreement is “the right agreement” because it brings in two key innovations:
    • Sustainability: Unlike the MDGs, “sustainable” in SDGs includes both environmental and social aspects, implicitly invoking issues like inequality.
    • Universality: The SDGs apply to all countries—rich, poor, or middle-income—acknowledging many shared problems across traditional divides. “It’s goals for all of us.”
• Michael Elliott ([01:57])
  • Universality is “absolutely 100%” the right approach.
  • SDGs build on tremendous progress made with the MDGs on health and poverty and create a “through train,” enabling continuous improvement on those while expanding the scope to new challenges, including “climate change, governance, corruption, industrialization, and inequality.”

2. MDGs vs. SDGs: Are We Setting Ourselves Up to Fail?

• Michael Elliott ([03:35])
  • Acknowledges the scale: 17 goals and over 160 targets is a “challenge...an enormous challenge.” Dismissing this expansion as unproductive is “a little too glib.” The SDGs offer nuance and foster alignment with national development plans.
• Nancy Birdsall ([04:12])
  • The MDGs redefined development from just economic growth to “human development and about people.”
  • Their value was in specificity, measurement, and accountability.
  • SDGs add to the normative shift by emphasizing “sustainable” and invoking “social justice in a larger sense,” and address systemic, collective action problems (e.g., climate change, tax evasion, antimicrobial resistance, cybercrime).

3. Achievability of the SDGs

• Michael Elliott ([06:46])

  • Not achievable “tomorrow,” but likely through ongoing commitment by national governments and increased engagement of civil society, especially in the Global South.
  • Civil society’s role will be to use SDGs as accountability and measurement tools.

• Nancy Birdsall ([07:35])

  • “It’s not that important” whether SDGs are fully achieved. What matters is “measuring progress and the rate of progress and clarifying who is accountable.”
  • Systemic issues require collective action—some accountability is clear (within countries), but much is increasingly global and diffuse.

• Michael Elliott’s Notable Quote ([08:58]):

  “I see these goals as the world making a promise to itself...arguably the biggest promise the world has made to itself since that extraordinary set of documents in the post-1945 period...It’s sort of a wonderful thing...we're one world, one planet, one society, one people who look out for each other and look out for how we get along in the world and how our one home is going to be handed on to the next generation.”

4. SDGs as the "Universal Declaration of Human Rights—for the Age of Metrics"

• Rajesh Merchandani ([10:03]):
  Describes the SDGs as “a universal declaration of human rights for the age of metrics and data.”
• Nancy Birdsall ([10:13])
  • Agrees: The UN is a “global public good in setting norms and in calling for collective action,” even if perfect collective action is elusive.
  • The SDGs "capture something about a world in which in principle we could have a more universal sense of where we should be going."

5. Aid's Role in the New Paradigm

• Nancy Birdsall ([12:24])
  • Aid’s role is “diminishing relative to understanding policy and politics and finding ways to leverage better policy for people everywhere.”
  • Emphasizes collective action and policy over simple aid flows.
• Michael Elliott ([13:25])
  • Aid is still “really, really important”—especially for the “last billion of people in extreme poverty,” most of whom will be in fragile or conflict-affected settings where “states are thin.”
  • Clarifies that a dollar of aid is not equivalent to a dollar of domestic or private finance due to differing impacts.
• Nancy Birdsall ([15:01])
  • Humanitarian assistance, especially from the U.S., “has to grow” in the face of climate-linked displacement and conflict.
  • Aid will increasingly take the form of humanitarian relief, and the development community needs to focus on innovative, efficient delivery models.

6. Using Cash as Aid

• Rajesh Merchandani ([16:21])
  • Mentions CGD’s Zoe in Barda convening a panel recommending more cash-based aid, especially in humanitarian contexts.
• Michael Elliott & Nancy Birdsall ([16:32-16:33])
  • Both strongly endorse this, with Nancy noting: "the evidence suggests it's a very good idea."

7. Differences Between MDG and SDG Negotiations

• Michael Elliott ([17:08], [17:21])
  • The world is vastly different than in 2000: technology, geopolitics, and trust in institutions have shifted.
  • In 2000, the U.S. was the “hyper power” and could more easily drive global consensus.
  • Now, there is widespread distrust in institutions, which has “made putting together the SDGs a little bit more difficult than it would have been.”
• Nancy Birdsall ([19:15])
  • The US’s model is more challenged now, with its relative power diminished and alternate institutions like the Asian Infrastructure Bank emerging.
  • The economic context is tougher (“low growth austerity”), posing additional difficulties.

Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• Nancy Birdsall on universality and inequality ([00:43]):

  “We don't have just the poor and just the rich anymore. It's a much more enriched mix. It's goals for all of us.”

• Michael Elliott on the promise of the SDGs ([08:58]):

  “This is the world making a promise to itself... a promise to ourselves that we're one world, one planet, one society, one people who look out for each other... That's a pretty wonderful thing to do.”

• Nancy Birdsall on accountability ([07:35]):

  “What's important is measuring progress and the rate of progress and clarifying who is accountable for what.”

• Michael Elliott on aid for fragile states ([13:25]):

  “Particularly when you get to the last billion of people in extreme poverty... in fragile states... aid is going to remain a really, really important part of the mix.”

Important Timestamps

• 00:43 – Nancy Birdsall: What makes the SDG agreement fundamentally different from the MDGs
• 01:57 – Michael Elliott: Universality and ongoing progress beyond the MDGs
• 04:12 – Nancy Birdsall: Accountability, measurement, and systemic challenges in development
• 06:46 – Michael Elliott: On the possibility of achieving the SDGs and civil society’s role
• 07:35 – Nancy Birdsall: Why full achievement is less important than measurable progress
• 08:58 – Michael Elliott: SDGs as “the world making a promise to itself”
• 10:13 – Nancy Birdsall: The UN’s role in setting global norms and universal aspirations
• 12:24 – Nancy Birdsall: How SDGs shift focus beyond aid towards collective action and better policy
• 13:25 – Michael Elliott: The irreplaceable importance of aid for fragile states
• 15:01 – Nancy Birdsall: Humanitarian assistance’s rising importance in aid
• 17:21 – Michael Elliott: The changing global context from 2000 to the current era
• 19:15 – Nancy Birdsall: The shifting power and role of the US in global development

Conclusion

The conversation concludes with both guests affirming the SDGs’ importance as a global commitment—even if imperfect or ambitious beyond likely full achievement. Their main value lies in reframing development in universal, measurable, and collectively accountable terms, with the greatest challenges now found in fostering global collective action and adapting to a world where traditional divides and solutions are less relevant than ever before.

For more research and analysis: cgdev.org