Mr. Chairman, and if I may say, my fellow colleagues or former colleagues, it's good to be back here, especially in consideration of such an important subject. I appreciate the opportunity of sharing some thoughts on how Canada can best support democratic development internationally. In particular, I will focus on the proposals made by an earlier incarnation of this committee in the report issued in 2007, in which it recommended the creation of two bodies: an arm's-length foundation for international democratic development and a centre for multi-party and parliamentary democracy, to be funded by that foundation.
I believe that in considering these proposals, the committee can do no better than to review the reasons for Parliament's decision in the 1980s to create the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, which fortunately has since been simply renamed Rights and Democracy, which is a little easier to say. Then, as now, much of the world was in turmoil and our parliamentarians came up with a modest, but effective, proposal for assisting people in developing nations in their efforts to develop democratic societies. In a unanimous report to Parliament, they recommended the creation of a single institution that would be clearly at arm's length from the government and would foster in developing countries provisions of the International Bill of Human Rights, and in so doing, would most effectively establish the foundation for a multi-party democracy. This key idea was accepted by the government of the day, Mr. Mulroney's government, and by the opposition parties, and resulted in the unanimous adoption of the bill creating Rights and Democracy that came into effect just before the election in 1988.
Of particular concern to parliamentarians at that time, as it should be today, was to avoid any form of Canadian imperialism lite, if I may put it that way. Our objective should not be to replicate our form of parliamentary democracy or our Charter of Rights; rather, it should be to foster human rights, which are universally recognized in the International Bill of Human Rights. This includes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the optional protocol on the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and finally, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
With this emphasis, it was understood in the 1980s as it is today that many states, for example, in Latin America, have so-called competitive elections, but what they lack is freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom to have a union, freedom of the press, and broadly speaking, the rule of law. As the broad sweep of western European and North American history has shown, the core foundation for a multi-party democracy is a society that embodies in its institutions and practices universal rights, which now include social and economic rights. Without human rights and the rule of law, so-called elections more often than not are simply a sham. With rights in place, however, men and women who were once excluded from the franchise used those rights to organize and demand their right to it. The act creating Rights and Democracy specifically focused on what it said was the need to reduce the gap between what some states are formally committed to, for example, in their constitutions, and what actually takes place within those states.
Since that time and now, many states have signed onto the international covenants but have failed to meet international standards for their implementation. Much of Rights and Democracy's most useful work has been to help bridge this gap between principle and reality, for example in Guatemala, Mexico, El Salvador, Peru, Kenya, Tanzania, Pakistan and Thailand. It was to pick up, as some of the earlier presenters said, a bottom-up approach, not top down. Most often this work was done by the institution with civil society partners in those countries, and it was those partners, not we Canadians, who established the priority for action. In the same countries, CIDA often worked on a state-to-state basis for the same objectives with the government of the day.
I believe it's of great importance to understand that by combining the words “democratic development” with “human rights”, the former was not seen as an add-on to the latter; rather, it was to make clear that the emphasis on rights is precisely what is involved in democratic development. It's for this reason that I do not believe Parliament needs to create two institutes, as recommended by the committee in 2007, one for international development and then another one for multi-party and parliamentary democracy. I believe one institution can suffice.
The principal reason the former Rights and Democracy did not have programs specifically aimed at the development of multi-party democratic states, during my six-year tenure as president, for example, was simply a matter of resources. Considering the global scope of the mandate and the limited financial resources, we thought we should restrict our support to human rights activists and programs. I now believe that with an enhanced budget, one institution would be sufficient, and it could be made clear in legislation that the development of multi-party democracies should be part of its mandate.
Some other suggestions might also be considered in contemplating the content of legislation creating a new institution. It should be spelled out in that legislation, in my view, that the institution is “not an agency of Her Majesty”.
To help ensure all-party support for its work, I believe board members should be appointed after serious consultation with leaders of all the opposition parties. In addition, consideration should be given to appointing up to one-quarter of the board's members from developing countries.
In conclusion, I would like to emphasize how unique the structure, independence and importance of Rights and Democracy were up until nearly the end of its existence. In operating independently of the government, it gained credibility both with international NGOs and foreign governments. At the same time, as a creation of the federal government with its president appointed by Privy Council and having the institutional support of the Department of Foreign Affairs, I as president had more access to heads of government than almost any other international NGO.
It was because of the special combination of independence from the government of the day, yet being on a Canadian diplomatic passport that I was able to seek and obtain meetings with President Clinton, the King of Thailand, and the presidents of Guatemala, Mexico, Rwanda, Eritrea and Kenya, among others. Such meetings and the usefulness they provide for serious human rights action and discussion are simply unavailable to heads of NGOs.
In summary, I believe Canada should help the emergence of more democracies in the world, and do so in part by establishing an arm's-length institution whose purpose is to help facilitate in developing countries the implementation of the rights found in the International Bill of Human Rights.
I'm very much aware that the ideas I've briefly outlined raise a lot of questions that I will now try to answer.
Thank you very much.