Hello and welcome to the first blog of Generation Development! We are incredibly excited about the prospects of mobilising young people and young professionals the whole world over in answering one basic, simple question:

What development agenda should replace the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in 2015?

To begin with, we need to know what these goals are, how and why they were created, and what problems there have been with their implementation.

Background to the MDGs

The MDGs were formed in 2000 from a long line of development goal setting, from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 to repeated UN Summits on poverty, food and other global issues in the latter half of the 20th century. They include 8 specific development targets across a broad range of social issues including poverty, education, gender, health, environment and international partnerships for development.

It has been suggested the goals mixed a combination of between economic ideology that promotes free trade and markets, and a development approach favoured by wealthy countries and international institutions. Though they can be commended for ushering a new era of support and awareness of the need for global development strategies, there remains still a lack of progress in reaching them after over 10 years.

Many criticisms could be made of why poverty and a lack of basic human needs exist despite the impressive goals agreed on in the MDG framework. A lack of funds, insufficient awareness of the goals at local levels, impossible goals considering local social and political contexts; all of these and more could be levelled at the MDGs’ authors and should be taken into account in any future development framework.

What we are concerned about most though is the extent of grassroots participation in international development goal-setting. For all the talk of global consensus in the MDG framework, we can see now that the priorities of the MDGs were reflections of specific development ideas or campaigns from the 1980s and 1990s. The MDGs were never a bottom-up process of agreeing development needs between different communities and sectors. A grassroots approach to international development strategies then is yet to be realised.

Enter Generation Development!

Our quest to find new ideas for the future of development from young professionals was borne out of a workshop at a student global health conference in November 2010. Participants argued persuasively, over and above the need for improved global frameworks, for the creation of a global forum that seeks the opinions of young professionals of the global South and North to inform future development goal-setting. We created the forum in November 2010 to create a sustainable and inclusive movement that does just this. Our dream was that through discussion, debate and the creation of new and innovative ideas from young people themselves, we could advocate for a new agenda for international development from our political leaders.

Get Involved!

We are now looking for enthusiastic and committed people from all around the world to take Generation Development to the next level. Interested? Then check out our recruitment page for more details.

In the meantime we are starting to assemble the people and materials needed to reach out to young professionals in order to find out their ideas for development. Join our mailing list, follow us on Facebook or Twitter to keep updated and keep visiting our website to keep track of our progress!

Above all, the future of international development policy is entirely in your hands. Join Generation Development to support a new movement of young professionals in creating a bottom-up, effective and sustainable new model for development.

Jonny, Tim, Fraser and the Generation Development team