MWP-IHEID Workshop
The accountability of International Organisations (IOs) has become a prominent topic of academic and advocacy debate. The debate reflected first the waves of democratisation since the late 1980s and subsequently the discontent with the power of international economic institutions and organisational failures to protect vulnerable populations. This event focuses on issues on salience and power of International Organisations, with the aim of assessing the scope of their accountability, arguing about the necessity to move beyond the binary perspective of whether IOs are accountable or not in order to identify the institutional and political factors likely to increase or limit the scope of international accountability.
Such academic debate is especially relevant for what concerns the accountability of IOs in the contemporary just transition towards a net-zero emissions world. IOs such as the Green Climate Fund, the UNDP and the World Bank have a prominent role in financing green development projects, environmental conservation and other projects that serve climate change adaptation and mitigation goals. These projects, while having crucial objectives as helping countries to move towards sustainable development, might impact negatively human rights and the environment. Therefore, international organisations and funds have adopted a great variety of policies for environmental and social standards, gender rights, and Indigenous peoples. Notwithstanding the existence of such policies, individuals and communities might still be harmed in the context of the implementation of green development projects, triggering the accountability regime of international organisations. Consequently, international organisations have set up accountability mechanisms that deal with grievance redress of affected individuals and communities. This seminar will delve into some interesting case studies of "just transition complaints" that have been brought to the attention of the Accountability Mechanisms of the above-mentioned organisations.
About the speakers:
Professor Liliana Andonova is a faculty member at IHEID since 2008, co-director for the Centre for International Environmental Studies since 2009, and Head of the Interdisciplinary programs since 2017. She was previously a Jean Monnet Fellow at the European University Institute, Italy, and Assistant Professor in Government and Environmental Studies at Colby College, USA. She authored Transnational Politics of the Environment and EU Integration and Environmental Policy in Eastern Europe (2004) as well as numerous articles. Her current research focuses on institutional change and public-private partnerships, European integration, transnational governance, and climate cooperation.
Dr Giada Giacomini holds a PhD in Public, Comparative and International Law from La Sapienza University of Rome, written in collaboration with the Strathclyde Centre for Environmental Law and Governance (UK). She has recently published her monograph Indigenous peoples and climate justice: a critical analysis of international human rights law and governance (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022). Former Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute (2022/2023 cohort), she is now employed in the project on the Accountability of International Organisations at IHEID led by Professor Andonova.