Resolution Feedback: The United Nations Special Conferences in the 1990s and the Millennium Development Goals

Abstract

Abstract There is a broad consensus that existing and preexisting international institutions matter in shaping the design of new international institutions. Previous research has focused on international institutions with binding obligations, with limited understanding of nonbinding agreements such as United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolutions. This study explores how the existing UNGA resolutions affect the design of subsequent UNGA resolutions focusing on the case of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs were presented to the UNGA as a nonbinding agreement consisting of targets found verbatim in the Millennium Declaration that had unanimously been adopted by the UNGA. However, the UNGA continued debating and eventually revised the MDGs. To identify the reason that the MDGs did not obtain immediate approval, this study borrows insights from historical institutionalism. It suggests that policy feedback at the international level could be a mechanism through which prior UNGA resolutions constrained the design of the MDGs. Through an investigation of the history of nongovernmental organization (NGO) involvement in UN decision-making and UNGA official records related to the MDGs, it demonstrates that UNGA resolutions adopted in the 1990s empowered NGOs and motivated them to make the MDGs comprehensively reflect the agreements from the 1990s. The findings indicate that policy feedback could occur at the international level involving NGOs that pursue their goals across borders. Providing resources, international agreements could strengthen the capacities of NGOs and enhance their influence in international politics.