Cities demand say in international negotiations

Cities, such as New York, have fewer rights than NGOs at the UN Alamy Stock Photo/Credit: Littleny / Alamy Stock Photo

At the United Nations, cities have fewer rights than NGOs. However, cities also want to have a say internationally and are becoming more involved.

Cities are important players. “Numerous global issues, from health to human rights, migration to the environment, are negotiated by states at the international level, but often the results are implemented locally,” says Anh Thu Duong, the co-director of the Global Cities Hub in Geneva. The organisation was founded in 2020 by the city and canton of Geneva and the federal government. “We wanted to create a structure that links cities and regions with international Geneva,” Duong says. The Swiss foreign ministry also views it as a positive development. Local and regional governments have been able to acquire a stronger voice thanks to the Global Cities Hub, the ministry said in response to questions.

Cities are important where they are in direct contact with the population. With regard to migration, governments decide who is allowed to stay in a country, but local authorities take care of integrating people, providing accommodation and ensuring that children can go to school.

Cities have long been speaking out on the international stage on global issues such as climate change and migration. At the UN, however, as subnational authorities they have no consultative status — unlike non-governmental organisations.

For more money, autonomy and fields of competence

Cities network internationally in various organisations. However, even United Cities and Local Governments – an organisation bringing together 250,000 member cities worldwide – can only participate in UN negotiations as an NGO. “We see ourselves as a task force that represents all the major city networks,” says Albert Llado, who is responsible for policy and partnerships at UCLG.

For example, UCLG is involved in the High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, which reviews the status of the UN 2030 Development Agenda. In UCLG’s view, these development goals can only be achieved if they are implemented locally. “Local authorities must therefore be given more money, more autonomy and more fields of competence,” Llado says. The organisation is expanding its contacts with governments. According to Llado, meetings between city presidents and the environment ministers of various countries, like those that took place at the UN Climate Change Conference COP28 in Dubai, should be institutionalised. This would make the multilateral system more inclusive, he says.

Both Global Cities Hub in Geneva and the UCLG are in favour of a consultative status for cities at the UN. But achieving this is complicated, as UN member states would have to negotiate and adopt a resolution. This is how the consultative status for NGOs was introduced in the 1990s.

A road sign telling people to wear masks KEYSTONE

Proposals for a UN agreement

The member states of the World Health Organisation are currently negotiating a pandemic treaty in Geneva. The Global Cities Hub took part in the meetings, which were open to organisations beyond national governments. “Together with a network of cities, we explained that cities were on the front line during the Covid pandemic,” explains Duong from the Global Cities Hub. Cities implemented measures including lockdowns, school closures and vaccination campaigns. “We therefore demanded that cities be included in the negotiation process and submitted proposals for the agreement,” she says. The Global Cities Hub has also submitted proposals for negotiations on a UN agreement on plastic pollution, she says.

The Global Cities Hub is also in favour of cities’ participation in the UN Human Rights Council’s regular review of the human rights situation of states, the Universal Periodic Review. NGOs are already permitted to submit their own reports in these processes. For Switzerland’s most recent Universal Periodic Review in 2022, the federal government consulted the cities for its state report, but they were not represented in the Swiss delegation.

To date, Swiss cities have seldom been part of the government delegation at UN conferences. One exception was in 2022, when the association of municipalities took part in the sustainability forum on the UN 2030 Agenda. The foreign ministry says it would welcome cities or cantons carrying out a voluntary local review of the implementation of this agenda. This would enable them to monitor their progress towards the development goals.

First success

Internationally, there has been an initial success: in January 2023, the UN Economic Commission for Europe in Geneva decided that the Forum of Mayors would become one of its official bodies. Mayors can discuss global issues that are implemented locally and make recommendations to governments. These issues include sustainable urban development, transport, vulnerable people and adaptation to climate change. 

Whether the cities will be granted their own consultative status at the UN remains to be seen. They have not yet officially applied for it. Legally speaking, cities are considered part of nation states. However, if they do not agree with their governments, it is currently hard for them to take part in negotiations on global issues. Cities are currently trying to utilise their existing room for manoeuvre and their current activities could pave the way for a formal application.

One obstacle to cities having their own status at the UN is that the greater the number of actors involved in decisions, the more complicated negotiations become. This is likely to deter some states. And although cities are only considering consultative status, autocratic governments may view this as a threat to their own power.

Cities emphasise their society-wide approach to negotiations as one benefit of giving them their own status. Cities have a different perspective from national governments, are closer to the people and are more likely to know what is happening on the ground, they argue. Giving cities a say would enable better planning and facilitate realistic measures, they say.

Edited by Benjamin von Wyl. Adapted from German by Catherine Hickley