Russia: Civil G8 or Putin’s G8?

What can discuss a member of the civil socieryt, the President of Russian Industrial Association and a representative of German civil society in a luxury hotel in Moscow? No, this is neither the beginning of a joke, nor an accidental meeting. It is what I saw at the Civil G8 just finished in Moscow, to which I participated as a representative of Acevo, the British association of Chief Executives of the Third Sector. And that is not certainly the scene which has impressed me more. Civil G8 gathers Civil Society representatives of the Member Countries of the G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Italy, United Kingdom, Russia and the USA). Its aim is to influence the G8 agenda, and monitor both its activity and the implementation of the decisions taken. This year Russia chairs the G8 for the first time. For this reason we were all in Moscow for the first meeting in preparation of the G8 which will take place in July in S. Petersburg. Whereas last year, in Great Britain, Civil G8 has been guided on every aspect by the ?Make Poverty History?- the campaign for poverty eradication in the world, that has involved millions of British citizens and obtained the support of the Prime Minister Tony Blair- this year it looks like Civil Society will support the Russian government agenda! Not considering the fact that all the event has been organized on account of the Russian Government, which has very generously hosted 300 national delegates and 100 international ones in the luxury World Trade Centre, what has impressed me more is the alignment of the debate along the interests and rhetoric of the Russian government. For example, while last year the discussion was about ?global warming? and alternative energetic sources, this year the main issue was ?energy security? and use of nuclear energy. Even more, if our themes are Peace Promotion and Intercultural dialogue, on that occasion the discussion was about Human Security and War on Terrorism. It is useless to say that there was no reference to the necessity of respecting human rights! In fact, the strong drive by a group of Russian delegates in a predetermined direction has brought several foreign delegates to refuse to undersign the relation of the session Human Security containing the final recommendations for the G8. Another peculiar aspect of this event ? probably due to the specificity of the national context- has been the participation of business people among the delegates. In fact during a session copyright protection has been discussed together with development in Africa. Russian Civil Society is very confused when it has to define and express itself. By no doubt it has very little independence with regard to government and enterprises. In some ways it looks it is not able to find its place inside society and is thus obliged to depend on other interests; but through this way it loses its function as well as its strength. At the same time, though, I have met many Russian leaders able to use this event to strengthen relationships and create alliances to strengthen Civil Society in Russia. For this reason, with my organization, we have offered our support in dialogue facilitation and in the construction of relationship among Russian and European leaders and we are already planning, together with the National Council on Civil Society and Human Rights and with CAF Russia, a common programme for 2007. In spite of all the limitations of such an event, I believe that a complete refusal of the dialogue would damage the Civil Society. Our commitment is to develop a strategy which would help Russian Civil Society to develop itself by becoming independent, and would persuade Russian Government about the importance of real democratic processes. Only through a continuous dialogue with the most sensitive subjects inside Russian administration we can hope that when Civil G8 will be held in Russia again it will really be an independent and representative organ, able to influence G8 agenda as it did with Make Poverty History last year. http://en.g8russia.ru/