Community of Democracies

This weekend, Mongolia will be hosting the ministerial conference of the Community of Democracies. This will be the highlight of the Mongolian presidency of this body.

Numerous delegations are travelling to Ulaanbaatar for the ministerial meetings organized in five separate fora: parliamentary, women, youth, civil society, corporate democracy.

Originally conceived of by U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in 2000 as a caucus of democratic countries, the CD is still somewhat casting about for its real mission. While an international grouping of democratic countries makes intuitive sense, its not entirely clear what such a grouping would do operationally.

Be that as it may, Mongolia’s role as president of the CD clearly acknowledges the achievements of its democratization.

I have taken this occasion to write two media comments:

About Julian Dierkes

Julian Dierkes is a sociologist by training (PhD Princeton Univ) and a Mongolist by choice and passion since around 2005. He teaches in the Master of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. He toots @jdierkes@sciences.social and tweets @jdierkes
This entry was posted in Bilateral Aid, Canada, Democracy, Development, Foreign Policy, International Relations, Ulaanbaatar and tagged . Bookmark the permalink.

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