A/HRC/50/60 II. Racial justice, development and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development 16. The 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals form part of a much broader international development framework and a global economic and financial system that have shaped the 2030 Agenda and constrain its outcomes. 17. Development interventions take myriad forms and involve a complex set of actors. Among the most influential are the so-called Bretton Woods institutions – the World Bank Group and IMF. The World Bank’s stated goals are to “end extreme poverty” and “promote shared prosperity”,23 while the IMF goals are “furthering international monetary cooperation, encouraging the expansion of trade and economic growth and discouraging policies that would harm prosperity”.24 As observed by the former Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, the “IMF is the single most influential international actor not only in relation to fiscal policy but also to social protection”.25 18. Within the United Nations system, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development and other agencies comprise the United Nations Sustainable Development Group, for which UNDP serves as the United Nations global development network, operating in over 170 countries.26 19. Many other multilateral institutions influence the international development framework. For example, the World Trade Organization has extensive influence over economic sovereignty, development outcomes and human rights 27 and several regional development institutions are also active in this field. Various global governance forums coordinate economic policy and multilateral activities among Member States. These include the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the Group of 7, the Group of 20 and the Group of 77. 28 The World Economic Forum, while not an intergovernmental organization, is an increasingly important platform for public-private partnerships, a development model with significant implications for development and human rights.29 A. Brief history of the international development framework 20. For centuries, colonial powers and their elites relied upon brutal regimes of slavery, indentured servitude, dispossession and extraction to maximize their wealth. They offered racist and exploitative justifications for their domination over colonized peoples, including the belief that non-white peoples were biologically inferior and culturally backward, and thus in need of “civilizing”. This “civilizing” project included the imposition of Eurocentric economic and political systems in colonial territories administered by European elites for their colonial benefit.30 This racist colonial imperative did not disappear with the gradual process of decolonization. Shortly after the First World War, the League of Nations mandate system was created to administer former Ottoman territories and German-held colonies, which were deemed by colonial powers as “not yet able to stand by themselves under the strenuous conditions of the modern world”.31 According to the League, these mandates would entrust “tutelage of such peoples … to advanced nations who by reason of their resources, their experience or their geographical position [could] best undertake this responsibility …”.32 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 6 See https://www.worldbank.org/en/who-we-are. See https://www.imf.org/en/About/Factsheets/IMF-at-a-Glance. A/HRC/38/33, para. 55. See https://www.undp.org/faqs. A/HRC/33/40 and A/65/260, para. 28. A/HRC/42/48, paras. 10–17. Ibid., para. 18, A/HRC/29/28, para. 61, and A/73/396. Ntina Tzouvala, Capitalism As Civilization: A History of International Law (Cambridge, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Cambridge University Press, 2020), pp. 50–53. Covenant of the League of Nations, art. 22. Ibid.