14th Bali Democracy Forum

Greetings to all of you, and my thanks to the organizers for this opportunity to speak about the need for a far broader democratic and civic space in addressing the continuing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This is a time of escalating inequalities, with dramatic setbacks for the achievement of environmental commitments and the Sustainable Development Goals, accompanied by severe social tensions.

It is a landscape of growing human rights disasters.

Over 100 million people have been pushed into extreme poverty. More than 2.3 billion people are living in conditions of food insecurity. And within this context of increasing suffering, women; low-income and informal workers; young people; and members of ethnic and religious minorities and indigenous peoples have been the hardest hit.

Inequalities, discrimination and exclusion have fuelled the pandemic – – and in turn, the pandemic is driving greater increases in inequalities, with particular emphasis on even greater age, gender and racial inequalities.

I am also particularly concerned about the pandemic's devastating impacts on children's rights. After school closures and economic recession, many of the poorest children may never return to education – which could perpetuate generational inequalities  – severely undermining social and economic development and increasing grievances for years to come.

We need to change the political choices that have produced these unbearable social costs, tearing apart the fabric of our societies and amplifying mistrust towards institutions.

We have seen that investing in rights – for example, health, education and social protection – produces strong benefits for the economy and society, including in times of crisis. It is time to act on that knowledge.

To combat and recover from the biggest development setback in our lifetime, we need to shape societies that work for everyone – because everyone is free to participate fully in decision-making.

At times of crisis, civil society can help to identify flaws in policy and relevant solutions that respond to the most urgent needs. States should be creating the broadest possible avenues for participation and feed-back – and should reach out to those most at risk to ensure that they are engaged and able to participate in decision-making.

They should maximise media freedoms and freedom of expression, to enable the most credible and effective policy responses. Censorship and other forms of restriction not only violate human rights – they erode public trust.

Human rights law – including gender equality, the rights to health, education and social protection, and the right to a safe and clean environment – constitute a resilient and adaptable framework for much more effective solutions.

They guide us to prioritise far broader access to universal health care, social protection, quality education and other human rights.

They lead us to new policies of transparency, accountability, justice and dialogue that widen the civic space, leading to more free and meaningful participation and greater public confidence in the authorities.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has committed all UN bodies to advance Our Common Agenda, a very broad-based framework, anchored in human rights, that will advance human development and a renewed social contract in equality and inclusion.

This is the way ahead – to a world that is more resilient, more fair, more equal and more respectful of people and our shared planet. I hope that your discussions will contribute to decisive and concrete movement along this path.