Botswana launches UN civil society advisory committee

The decision to create a civil society advisory group was based on UN Secretary General's 2005 recommendations on enhancing UN country-level engagement with civil society partners. This was a direct response to the 2004 Cardoso report, named after former Brazilian leader President Cardoso, who led the review, which stressed the need to deepen and strengthen UN relationship with civil society to a more strategic level, recognizing their central role in building democratic societies and institutions.

The most powerful case for reaching out beyond the traditional constituency of central governments and enhancing dialogue and cooperation with civil society is that doing so will make UN more effective and inclusive in addressing ground-level realities to inform the organization's norms and processes.