NIEO 50th Anniversary

From 28 April to 1 May 2024, the National Capitol of Cuba will host the 50th Anniversary Congress on the New International Economic Order.

The Congress — co-convened by the Progressive International and the Asociación Nacional de Economistas y Contadores de Cuba — will bring the world’s leading scholars, diplomats, and policymakers to Havana for three days of intense discussion, deliberation, and preparation of a Program of Action to secure peace through sovereign development in the twenty-first century.

“The current threat to international peace is closely associated with the economic inequalities, polarization and injustice that result from the economic order established in the 20th century, heir to the colonial system that emerged in the 15th century,” says Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío. “Fifty years after the New International Economic Order was approved by the United Nations, the conditions described then — far from being mitigated — have worsened.”

One year ago, delegates from over 25 countries traveled to Havana to inaugurate Cuba’s presidency of the Group of 77.

“Our nations continue to be in the rear-guard of global development, while carrying on their shoulders the consequences of multiple crises and inequalities derived from the unjust current international order,” said President Díaz-Canel in his inaugural address.

Over the course of its deliberations, the Congress yielded a clear strategy to ‘assert Southern power’, set out in the Havana Declaration delivered at the closing ceremony on 28 January.

The Congress recognizes that economic liberation will not be granted, but must be seized... Our vision can only be realized through the formation of new and alternative institutions to share critical technology, tackle sovereign debt, drive development finance, and face future pandemics together,” read the Declaration.

One year later, however, the nature of these “new and alternative institutions” — as well as their path to implementation — remains to be defined. In other words, while the first Congress succeeded in articulating a strategy for Southern power, the second Congress must now identify the tactics to secure it.

That is why we are returning to Havana: to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the New International Economic Order; to renovate its vision of sovereign development for the twenty-first century; and to forge the community of scholars, diplomats, and policymakers to win it.