The UN and the post-2015 Development Agenda

Determining what the shape and content of the post-2015 Development Agenda (post-2015 DA) will be once the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have expired has generated a great deal of analytical energy. The agenda of the MDGs+10 UN Summit in 2010 was circumscribed so that it focused only on the MDGs. At the core of the post-2015 debate has been an official process. With input from government actors, UN agencies, and civil society, the high-level panel (HLP) produced its report, including 12 'illustrative goals' for the post-2015 Development Agenda, in May 2013. This chapter begins with an examination of the political economy of the post-2015 DA, offering a short analytical history of the immediate run-up to the formulation and implementation of the MDGs. It argues that growth was kept off the MDG agenda so that it remained under the guidance of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) and was not part of any UN General Assembly-based process.