Moving Towards a Fair Globalisation A CONFERENCE REPORT BY NICOLA LIEBERT This report sums up the results of the conference “Moving Towards a Fair Globalization: Taking forward the work of the ILO Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization” held in Berlin on May 25 th 2004. The report of the ILO Com­mission is available on www.ilo.org When the ILO World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalisation ended its work in February 2004 it left no doubt that its final re­port was not to be seen as the last word on the subject but rather as a catalyst“to stimulate a wider process of public dialogue and common endeavour which will promote a fair and inclu­sive globalisation”(p. VIII). The Friedrich Ebert Foundation and the Federal Ministry of Econom­ics and Labour have taken up this call by organ­ising a conference in Berlin to take forward the work of the World Commission. The World Commission recognises the huge productive capacity of globalisation and its po­tential for development. To fully realise its pro­mise, however, there must be a more equitable distribution of its benefits. The Commission’s recommendations how this might be achieved fall under four broad areas of action: • Solving the problems of globalisation begins at home. Contrary to the dominant ideology of the 1990s, the Commission envisages a stronger role for a democratic and effective state. • Globalisation and market liberalisation, in and of itself, do not automatically lead to higher growth rates or to full employment. The creation of decent jobs must therefore become a policy objective in itself. Again, the Commission contradicts the present mainstream by suggesting a stronger consi­deration of demand-side economics. • Globalisation needs to be governed by fairer rules, including rules for trade, investment, labour and migration. This must be accom­panied by high standards of accountability on the one hand and adequate aid flows on the other. • The quality of global governance must be improved. Better policy coherence is an im­portant prerequisite to this, especially put­ting social policies on a par with financial and economic objectives.