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Cumberland Lodge Conference 2008 Report

The Commonwealth after Kampala

Cumberland Lodge, 17-18 January 2008

1: The Kampala Commonwealth meetings     2: Kampala Outcomes
3: The Commonwealth after Kampala           4: India and the Commonwealth
5: Problem states                                         Participants

Session 1: The Kampala Commonwealth meetings

Chair:
Prue Scarlett - Chair, LEPRA

Speakers:
Matthew Neuhaus - CHOGM
Mark Collins - People's Forum
Vic Craggs - Youth Forum
Gregor MacKinnon - Business Forum

In opening the meeting, Richard Bourne, Chairman of the Round Table, made three observations on the recent CHOGM. First, he thought the election of the Commonwealth's first Indian Secretary-General was very significant. India was of course an increasingly important player on the world stage, with ever deeper trading and cultural connections with other Commonwealth countries. But the view from New Delhi was very different from the view from London, and the new Secretary-General would rightly bring new perspectives and new priorities to the organization. Secondly, despite the fact that globalization was softening the boundaries between different spheres of action, and despite the best efforts of Mark Collins, Vic Craggs and others, politicians, civil society activists, business leaders and youth representatives had still largely conducted their proceedings in different fora, with only occasional and superficial contact between them. Thirdly, he had been struck by the lack of serious and sustained media interest in the CHOGM in all Commonwealth countries - a worrying confirmation of a trend that had been going on for a number of years.

Matthew Neuhaus said that he agreed especially with Richard Bourne's point about the lack of media interest. This was a problem that had worried his colleagues in the Commonwealth Secretariat for many years, and which was recognized as one of the major difficulties ahead of the organization under the new Secretary-General. He also agreed that the election of Kamalesh Sharma as the Commonwealth's new Secretary-General (after a hard-fought contest with Michael Frendo) was very significant; the new Secretary-General was a very distinguished and able diplomat, who would bring an increased focus on development, women and youth, as well as the different perspectives of the Indian subcontinent. At the same time, there had been a widespread recognition of Michael Frendo's ability and commitment to the Commonwealth, and his particularly able handling of CMAG, and Matthew had certainly gained the impression that Heads hoped he would continue to play an important role in the Commonwealth.

Matthew had been to a number of CHOGMs, both in his Commonwealth Secretariat capacity, and before that as a member of the Australian Foreign Service. The Kampala CHOGM had of course been a particularly challenging one. Two years previously, with the government jailing opposition leaders, war in the north of the country, and various other problems, there had been serious doubts about whether Uganda was the right country to host a CHOGM. Since then, however, the situation in Uganda had markedly improved, and Matthew liked to think that the work the Commonwealth had put in had contributed to that. There were of course some hitches - for instance, the late arrival of the Ugandan President and the Secretary-General at the opening ceremony - but in fact the logistics of the meetings had been relatively problem-free. In his view, the Commonwealth People's Forum had been the best yet.

At the Heads of Government Meeting itself, 48 of 53 Commonwealth countries had been represented (three countries having been excluded: Fiji and Pakistan because of their suspensions, and Nauru because of its arrears), 36 of them at Head of Government level. There had been an especially good turnout from the African continent. This was the first CHOGM that the Prince of Wales had attended; his involvement had gone very well, and he had had the opportunity to meet with a number of Heads of Government. Another notable plus was the meeting of Foreign Ministers beforehand (following the Malta precedent), which had enabled a thorough discussion of some of the key issues before the Heads actually met.

The CHOGM had resulted in four communiqués. The Kampala communiqué had of course hidden some of the serious debates and divergences amongst the Heads, but had nevertheless included some very significant statements. The Munyonyo Statement on Respect and Understanding represented a very important development, about which much would be heard later; the level of debate and interest amongst Heads in this topic had been very striking indeed. The Action Plan on Climate Change - significantly, named after Lake Victoria, which had itself been seeing some serious consequences of climate change - was important, particularly as setting the scene for Commonwealth engagement at Bali. There had been some disappointment at the stances taken by some countries, notably Canada and New Zealand (though now no longer Australia), in resisting the commitment of the Commonwealth to really substantial targets. Nevertheless the outcome had by no means been insignificant, with the Commonwealth now committed to providing support in international negotiations for small states (as in trade negotiations); reference to the need to involve better the Commonwealth's professional organizations; a specific focus on rainforest management; promises of better support for disaster management in member states; and a recognition of the need to do more to address the vulnerability of small and micro- island states. Finally, the declaration on the CHOGM's theme of 'Transforming Societies', despite some initial uncertainty as to what this meant, covered a number of important issues, and had been given greater strength by the link with the statement on the Millennium Development Goals, which had been pushed by the UK.

The Heads had also discussed the question of Commonwealth membership in detail. The committee set up after the Valletta CHOGM and chaired by P J Patterson of Jamaica had taken a rather conservative view of Commonwealth membership, and this had been reinforced by the Heads, with a focus more on fundamental values than historical connections, and an interesting tilt towards strategic partnerships with regional organizations such as the African Union and the Pacific Forum rather than a headlong rush to acquire new members. The issue of dependent territories had been resolved firmly in favour of the admission only of sovereign states, though it had been recognized that serious efforts now needed to be made to engage the dependent territories. Importantly, it had been agreed that any new members would add to the pot of Commonwealth resources, rather than triggering a reduction of existing members' commitments, though the thorny question of a change in the scale of contributions had been left to one side.

The CHOGM had been a particularly important one for the future of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG), which many observers feared had been downgraded in recent years. The discussion of Pakistan and the Heads' commitment to the continuation and even strengthening of CMAG had nevertheless been striking. This had followed several weeks of increasingly difficult negotiations, the setting out of a series of conditions for the continuation of Pakistan's full Commonwealth membership, and Pakistan's plea for more time to meet those conditions. The Secretary-General's discussions with Heads prior to the CHOGM had revealed a clear opinion amongst the Heads that they expected CMAG to lead on the issue, and under the able chairmanship of Michael Frendo CMAG had resolved its internal differences and agreed that Pakistan should be suspended from the councils of the Commonwealth. Subsequent discussion amongst the Heads had endorsed this position and avoided the blind alley of a Troika (unlike with Zimbabwe), thereby affirming the role and strengthening the position of CMAG.

Amongst other important developments, Sri Lanka had offered to host a meeting on terrorism, clearly an issue of concern to many Commonwealth countries; at Gordon Brown's suggestion, it had been agreed to convene a working group to put forward ideas about the reform of international institutions; there had been a commitment to the establishment of an office in Geneva to help small states in trade and other international negotiations; Malta had agreed to host an office to further the Commonwealth Connects agenda; and there had been a request for the Secretary-General to convene a meeting at the UN with representatives from the private sector, to look at ways in which the latter could contribute to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

Mark Collins reported on the Commonwealth People's Forum which, with 1500 people representing 600 organizations from 59 countries, and with 20 workshops (slimmed down from 84 proposals), was the biggest Commonwealth civil society event to date. Many lessons had been learned from previous events, and in particular the Malta event, including the need for a greater emphasis on national consultations prior to the meeting, the need to make sure the Forum was not seen as a closed or exclusive event, better coordination with other fora, including the Human Rights Forum (now brought within the People's Forum), the need to see the Forum as part of a process and not just a one-off event, and the need to develop the Commonwealth specificity of discussions. The Forum had therefore been preceded by a good deal of preparatory activity, including a number of preliminary symposia in Uganda itself, nine national-level consultations, and one regional consultation (for the Pacific). Strengthened engagement with the 'official' Commonwealth ensured that the Committee of the Whole had received a draft statement as early as October 2007. Other innovations included the People's Space, a very successful development which ensured wider participation particularly of Ugandans and many interesting activities. The Ugandans' hosting of the Forum had been widely praised, and there had been excellent facilities.

The final civil society statement reflected many of the themes discussed both in preparatory meetings and at the People's Forum itself. Amongst other proposals, the statement recommended a biennial stock-take of progress towards the Millennium Development Goals by member states; the commissioning of a report on the state of Commonwealth cities, to be presented to the 2009 CHOGM; a high-level commission on climate change; an investigation in particular of the decline in fish stocks and what might be done to address the problem; the creation of a Commonwealth adaptation fund; an investigation of fund flows from South to North as part of a wider look at the financing of development; a strengthening of education cooperation across the Commonwealth; a furthering of the 'Respect and Understanding' agenda, based on the Commonwealth Foundation's initial work; the creation of a disability rights forum for the Commonwealth; and greater collaboration in identifying and addressing unfair trading practices. On human rights, the civil society view was very much in favour of strengthening CMAG, charging it with tackling serious and persistent human rights violations as well as breakdowns of democratic government, and ensuring greater transparency for the Commonwealth's 'good offices' role.

The Forum's theme of 'Realizing People's Potential' worked very well, and tied in with the CHOGM's official theme of 'Transforming Societies'. Nevertheless, while representatives of civil society had had a useful dialogue with Foreign Ministers, there was a widespread feeling that in future more needed to be done to strengthen engagement between the official and unofficial Commonwealths (the latter including the business and youth fora as well as the People's Forum). This might be achieved by an earlier announcement of the theme of the next CHOGM, so that civil society organizations could contribute better to preliminary discussions; and by more systematic and deeper engagement between officials and ministers on the one hand and civil society representatives on the other. Looking further to the future, various suggestions had been made, including on the one hand transforming the CHOGM into a 'Commonwealth Summit' which would embrace and integrate youth, business and civil society representatives as well as government leaders; and on the other disengaging the People's Forum from the official CHOGM, perhaps holding it six months or so before the politicians' meeting, so that the Forum could generate ideas which could then be worked on and refined, then both fed into the official planning process and taken by a much smaller group to the ensuing CHOGM.

Vic Craggs reported on the Commonwealth Youth Forum, which had also benefited from the fantastic efforts made by the Ugandan hosts to ensure a successful meeting. The fifth such gathering (the first having taken place in Edinburgh in 1997), the Youth Forum was held in Entebbe over seven days, ending the week before the actual CHOGM, and had brought together representatives from 41 Commonwealth member countries. Supported by the Commonwealth Youth Exchange Council and the Commonwealth Secretariat's Youth Programme, it was a good example of a successful civil society-government partnership. As with the People's Forum, a greater emphasis on prior preparation reaped benefits in terms of the quality of the discussions and outcomes. A key component of the Commonwealth Youth Forum is that the Forum is planned by a team of young people and is led and delivered by young people.

The overall theme of the Youth Forum was 'Breaking Barriers - Unleashing Young People's Potential for Development', under which had been grouped three sub-themes, climate change, economic development, and young people and health. There had been some good speakers and some very useful work contributing to the final communiqué. The general message was a demographic one: that since over half of the population of the Commonwealth consisted of young people there was a greater need to engage with them, and to see them as part of the solution not as part of the problem. There had been some useful links with the People's Forum, which had ensured that the concerns raised in the Youth Forum were able to feed into civil society discussions; and there had also been improved engagement with officials and politicians, including a useful meeting with Foreign Ministers and a Youth Dialogue organized by the Commonwealth Secretariat which brought together representatives from the Forum with ten Heads of Government. Nevertheless Vic Craggs felt, as Mark Collins did, that the Commonwealth could only benefit in future from deeper and more sustained engagement between youth and civil society representatives and the 'official' Commonwealth.

Gregor MacKinnon reported that the Commonwealth Business Forum had also been very successful, with more than 900 participants from the Commonwealth and indeed many non-Commonwealth countries, and with the participation of six Heads of Government (including the President of Uganda, who had addressed the Forum) and many more ministers. The outcomes of the Forum had been presented to the CHOGM in a variety of ways, including at the Committee of the Whole, in a meeting with Foreign Ministers, and via the Forum's report and final communiqué.

understandable reasons. A wide range of other problems and proposals were discussed, including the need for more inclusive banking in order to encourage development in poor rural areas; the need to tackle the problem of counterfeit medicines; the need to establish common principles for the local control of multinational companies' activities; and the need to disseminate good practice in public-private partnerships for infrastructure development.

Ten years had passed since the Edinburgh CHOGM had put a focus on economic development at the heart of the Commonwealth's activities, and it was encouraging that this had never dropped back off the agenda. Nevertheless clearly a lot more could be done to give concrete shape to the ways in which the Commonwealth could work for the economic empowerment of its citizens.

• There was some criticism from the floor of the CHOGM's somewhat anodyne statement on climate change, which stood in contrast to the more forthright statements produced by the People's Forum and Youth Forum. It was suggested, on the one hand, that this reflected the fact that the most vulnerable states were also the amongst the smallest, who could not hope to have much direct impact on international responses to the problem; and on the other that it was impossible seriously to address the problem of climate change without also addressing a raft of other issues, most notably energy, which raised all sorts of controversial issues. In response, Matthew Neuhaus said that the Heads had spent a good deal of time discussing climate change (climate change and Pakistan being the only two issues on which there were thorough discussions in the Executive Session). Progress had been slow because so many countries were locked into entrenched positions on the problem. Nevertheless he agreed that a lot more needed to be done to broker agreement on the issue, and he hoped that it would be one that the new Secretary-General would take up. Mark Collins agreed, saying that civil society organizations were extremely concerned by the 'official' Commonwealth's weak stance. The civil society communiqué contained some very robust statements, for instance on the vulnerability of some countries to depletion of fish stocks, and on energy for sustainable development.
• It was suggested that here, as elsewhere, it was necessary to be clear about just what the Commonwealth could do better than any of the other, wealthier international organizations. Typically, the Commonwealth's role was, as Sonny Ramphal had once put it, to help the world to negotiate, not to do the actual negotiation.
• One of the journalists in the audience agreed wholeheartedly that the CHOGM should be re-branded as a Commonwealth Summit; journalists and the general public were frequently baffled and turned off by the CHOGM appellation. He also agreed that the People's Forum should be disengaged from and should precede by some time the official meetings; as it was, the civil society meetings and their outcomes tended to be overshadowed by the officials' and politicians' deliberations, and there was little time for any outcomes of the civil society meetings to be evaluated and fed into the intergovernmental discussions. There was, indeed, a wider problem of the Commonwealth's media image to be addressed; media coverage of the CHOGM in the UK was almost entirely dominated by two stories - Pakistan, and the Prince of Wales. On the former, it was a good thing that CMAG had taken a robust stance, since anything less would have been disastrous in media terms.
• Several other participants took up the point about media coverage, and there was a widespread view that the Commonwealth Secretariat needed to overhaul its publicity and PR machinery.
• On the question of separating the civil society and other gatherings from the CHOGM, however, there were mixed views. It was suggested that many civil society organizations would question the value of attending a large gathering if they were not to have some opportunity of engaging directly with officials and government leaders; and that it would also be much harder to grab the attention of the people in whose country the gathering was being held. On the other hand, it was suggested that the extent to which officials and politicians would be willing to listen to civil society organizations was necessarily limited. The Commonwealth might be the only international organization which, so to speak, allowed sixth-formers into the common room; but that didn't mean that they were always listened to.
• It was pointed out that there seemed to have been relatively little engagement between the civil society, youth and business fora (as illustrated, for instance, in the very different statements on Economic Partnership Agreements in the civil society and business fora), which did not bode well for the idea of an integrated Commonwealth summit.
• Mark Collins emphasized that the People's Forum was the culmination of a long process of consultation and discussion, and suggested that the way forward might be to build greater engagement with the 'official' Commonwealth into earlier stages of the process, and indeed at other points of the two-year cycle, such as when Foreign Ministers or other ministers held their meetings. He believed that the world was moving towards the need for greater engagement between governments and civil society (the latter including business and youth); this was recognized, indeed, by the number of references in the CHOGM communiqués to the need to work with civil society.
• Matthew Neuhaus asserted that the 'official' Commonwealth did listen, as was evidenced by the number of passages in the CHOGM communiqués which drew directly on the language used in the People's Forum and the youth and business fora, though he personally would like to see more Heads spending time in those fora ahead of each CHOGM. He also pointed out that if civil society representatives felt shut out of the CHOGM, that was a feeling shared, perhaps even more so, by government officials, many of whom intensely disliked the Retreat in particular, where Heads (dangerously, in many officials' view) were able to enjoy often highly productive discussions without any of their officials present. On the question of the Commonwealth Secretariat's media presence, he took much of what had been said on board, though he also thought that a fair share of the blame ought to be attached to the media rather than the Secretariat. The Commonwealth was an organization intensely focused on finding solutions, whereas the media often seemed to be interested only in problems or conflicts. Hence much of what the Commonwealth did simply wasn't newsworthy according to the media's own agenda.

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Session II: Kampala Outcomes

Chair:
Mark Robinson

Speakers:
Victoria te Velde - membership
Alexandra Jones - Civil Paths to Peace

Victoria te Velde began by saying that the issue of membership went to the heart of how an organization saw itself and wanted to be seen. In the case of the Commonwealth, membership had evolved gradually over time, and in a series of both pragmatic and principled decisions, as the Commonwealth emerged from the ashes of empire. The decision of the Valletta CHOGM in 2005 to appoint a high-level commission to look at membership criteria under the chairmanship of P J Patterson, former Prime Minister of Jamaica, reflected a perceived need to adopt a more consistent approach, as well as a desire to ensure that the Commonwealth adapted to global challenges without compromising its basic values. In the run-up to the 2005 CHOGM it had been clear that there was a growing queue of potential new members, drawn to the Commonwealth for a variety of reasons, but it was felt that the existing members needed to be clear about their general principles of membership before looking at individual cases; indeed the Patterson commission was charged with reviewing the criteria but not assessing any individual applicants.

The 2007 CHOGM had largely accepted the Patterson commission's proposals, including a strengthened set of criteria for membership, a more open and transparent process of application, and a cautious opening to new member-states. Among the criteria that had been established were that applicants should be sovereign states, should accept the Headship of the Commonwealth and English as the sole official language of the organization, that there should be some strong constitutional or historical relationship with an existing member-state, and that applicant countries must endorse the shared values of the Commonwealth. A compromise clause adopted by the Heads of Government, contained in paragraph 87 of their statement on membership, broadened the criteria by allowing for 'exceptional circumstances'. Nevertheless the effect of the Patterson recommendations as accepted by the Heads of Government constituted a cautious opening of the door. The Heads also accepted the Patterson commission's recommendations regarding a formalised process, which in future would consist of four steps: an informal assessment by the Secretary-General, consultation with existing members, an invitation to submit a formal application, and evidence of democratic process and popular support. In addition, the Heads had agreed that the Commonwealth budget would no longer be capped, so that any new members would add to the existing budget rather than triggering a redistribution of a fixed amount.

The decisions taken at Kampala were on the whole an important step towards a more rules-based organization, but some criticisms needed to be made. There were no explicit benchmarks for membership related to the Commonwealth's 'shared values', and therefore no clear way of identifying potential applicants' compliance. Similarly, there were no mechanisms explicitly outlined for monitoring 'democratic process' and 'popular support'. Since about 1995 it had been usual to speak of membership criteria and the Harare declaration of 1991 in the same breath, but the Kampala statement made only a general reference to the Singapore declaration of 1971 and subsequent statements; it was to be hoped that this did not signify a downgrading of human rights criteria in evaluating membership applications.

The queue of applicants pre-2005 had not been dealt with by the Patterson report. Nevertheless with agreement on the basics of criteria and process, it was expected that negotiations with some potential applicants would re-start, and it was reasonable to foresee some slight increase in Commonwealth membership over the next few years, probably beginning with Rwanda (whose claim was being supported by the UK government as well as regional players).

Alexandra Jones outlined the background to the report of the Commission on Respect and Understanding chaired by Amartya Sen, 'Civil Paths to Peace', and the subsequent Munyoyo Statement on Respect and Understanding. The impetus for the Commonwealth to look at this area was of course provided by the upsurge in violent extremism exemplified by 9/11 and 7/7. The Commission chaired by Amartya Sen had nevertheless eschewed the term 'war on terror', and had instead looked at the economic and social backgrounds to religious and security issues, and the roots of extremism in marginalisation, impoverishment, grievance, humiliation and divisiveness. The Commonwealth had been very fortunate in securing Amartya Sen as chair of the Commission; he had preferred to associate himself with the Commonwealth's project (rather than the UN's 'Alliance of Civilisations' project) because of the way the Secretariat had set about conceptualising its approach, eschewing an overly faith/dogma-driven approach, or the traps of Huntingdon-esque thinking. He and others involved with the Commission found that they were swimming in the same direction from the outset.

From the outset, Amartya Sen had been determined that the Commission's report should have focus and bite. This was an incredibly complex and far-reaching topic, and it would have been all too easy for the Commission's report on the one hand to be hijacked by particular causes, or on the other to be pulled in multiple directions, seeking (but failing) to be all things to all men. There were strong Commonwealth underpinnings from the outset, with the Commission's precepts being taken from the Commonwealth's own fundamental, rights-based and development-based, values. There had been some debate about the extent to which the Commission should be heavily prescriptive, but in the end it was decided that it would be best to outline a framework for action rather than filling in all the details, leaving what the Commonwealth Secretariat and individual member-states might do for a later stage.

Unlike the United Nations' High-Level Group report, 'Alliance of Civilizations', the Commission's report took as its starting-point the reality of multiple identities. 'Civil Paths to Peace', as its title implied, put a strong emphasis on civil rather than military responses to religious extremism. It focused on the need for patient dialogue (as was indeed the Secretariat's approach already in many politically-sensitive areas), and gave a ringing endorsement of multilateralism in international relations, as exemplified by the Commonwealth itself. It rejected simplistic notions of singular identities, repudiated talk of the clash of civilisations, and focused on a sustained battle for minds not emotions, refusing to let the "faith tail wag the Respect and Understanding dog".

'Civil Paths to Peace' was the result of a lengthy consultative and drafting phase, and it was presented to the Heads of Government by Amartya Sen himself, who travelled to Kampala for the purpose. There was a lively debate amongst the Heads over lunch, but the text went through with very few amendments, and a lot of support from the Heads. As far as operationalizing the report was concerned, there were a number of key strands of activity outlined, which the Secretariat would be seeking to take further; the report contained seven key recommendations, to which the Heads added one further (the dissemination of best practice). There was clearly scope for dialogue with the United Nations' Alliance of Civilizations initiative, but there were also areas where they differed, and the Commonwealth would want to protect and retain the conceptual distinctiveness of its approach. There would be a review of Commonwealth activity in this field at the September 2008 Foreign Ministers' meeting. It was hoped that the intellectual spadework done by Amartya Sen and his colleagues would lead to a really useful follow-up.

• Several participants agreed with Victoria te Velde's point that the membership principles agreed by the Commonwealth had reflected politicians' general preference for a fudging of the issues rather than the clearer-cut criteria and means of assessing them that were called for. It was pointed out that there was an increasing number of indices and measures of good governance, human rights violations, or corruption, thanks to bodies such as Freedom House and Transparency International; it could therefore hardly be argued that it was impossible to measure compliance in such areas. It was also suggested that there needed to be closer co-operation between the Secretariat and civil society organizations on such issues, so that the Secretariat could get a better feel of what was going on on the ground.
• By contrast, it was also pointed out that other international organizations tended to work on a case-by-case basis, and that the Commonwealth was unusual in having so highly developed a set of criteria for membership. It was suggested that paragraphs 87 to 89 of the Heads' statement on membership set out a fairly comprehensive and tough set of principles for applicant states to adhere to. Indeed, people who didn't know much about the Commonwealth were always struck by the fact that the organization was (unusually for an international organization) willing to exclude members for violations of shared principle, yet at the same time had states queueing up for membership.
• Pressed to enumerate which states were in line for membership, Victoria te Velde said that Rwanda, Timor-Leste, Yemen and Palestine were all known to be interested in Commonwealth membership, and that at various times there had been rumours and perhaps unofficial discussions about possible bids from Algeria, Madagascar, Somaliland, Congo and Ireland.
• There was some discussion of the 'historic connection' principle, but it was thought that this would be of little significance given also the 'exceptional circumstances' principle.
• Several participants thought that the mechanisms for evaluating the adherence to shared values of existing members should be strengthened, as well as the mechanisms for evaluating the adherence of potential applicants.
• Some disappointment was expressed at the fact that the Heads had come down so decisively in favour of limiting membership to sovereign states. There was a real need to bring the overseas and dependent territories (including Jersey, Gibraltar, etc.) into the Commonwealth tent.
• It was pointed out that whereas earlier documents had made reference to the 'British monarch' as Head of the Commonwealth, the Patterson report had referred specifically to 'the Queen', and the Heads of Government had tightened this further to refer specifically to 'Queen Elizabeth II'. Clearly this was an interesting signal from the Heads of Government that they did not feel that there was any automaticity about Queen Elizabeth II's successor becoming also Head of the Commonwealth. Indeed, the London Declaration of 1949 had vested the Headship of the Commonwealth in the King personally (not in the Crown), though there appeared to have been little debate in 1952 before that role was given to his daughter, the present Queen.
• It was agreed that Rwanda would probably be the first new state to apply successfully, having widespread support and very deep and close connections with Uganda and other Commonwealth neighbours.
• There was some debate about whether the Commonwealth needed some new declaration to supersede the Singapore and Harare declarations and the Millbrook Commonwealth Action Programme. On the one hand it was thought that those documents contained more or less everything that was needed; on the other it was suggested that various ambiguities needed clarification, and that a new declaration would have a symbolic value.
• There was also discussion of the Munyonyo Statement on Respect and Understanding, with some participants suggesting that the statement was rather too soft-focused. There had, for instance, been considerable disquiet amongst Commonwealth civil society organizations at some of the restrictions on human rights and freedom of expression introduced in some Commonwealth member-states in the context of the war on terrorism; the fact that three member-states voted against the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; or the practice of one member-state of putting asylum seekers on a remote Pacific island. The 'Civil Paths to Peace' report provided an opportunity for the Commonwealth to demonstrate a more robust approach to such detractions from basic liberal-democratic values amongst its existing member-states.
• While those who had read it had been very impressed by the 'Civil Paths to Peace' report, with one participant describing it as the best document the Commonwealth had ever produced, it was suggested that it was not written in such a way as to give it popular appeal, and that the Secretariat might like to commission a more easily readable summary.

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Session III: The Commonwealth after Kampala

Chair:
Richard Bourne

Speaker:
Rt Hon Don McKinnon

Don McKinnon began by saying that he had been so busy over the last eight years of his Secretary-Generalship that the time had seemed to go by in a flash; indeed he was frequently reminded of Henry Kissinger's saying, that when you're up to your waist in alligators it's difficult to concentrate on anything else. Back in 1999 he had been told by many people that he was going into a cosy semi-retirement job; they had clearly not anticipated the series of crises around the Commonwealth, from Fiji through Zimbabwe, Pakistan, and the Solomon Islands, and so on, with which he would have to ddeal. It had been a very demanding period, to which anything in his earlier career bore little comparison.

In Don McKinnon's view, the Commonwealth would always be judged by how it responded to political issues. Trade and development, education, health, and so on were incredibly important, but they didn't attract anything like the same media exposure and critical attention. After eight years in post, he was more than ever impressed by the Commonwealth's capacity to act coherently on such issues. He had frequently spoken to counterparts and colleagues in other international organizations, and whenever he asked why they didn't enumerate clearer rules for membership of their own organizations, he was told that it would be too difficult. The Commonwealth, by contrast, was moving from strength to strength in this area. Having been a member of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group and then Secretary-General, he was convinced that the existence and work of CMAG made the crucial difference in this respect. No other international organization could claim such a body as CMAG. Its work underpinned all that the Commonwealth did and stood for, and Don McKinnon was proud that under his Secretary-Generalship CMAG had continued to prove its worth, and had fought off attempts at downgrading its significance. CMAG helped to keep the Commonwealth relevant, credible, and constantly forward-looking - as any international organization had to be.

If Don McKinnon had learned one lesson in politics, it was that no-one wanted to know what you did yesterday; the question was always, 'what are you doing tomorrow?'. So with the Commonwealth, no-one was really interested in what the Commonwealth achieved ten or twenty years ago, nor in the fact that its members said they believed in X or Y set of values. The test was how those values were put into practice on a day-to-basis, and how the Commonwealth responded to every new situation that came along. Don McKinnon's own successor would no doubt have to respond to a new set of crises which were not even on anyone's radar at this moment; but it was likely that he would be doing so on the basis of the same set of values that the Commonwealth had identified as the most important bond that kept them together.

The Secretary-General of the Commonwealth in effect worked for 53 governments, each of them seeing things in a slightly different way, and with different aims both regionally and globally, and for the Commonwealth as an organization to work with and through. It was therefore the job of the Secretary-General to have to make fine judgements and decisions all the time, knowing that it was well-nigh impossible to please all the member governments all the time. The situation was exacerbated by the fact that the Commonwealth was so diverse, by comparison with organizations like the EU or AU; it was therefore all the more important that the leaders of Commonwealth countries should feel that they knew each other well, and were able to resolve differences in constructive and friendly ways.

Thirty-two of the Commonwealth's member states were small countries, and the Commonwealth had a particular duty to speak up on their behalf. The Commonwealth, indeed, was far more important to small states than it was to big states like the UK or India; and even though it was important also that the Commonwealth should work, and be seen to work, in the interests of the latter, there was clearly a special responsibility to continue its advocacy and capacity-building role for the small state members. Clearly small states, especially poor small states, faced particular problems in international negotiations. For example, many small states had been on the receiving end of a very unfair assault in the name of the OECD over offshore banking, and the way small states had then been treated had been appalling. Many Caribbean countries had diversified from bananas and sugar into banking at the explicit urging of other states and international organizations, and quite rightly felt that the carpet was now being pulled from under them. The WTO hardly recognised small states, and only the World Bank and the Commonwealth had done much to work specifically in their interests.

There were of course clear limits to what the Commonwealth could do. The Commonwealth was rather like a Rolls Royce with a two-stroke engine. Every British citizen, for instance, gave some £53 a year to the EU, £10 to NATO, £2 to the UN, but only 18p to the Commonwealth. Since there were few prospects that this amount would increase significantly in the short term, the Commonwealth simply had to learn to live within its means. Nevertheless the Commonwealth was able to punch significantly above its own weight. One way it was able to do this was by developing partnerships with other organizations who did have the resources (such as the EU and the UNDP, or indeed the private sector and charities). Several colleagues relished the fact that the Commonwealth had been given EU money to enable capacity-building amongst small developing states - money which, in effect, was being used in some areas of negotiation to fight the EU.

In a world which was fractured, fragile, and challenging to all international institutions, the Commonwealth had fared very well, and indeed had to a certain extent come into its own. This was seen, for instance, in the way that Gordon Brown hoped that the Commonwealth would provide an impetus to reform of the international institutions; or in the very significant report on Respect and Understanding emanating from the commission chaired by Amartya Sen. Friends of the Commonwealth should recognise, however, that there were some areas where the Commonwealth could add little to what was being done by other organizations. This might be true of climate change, although the Commonwealth would continue to push the small states' perspective. The Commonwealth could not be all things to all men, nor could or should it spread itself so thinly that it never made a real impression in any one area. At the same time, there were things the Commonwealth did which only it could do, or which it could do far better than any other organization. There was certainly cause for optimism about the Commonwealth's role in the future.

• Don McKinnon was asked (having been elected twice, and having supervised the proceedings in Kampala) about the process of electing a new Secretary-General. Although no-one could be displeased by the outcome, there was some disquiet in civil society circles at the lack of transparency in the process. In response, Don McKinnon outlined the process which had taken place in Kampala. Although three candidates had declared themselves, only two appeared on the ballot paper, as no Head of Government was willing to nominate Mohan Kaul. The decision between Kamalesh Sharma and Michael Frendo was then taken after a good deal of discussion amongst the Heads. In Don McKinnon's view, the process was a more satisfactory one than, say, the process of electing a new United Nations Secretary-General, since in the latter case the five permanent members of the Security Council held a veto, and the ultimate decision often came down to political considerations of who would be least offensive to (or perhaps more controllable by) officials in those countries.
• Given that reform of the United Nations and other international institutions, and of the European Union, etc., was so much in the air, it was suggested that it was significant that no-one was really calling for a major reform of the Commonwealth - a point with which Don McKinnon agreed, saying that the flexibility of the Commonwealth was increasingly seen as an asset in the twenty-first century.
• Asked whether the Commonwealth might exploit its links with Hong Kong in order to build a closer relationship with China, Don McKinnon agreed that it was important for the Commonwealth to engage in closer dialogue with China, but said that he thought it important not to overdo the links with Hong Kong, which could perhaps be counter-productive when dealing with Peking and Shanghai.
• The Secretary-General was asked whether he thought the Irish Republic would join the Commonwealth in the near future. He responded by saying that accepting the Queen as Head of the Commonwealth was a difficult issue for the Irish, perhaps for the electorate even more than politicians. Though there had been some signs of interest in joining, he expected other countries, such as Rwanda, Timor-Leste, or Sudan to be further ahead in the queue.
• Asked what were his worst and best moments as Secretary-General, Don McKinnon said that his worst was probably having to deal with the Zimbabwe issue; that had taken a great toll in terms of time and resources, without a satisfactory outcome, though he still did not think that anything should have been done differently. As for his best moment, there were many, but if pressed he would single out visiting schoolrooms in developing countries where he had been able to see for himself the very positive results of Commonwealth education projects.
• The hope was expressed that in his retirement Don McKinnon would write his memoirs, or at the very least an evaluation of what had worked and what hadn't during the period of his Secretary-Generalship.

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Session IV: India and the Commonwealth

Chair:
James Robbins

Speakers:
Sarmila Bose - India's role on the global stage
Dipankar de Sarkar - India and the Commonwealth

Sarmila Bose said that she was approaching this topic from the perspective of someone who was primarily interested in India's internal politics and public policy, rather than its foreign policy or role in the Commonwealth. Nevertheless internal politics were of crucial importance to India's global role. Questions such as what was driving the rise in India's international profile, whether it was sustainable, what the risks were, and what the potential brakes were, clearly turned to a large extent on issues of Indian domestic policy.

The concept of India as a major world player was not new. In the early days following independence, under Nehru's leadership, India clearly had aspirations to be a global leader, albeit with a claim based on ideology more than economic or military might. But such aspirations had remained largely unfulfilled, and for four decades or so it was usual to refer to India as a sleeping giant whose potential had not been realized. This weakness was in part self-inflicted: the choice of state-led socialism and a licence-permit Raj stifled enterprise and limited both India's economic might and its appeal as a model for other countries.

Clearly India's economic position was now very different, but it was important to bear in mind that the change in India's economic policies after 1991 had not come out of well-considered or popularly-driven policy decisions; rather, it had come about as a result of crisis and a fear of international humiliation. There was a question mark still over the extent to which India had really changed, and whether there had really been a widespread acknowledgement that India's earlier economic policies had been wrong. The economic reform programme was almost certainly irreversible, whatever politicians might say in opposition. Nevertheless the half-hearted support for that programme presaged only a slow adaptation, and suggested that social and political factors might act as significant brakes on India's further development.

Comparisons were frequently made between India and China, and it was often suggested that since India was a democracy and China was not, the latter would encounter political problems in its dash for growth which India would not. Yet China was clearly way ahead in economic terms, and also in most social and human development indices. Economic growth in India had so far benefited a relatively small segment of the population; the majority of the population continued to live in poverty. Indeed, despite India's democratic political system, it appeared that China did much better in terms of ensuring that economic growth benefited the whole population.

India's much-vaunted attachment to democracy obscured a number of problematic aspects of its political system. The latter was characterized, to put it bluntly, by patronage, a kind of feudal non-meritocracy, red tape, endemic corruption, the rise of identity politics, regional, religious and ethnic conflicts, and the decline of all important institutions, including political parties. India had proven very resilient. Frequent predictions of its political system falling apart had so far always proved untrue. But some important trends were clearly going in the wrong direction. The failure to deliver politically as well as economically to the majority of the population, the failure to resolve longstanding conflicts let alone the new ones that were emerging, and the very real limitations on the rule of law, all, at the very least, undermined the quality of policy-making, and suggested that there were some significant limits to the success of India's relatively newly-adopted economic policies.

India's claim to a seat on the UN Security Council was seen by many Indians as the symbol of their new-found confidence, and a test of the world's acceptance of a new global balance of power. Yet India was not at present offering any new thinking on reform of the international institutions, or indeed any new paradigms of global leadership. Rather, the claim to a Security Council seat reflected an old-fashioned bid for regional primacy. Likewise, on many of the crucial questions for the international community in the twenty-first century India as yet had nothing new to offer. India's record on conflict prevention was not good; it had failed to find solutions to its own conflicts with its neighbours; its record on dealing with small states was poor; and there was little evidence that it would bring any fresh ideas to the conference table. Unless India's political elites were willing to address the underlying problems of its political system, it was safe to assume that the obstacles to a full realization of India's economic potential would remain.

Turning more specifically to India's role in the Commonwealth, Dipankar de Sarkar noted the important contributions that India had already made to the evolving Commonwealth. Indeed, the modern Commonwealth was frequently dated to the London Declaration of 1949, which had allowed India to remain a member of the Commonwealth despite its adoption of a republican form of government. This compromise set the tone for the Commonwealth of the future, which would be characterized by accommodation not the dominance of any one power. The first major test of this 'new' Commonwealth was the Suez crisis of 1956, when Nehru resisted calls to withdraw from the Commonwealth. India's role in subsequent Commonwealth concerns such as the struggle against apartheid in South Africa had also been important. It was widely felt in India that, particularly in the Cold War period, the Commonwealth enabled India to punch above its weight in international affairs.

Now, largely as a result of its economic growth, India was clearly set to play an even more important role in the Commonwealth. The fact that India was willing to put up Kamalesh Sharma as a candidate for the next Commonwealth Secretary-General clearly indicated a greater engagement with the Commonwealth and a willingness to adopt a leadership role. Such a willingness came from the top, and it was no coincidence that Manmohan Singh had earlier played an important role as chairman of the Commonwealth Expert Group on Development and Democracy, established by the Coolum CHOGM. Other signs of India's increasing engagement included its expressed willingness to fund more activities through the Commonwealth.

Quite what form India's increased engagement with the Commonwealth would take remained to be seen. Early indications suggested that the Commonwealth would act as a moderating influence on the natural tendency of a more powerful India to distance itself from the foreign policy assumptions of earlier decades and to engage more unilaterally on such issues as trade. At the same time India, like other Commonwealth countries, was experiencing the effects of rapid globalization in uneven ways, and India would be keen to learn from other countries' successes and failures. India was in a sense a microcosm of the Commonwealth, with great disparities of wealth and sharp religious, linguistic and ethnic divisions. It was hoped that India could learn from the Commonwealth as much as the Commonwealth could learn from India.

• Pressed to elaborate the new thinking that India should bring to the international table, Sarmila Bose said that the twenty-first century demanded a new emphasis on shared sovereignty and interdependence. India could start by shedding some of its old nation-state attitudes in its approach to regional disputes and internal conflicts. There needed to be a shift in mindset, but for the moment that seemed unlikely given the regressive aspects of India's internal political system.
• It was suggested that India at least had the elements of a democratic system and the rule of law in place, whereas by contrast China was still a very authoritarian and hierarchical society, and that the latter would at some point slow down or even reverse China's economic growth. This was indeed the argument put forward by Will Hutton, who suggested that in China the market was being distorted by the overlay of Communist Party control, which would jeopardize China's growth within the next fifteen or twenty years. Sarmila Bose agreed that there was some truth in this view. Nevertheless it was unclear whether politics or economics came first. It was possible that economic growth in China would lead to a gradual political liberalization - indeed, China had already started to introduce limited local democracy - whereas the worry was that India hadn't got its politics right. As a result, there was something of an emerging disconnect between the most creative elements in India and the nation's public life; the most talented individuals in India now seemed to take very little interest in politics.
• It was pointed out that one of India's most dynamic states in economic terms, Gujarat, was also one in which the politics of division and intolerance, and the deficiencies of the democratic system, were most marked.
• On the question of whether businesses found it easier to deal with India or China, Dipankar de Sarkar repeated what a businessman friend had told him: that when a company did a deal with China there was a cheque across the table straightaway, whereas in India there was a parliamentary debate, a protest, another parliamentary debate and only eventually, ten years later, a cheque.
• There was some debate about the roles of enterprise and innovation in India and China. One the one hand, it was suggested that China's economic growth was largely imitative, whereas India's had been driven to an extent by innovation. On the other, it was suggested that creative and enterprising Indians had succeeded in spite of, not because of, the political and economic environment in which they were operating.
• Asked whether he thought that India might develop a more significant regional role, Dipankar de Sarkar said that India's engagement with its neighbouring countries through the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation had so far proven disappointing, largely for political reasons. SAARC countries accounted for no more than 5-6% of India's international trade, less than ASEAN countries. The political problem was exacerbated by the economic difficulties in which Pakistan was increasingly finding itself. While India would no doubt seek to increase trade within the South Asian region, and while it was clearly in India's interest to increase intra-regional trade, its orientation was international more than regional.
• It was suggested that India's role in the Commonwealth would continue to be relatively limited so long as the Indian electorate remained unconvinced of the value of the association. In many ways it was easier to see what India could bring to the Commonwealth than what the Commonwealth could bring to India. It was suggested that this was all the more true given that many of the old issues of the period of Cold War and decolonisation were now fading. In response, Dipankar de Sarkar said that Indians would be attracted to the Commonwealth on the basis of its ability to respond to new issues, not as a result of its past achievements. The Commonwealth, he believed, provided a forum in which India could play a more effective role than, for instance, the United Nations.
• Asked whether India might seek to emulate China's success in developing economic links with Africa, both speakers agreed that although there were some strong individual links, India's uncoordinated approach contrasted unfavourably with China's much more determined and focused approach. Nevertheless both speakers also agreed that India perhaps had the potential to develop stronger links over the long term, since the Chinese approach was very much to engage in one project then move on: typically, the Chinese would set up walled compounds, bring in their own workforce and services, then, when the project was over, up sticks and leave. While China thus played a crucial role in infrastructure development, it was possible that India might establish a deeper and more long-term set of relationships.
• There was some discussion of India's attitude to climate change. For the moment it was recognized that India would be unlikely to engage seriously with the issues raised, for the simple reason that the vast majority of Indian people felt that it was unfair that rapidly developing countries should be made to pay the price for the mistakes of the already developed countries. Moreover, if a country like the United States was unwilling to make any really significant sacrifices in order to halt climate change, there was resentment that a country like India was expected to. Indians were far more excited about the launch of a $2000 car than international agreements that would have the effect of limiting economic growth.

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Session V: 'Problem states'

Chair:
Terry Barringer

Speakers:
Wilf Mbanga - Zimbabwe
Syed Sharfuddin - Pakistan
Victor Lal - Fiji

Wilf Mbanga began by saying that the Commonwealth had been present at Zimbabwe's birth; indeed the Commonwealth could be said to have acted as both the midwife and the nanny. Following the white Rhodesian regime's Unilateral Declaration of Independence in 1965, people-to-people ties were not cut, and everyone expected that at some point a majority-ruled nation would return to the Commonwealth fold. Commonwealth member states from Africa, Asia and the Caribbean piled increasing pressure on the British government to use its influence to solve the problem, culminating in the Lusaka CHOGM of 1979. This was rapidly followed by the Lancaster House talks, the establishment of a Commonwealth monitoring force to monitor the ceasefire, and the sending of a Commonwealth observer team to monitor the 1980 elections and play an important role in reassuring voters that they could vote freely. Following majority rule, Commonwealth member-states helped in all sorts of ways: Pakistan trained Zimbabwe's pilots, the UK oversaw the integration of the armed forces, India sent teachers and engineers, Ghana sent doctors. Zimbabwe became an enthusiastic member of the Commonwealth, and indeed hosted the summit in 1991 which produced one of the most important Commonwealth documents, the Harare declaration, whose initial draft was prepared by the Zimbabwe government. Following the declaration, the Zimbabwean Foreign Minister was in the forefront of those calling for the suspension of Nigeria and Pakistan. Zimbabwe also gave key support for the anti-apartheid struggle in neighbouring South Africa, and crucial encouragement to Mozambique to apply for membership of the Commonwealth and to its fellow member-states to accept that application.

Even in those, now seemingly halcyon, days, there was a sinister side to the Mugabe government, including the massacres in Matabeleland, the arrest of opposition leaders (such as Bishop Muzorewa), and the emasculation of the constitution. Initially Mugabe was very popular both at home and with the international community, and the Commonwealth failed to raise its voice. Nevertheless by the late 1990s Mugabe's abuse of power was becoming too flagrant to ignore. Particularly after he lost the 2000 referendum on the constitution, he resorted to state-sponsored violence against the opposition, the takeover of white-run farms and the intimidation of their workers (only for the farms to be handed over to Mugabe's cronies), the purging of the judiciary, and the blatant rigging of elections. The Commonwealth responded by condemning the fraudulent elections of 2000 onwards, and the EU and the US by imposing sanctions against Mugabe and the ZANU-PF leadership. Nevertheless the abuse of power continued and even worsened, as Mugabe successfully portrayed the economic meltdown in Zimbabwe as the result of Western sanctions rather than his own policies. Unemployment and inflation shot up, life expectancy became the lowest in the world, and Zimbabwe turned from bread basket to basket case.

The Commonwealth's attempts to bring pressure to bear on the situation in Zimbabwe, particularly through the appointment of a 'Troika', got nowhere, and only fuelled Mugabe's paranoia. The threat of continued suspension from the Commonwealth was met by Zimbabwe's sudden withdrawal in 2003, without a referendum or even parliamentary discussion. Nevertheless most Zimbabweans expected their country to return to the Commonwealth fold one day, and indeed still felt themselves to be part of the Commonwealth. To the extent possible under Mugabe's dictatorship, civil society links were kept alive, and it was the fervent wish of most Zimbabweans that one day Zimbabwe would be accepted back into the Commonwealth. The Uganda CHOGM was most disappointing in the way that it ignored Zimbabwe (many African leaders having a residual sympathy for Mugabe as the hero of the anti-colonial struggle, or else not wanting the CHOGM to be dominated by Zimbabwe as so many before had been). Nevertheless it was clear that most civil society organisations kept a candle in the window burning, and that one day a democratic Zimbabwe would seek to return to full Commonwealth membership.

Syed Sharfuddin said that Pakistan had quite frequently found itself described as one of the Commonwealth's 'problem states'. Indeed, no other country could match Pakistan's record for being in and out of the Commonwealth. It had left voluntarily in 1972 (following the recognition of Bangladesh), but rejoined in 1989; it had then been suspended between 1999 and 2004, re-admitted, but then suspended again on the eve of the Kampala CHOGM. Some Pakistani commentators suggested that Pakistan should happily remain outside the Commonwealth. After all, the Commonwealth had done very little to help Pakistan, or even to arbitrate, in its long-running dispute with India; as in many other countries the Commonwealth was viewed as something of a hangover from empire; and there were now a host of other attractive partners and networks. Why, then, was Pakistan so keen to remain in, or be re-admitted to, the Commonwealth? Clearly one reason was that the Commonwealth symbolised for many the special relationship with the UK, and to a lesser extent with Canada and Australia, where there were significant Pakistani diasporas; this was particularly the case with many of the feudal families who remained so powerful in Pakistan, and who operated a sort of old boys' network. In addition it was widely recognised that the 1972 withdrawal had resulted in damage to many bilateral relationships. But the bottom line was perhaps that Commonwealth membership cost Pakistan very little, in return for which there were a host of small but cumulatively significant advantages.

That said, it was clear that there had been many missed opportunities in the relationship between Pakistan and the Commonwealth. Perhaps the best days of Pakistan's membership were under Ayub Khan, before the Commonwealth had started moving towards becoming a more rules-based organisation, and when Pakistan was welcomed in Commonwealth circles despite its undemocratic government. But as it did move towards becoming a more rules-based organisation, the Commonwealth failed signally to engage with the underlying problems in Pakistan, and in particular the role of the military in Pakistani society and politics. The Commonwealth had also failed to make the best use of Pakistan even when it was a member - for instance by including Pakistanis on expert groups or in election observer teams - and could not make much use of what Pakistan did have to offer (most notably its military might, which was used by the UN but not the Commonwealth). Pakistan for its part had failed to make use of the Commonwealth to project its global policies, unlike especially the Commonwealth's small states. Moreover, the problems of Pakistan - the proliferation of drugs and small arms, terrorism, poverty, illiteracy, a chronically under-performing economy, and a fraught civil-military relationship - were simply too large for an under-resourced organization like the Commonwealth to make much of an impact on.

The Commonwealth was known for its principles, but these did not always correspond with the realities. The Commonwealth was unique amongst international organisations in having a watchdog in the form of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group, but it had few teeth. It seemed also to be fixated on free and fair elections, when clearly these alone wouldn't solve Pakistan's deep-rooted problems. Moreover it was not clear that the Commonwealth had an action plan. If Musharraf did give up his role as head of the army, lift the state of emergency, and hold elections, what then? Clearly the underlying problems would still remain. The Commonwealth's engagement with Pakistan and other 'problem states' was too sporadic and superficial. The Commonwealth certainly could play a more effective role, but in order to do so it needed to attract a much greater resource-base, and perhaps give up its attempt to replicate the work of other international organisations in areas such as health and education, in order to concentrate on its core activities, and those it was best fitted for, in promoting democracy, development, and the interests of small states.

Victor Lal said that when he published his book, Fiji: Coups in Paradise (1990), after the two coups of May and September 1987, he had had an uncanny feeling that these would not be the last coups in that group of islands; indeed, he anticipated that in future editions of the book he might have to keep adding new chapters. Sadly, his premonition had come true, and Fiji had indeed suffered further coups, in 2000 and again in 2006, resulting on both occasions in Fiji's suspension from the Commonwealth. The 1987 coups, which occurred when Fiji was still a monarchy, with the Queen as head of state, attracted considerable media coverage in the UK. This was less true of the subsequent coups, whether because the Queen was no longer directly involved, or because of a certain ennui.

It was now sadly correct to talk of something approaching a 'coup culture' in Fiji: if certain people did not like what was happening in politics they resorted to violence to change the government rather than trying to use the ballot box. The international community, including the Commonwealth, had undoubtedly not done enough to challenge this culture. Indeed, statements emanating from the Commonwealth Secretariat after the most recent coup seemed to give the impression that the Secretariat swallowed the military's line that it had carried out the coup in order to weed out racism against the Indian Fijian population and corruption, citing as evidence the inclusion of the victim of the 2000 coup, Mahendra Chaudhry, as Finance Minister in the new government. Had that really been the case, Victor Lal would have been the first to rejoice, but sadly it was not. The reality was that the military had their own agenda, and only later devised their justifications for the coup. The willingness of Chaudhry and his Fiji Labour Party to participate in the new government reflected their political marginalisation before the coup; while well-attested allegations of financial impropriety against leading FLP figures gave the lie to the idea that the latest coup was part of a 'clean-up' campaign, as suggested by its leader, Commodore Frank Bainimarama.

While the suspension of Fiji from the Commonwealth was clearly the right decision to have taken, Victor Lal felt that the Commonwealth had not acted anywhere near as forcefully as it should have done, particularly after the latest coup. The coup culture had a corrosive effect on Fijian public life and indeed on its economy. The country would continue to have repeated coups unless politicians and the international community acted more vigorously to address the underlying roots of the problem.

• It was suggested that the three 'problem states' looked at by the speakers had little in common in terms of the causes of their problems and indeed the forms that they took. Nevertheless each raised questions about the effectiveness of the Commonwealth in addressing derogations from the democratic values which its members claimed to espouse. Much had been made in earlier discussions of the value of CMAG. CMAG was indeed a unique institution, and nothing similar existed, for instance, for the United Nations. But each of the presentations had highlighted the weakness of CMAG in face of the deep-seated problems addressed. Certainly, if CMAG was to work better, it needed to carry the Commonwealth member-states with it. The question was, was it better to continue with CMAG in its current form, or to strengthen the institution, knowing that the latter course ran the risk of destroying the institution altogether?
• Syed Sharfuddin said that he definitely thought it better to try to strengthen CMAG. It needed to meet more frequently; it needed its own budget; and it needed to be able to offer carrots as well as sticks. Most importantly, it needed to be given the power and responsibility to look at deteriorations in the political climate and deal with them before matters got to the point of the complete suspension of democratic government.
• Victor Lal thought that the weakness of CMAG related to the weakness of the Commonwealth itself. Fiji was an extremely Anglophile country, and suspension from the Commonwealth was regretted primarily as driving a wedge between Fiji and the UK. But as for the Commonwealth itself, he would be surprised if the man in the Fijian street much noticed any effect of suspension at all. There were no Commonwealth offices in Suva which could close down, nor any particularly significant Commonwealth programmes which would be missed. It was therefore unclear what suspension from the Commonwealth actually meant in practice.
• Another participant suggested that there was in fact a common thread, which was to do with the failure to find a stable relationship between the civil and military powers; this was obviously the case with Fiji and Pakistan, but to an extent also the case with Zimbabwe, which in effect had seen the militarisation of a nominally civilian regime. Wilf Mbanga agreed with this analysis, saying that the legacy of the liberation struggle was a militarised society, exacerbated by Mugabe's rule, which depended very largely on the military and the 'war veterans' to keep it in power, in return for which large sectors of the economy were now controlled by the military, either individually or collectively. Victor Lal also agreed, saying that the failure to break the civil-military nexus in Fiji was at the root of many of Fiji's political problems; and likewise the nexus had been strengthened in recent years, although in this case by the fact that civilians were to an extent unwilling to engage in public affairs because of the risk of being associated with the military and subject to the same, primarily Australian and New Zealand, sanctions. In regard to Pakistan, Syed Sharfuddin asserted that key to breaking the cycle of military rule in Pakistan would be to remove the military from control of economic resources, and re-train the armed forces in order to instil in them a respect for the rule of law and democratic institutions, and a pride in the role of the military as it might be found in a country like the UK. This was a rather larger task than might be imagined, given that in provinces such as the Punjab, the militarisation of society went back many centuries, preceding even British rule.
• It was suggested that as well as giving CMAG the power to address derogations from democratic values before they got to the stage of coups or dictatorships, the Commonwealth also needed an early warning system to highlight potential future conflicts. The twenty-first century might indeed see more regional or internal conflicts as a result of climate change and competition for scarce resources. The Commonwealth needed to be looking several years ahead, and not just responding to events as they happened.

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Participants: ( * = Round Table editorial board member)

*Terry Barringer (Book Reviews Editor, The Round Table)
Dr Sarmila Bose (Director, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford)
Nick Bouchet (Assistant Director, Commonwealth Parliamentary Association)
*Richard Bourne OBE (Chairman, The Round Table)
Homera Cheema (Projects Coordinator, Commonwealth Policy Studies Unit)
*Dr Mark Collins (Director, Commonwealth Foundation)
Daisy Cooper (Planning Officer, Strategic Planning and Evaluation Division, Commonwealth Secretariat)
*Stephen Cox CVO (Executive Secretary, The Royal Society)
Vic Craggs OBE (Chief Executive, Commonwealth Youth Exchange Council)
Devapriyo Das (Acting Head of Public Affairs, Royal Commonwealth Society)
*Dr Paul Flather (Secretary-General, Europaeum)
*Dr Amelia Hadfield (Lecturer in European International Relations, University of Kent)
*Meredith Hooper (Partner, Hooper Communications)
Martin Gaal (PhD student, University of Kent)
*Derek Ingram OBE (President Emeritus, Commonwealth Journalists' Association)
*Alexandra Jones (Director, Strategic Planning and Evaluation Division, Commonwealth Secretariat)
Dr Victor Lal (Department of International Development, University of Oxford)
*Prof Anthony Low AO (Former Vice-Chancellor, Australian National University)
*Dr Peter Lyon OBE (Reader Emeritus, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London)
Rt Hon Don McKinnon (Commonwealth Secretary-General)
Gregor MacKinnon (Director of Programmes, Commonwealth Business Council)
Sir Peter Marshall KCMG, CVO (Former Commonwealth Deputy Secretary-General)
Lucy Mathieson (Coordinator, HR Advocacy Programme, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative)
*Dr Alex May (Hon Secretary/Treasurer, The Round Table)
Wilf Mbanga (Editor, The Zimbabwean)
*Stuart Mole OBE (Director-General, Royal Commonwealth Society)
Matthew Neuhaus (Director, Political Affairs Division, Commonwealth Secretariat)
*Dr Alastair Niven OBE (Principal, Cumberland Lodge)
Richard O'Donnell (Intern, Commonwealth Human Ecology Council)
Bashir Patel (Director of Programmes, Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation)
John Phillips (Public Affairs Adviser to the Secretary-General, Commonwealth Secretariat)
*Dr Gowher Rizvi (Director, Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation, Harvard University)
*James Robbins (Diplomatic Correspondent, BBC News)
*Mark Robinson (London Chair, Consortium for Education in the Commonwealth)
Dipankar de Sarkar (Chief, European Bureau, Indo-Asian News Service)
*Prue Scarlett LVO (Hon Consul for Samoa)
*Victoria Schofield (author and journalist)
Uttara Shahani (London Liaison Officer, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative)
Syed Sharfuddin (Chief Executive, Commonwealth Consulting and Risk Analysis Ltd)
Miriam Shearman (Head, Commonwealth Coordination Team, Foreign & Commonwealth Office)
*Nicholas Sims (Reader in International Relations, London School of Economics)
*Tim Slack LVO (Former Principal, Cumberland Lodge)
Dr Victoria te Velde (Acting Head, Commonwealth Policy Studies Unit)
Zoe Ware (Project Officer, Association of European Parliamentarians for Africa)
Dr Nicholas Watts (Education Adviser, Commonwealth Human Ecology Council)
Kaye Whiteman (Former Director, Information and Public Affairs Division, Commonwealth Secretariat)
*Prof Andrew J Williams (Editor, The Round Table)

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