When I was a teenager, in Mumbai, India, my parents hired a new maid. She was exactly the same age as I was, but unlike me, had never been to school. While I probably attributed my academic ‘success’ to my own hard work, and my parents probably believed they’d paid for it through theirs, the stark reality was that my education had been paid for by our new maid and her brothers and sisters all over India. Hundreds of millions whose life choices were limited virtually from birth by a deeply entrenched system of privilege that, for instance, granted me access to a subsidised education all the way up to the post-graduate level, while excluding her from even basic literacy.  

The themes of that story are replicated at every level in our societies. As individuals, communities and states, those with the highest stake in policy outcomes have the least say in policy formulation. At each level, and in every domain – economic, social, political and cultural - the systems and structures of decision-making are controlled by elite groups privileged by gender, age, race, class, caste, religion, ethnicity, differential physical or mental capacity and citizenship.  

At the very apex of global decision-making the disparities are even starker. One country controls 17.5% of the votes at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the poorest 40 control less than 0.9%. Access to these elite clubs is strictly controlled. The recently concluded G-8 meetings highlighted this fact yet again.  

My parents could transform our maid’s prospects through a personal intervention. Ensuring other girls like her could realise their rights and potential would take more: nothing less than a nation-wide mobilisation to amend the constitution, redress budgetary allocations and ensure effective policy implementation in, and accountability to, local communities at the grassroots in every village and town.  

Yet even in this seemingly local struggle – in one country, on one particular right, for a subset of the population – it was clear that the forces arrayed against it were global. Market forces, world trade bodies, international financial institutions, aid agencies and other governments – all had a stake in the outcome. And each enjoyed far greater access and influence in the corridors of power than all the local civil society representatives combined.

Regardless then, of one’s constituency, issue focus or location, it’s clear, now more than ever, that the solutions to structural injustice lie as much at the global level as at the local. That, in fact, only simultaneous and concerted action at both levels stands any chance of achieving significant and sustainable change. As I heard it recently expressed, “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the table.”

With gratitude, faith and solidarity,

Ingrid Srinath,
CIVICUS Secretary General

To send your comments, suggestions or contributions of articles to e-CIVICUS, e-mail editor@civicus.org.

For previous articles from the Secretary General, see details below: 

1. Beyond G-8: Civil society challenges

2. Recalling the Day of the African child

3. CIVICUS 2008 World Assembly, a unique opportunity to effect real change

4. CIVICUS new Secretary General appointed. 

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