The paper addresses the failure of renewing the same millennium development goals (MDGs) format in measuring achievement in a region like the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region which is drastically being t...The paper addresses the failure of renewing the same millennium development goals (MDGs) format in measuring achievement in a region like the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region which is drastically being transformed. A new approach focusing on "human security" principles based on freedom, dignity, justice, equality, solidarity, tolerance, and respect articulated in the millennium declaration is needed. Achieving this requires a more integrated, inclusive, and comprehensive development framework that is able to analyze and understand the context with its progress and setbacks. The paper realizes that measuring MDGs achievement does not only need a comprehensive integrated approach, but also a defmition of risks and challenges that the region faces. Issues like poverty, inequality, unemployment of graduates, personal and collective insecurity due to conflict, migration, and brain drain, food insecurity, and gender inequality are all issues that need to be redefined when analyzing the region to suit the context. The paper concludes that in order to understand the context, re-definition of concepts like poverty reduction, participation, and empowerment is needed to make concepts more relevant to the context. Lastly, the paper reflects the new call from youth for a new development model that is not based on market economy, ends political economy of the rentier states, and emphasizes a productive oriented economy that is able to generate employment and decent work. It also emphasizes democratic governance as an only path for a sustainable participatory development that can realize ambitions and aspirations of the majority of population.展开更多
文摘The paper addresses the failure of renewing the same millennium development goals (MDGs) format in measuring achievement in a region like the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region which is drastically being transformed. A new approach focusing on "human security" principles based on freedom, dignity, justice, equality, solidarity, tolerance, and respect articulated in the millennium declaration is needed. Achieving this requires a more integrated, inclusive, and comprehensive development framework that is able to analyze and understand the context with its progress and setbacks. The paper realizes that measuring MDGs achievement does not only need a comprehensive integrated approach, but also a defmition of risks and challenges that the region faces. Issues like poverty, inequality, unemployment of graduates, personal and collective insecurity due to conflict, migration, and brain drain, food insecurity, and gender inequality are all issues that need to be redefined when analyzing the region to suit the context. The paper concludes that in order to understand the context, re-definition of concepts like poverty reduction, participation, and empowerment is needed to make concepts more relevant to the context. Lastly, the paper reflects the new call from youth for a new development model that is not based on market economy, ends political economy of the rentier states, and emphasizes a productive oriented economy that is able to generate employment and decent work. It also emphasizes democratic governance as an only path for a sustainable participatory development that can realize ambitions and aspirations of the majority of population.