The Sevilla consensus: “You’re on your own, Kid” - Roberto Bissio
“You're on your own, kid ….
Yeah, you can face this ….
You're on your own, kid ….
You always have been ….”
—Taylor Swift
At the closing ceremony of the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development, last July 3 in Sevilla, UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed delivered a sobering statement:
« …For decades, the mission of sustainable development has united countries. Yet today, development and its great enabler — international cooperation — are facing massive headwinds.
Over the last four days (…) the human consequences of rising debt burdens, escalating trade tensions, and steep cuts to official development assistance have been brought into sharp relief.
Likewise, we understand all too well the collateral damage that competing government priorities can have on development finance, and that global support for sustainable development can no longer be taken for granted. »
Since her job requires to convey faith in the multilateral system of the UN, she found some solace in that the outcome document «upholds the commitments from Addis Ababa ten years ago and seeks to rekindle the sense of hope embodied in the Sustainable Development Goals ».
Upholding old commitments that were never met is a poor compensation for the lack of any substantial progress in the key issues of the FFD agenda.
On official development assistance (ODA) the conference committed to « reverse declining trends » (paragraph 36b) and reaffirmed the fifty-year-old commitment « by most developed countries » (the US never agreed to that target) to achieve 0.7% of gross national income for ODA to developing countries and between 0.15 and 0.2 per cent to the least developed countries. The problem is that only half of that target was ever reached in half a century, and major cuts in assistance budgets have been announced by the US, Germany, the UK and France, among others. Simultaneously, European military budgets are doubling, expected to reach 5% of GDP in most of Europe, except notably Spain, the host country of the Summit.
On external debt, the outcome document recognizes that “sovereign debt challenges have become one of the greatest obstacles to realizing sustainable development,” (paragraph 47) but instead of starting work on a sovereign debt workout mechanism as developing countries requested, it vaguely promises to “initiate an intergovernmental process at the United Nations, with a view to making recommendations for closing gaps in the debt architecture and exploring options to address debt sustainability” (paragraph 50f).
On trade, the « Compromiso de Sevilla » (a title that translates as « Sevilla Commitment », though many critics ironically call it « Compromise ») acknowledges that «trade restrictions, including tariffs inconsistent with WTO rules, principles and commitments, are on the rise globally amid rising trade tensions and stalling multilateral negotiations ». The conference makes the usual, likely ineffective, calls to respect old commitments. One of the few concrete decisions was support for « updating and reforming outdated investment agreements » and a call for « the establishment of an advisory centre on international investment dispute resolution », to help countries reform investor-State dispute settlement mechanisms in trade and investment agreements.
On the international financial architecture, the Conference again recognized the need for reform but declined to assert a major UN role in ensuring that Bretton Woods Institutions' decisions align with human rights and development principles. It reaffirmed « full respect for the respective mandates and governance bodies of different international institutions ». Since the US has veto power in those institutions, all further “encouragements” for more voting power for emerging countries are likely to go unheard.
On domestic finances, the conference acknowledged the importance of fair and progressive taxation to mobilize national resources and committed governments «to engage constructively in the negotiations on the United Nations Framework Convention on International Tax Cooperation », following demands initiated by African countries. However, it avoided supporting the Human Rights Council process for a binding legal instrument on transnational corporations and human rights. Legally established corporations remain a major source of illicit financial flows out of Africa — flows that far exceed the total amount of official development assistance received.
The survival of multilateralism
Many commentators argued that merely reaching a consensus agreement was a major achievement for multilateralism, at a time when some countries are imposing their will through military and economic power.
In fact, consensus was only reached because the US, after rejecting the entire draft, decided to abandon the process at the last minute rather than force a vote. According to Bhumika Muchala from TWN, « the role of the US in the negotiations has been publicly reported, in terms of aggressively blocking and requesting deletions across entire paragraphs of the document ». Meanwhile, the European Union and other developed countries — including Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Japan, and the UK — also pushed back throughout the process.
With no substantial results and no alliances from the Global North, the message to developing countries sounds eerily like the chorus of Taylor Swift’s song: « you’re on your own, kid! »
What remains to be seen is whether the Global South, like the singer, will find its voice, rise above despair, and realize that by joining forces — « you can face this! »
References
https://docs.un.org/en/A/CONF.227/2025/L.1
https://docs.un.org/ar/A/CONF.227/2025/L.1
https://twn.my/title2/finance/2025/fi250703.htm
This article is part of ANND’s newsletter on FFD meetings in Sevilla.
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