Doha, Qatar – The Second World Summit on Social Development (WSSD2) recognized the Global Accelerator on Jobs and Social Protection for Just Transitions as a concrete mechanism to implement the ambitions of the Summit. Member States committed to consider supporting the implementation of the Global Accelerator, as encapsulated in the commitments of the Doha Political Declaration (paragraph 30 h).
Hosted 30 years after the first WSSD, the Summit convened to advance the three core themes of social development – accelerating action on poverty eradication, the promotion of full employment and decent work, and social inclusion. The adoption of the Declaration demonstrates a shared pledge by governments to tackle poverty, create decent work, combat discrimination, expand access to social protection, and protect human rights.
The Global Accelerator supports all three core themes of social development simultaneously, by making global commitments tangible and actionable at the national level. It serves as a platform to foster stronger multilateral cooperation by aligning the priorities, expertise, and resources of international partners around shared objectives of expanding social protection and promoting decent work. At the same time, it serves as a catalyst to mobilize and leverage financing—both public and private—by pooling contributions, leveraging co-financing and linking with wider development finance mechanisms. This dual focus on collaboration and resource mobilization effectively helps countries design and implement integrated, sustainable solutions that address informality, and new vulnerabilities related to climate change, youth unemployment, ageing and digital economy, while accelerating progress towards universal social protection and decent job creation.
The Global Accelerator hosted its virtual Solutions Session “Country-led solutions: Integrating decent jobs and social protection for social development” on 4 November, as part of WSSD2. The event showcased how countries, donors, and international financial institutions are aligning policy and financing to scale reforms for decent jobs and universal social protection. Albania, Cambodia and Senegal, as the Pathfinder Countries of the Global Accelerator showcased how combined investments in employment, skills and social protection policies and programs are helping achieve national social and economic development priorities.
The event also showcased how the Global Accelerator, and its multistakeholder engagement mechanism (M-GA) place social development at the heart of economic development and ecological, demographic and digital transitions.
The session reaffirmed the Global Accelerator’s role as a concrete platform for turning global commitments on decent jobs and universal social protection into country-led action, and its contribution to the implementation of the WSSD2 Political Declaration.
Read an extensive summary of the event here.
Watch the recording of the event here.