- ATD Fourth World

We had five excellent presentations in the workshops and in speaking about them now I will try to cover all the areas that were touched on in the debates.
During these two days our workshop placed major demands on the interpreters, as a result we had less time for our general debate and to reach conclusions to be discussed during the plenary session. I hope that in spite of all this we will have raised some pertinent issues.

1. Firstly we think it is an appropriate time to reflect on the definition of participatory indicators in the fight against poverty and exclusion. This particular issue of indicators is in fact a key issue of the moment. In Brussels, for example, we know how important it is in the fight against poverty, both at European and therefore also at Member State level.

2. As a general rule we asked ourselves what the exact role of the indicators should be. We feel that they should help to fight against poverty by measuring the change in the daily lives of the poor and the change in society and therefore monitoring the rate at which poverty is disappearing.
We also feel that citizens wish to be kept informed by their government, of the outcome of certain political measures implemented to combat poverty.  It is the duty of the government to report back to them, and in particular to those living in conditions of poverty.
The players or groups given the task of defining these indicators do of course have different motives. In our workshop we agreed that all indicators are normative, in other words, they all express value judgements. Our definition of poverty will be the main point of reference in developing indicators. We have to decide, for example, whether the poor are without resources or without authority.

3. We also wanted to present the reasons why we felt this combined approach was so important in the way we defined indicators. In fact, we feel that simply talking about participatory indicators is not as important as our joint efforts to define them. We are not talking here about simply adding qualitative indicators to quantitative ones or subjective indicators to objective ones; we are talking about a new approach for all indicators.
We do not think it fair to develop instruments that measure poverty without the help of those who are actually subjected to these conditions. Having poor people participate in the debate would prove that they have pertinent views on the future of European society. Their participation is so important because it would allow us to create better instruments for everyone in the fight against poverty. So we have not really focussed on technical details but on the different issues we have to tackle and the different areas that we have to consider in reference to these issues.

4.  We then considered the following question: what basic conditions are required to make this development of participatory indicators as effective as possible? First things first: the people living in conditions of poverty must be involved in this development from the start. Furthermore, we believe that poor people need to be supported by the organisation. They should, for example, have someone they can turn to who will help them express their views and engage in a discussion with others. But it is also important that we try not to exclude people who lack the support of such organisations.
These people need to talk amongst themselves but also with other people from different backgrounds, and exchange ideas so that we can make progress in the fight against poverty. Poor people need to keep in touch with their own surroundings so that what they say is based firmly on this experience. The role these people play should not be limited to simply recounting their experiences of living in such conditions, information that will then be exploited by others. Instead, we must work with the scientific community, statisticians, politicians and officials, not against them. In other words we should not throw out the baby with the bath water. 

5.  What difference could that make? What is our vision? What changes do we think it will bring about?
We feel that the indicators are probably rooted in human rights because we have realised that the poor can identify with this framework. They want tools that will change their lives, but only on condition that these changes become a reality and are not just empty words.
These indicators will therefore correspond to the reality experienced by the poor. However, we must not forget that this reality is not just multi-dimensional, but that each dimension also interacts with others and that the various dimensions affect each other. This would demonstrate the efforts made by people living in conditions of poverty to fulfil their dreams and not simply to survive. Indicators developed in this way would reveal the priorities put forward by the poor. For example, lack of respect and the fact that they never have the right to speak, the ability to turn their lives around and often do not even have hope for the future. This is why we must monitor the progress made in reducing the feeling of shame that the poor are made to suffer. 

Going back to the ideas of Father Joseph, one last thing that we would like the indicators to do is monitor over the next 20 years or so the extent to which the dreams that poor parents have for their children are fulfilled. We know that we are only at the very beginning and that there are very few people who know how to work together with the poor. We must learn better how to include and relay the experience of the most marginalised people (often women) in a sensitive way. NGO must develop a technical ability to initiate this debate.
Indicators are often held up, either in a European or a national context, as national action plans and are therefore often subjected to different constraints. In practical terms it is likely that we will have quite a lot of influence on the national criteria and objectives, but thanks to the open practice of coordination, in the long run we could also exert an equal amount of influence on the criteria and values maintained by the European Union.

6.  Finally, what can we reasonably hope to achieve? It is true that we have made quite good progress as far as indicators are concerned, even if it is still a struggle. The committee on social protection has officially expressed its support for including the poor in the process of establishing future indicators. We have also noted parallel trends, not just in Europe but throughout the world. We are putting more and more emphasis on the opinions of those using the protection services based only on their experience. We are also insisting more strongly that the strategies used to combat poverty should be based on the viewpoints of those living in conditions of poverty in the southern hemisphere in the same way as those in the north. This demand has not only been expressed by NGO, but also by certain official bodies.

In conclusion we could say that our aim is not only to have participatory indicators at our disposal but to have other types of indicators too. We need different types of indicators but we also need to find a way of ensuring that all indicators have a role and are closely linked to the experiences and views of people living in poverty.
However, it is clear that if the poor are not treated on an equal footing with other players in the process, without renouncing the role of the latter, we will never reach our objective if the poor do not become our partners and if we do not adopt an approach that involves all players. This applies not only to the creation of poverty indicators, but also to all the strategies chosen to combat poverty. We will never attain convincing results in our fight against poverty if the poor are not shown the same respect and are not given the same rights to participate in establishing these processes.