The UN’s Fourth Financing for Development Conference (FfD4) will take place between 30 June and 3 July 2025, in the context of calls for reform of the international financial architecture (IFA; see Observer Autumn 2024), including the World Bank and the IMF (i.e., the Bretton Woods Institutions – BWIs; see Dispatch Annuals 2024, Springs 2023; Observer Spring 2023, Spring 2023, Summer 2022). The first FfD conference in 2002 in Monterrey, Mexico, resulted from Global South efforts to reclaim the UN – where each country has an equal vote – as the central forum for IFA discussions, away from the BWIs and other less democratic fora (i.e. the OECD and G20).

In September, the Civil Society Financing for Development Mechanism – a coalition of over 800 organisations – reacted to the UN Summit of the Future’s failure to deliver meaningful reform and called on FfD4 to focus on systemic changes, highlighting that IFA reform cannot be led by multilateral lender-driven institutions like the BWIs.

As part of the consultation period in October, the Mechanism submitted its input to the draft FfD4 Elements Paper, later published on 22 November. The submission urged FfD4 to “generate actionable multilateral decisions for the removal of the systemic and structural impediments to transformation and the re-design of global economic governance to promote truly democratic multilateralism.” The input will feed into the negotiations that will result on a preliminary text to be published at the end of December. The coalition has also developed a checklist of what should be achieved at FfD4, including to agree a UN Framework Convention on International Tax Cooperation, a UN Framework Convention on Sovereign Debt, and for all workstreams to ensure gender and human rights are cross-cutting themes.

The next months will be key in the road towards the conference, with Preparatory Committee sessions happening in February and May.