SDG partnerships may perpetuate the global North–South divide The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development gives equal emphasis to developed (‘Northern’) countries and developing (‘Southern’) countries. Thus, implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) demands coherent collaboration to transform society across all countries. Yet, there has been little research published on SDG partnerships and this is the first study to explore the extent to which partners from Northern and Southern countries are involved in them and their focus. It identifies that involvement is unequally distributed and may perpetuate the North–South divide in countries’ resources, including access to data and scientific capacities. Most notably, partners from low-income countries are involved in far fewer partnerships than partners from countries in all other World Bank income categories, although the former are least able to develop sustainably. As such, all those promoting sustainable development from governmental, private and third-sector organisations need to address global inequalities in establishing and implementing SDG partnerships if, collectively, they are to facilitate delivery of Agenda 2030. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development was adopted in 2015 by all United Nations (UN) Member States. Its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and 169 targets build upon the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). While the MDGs focused on actions in developing (‘Southern’) countries, the SDGs give equal emphasis to implementation in developed (‘Northern’) countries1. However, there is a global North–South divide in countries’ resources, including access to data and scientific capacities. For example, low-income countries have much less investment in research and development and far fewer researchers, when compared to higher income countries2,3. This has substantial implications for the development and implementation of policies and practices. The negative consequences of the divide for how science is designed, produced and communicated and how action on the ground is implemented have been highlighted at all scales from international to local4,5 and across various themes and sectors6,7,8,9. Specifically, it leads to policy development and implementation shaped by a Northern agenda rather than the needs and priorities of Southern countries5,8, preventing global sustainable development and, thereby, fulfilment of Agenda 2030. Thus, the SDGs present numerous challenges for transforming society through coherent collaborative efforts involving all countries10. While each country is responsible for its own sustainable development11, global telecoupling12 means that many SDG actions should be implemented by countries in partnership.SDG 17 focuses specifically on strengthening implementation of the SDGs, including through North–South, South-South and triangular cooperation, and multi-stakeholder partnerships13, which can be public and private10. Over recent years, the importance of multi-stakeholder partnerships has been increasingly recognized by UN Member States and leading international development institutions14. SDG Target 17.16 highlights that multi-stakeholder partnerships can ‘mobilize and share knowledge, expertise, technology and financial resources, to support the achievement of the SDGs in all countries, in particular developing countries’15. While partnerships may not be a panacea for global inequalities, they offer opportunities for people and institutions from different contexts to negotiate social relations and power that can lead to more respectful, equal implementation16. It has been specifically suggested that Northern countries should ‘co-produce knowledge, technologies, and processes for sustainability’17 with Southern countries to support development of their capacities18,19. The equitable involvement of southern partners in such co-production is important to ensure that resultant knowledge systems are credible, salient and legitimate20.Despite the acknowledged importance of multi-stakeholder partnerships for sustainable development, there has been limited research on their focus, which countries are involved, and relationships between them. Additionally, while SDG 17 highlights the need to enhance Southern countries’ capacity to implement the SDGs (Target 17.16), little is known about its achievement. While there are some reports on SDG partnerships21,22,23, very few have focused on how they address the global North–South divide24. Thus, our paper aims to explore the extent to which partners from Northern and Southern countries are involved in SDG partnerships globally, in different regions of the world, and the SDGs on which they focus. We use World Bank income categories25 in applying the descriptors ‘North’ or ‘Northern’ to high-income countries, and ‘South’ or ‘Southern’ to countries in all other income categories25. Our analyses use data collected from the UN’s SDG Partnerships Platform.A total of 4521 partnerships were registered on the UN’s SDG Partnerships Platform in July 2019. Of those, 1645 partnerships (36%) referred to an organisation (e.g. the UN or the European Commission) or a broad geographical focus (i.e. without identifying partners from a specific country), with most referring to ‘oceans’ (863; 19%) or ‘global’ (371; 8%). Subsequently, our analyses of ‘countries’ involvement’ addressed the 2876 partnerships (64%) that specifically identified partners from one or more countries. Of these partnerships, 1724 (60%) involved partners from at least one Southern country and 1309 (45%) included partners from one or more Northern countries.Partners from a total of 195 countries were involved in at least one registered partnership (Fig. 1). Of those, 30% (59) were from high-income Northern countries and the remainder (136) were from Southern countries: upper-middle-income (30%), lower-middle-income (24%) and low-income (16%) (Fig. 1, pie chart).Figure 1Distribution of partners’ countries by World Bank income category and region. The number and percentage of partners’ countries involved in the 2876 partnerships that specifically identified partners from one or more countries are shown by World Bank income category (pie-chart) and by World Bank region (large map). Total number of partners’ countries: 195. Map generated in QGIS 3.12 (https://qgis.org/) and further modified in Inkscape 0.92.5 (https://inkscape.org/).The partners’ countries were unevenly distributed across the World Bank’s seven world regions (Fig. 1), with the greatest number located in Europe & Central Asia (53; 27%), and Sub-Saharan Africa (48; 25%). The number of partnerships in which partners from these countries were involved ranged from 1 to 231, with an average of 29 partnerships per country. Partners from 174 (90%) of the countries were involved in less than 60 partnerships, while partners from 93 (48%) of the countries were involved in less than 20 partnerships.Registered partnerships that specifically identified partners from one or more countries (Fig. 2a) included 2586 (90%) partnerships with partners from only one country, i.e. domestic partnerships (Fig. 2b), 264 (9%) partnerships with partners from 2 to 20 countries (Fig. 2c), and 26 (1%) partnerships with partners from more than 20 countries (Fig. 2d). On average, each country had 13 domestic partnerships, 7 partnerships involving partners from 2 to 20 countries, and 13 partnerships with partners from more than 20 countries.Figure 2Distribution of the number of partnerships that specifically identified partners’ countries. Overview of the number of partnerships that specifically identified partners from: (a) one or more countries; (b) only one country, i.e. domestic partnerships; (c) 2 to 20 countries; and (d) more than 20 countries. Northern countries (high income) are shown in shades of blue; Southern countries (upper-middle, lower-middle and low income) are shown in shades of red. Maps generated in QGIS 3.12 (https://qgis.org/). Larger versions of the components of this figure are included in Supplementary Material.There were some clear differences in the average number of partnerships in relation to the income category of partners’ countries (Fig. 3). Across all sizes of partnerships, partners from high-income (Northern) countries participated in almost twice as many partnerships (34 per country) as those from low-income countries (18 per country). Partners from low-income countries were also involved in considerably fewer domestic partnerships (4), as compared with those in other income categories (12 to 19), on average. However, partners from countries across all income categories were, on average, party to a similar number of partnerships with partners from 2 to 20 or more than 20 countries (6 to 10 and 8 to 9 partnerships, respectively).Figure 3Average number of partnerships per partners’ countries by partnership size and country income category. Figures in the first column are not the sum of figures in the subsequent columns, as all are average figures.Partnerships’ focal SDGsBased on the information included in the UN database, we identified each partnership’s focal SDGs. In general, all partnerships that identified partners from at least one country (Fig. 4a) focused most strongly on SDG 14 (Life below water) and then in descending order on SDGs 4 (Quality education), 8 (Decent work and economic growth), 17 (Partnerships for the goals) and 5 (Gender equality). This was also true more specifically of domestic partnerships (Fig. 4b). However, while partnerships that identified partners from 2 to 20 countries also focused most strongly on SDG 14, they then focused in descending order on SDGs 17, 5, 4, and 8 (Fig. 4c). There was an increasing focus on SDG 17 with size of partnership. The focus of the largest partnerships was, in general, quite different from partnerships that identified partners from 20 or fewer countries (Fig. 4b,c), as they focused most strongly on SDG 8 and then in descending order on SDGs 17, 4, 1 (No poverty), and 10 (Reduced inequalities). In addition, few of the largest partnerships focused on SDG 14 (Fig. 4d).Figure 4Partnerships’ focal SDGs. The SDGs addressed by (a) all partnerships that specifically identified partners from at least one country, (b) domestic partnerships, (c) partnerships involving 2 to 20 countries, and (d) partnerships with more than 20 countries. The bars on the left of Figs. 4a to 4d represent the percentage of partnerships that address each SDG. The bars on the right of Figs. 4a to 4d represent the percentage of partnerships that address each SDG involving partners from countries in each income category (represented by different intensities of colour). Note that many partnerships include partners from countries across multiple income categories and address more than one SDG. Larger versions of the components of this figure are included in Supplementary Material.There were notable differences in the relative proportion of partners from countries in different income categories involved in partnerships focused on some SDGs. In general, across all partnerships that identified partners from at least one country (Fig. 4a) and, specifically, for domestic partnerships (Fig. 4b), the percentage of partnerships focused on SDGs 1, 2 (Zero hunger), 3 (Good health and well-being), and 5 decreased with increasing income category of the countries involved. In contrast, for SDG 14 the reverse was broadly true, except for high-income countries, and for SDG 4 a higher proportion of low-income and high-income countries was involved than middle-income countries. Notably, the relative proportion of partners from countries in different income categories involved in partnerships that focused on SDG 13 (Climate action) was broadly similar within each size category of partnerships and increased across all income categories in the same way with increasing size of partnership.Country-wise relations between partnersIn order to analyse the country-wise relationships between partners from different countries and World Bank regions, we assumed that a partner from a country had relations with partners from all other countries within the same partnership. The analysis focused only on those partnerships that involved partners from 2 to 20 countries (see ‘Methods’ for details), i.e. 264 partnerships. These partnerships involved 9468 such country-wise relationships. Approximately 10% (945) of the relationships solely involved partners from Northern countries, i.e. North–North (Fig. 5a), 35% (3286) were between partners from Northern and Southern countries, i.e. North–South (Fig. 5b), while most (55%; 5236) solely involved partners from Southern countries, i.e. South-South (Fig. 5c). Approximately 36% (342) of all North–North relationships were between partners within Europe & Central Asia region, and a further 15% (146) were between partners from Europe & Central Asia and East Asia & Pacific. Most North–South relationships (2463; 75%;) were between partners in different regions, most commonly between partners in Europe & Central Asia and East Asia & Pacific (328; 10%), and between partners in Europe & Central Asia and Latin America & Caribbean (277; 8%). A large proportion of South-South relationships (55%; 2898) were between partners from countries within the same region, particularly within East Asia & Pacific (1052; 58%) and Sub-Saharan Africa (1037; 42%). The remainder of South-South relationships (45%; 2338), between partners in different regions, mostly involved partners from Sub-Saharan Africa (1407; 60%).Figure 5Number of country-wise relationships within and between World Bank regions. The types of relationships are indicated by different coloured circles (within regions) and lines (between regions): (a) North–North relationships (black), (b) North–South relationships (grey) and (c) South-South relationships (white). The size of circles and the figures in the circles represent the nu
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-01534-6
SDG partnerships may perpetuate the global North–South divide
