Alianzas público-privadas para el desarrollo: RSC y relaciones ONGD-empresas (Public-private partnerships for development: CSR and business-NGO relationships)

The current Master Plan of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) includes references to the need to promote public-private partnerships and to collaborate with the private sector around shared goals of poverty reduction and sustainable human development . In this context, non-governmental organizations face a multi-faceted discussion: how should the relationship of NGOs with multinational companies be? Should they support companies that claim to act ethically and responsibly? Regarding the goal of poverty reduction, is it necessary to weave an alliance between the "private sector" and the world of development cooperation? Here arises a central question: what should be the role of NGOs when implementing policies on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)? In this paper, we explain the evolution of the agenda of international cooperation in the last decade in terms of taking account of large corporations as agents of development. Based on the paradigm of CSR, transnational corporations and international agencies have been articulating a discourse that focuses on the incorporation of the "private sector" in the strategies of cooperation as a driver of human development goals and fighting poverty. In the following pages we will show the different views that are in the field of development cooperation, with special attention to the characterization of the position that NGOs have developed around the possibilities of collaboration with transnational corporations, as well as some examples of "public-private partnerships for development" launched by multinational companies and NGOs in Spain. El actual Plan Director de la Agencia Espa ola de Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo (AECID), vigente para el período 2009-2012, incluye menciones expresas sobre la necesidad de fomentar las alianzas público-privadas y la colaboración con el sector privado empresarial alrededor de objetivos compartidos de lucha contra la pobreza y desarrollo humano y sostenible . En este contexto, las organizaciones no gubernamentales de desarrollo se enfrentan a un debate con múltiples aristas: cómo ha de ser la relación de las ONGD con las empresas multinacionales? Tienen que apoyar a las empresas que afirman actuar éticamente y de forma responsable? Con el objetivo último de luchar contra la pobreza, es necesario tejer una alianza entre el “sector privado” y el mundo de la cooperación al desarrollo? Todo ello, en torno a una pregunta central: cuál ha de ser el papel de las ONGD a la hora de llevar a la práctica las políticas de Responsabilidad