The Commonwealth today: It's a mammoth
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This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from March 1979.
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In all Commonwealth countries people in government, in academic and in working life habitually use the English language. In all of them there are shared techniques and attitudes, in government, in the law, in education, in public and in private life. These countries, with a combined population of about one billion people, agree that their interests are well served by continued partnership and co-operation.
The Commonwealth recognises and welcomes the diversity of its membership.
Members around the globe
The evolution of the Commonwealth began with the introduction of responsible government in Canada in the 1840s. Australia, New Zealand and South Africa followed along the road to independence, and their complete autonomy as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations, united by allegiance to the Crown, was given legal form by the Statute of Westminster in 1931.
The modern Commonwealth began to take shape in 1947, when India and Pakistan became members. Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) followed in 1948. In 1949 India became a republic, the word "British" was dropped from the Commonwealth's name, and Heads of Government agreed that allegiance to the same monarch need no longer be a condition of membership. The Queen remains the symbol of the free association of independent member nations, and as such the Head of the Commonwealth.
In 1957 Ghana gained its independence, and the growth of the Commonwealth gathered speed. New nations in Africa, Asia, the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean and the Pacific were welcomed as members. Now twenty-one members are republics, the Queen is Head of State of twelve, and four members are monarchies with other sovereigns. Not all countries formerly under British rule have chosen to join the Commonwealth. For example, Burma, Ireland and the Sudan are outside the association (although there are still links of friendship).
In 1961 South Africa, which on becoming a republic wished to continue as a member, left the Commonwealth when other members expressed strong disapproval of its racial policies. In 1972 Pakistan withdrew when a number of Commonwealth countries recognised the new state of Bangladesh. The Commonwealth also includes some six million people living in the self-governing states and dependencies associated with member countries. They take part in certain Commonwealth activities, including programmes for technical co-operation.
The self governing states, which have a constitutional status amounting to slightly less than independence, are associated with Britain and New Zealand. In addition, Australia, Britain and New Zealand each have one or more dependent territories.
Government heads exchange ideas
Every two years the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth meet to discuss international developments and to consider co-operation among members. In no other forum do the Heads of Government of such a wide variety of countries meet regularly for an informal exchange of views between equals. The proceedings are private, which permits an unusual frankness of discussion.
The aim at Heads of Government meetings is to ensure that all Commonwealth governments have a common understanding of The Commonwealth Secretariat was established in 1965. It is responsible to all member governments. Its establishment symbolised the fact that the Commonwealth is an instrument of all its members collectively.
The Secretariat organises meetings and conferences, of Ministers and of many others within the Commonwealth, and is responsible for putting into effect decisions for collective action. It is the main agency for multilateral communication among members, organises consultation and co-operation in many spheres, and collects each others' problems and the world's, and of the policies which each is separately pursuing. Decisions are reached not by voting but by consensus. In recent years several major Commonwealth projects have been launched.
Cabinet secretaries, permanent secretaries to Heads of Government and other senior officials now meet every two years, between meetings of Heads of Government, to provide continuity, to exchange views on international developments, and to review the activities of the Secretariat.
Secretariat
and disseminates information for the use of its members.
Member countries contribute to its budget on a scale based on that for United Nations contributions: the amount for 1978-79 is 2,453,200. They contribute separately to the Commonwealth Youth Programme which are administered by the Secretariat, and to the Commonwealth Science Council which works closely with the Secretariat.
Secretariat activities cover international affairs, economic affairs, export market development, food production and rural Each member is responsible for its own policies, but all members collectively subscribe to certain ideals, set out in the Declaration of Commonwealth Principles.
They regard these principles as valid not merely for themselves, but as a contribution to the collective understanding and good will of all mankind.
All Commonwealth nations believe in and work for the success of the United Nations.
They also belong to other regional or world-wide international associations, economic or political.
Commonwealth membership is not an alternative, but a complement, to other forms of international co-operation.
The summit of Commonwealth relationship is the meeting of Heads of Govern
Health and Education
There is a long history of educational co-operation in the Commonwealth, given direction by triennial Commonwealth Education Conferences. Between conferences the Commonwealth Education Liaison Committee reviews developments and gives guidance to the Secretariat, which assists educational co-operation among member countries.
Through meetings and seminars, publications and the exchange of information, the Secretariat assists educational development. Fields of current interest include the teaching of science technical education, book publishing and non-formal education.
Founded in 1913, the Association of Commonwealth Universities has a membership of 205 institutions. It helps with appointments, publishes the Commonwealth Universities Yearbook, and organises quinquennial conferences of which the next is in Canada in 1978. It co-ordinates bilateral movements under the Commonwealth Scholarship and Fellowship Plan, whose expansion was recommended by the Accra conference; over 10,000 scholars have held awards offered by 13 countries under the plan.
Commonwealth co-operation in health has been increasing over the years. Conferences of Health Ministers have shaped several programmes of mutual help. The fifth conference was held in New Zealand in November 1977 with community health as its theme.
Recent conferences have all stressed the value of regional co-operation in making the best use of scarce resources and manpower. The Secretariat has helped the establishment of regional health secretariats in Lagos, Nigeria for West Africa, and in Arusha, Tanzania, for East, Central and Southern Africa. Assistance is also given to the health section of the Caribbean Community Secretariat.
Regional courses and seminars have been held on subjects like the training of medical staff and ancilliaries, hospital management, equipment maintenance, hospital engineering, drug procurement and quality control. Studies have been made of the medical brain drain from developing countries, and laws governing abortion.
Exchanges of staff and students between medical schools are frequent. The Commonwealth Scholarship and Fellowship Plan makes many awards for medical studies. The Commonwealth Medical Association and the Commonwealth Nurses' Federation provide professional links between member countries, as also does the Commonwealth Pharmaceutical Association. The Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind and the Commonwealth Society for the Deaf are voluntary bodies that concern themselves both with medical treatment and with social care.
Science cooperation
Scientific co-operation among Commonwealth countries has been long established. More recently the Commonwealth Science Council has been promoting co-operative links between members, and has integrated its work with that of the Commonwealth Secretariat.
The resulting expanded science programme concentrates on sharing expertise and working together for economic development. It is focused on nonconventional energy resources like wind, bio-gas and solar power; storage of food and cutting down postharvest losses and on standevelopment, education, health, science, the law, youth affairs and training in public administration. It provides technical assistance for development through the CFTC.
The Secretariat has a staff of about 370 drawn widely from within the Commonwealth. It is recognised as an impartial body, and has made its good offices available in cases of dispute involving member countries.
It has observer status at the UN and maintains close contact with relevant UN agencies. Its headquarters are in Marlborough House, London. dardisation and quality control. The CSC has held regional workshops on communication techniques, rural technology, industrial standards and alternative energy resources.
The Council meets every two years. The Commonwealth Geological Liaison Office publishes a monthly newsletter to help geologists keep abreast of geological developments and organises regional meetings of heads of geological surveys. Research in agricultural sciences is conducted by ten Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux and four Institutes which also act as clearing houses for information. The Commonwealth Forestry Conference helps contacts in an industry of importance to many members.
Other organisations co-ordinating work in their respective fields include the Commonwealth Advisory Aeronautical Research Council, the Commonwealth Consultative Space Research Committee, the Commonwealth Air Transport Council and the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation. ment, held every two years.
Other Ministers of finance, law, health, education also hold regular meetings, to help formulate policies and to advance the interests of their own nations and the world at large. The central body for co-operation between Commonwealth governments is the Secretariat, established in 1965.
Governmental co-operation in the Commonwealth is crucial, but by no means everything. There is also a massive network of relationships between organisations and individuals in Commonwealth countries, more intimate and friendly than in any other international group of such diversity.
The Commonwealth, world-wide, is a framework for friendship, frank speaking, and mutual understanding.
Economic affairs
Regular consultation and co-operation in economic affairs are a vital part of Commonwealth activity. Nearly one-fifth of total trade by Commonwealth members is done with other members, and some commodities are traded almost exclusively within the association. Questions of finance, of trade and of international economic relations are discussed at Heads of Government meetings, and by Commonwealth Ministers and officials. The Commonwealth has a particular commitment to the economic development of its less prosperous members.
Commonwealth Finance Ministers meet annually, usually on the eve of the annual meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The 1978 meeting was in Montreal, Canada. Finance Ministers have been much concerned with the plight of developing member countries, and have discussed the recycling of oil revenues, development assistance, and the need for satisfactory terms of trade for primary producers. They have urged that schemes for international monetary reform should give due weight to the needs of developing nations.
Commonwealth countries have also worked together in relation to the GATT multilateral trade negotiations, and in the negotiation of the Lome Convention between the EEC and its developing partners. Multinational corporations have been the subject of studies and seminars.
In 1975 Heads of Government set up a ten-member Group of Experts who have reported on ways to make progress towards a New International Economic Order. Their reports have been discussed widely within the Commonwealth, at the UN and in other world negotiating groups. Another team of Commonwealth experts has prepared a report recommending measures to accelerate industrial development through cooperation. A technical working group reported in September 1977 on the establishment of a Common Fund as a part of the Integrated Programme for Commodities discussed at UNCTAD IV. The report formed the basis for discussion at a Commonwealth ministerial meeting on the Common Fund in London in April which advanced agreement between rich and poor countries on major aspects of the Fund. Besides supporting the work of these groups, the Commonwealth Secretariat, which has a long tradition of factual analytical studies of key issues to assist in formulating policy and in international negotiations. The Commonwealth has its own programme in the Commonwealth Fund for Technical Co-operation. It concentrates on providing experts and training to meet manpower shortages in developing member countries.
The fund is managed by the Secretariat. All member countries subscribe to it on a voluntary basis, and all are represented on its governing body. Canada, Britain, Australia, Nigeria, New Zealand and India are the fund's largest contributors.
Since its foundation in 1971 it has grown from an annual 400,000 to 12 million in 1978-79. A special Commonwealth Fund for Mozambique, set up by Heads of Government in 1975, is administered by the CFTC: it has resources of almost 1 million. Through the CFTC the Secretariat provides experts and advisers to assist developing countries. Over 300 experts are now at work, of whom almost half are themselves from developing countries. It finances the training of developing country personnel, mainly in other such countries within the Commonwealth.
Over 500 training projects, many benefiting more than one student, are supported each year. The CFTC also finances a Secretariat division which assists developing countries to promote exports, and training-oriented projects undertaken by other divisions.
Youth programmes
The Commonwealth Youth Programme has been in operation since 1973, helping to tackle the problems facing young people and to develop their full participation in the life of their countries. It operates from three regional centres - in Guyana, India and Zambia - as well as from headquarters within the Secretariat in London.
Most of its work is in providing courses for youth workers within the regions served by the centres: it thus both upgrades their skills, and gives them a knowledge of the peoples and problems of neighbouring countries. The CYP also organises seminars and meetings at which young people are brought together to. confront the issues before them, both internationally and at home.
Young people in Commonwealth countries meet and work together under many voluntary schemes. The Royal Commonwealth Society organises study tours by young business and professional people in many regions, and in Britain the Commonwealth Youth Exchange Council promotes contacts and visits between people in many countries, as in its Youth Enterprise 1977 venture.
Scout and Guide Associations are active in almost every Commonwealth country and maintain Contd. on page 15 from page A2
Commonwealth links. The Duke of Edinburgh's Award scheme promotes understanding between young people in many countries, and successive Commonwealth expeditions (Comex) have taken young people on road journeys to other countries.
LAW
The law has become a primary tool for promoting economic development and social and political advancement.
Meetings of Law Ministers - the next will be in Bridgetown, Barbados, in 1980 - guide growing co-operation. The Secretariat has organised a series of courses for the training of legal draftsmen who are badly needed in many developing countries to put into legal form essential legislative programmes. Over 100 officers from 30 jurisdictions have received training. Itspublications include a comparative study of systems of drafting legislation. It also assists the work of law reform agencies.
The Commonwealth is fortunate in the keen loyalty it commands among many private persons, and in the links between private associations in member countries. Recent years have seen a rapid development of such associations, which have been given official support since 1965, when Heads of
Legislators meet yearly
The Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, which every year organises a conference in a different member country, has become an important forum for consultations between parliamentarians. There are also regular conferences of Speakers and Presiding Officers of Commonwealth Parliaments.
The Association has a membership of MPs from over 100 branches in national legislatures and the assemblies of states and provinces. The annual conferences demonstrate the development and vitality of parliamentary democracy.
The headquarters of the association at Westminister operates a parliamentary information and reference centre and produces The Parliamentarian quarterly. It has also published authoritative monographs such as Salaries and Allowances of Commonwealth Parliamentarians, 1973. Government established the Commonwealth Foundation to promote and strengthen links between professional people in the Commonwealth.
The Foundation has helped the formation of associations of veterinarians, lawyers, surveyors, geographers, pharmacists, magistrates, nurses, librarians and museum curators. Existing associations of doctors, architects and engineers have been supported. Professional centres for people from many disciplines have been established in ten member countries. Many conferences and meetings have been supported. Over 2,000 individuals have been helped to travel outside their countries on study visits or to attend professional meetings.
International understanding is fostered by many clubs and societies, of which the largest is probably the Royal Commonwealth Society, in London, with fellow organisations in other member countries. The Royal Overseas League and the Victoria League for Commonwealth Friendship are both London-based organisations.
The Secretariat has published a handbook of organisations active within the Commonwealth since that meeting, and in June 1977 Heads of Government asked the Commonwealth Secretary-General to set up an Advisory Committee to report on concrete steps to further the mutually beneficial ties between the official and the unofficial Commonwealth. THE HUMAN DIMENSION
The Commonwealth, of course, is more than its formalinstituions. In scores of ways the people - and especially the writers and musicians and sportsmen and entertainers- of each member country contribute to the enrichment of all whether by affinity or by contrast.
A community of nations that includes among its citizens Chinua Achebe, Graham Greene, George Lamming, V.S. Naipaul, R.K. Narayan, Wole Soyinka and Patrick White clearly enjoys advantages that are more than material. In the visual arts, the theatre and on television, audiences in Commonwealth countries can enjoy the work produced in others. commonwealth Games bring together athletes in friendly competition every four years. Information about the changing Commonwealth is provided to opinion formers in member countries by the Secretariat, which issues publications and press releases, provides tape recordings to radio stations, and assists training for journalists.
Broadcasting organisations come together in the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association, and newspapers and agencies in the Comcommonwealth Press Union. Both organisations are active in maintaining standards of communication, and provide training for their own special skills. The Commonwealth Institute in London organises exhibitions, acts as a cultural centre, and spreads information about the Commonwealth, mainly to the British public.
All member governments are represented on its governing body.
