The Joint Summit Working Group (JSWG) was established with the Action Plan of Quebec City (Third Summit of the Americas, 2001) as a permanent coordination mechanism of the inter-American system to ensure the effective and efficient implementation of the mandates agreed upon at the Summit of the Americas.
Through a Letter of Understanding, four organizations of the Inter-American System adhered to the JSWG in 2001. Since then, several multilateral organizations and international financial institutions have joined the JSWG, achieving the participation of thirteen organizations to date.
The collaboration of the JSWG in the Summits Process is reaffirmed with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in September 2018, which establishes the JSWG as "the horizontal technical cooperation mechanism that allows for continuous dialogue and close coordination of the inter-American system to ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of the implementation and follow-up of the mandates of the Summits of the Americas."
Simultaneously, as a follow-up to the Eighth Summit of the Americas (Lima, 2018), where the participating states adopted the Lima Commitment "Democratic Governance Against Corruption", the Summits Secretariat has been promoting cooperation initiatives on the prevention and the fight against corruption among states, as well as between them and the JSWG institutions, within the framework of the Follow-up Mechanism of the Lima Commitment.
As a result of the information registered in the Mechanism, including the needs and challenges presented by the participating states and the JSWG institutions, the Summits Secretariat elaborated the JSWG Action Plan (2019-2021) as a proposal for the implementation of the Lima Commitment mandates.
The OAS Summits of the Americas Secretariat serves as the technical secretariat of the JSWG and the OAS Secretary General as its chair.
