August 25, 2006

UNfair Criticism

In the midst of the outbreak of violence in Lebanon and northern Israel, much hope for halting the war was placed on the United Nations. Now, it appears that a UN force will be charged with keeping the peace between Hezbollah and Israel. Unfortunately, the hope for stopping violence and maintaining peace is placed in a United Nations that does not and never did exist. When people look to the UN to step in and solve conflicts, they imagine a fictional world governing body with the power, will, and clear-mindedness necessary to make an impact around the world.

However, because of the very structure and authority of the organization, the UN’s true power, will, and perhaps above all, clear-mindedness, fall far short of the hopes placed on it, leaving the UN open to consistent criticism when things go badly.

The UN as it actually exists is by definition limited, constrained, handcuffed, paralyzed. Despite lofty rhetoric, it is not a world government with world peace as its agenda, but a collection of national governments with national interest as their agendas. Without the consent of the member states, the United Nations cannot even issue staplers to its employees, much less compel the deployment of troops sufficient to quell violence in Lebanon, Darfur, or anywhere else.

Yet it is the UN that is the convenient answer to all the world’s ills and the convenient scapegoat when all the world’s ills go unsolved. Yale historian Paul Kennedy, author of “The Parliament of Man: The Past, Present and Future of the United Nations,” notes that if the UN fails to bring a lasting peace to Lebanon, the consolation for the world will be that “we will all be able to blame the United Nations for being ineffectual, weak-toothed, anti-Israel or anti-Arab, and thus of no good to the world community.”

Such proclamations have become standard accompaniment to global conflicts, as though it is the UN that is the source of the world’s discord rather than the bad-behaving individual nations – or as though it is the UN itself rather than the obstructive member states within it that prevent the UN from adequately responding. Certainly the UN has its own troubles, including corruption at high levels, but the lion’s share of the responsibility for UN failures in responding quickly and substantially to unfolding crises requiring military responses rests with member states looking out for their own interests.

As we evaluate the UN, we must remember that at its essence, the United Nations is a building. It is a forum for the nations of the world to gather and discuss the problems of the day. It is a place for diplomacy and smoky room dealmaking. In this way, it is an alternative to war and it has been somewhat successful in putting global diplomacy on at least equal footing with military confrontation as a means of solving problems.

Given its actual role and mandate, the UN is very good at limited tasks – negotiating peace agreements, coordinating and delivering humanitarian aid around the world, observing elections and assisting in rebuilding infrastructure in war-ravaged countries, keeping human rights on the global radar, providing international business and legal guidelines as national borders disappear in those areas, and gathering statistics for reports that reveal trends in the world. Conspicuously absent from this list is anything related to military endeavors. Yet it is on the military front, in Lebanon today and somewhere else tomorrow, that the world seems to expect the most from the UN only to consistently be disappointed.

Paul Kennedy argues that “the U.N.’s performance can only be measured against its existing capacities and authority, not against some mythical, nonexistent strengths.” It is unfair to condemn the UN for being unable to accomplish tasks it is fundamentally unqualified to accomplish, especially when the UN remains unqualified in part because of the member states’ unwillingness to give the organization broader power. The criticism is unfair perhaps, but politically useful and not likely to end any time soon.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

you mention obstructive states, but umm, i wish you would of been a little more explicit. Certainly all these (see list of US vetoes at http://www.krysstal.com/democracy_whyusa03.html) aren't detailed and may very well have left out salient points, but the sheer magnitude of us vetoes vs the rest of the world is overwhelming. You would have to conclude that alot of the un's lack of authority and power comes from the fact that the us basically only accepts it as legitimate when it falls in line with our interests.