The United Nations replaced the inter-war League of Nations in an attempt to ensure world peace and secure the economic, social and political conditions under which this can be achieved. It started as an agreement between the allies fighting Hitler’s axis powers in the Second World War, and much of its structure and subsequent problems follow from this. Its charter originated from discussions held at Dumbarton Oaks (Washington, DC) in 1944, between the USA, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and later China, and the Charter was signed in June 1945, with an initial membership of 51 countries. By 1992 the total number of members had reached 179, following a sudden increase in the total number of internationally-recognized states after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the former Yugoslavia. Paradoxically, two of the then Soviet republics, Belarus and Ukraine, became full and independent members of the UN from its inception as part of a political compromise made to retain the joint membership of both the USA and the Soviet Union. Given that the vital first few years of the UN coincided with the worst of the early cold war days the continued membership of both superpowers was quite an achievement. By contrast, until 1971 the ‘China’ that occupied a seat at the UN was not the communist People’s Republic of China (PRC), the major world power led by Mao Zedong, but the island Republic of China (Taiwan), as the USA refused to recognize the mainland government.
The UN’s wartime origins show also in its basic organization. The most important organ of the UN is the Security Council, in permanent session and charged with maintenance of international peace and security, including calling on the member states to put together peace-keeping forces to monitor cease-fires or conflicts in specific disputes. Peace-keeping forces are allowed to use their weapons only in self-defence, but ultimately the Security Council may sanction a full military operation. The body has 15 members, of which five are permanent. They are, in effect, the main victorious allies of the Second World War, the USA, Russia (having inherited the seat of the Soviet Union upon its dissolution in 1991) the UK, France and the PRC. Until the PRC replaced Taiwan in 1971, therefore, this insignificant island was actually a permanent member of the Security Council. Even since then the second-tier powers of the UK and France have retained permanent membership, while equal or superior powers, at least in economic terms, such as Germany and Japan, only serve for two-year periods as and when elected. As the five permanent members each have an absolute veto on Security Council resolutions, the international power balance has been effectively freeze-framed at 1945, and any one of them has been able to block effective UN action, and frequently has.
Since the collapse of the superpower status of the Soviet Union there has been evidence of a new world order, in which the greater recognition of global common interests has greatly reduced the tendency for one or other of the permanent members to use their veto. The first mark of this was the Council’s ability to recruit a force, under US leadership, to fight the Gulf War after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. As the USA involved itself in a self-declared ‘war on terrorism’ after the attacks on its territory in September 2001, it spared no effort to ensure UN support for as much of its activity as possible. It was quite clear, however, that both the USA and its main ally the UK would not be deterred from acting without a UN mandate were that unavailable.
The other main organ, the General Assembly, consists of all members and can debate and pass resolutions on any matter covered by the Charter, except for disputes already on the agenda of the Security Council. However, it is largely a propaganda arena and ideological battlefield to which few nations in conflict pay any attention. The most important work of the UN, other than the peace-keeping of the Security Council, is done by the specialized agencies, and by the direct personal diplomacy of the administrative head, the secretary-general. The secretaries-general have nearly all been extremely-widely respected international statespeople whose personal interventions have often been of great help. The specialized agencies like the World Health Organization and the International Labour Organization (which actually began under the League of Nations) have, along with other agencies affiliated to the UN such as the regional commissions, made major contributions to international social welfare and economic development. Others, like the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, or the International Court of Justice, though dependent on political consensus for their work, have often been able to minimize the human suffering that would have been consequent on political conflict that the UN has not actually been able to avoid. The internal budget of the UN has frequently been the subject of controversy, however, largely because major contributors, particularly the USA (liable for 25% of the budget in the years 1989–91) and the former Soviet Union (liable for 11.6%), objected to the level of their financial burden compared to the weight of their voice in the General Assembly, where Third World nations tend to dominate.
The greater effectiveness of the UN compared with the League of Nations is shown mainly in its ability on several occasions to put military forces in the field which have either stopped international aggression (as eventually in the Korean War, and more swiftly in the Gulf War) or minimized it, as with the peace-keeping forces in Cyprus and the Belgian Congo. This competence, and its general ability to function as an international safety valve, is due to the fact that while the League of Nations lacked two of the most important powers, the USA and, from 1933, Germany, the UN has had both the USA and the Soviet Union/Russia firmly entrenched in the Security Council. (Though it must be noted that UN action against the communist North Korean forces invading South Korea was only possible because the Soviet Union was, at that time, boycotting the UN. It would otherwise undoubtedly have used its veto in support of North Korea.) Already the longest lasting and most universal international political body, its new found strength in the post-cold war era has already revitalized the UN, and it may play an ever increasing role.
This is the complete article, containing 1,061 words
(approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page).
