How would you fix the United Nations?

[luiz]

In 2018 I think the global geopolitical situation is a lot more stable than it was in 1945, and most countries have at least basically operational governments. There’s really no need to concentrate the power of international diplomacy into the hands of the largest economies, in fact it’s pretty much counterintuitive to the idealistic concept of the U.N. There shouldn’t really be any permanent members of the security council.

But any system that places the US, China and other big dogs on the same level as Togo will be discredited. Because the big dogs will never accept it.

 

[Hrothbern]

But any system that places the US, China and other big dogs on the same level as Togo will be discredited. Because the big dogs will never accept it.

At my secondary school we had the formal organisation representing us, the pupils, mostly busy with organising school events.
Each class had a by the class chosen representative.
But the real deciding (informal) body was just a couple of them.... meeting at the local snackbar regularly.
And that even without the nukes.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

But any system that places the US, China and other big dogs on the same level as Togo will be discredited. Because the big dogs will never accept it.

As I've been saying, though I've been using rank as a supplier in the arms market rather than size of the overall economy. That's really what's at issue, since the strongest tool in the UN arsenal of corrections is "we will sanction you and you won't be able to buy arms." If the largest suppliers are not all in agreement to go along such a threat is toothless, and everyone knows it.

 

[inthesomeday]

But isn’t it already basically ineffective in reaching compromise about that? China still arms the DPRK, the US still arms Israel, Russia still arms Iran, etc etc. I guess I get your point that this way there’s some kind of illusion of diplomacy by letting them just veto it before it even gets enacted, but then if the effect is the same either way why not allow smaller countries to sometimes provide input on the non-sanction functions of the UN?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

But isn’t it already basically ineffective in reaching compromise about that? China still arms the DPRK, the US still arms Israel, Russia still arms Iran, etc etc. I guess I get your point that this way there’s some kind of illusion of diplomacy by letting them just veto it before it even gets enacted, but then if the effect is the same either way why not allow smaller countries to sometimes provide input on the non-sanction functions of the UN?

They do. The veto is only in the security council, and the security council basically only gets involved in disputes that end in arms trade sanctions.

 

[Velegon]

They should add a 2nd tier of permanent members of the security council - the 2nd tier would initially have no veto powers - but eventually they should look into overturning a veto if say 75% or so of the permanent countries oppose the veto issuing country. That might encourage more diplomacy among the permanent numbers to avoid being completely isolated on any issue.

While most of the current permanent security members are still among the most relevant countries in the world - either due to population, economy, technological advancement, military, internal stability or nuclear capability - there are some that should be added that are equally relevant now but were left off due to being the defeated countries in WW2 or not as relevant until recently. By that criteria - Japan, Germany and India should be added as 2nd tier permanent members. Though an united Korea might be more of a worthy candidate eventually over Japan given Japan's projected population plunge - or if Indonesia eventually becomes more relevant.

Eventually they should add a permanent member from South America and Africa to make it 10 permanent nations but none of the countries in those continents are ready or capable yet for that responsibility - I thought Brazil was getting close, but their current state of turmoil in terms of government corruption and its uncertain economy makes it clear they aren't quite yet. I don't think any current African country meets the above criteria yet - though eventually one of Nigeria, Ethiopia, Egypt, South Africa or the Democratic Congo might be.

Admittedly this wouldn't really make the UN fixed or any more effective necessarily but it would modernize the security council from its current WW2 victors state which doesn't quite reflect the current world power status.

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

Eventually they should add a permanent member from South America and Africa to make it 10 permanent nations

You'd need to always have an odd number of permanent members with veto power. That would avoid split votes and other silliness.

Admittedly this wouldn't really make the UN fixed or any more effective necessarily but it would modernize the security council from its current WW2 victors state which doesn't quite reflect the current world power status.

And that's the crux of the issue isn't. The General Assembly of the UN, as well as most of the UN's other boards, agencies, and councils have since probably the 70's devolved into chambers for countries to yell & point fingers at each other. See all the meaningless votes and resolutions that are passed that are just meant to thumb the nose at somebody. Its hard to take much of what the UN does seriously when they do silly stuff like put Saudi Arabia on the Women's Rights Commission.

The true power and purpose at the UN has always been the Security Council which was simply the WWII Allies under a new name imposing their world order. That "world order" got derailed by the Cold War, and the ensuing~70 years has basically killed the 1940's spirit which created the UN. The UN has morphed into too large and unwieldy a creature to be properly reformed IMO.

 

[Akka]

The problem at these idea of "overturning a veto" or "expelling the problematic country" and so on, is that they miss the entire point.
It's not a government, it's a diplomatic room. It's about making it work in the real world, not making it work in a legal theory.
Tim already said it : "The UN choosing to be powerless because they are following their own rules is an entirely different matter than the UN being demonstrably powerless because the US just blows them off."
It's not just about the US, but the core concept is here.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Exactly. And to fix this, the UN would have to become a government, like the EU. That was my entire point. But of course, that is not an option. So the UN will stay in many ways dysfunctional for the foreseeable future. But that does not make the UN a bad thing, not at all. It is just in its nature to not work smoothly. But it still does the good work.
Don't kill the messenger, as they say. The UN just mirrors the reality it is happening in. And it can only respond, because it has no power to shape.

 

[uppi]

I have the suspicion that "Fix the UN" often means: "Make the UN enforce my views". That isn't going to happen.

 

[Hrothbern]

Apparently the UN has a formal mechanism to break a deadlock from repeated veto's in the security counsil,

which was designed shortly after the founding of the UN because of the Korean crisis at that time.
From https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...nations-may-seek-to-bypass-russian-veto-at-un

"Western governments, worried that the impasse is weakening the wider authority of the security council, want to pick up a rarely used route, first set up in the 1950 Korean crisis. Called “uniting for peace”, it would enable nine members of the 15-strong security council to bypass a Russian veto and refer the matter to a full vote at the general assembly. It would then require a two-thirds majority by the general assembly for an attribution mechanism to be agreed.
The 1950 “uniting for peace” route was explicitly designed to be used when the security council could not meet its responsibilities over maintenance of peace".

The fact this mechanism has hardly been used so far demonstrates I think that none of the veto countries likes it and have used their informal power to prevent it in practice.

At the core of the mechanism lies the necessity of any veto country to be able to have at least onethird of all the countries not against their veto, to neutralise this bypass procedure and win their point of view.
Something that was most of the time for most situations the case the past decades.

I doubt Russia will find onethird on their own, but I guess none of the big three will like the reviving of this procedure.
China has a lot of influence in Africa.

Interesting and risky.

 

[rah]

Yeah but the punishment would probably be as weak as in CIV IV. A little unhappiness but not enough to really make a difference.

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

I doubt Russia will find onethird on their own, but I guess none of the big three will like the reviving of this procedure.
China has a lot of influence in Africa.

While Russia is all in on supporting the Syrian Government, I'm not so sure that China would be all that interested in cashing in a lot of their influence chips for a Moscow pet project. Beijing knows how actively campaigning against chemical weapons would look, and they've got bigger interest that Syria.

 

[Hrothbern]

While Russia is all in on supporting the Syrian Government, I'm not so sure that China would be all that interested in cashing in a lot of their influence chips for a Moscow pet project. Beijing knows how actively campaigning against chemical weapons would look, and they've got bigger interest that Syria.

Guess so as well.
So Russia will probably lose the vote, incurring I think little inconvenience from it.
Whereby noted that voting "abstention", that feels like neutral, would in effect be favoring Russia, because the procedure needs a two-thirds majority of "yes" votes.
-> there are two grades of being against a resolution proposed by the West: "no" and "abstention".

 

[onejayhawk]

One major change would be to change the veto power, by making an override possible. Say, by a 6 of 9 vote.

The sad reality is that it is a place to talk, not to act.

J

 

[rah]

Never discount the value of talking.

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

The sad reality is that it is a place to talk, not to act.

Why do you say sadly, that's the whole point.

 

[Hrothbern]

One major change would be to change the veto power, by making an override possible. Say, by a 6 of 9 vote.

The sad reality is that it is a place to talk, not to act.

J

Typical not

The UN core is the security counsil with imo as purpose to prevent avoidable escalation of conflicts that cause big violence
If acting realises that better than talking, I can agree. But most of the times acting only escalates.

The other purpose of the UN is to get consensus on common goals that need parallel efforts from many to move forward, like the Climate agreements.
And again talking is the best base to get on with that.

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

The UN core is the security counsil with imo as purpose to prevent avoidable escalation of conflicts that cause big violence

People often seem to forget that the main founding purpose for the UN was the prevention of the war situation that dominated the Earth from 1914-1945. Everything else is an expansion of mandate, which is why it doesn't usually work out so well. And it must be said that the UN has done a good job of preventing large scale war, though its proven inept at handling smaller scale conflicts.

 

[Hrothbern]

People often seem to forget that the main founding purpose for the UN was the prevention of the war situation that dominated the Earth from 1914-1945. Everything else is an expansion of mandate, which is why it doesn't usually work out so well. And it must be said that the UN has done a good job of preventing large scale war, though its proven inept at handling smaller scale conflicts.

yes, "smaller" issues.... there are so many of them

Still... restricting judging the UN only to what has really large scale effects:

• Climate is one, as it is fully capable of causing large scale changes involving many casualties as base line and on top geopolitical peace risks.

Some lesser visible examples:

• Less visible, but of enormous importance imo, is minimising fertility rates above 2. Another big cause of regional instability. Compared to 50 years ago, almost all countries have achieved that except African countries and some exceptions. Many programs of the UN were targetting that (without ofc imposing it). To consider here that as soon as you get education for female children implemented that fertility rate goes down. And gets close to 2 when female children get some years of secundary schooling.
• The FAO, one of the least visible and sexy departments of the UN has done tremendous well in doing research on local crop species and crop potentials !!! Not that much visible because of multinationals that rape the soil locally producing export products (like coffee, palm oil, etc). But the UN has done a lot here working together with universities all over the world. First the Western universities, but now increasing with China, India, Iran, etc. (also related to wholesome food and medicinal effects to avoid Big Pharma burden)

Perhaps it is more our press that does a bad job reporting on those preventive actions of the UN for large scale conflicts, than the UN.
Ofc the press reports tons of info on local/regional violence and abuse... all those too many "smaller" issues