Fundamental Principles of International Relations by Rochester J. Martin;

Author:Rochester, J. Martin;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Routledge

An Assessment of the UN: Benefits and Costs

The United Nations is commonly evaluated based on its record in the area of war and peace. That record has been at best mixed, with failures outnumbering successes. Despite the UN Charter’s proscription against armed aggression, according to one estimate, between 1945 and 1999, two-thirds of the members of the United Nations were involved in interstate “militarized disputes” of some sort.52 However, some scholars have offered empirical evidence indicating that the UN’s performance may be better than generally thought, especially in the recent past. A Rand Corporation study of “major UN-led nation-building operations from 1945 to the present” concludes that the UN was successful in two-thirds of the cases studied; successes included Namibia (1989-1990), El Salvador (1991-1996), Cambodia (1991-1993), Mozambique (1992-1994), Eastern Slavonia (1996-1998), Sierra Leone (1999), and East Timor (1999); failures included, most notably, the Congo (1960-1964).53 In another study, Ernst Haas examined 123 disputes submitted to the UN for settlement during the Cold War period between 1945 and 1981 and concluded that the organization helped to resolve or at least manage (ameliorate) conflict, through reducing hostilities, in 51 percent of the cases.54 In a subsequent study, Haas found that the early 1980s marked a low point in the life of the UN, with the “lowest share” of “all disputes involving military operations and fighting” being referred to that body “in the history of the organization.”55 With the end of the Cold War, though, the UN became increasingly active in hot spots all over the globe, scoring a number of successes. As one study, Human Security Report, noted (consistent with the Rand report), “the number of armed conflicts around the world declined by more than 40 percent” after 1990, at least partly because “with the Security Council no longer paralyzed by Cold War politics, the UN spearheaded a veritable explosion of conflict prevention, peacemaking, [peacekeeping], and post-conflict peace-building activities.”56

In order to provide an overall assessment of the degree of success (or lack thereof) the UN has experienced in peace and security matters, it is helpful to utilize as a conceptual framework the spectrum of conflict management roles identified by former UN secretary-general Boutros Boutros-Ghali, in his 1992 Agenda for Peace report to the Security Council.57 See Figure 6.2 for an overview.

Ghali pointed out that the UN often is able to play a constructive role in peace maintenance, defusing a crisis before it has escalated and deteriorated into hostilities. The UN in fact has engaged at times in “preventive diplomacy” by dispatching fact-finding teams to relieve tensions and encouraging disputants to make use of Chapter VI peaceful settlement procedures ranging from mediation and good offices on the part of the secretary-general or another third party (e.g., U Thant’s assistance during the Cuban missile crisis and his intervention in the 1962 West Irian conflict between the Netherlands and Indonesia) to adjudication through the World Court (e.g., Libya and Chad submitting a border dispute to the Court in 1990). There was a sixfold increase in

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