MEDIOCRATY AT THE UNITED NATIONS
by Ghassan Abdallah, Ph.D.
September 24, 2009

The performance and behavior of various kings, presidents, and world leaders at the United Nations' 64th session, in New York, reminds me of junior high school.  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the U.S. Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice walked out on Qaddafi.  Canada's Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon, and just about everybody else, walked out on Ahmadinejad.  Nobody walked out on President Obama, but nobody listens to him and nobody cares.  It would be refreshing if, in the future, an American president would skip the event altogether and spare all of us the annual spectacle.  However, that is not likely to happen as politicians find it hard to resist inertia and brake away from the existing line of motion.  That is especially true of Barak Obama, who never seems to pass up an opportunity to give a speech. 

The annual ritual at the U.N. is always dominated by discussions on the usual and normal topics of nuclear proliferation, environmental degradation, Middle East peace, and economic growth.  Also becoming a ritual are the so called "sideline meetings" between various heads of states, many of whom hail from banana republics, and find in the annual UN session an opportunity to feel relevant, fly to New York aboard private jets, and stay for a week or two at the Plaza or Waldorf, while their people are mired in misery and despair. 

One of the main spectacles surrounding this year's UN event is Libyan leader Qaddafi. His incoherent tirade against the United Nations has drawn a lot of attention.  Qaddafi may be a lunatic but even lunatics can, on occasion, be right. Qaddafi's assertion that the United Nations has failed in its main task of collective security is true.  The Security Council which has the authority to enact collective security measures, against countries that commit acts of aggression against other countries, has authorized such measures only twice in the 65 year history of the United Nations.  The first was during the Korean War and the second was during the first Gulf War in 1991. Dozens of other countries have violated the U.N. charter, specifically Article II Section IV, which calls on member states to "refrain from the threat of or use of force against other member states," without facing any punitive measures from the Security Council.  

The United Nations is not a relevant independent political actor in the international arena.  From a realist political perspective, nation-states are the only relevant actors in the international system and International Organizations, such as the UN, only work when it is in the interest of the great power states to make them work.  This is not to say that the UN is completely irrelevant.  The World Food Program, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) have all done good and much needed humanitarian work.  In the end the United Nations is, mainly, a humanitarian organization and should be treated as such.

© 2009  Ghassan Abdallah, PhD
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Ghassan Abdallah, Ph.D | Adjunct Professor, Univ. of Houston | Email