Comment: All or nothing?
Should the UN be reformed or disbanded? wonders
Nihal
Fahmy*
Once again UN reform is on the table; indeed proposals for making the
UN more effective, more accountable and more democratic pop up about
once a decade. This year, momentum built again with strong indications
that a general overhaul and housecleaning is in the offing. This month
placed UN reform front and centre on the agenda in Washington. One
Congressionally-mandated effort was the publication of the report of the
Task Force on the UN on 15 June, entitled American Interests and UN
Reform. The work has been underway since December under the
bipartisan chairmanship of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former
Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, and staffed by six of
Washington's major think tanks gathered from across the political
spectrum.
The 154-page report proposes a package of practical reforms in areas
ranging from early action to prevent genocide, the abolition of the
existing Commission on Human Rights and the establishment of a new human
rights body, management and personnel reform within the UN secretariat,
improved peacekeeping procedures -- including "zero tolerance" for
sexual exploitation and abuse -- the adoption of a common definition of
terrorism and embracing a poverty- reduction agenda that goes beyond
redistribution to include a strong commitment to the promotion of
effective governance and economic growth. Issues not addressed in the
report include the composition of the Security Council -- should Japan
have a permanent or renewable seat? Or Germany? India? Or Brazil? And
the withholding of UN dues as a means of leverage, an approach embraced
by House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry Hyde but
opposed by the Bush administration. The report, therefore, is not as
tough as conservatives would have liked; they attribute this weakness to
bipartisanship.
The proposals of the Henry J Hyde United Nations Reform Act of 2005,
adopted by the House of Representatives, make no compromise. Tough
budgetary reforms are outlined along with changes in the UN voting
system towards weighted voting based on countries' assessments. Among
the proposals is the shifting of some 18 UN programmes to voluntary
funding as well as cutting the fund for conferences, the largest single
line item in the UN budget. Yet the most powerful of all proposals in
the Hyde bill is the threat of withholding up to 50 per cent of US
contributions to the regular UN budget upon condition that the US
secretary of state certifies that at least 32 out of 39 proposed reforms
have taken place.
This type of thinking, that reform of UN can only happen by
threatening unilateral cuts in budget contributions, is not only
unfortunate and counterproductive but disastrous to US interests at a
time when America's image is already damaged in the eyes of most nations
of the world. It is important to note here that the UN is an association
of sovereign states that agreed, when they ratified the UN Charter, to
share the expenses of the organisation "as apportioned by the General
Assembly". The scale of assessment, which determines the contribution of
each member-state, is renegotiated every six years, and every year the
General Assembly passes a resolution, supported by the US, calling upon
all members to pay their contributions promptly, in full and without
conditions. So negotiation, not the "big stick" approach, as the
Gingrich- Mitchell report has described it, is the best means of
ensuring change and reform.
Also, the UN does not exist in a vacuum, or for its own sake. It is a
forum in which nations can come together to find common solutions to
common problems, and hence it is the instrument through which to pursue
those solutions. The global threats and problems of today's world face
rich and poor countries alike, though the failure of the review
conference on the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty in May is indicative
of the gap among states on one of those threats, namely the threat of
weapons of mass destruction. Political leaders need to give greater
urgency to such problems. In dealing with them the need for a stronger
and more representative Security Council is a top priority.
The issue of Security Council expansion should not be taken lightly,
reduced in our thinking to a kind of parlour game on the diplomatic
cocktail circuit. Nothing could be more naïve. The Security Council was
formed after World War II with the winners giving themselves permanent
seats and a veto. The council's membership has been enlarged from 11 to
15 but permanent members haven't changed and nor has the power of veto.
In effect, the status quo of the permanent members has not changed since
the council's first meeting in 1946. Balking on Security Council reform
will weaken its standing in the world.
The UN is a venue for seeking consensus on global issues from nuclear
proliferation to poverty reduction. Despite its flaws, the UN is needed
by the US as much as by other nations. Taking a hammer to it will not
reform it. And a word of advice to US officials: visible effort towards
seeking consensus increases the legitimacy of US actions. Thus, the US
must answer this question: does it want a world with a reformed UN or a
world with no UN at all?
* The writer is professor of international
organisations at the American University in Cairo
