A few weeks ago, I was invited as a 'Young Professional' in London to two contiguous lectures, both emphatically entitled 'The Future of the United Nations'.
It's a familiar theme, and has been covered here at openDemocracy in the past – peer into our archives from three years ago and ponder re-establishing the UN as 'an essential actor', or 'rediscovering the role of the United Nations'. Today, the future of the UN takes another historic step as its Member States prepare to elect the new Human Rights Council.
'What You Should Know' is how Amnesty International's Guide to selecting the right candidates for the election begins. As we enter the last seven months of Annan's leadership, what do we need to know? Of late, and particularly with the 60th birthday celebrations, figures like Lord David Hannay and Shashi Tharoor have had to step into the public eye, clasp the rose stem by its thorns and turn to the past to begin to justify the UN's future - and to validate yet again whether one even exists.
'When the UN succeeds the whole world wins', explained Tharoor as he echoed its textbook achievements - the 1990 reversal of tension in Kuwait, Mozambique, El Salvador, Namibia, Cambodia, dealing with earthquakes and tsunamis…yet both speakers admitted that the UN's indispensability is often matched with its ineffectiveness. Hannay traced his fingers over the thorns of the UN's reputation, citing universal examples to back up his views. He opened by addressing the serious image and communications problems of the institution as a whole. The criticised number of UN-acronymed-bodies stacked up against the wall with further examples of situations where the UN has acted unwisely (Rwanda, Bosnia), situations where the UN has been too divided to act wisely (Iraq), situations where confusion has reigned (Kosovo/ Iraq 2003), and so on (Sierra Leone, Soloman Islands), and so on (Afghanistan, Sudan)...In amongst that pile, there has been no agreed definition on terrorism, no conflict prevention, and the recent rejected proposals fiasco, etc.
But we do know all this, and it is the achievements that need to be built upon, as Tharoor affirmed. He delved further into the past and began at the beginning amidst the 'bombscarred ruins of London'. The UN filled the post wartime universal void, as it sewed the international dynamics of governmental-wide threads across the globe. But times have changed and we have to leave the original ideals aside for the time being - it is 60 years later and Amnesty is asking us to take action. Tharoor evokes the UN as 'a mirror of our world', but when will today (literally and figuratively) prove that the UN does truly reflect our hopes?
For the remainder of his lecture, Hannay, equally indefatigably, straddled the current UN-reform-obsession horse to discuss the ensuing 'breakthrough in principle' from 2005 - namely the 'responsibility to protect'. The Human Rights Council is an example of a reshaped tool for greater, doubled resources, in this case strengthening the UN's human rights machinery. As of today's election, global protection will be assured by a new 47-member Council, which will represent a new wave in transparency - even by its functional replacement of a redundant Human Rights Commission (which met annually for six weeks, as opposed to the new guidelines of meeting regularly, scheduling no fewer than three 10-week sessions a year).
What is credibility and where does it begin and end in the UN? The US's acquiescence is timely, as they announced last week that they will not run for Council today, dissatisfied with its planned constitution. And despite the strict adherence to the secret ballot process, with candidates only winning when backed by the votes of at least 96 nations first, doubts have been cast about the quality of the 64 candidates - including Azerbaijan, China, Cuba, Iran, Pakistan, Russia and Saudi Arabia - who create far more discomfort by having keenly 'stepped up to the plate'. The world's countries need to move into position and smack that development ball hard, to create some much longed-for impact. Its trajectory is awaited - we must be further assuaged with more follow-ups and implementations in this, the year proceeding the reform pledges.
The elections won't stop here though. Time is calling on Annan after almost ten years of leadership, and awaits a new Super-Diplomat for 2007 - and the next 5 - 10 years. To quote Tharoor again, 'the UN is a highly adaptable institution and has evolved in changing times'. It's a shame then that the ship can't simply sail onwards and break free of that anchor to that 60-year-old, unchangeable election process (Lebanon 1946), whereby of 15 voters, 5 can say no, and 5 permanent voters can use their 'cold war veto relic' (but should agree not to, we are told). White smoke will then cinematically emerge, Tharoor jokes – progress...? Whether the audiences were denuded, or 'de-obfuscated' by these lectures remains to be seen; the proof is in the pudding, measurable slices of which will be cut and doled out today.
