UN reforms and their pre-requisites

NIGD Press release UNCTAD XI

Most of the proposals for a UN reform seem very difficult if not impossible to realise. The permanent members of the Security Council have a veto over all amendments and any review of the Charter, including those aiming at abolishing or revising veto rights of the permanent members of the Security Council. Consequently Security Council or General Assembly reforms appear unlikely. Moreover, the US dominates the contemporary UN system not only by its veto, but through financial conditionality and by translating its other resources into bargaining power within the UN. Also the location of the UN headquarters in New York makes the UN staff and representatives susceptible to the influence of US culture, media and public opinion. In addition to the consistent opposition of the US, a veto by China, Russia or the ex-colonial powers Britain and France would similarly suffice to block any reform. The US and China, in particular, would also seem to oppose the establishment of a People’s Assembly.

However, as the existing UN Charter already authorises it, an ECOSOC-based reform of the UN would be less difficult. Yet lack of political will and money hinder this option. Indeed, our analysis indicates that – apart from the possibility of moving the headquarters of the UN to somewhere in the global South – the best immediate way to reform the UN system is by way of establishing new sources of finance. This might also contribute to changing the power structures within the UN. Generating alternative sources of funding for the UN system through a UN world lottery or a UN credit card are real possibilities. More ambitiously, it is also possible to establish a currency transaction tax or a global carbon tax without the consent of all ‘great powers’ (although some of them are needed). It is achievable to feed some of these revenues into the UN system and thereby lift some of the pressures on the UN caused by financial conditioning and troubles.

At any rate, only fairly modest UN reforms seem feasible. The catastrophes of the First and Second World Wars led to a growing acknowledgement that the nature and process of international governance would have to change. Perhaps our choice in the early 21st century then is: either to wait for the next titanic catastrophe which is likely come in one form or another, rather sooner than later; or to begin to build a parallel and more efficient and democratic system than the UN. In the latter case we can at least hope for an opportunity to arise to transform that parallel system into a new universal political organization, possibly helping to prevent the catastrophe from ever occurring.

At first, however, it is imperative to create the economic and political conditions for a new legitimate world organization, whatever form that may assume in the future. For that purpose, NIGD has developed a strategy of the first four steps toward global democratization.