Viewing the U.N. And Its Charter From the Perspective of Realism

Not by lamentations, but by congratulations, should a former UN staffer like me, greet the appointment of the new Secretary-General. I have served under four of his predecessors: Dag Hammarskjold, U Thant, Kurt Waldheim, and Javier Perez de Cuellar.

Antonio Guterres, now the 8th Secretary-General, deserves to succeed. He, a former Prime Minister of Portugal, and a former UN High Commissioner for Refugees, has the right tools for UN leadership. However I am not questioning the worthiness of the new captain of the UN ship. I am not sure whether the ship itself is still sea-worthy.

Born in 1945, the UN is governed by a charter born out of the smoldering ruins of the Second World War. Its elements were taking form as early as 1942, following the entry of the US in that war. A war whose human casualties are estimated at 40 millions. Its founding members numbered, in San Francisco, 51 States. That number has now grown to 193.

Over the past 71 years, the world has changed several times over. Issues of war, peace, and development are no longer the same. Even pen and paper, except for old hands like mine, are no more. The State is now competing with the non-State actor for hegemony. Even globalization has lost its luster. Digitization has become the medium, and landing on the moon might soon be eclipsed by landing and living on Mars.

Yet the Charter remained the same. Not because of its resilience and relevance to the vastly changing circumstances. But because it is nearly impossible to revise. Article 109 provides for that remote possibility. That possibility cannot become a reality due to two impossibilities: unanimity amongst the Big Five Powers in the Security Council (U.S./U.K./France/Russia/China); and the super-majority of two-thirds approval by the entire membership.

So the U.N. is blanketed by too much ice to make it a sea-worthy ship for its new captain, Antonio Guterres. And there is hardly anything that he could do about it. That is although the UN Secretary-General is, under the Charter, two in one: Chief Administrative Officer (Article 98), and, at his discretion, a political entity (Article 99).

Here are selective lamentations in regard to the shackles built into the Charter:

• To begin with, let us overlook the anomaly of calling the organization, "the United Nations." Nations? The membership is made up of States, not nations, immersed in the daily struggle for upholding their sovereignty. 
• In fact, once in a while, we get the entertaining spectacle of two delegations, each claiming representation of the State. The Dominican Republic, China, Mali, and Tshad are examples.
• The right of States to self-defense is relegated to Article 51;
• That basic sovereign right is expressed at the end of Chapter VII, the main tool of the Big Five hegemony expressed as sanctions against other States.
• The preamble of the Charter in regard to the fundamental right of every individual to dignity, and to gender equality is vague and exhortatory. It took 3 years for the General Assembly to amplify those rights in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948).
• The rights of civilians for protection from war-faring combatants found their way to expression in 1949. In the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (1966). Genocide, that mass murder for any reason, was a later invention of the early 1950s.
• Article 2, paragraph 7 forbids the intervention by States in the internal affairs of other States. Great!! But that basic principle of sovereignty is made subsidiary to Chapter VII in sanctions where the Big Five (the permanent members of the Security Council) hold sway.
• It is in the General Assembly (GA) where that equality of sovereignty is expressed. The GA is considered the Parliament of Man/Woman. Yet nearly all its resolutions are non-enforceable. They are a wish list of "please, would you be so kind as to...!!"
• The only exception to the above is the budget. But the arrears have for far too long overwhelmed payment of assessments on time. One country once paid $40 to avoid voting deprivation. Just to remain a hair-breadth under the arrears accumulated over 2 years.
• As to the Security Council, which has "the primary" (not the exclusive) responsibility for the maintenance of peace and security, well..? We have the veto power in the hands of 5 States from among 15 States, 10 of which are non-permanent members. The latter category satisfies the scenery of geographic representation by regions (by caucuses), but with hardly any impact on the decisions of war and peace. Only the resolutions of that body are enforceable.
• With decolonization virtually accomplished, one of the 6 main organs of the UN, namely the Trusteeship Council, has no job. Its ornate hall at UN Headquarters serves as a meeting space. Attempts to rename that Council "The Human Rights Council" have failed.

The above is beginning to look like the Martin Luther list of grievances pinned to the door of that church in Gutenberg, Germany, in the 16th Century. So we shall stop here to turn our lamentations towards the misperceived concepts and the cancerous impediments to the growth of that universal organization:

• Where is the UN today in the global problems of terrorism, safe havens for internally-displaced persons, and genocidal wars waged by leaders internally? Not to mention the horrors of Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya and of death by drowning of immigrants young and old.
• "Internal affairs" are to be designated and protected from outside interference by the State itself. The UN is shut out, unless through resort to the recently developed laws of human rights and of humanitarian intervention.
• That UN absence is now filled by States, or by regional defense arrangements. Bringing these issues to the UN Security Council is akin to the fig leaf of legitimating what sovereign powers have already decided to do outside of the UN.
• The term "peace-keeping" does not exist in the UN Charter. It was a Hammarskjold invention which was embarked upon in regard to the first Suez War of 1956. OK. We shall take whatever we get to help our troubled world through our only universal organization -the UN. 
• But the national contingents volunteered by States at their own volition, need two main strategic elements: freedom of movement (which can only be granted by the States on whose soil the peace-keepers are stationed). And prior training in joint exercises to at least learn the communication code of that array of multi-national forces.
• That pre-training does not exist. Except in two or three of the Scandinavian States. For how can the UN membership agree on planning for peace-keeping, say, in the Philippines? The Philippines would be the first to angrily object saying: "Who is the UN to anticipate a crisis in our country? This is nothing but fomenting a crisis. In any case, we shall not sign a status of forces agreement (SOFA)." And the matter dies.
• In that regard the UN, being an inter-State system, has no role to play in civil wars. It was not designed for that purpose.
• From where did the UN Security Council get its legal authority to ban individual citizens of sovereign States from travel out of their localities? That Council is not a court of law; the banned persons are not put on advance notice; when I represented a travel banned victim, I discovered that the UN investigators used as evidence irrelevant indicators; and the expert reports on the need to end that system of "you are guilty until you prove yourself innocent" went nowhere.

Add to the above selected list that up to now there are terms which lack precise definition through international inter-State consensus. Terms like "democracy," and "aggression."

So Secretary-General Guterres, we wish you well. You shall have your hands full. But you still have at your disposal tools which have proven their functional effectiveness.

Primary among these are the 30 specialized agencies and programs within "the UN Family of Organizations." Including, of course, your old office, "The UN High Commissioner For Refugees."

There are also the more than 2000 non-governmental organizations around the world. Representing what is referred to in the Charter by "We the People." Above all, you are perceived worldwide as endowed by an unarticulated moral authority of the rare type -its neutrality.

Let us not forget the central role of one of the 6 principal organs of the UN itself. Namely, the UN Secretariat. Under Article 98, you are the decider over that main organ which is in session 24/7. You, or your representative, hire and fire. Through this vast bureaucracy, the entire equivalents within the Family of the UN Organizations are also influenced.

In 1960, Hammarskjold has planted the flag of "the independence of the international civil service." His clarion call, which rattled the Soviets and troubled the British, was broadcast through his Oxford University speech of that year. Written for him by my late friend, the legal mind of the UN at the time, Professor Oscar Schachter.

On the other hand, your powers under Article 99 are discretionary. That article separates your capacity of executive from that of being empowered to raise issues of war and peace. Issues you can submit to either the Security Council or the General Assembly for their consideration.

Thus it is an illusive power on which decisions are not within your hands. Nonetheless it is a recognizable moral authority which may have consequences. In this regard, even symbolism can be a factor for good.

You also have on your side the Charter interpretation in ways never expected before. In the absence of revision, broad interpretation has accelerated decolonization. It also gave birth to imaginative ways to leapfrog over the veto power. An example on this is "the presidential statement" on behalf of the Security Council.

As an engineer and a mathematician, you, Secretary-General Guterres may, in spite of the assessment above, be able to navigate this unwieldy UN ship through these troubled waters towards harbors of safety. Your Portuguese ancestors, in the 17th & 18th Centuries, proved themselves as experienced mariners!!