The United States has long advocated reform at the United Nations. Much of the
discussion of the sometimes unglamorous issues of management reform has been
driven not just by the Congress, but by the harping of the United States working
with other major UN contributors over the years.
The goal of the United States, and of the Bush Administration in recent years,
is to seek to make the United Nations more
efficient so that it can serve its original purposes more effectively. We believe
the United Nations has great potential for furthering freedom and making the
world more secure. But reform is necessary to make it better equipped to carry
out the objectives first outlined in the UN Charter 60 years ago.
Sometimes we have to stand back and look with amazement at how much the United
Nations shoulders and what a good job it does. At other times, unfortunately,
we see the UN machinery as creaky and slow. Ultimately, however, it will require
political will to help make multilateralism work.
Multilateralism is a slippery term
because, at least in the eyes of Americans, adding the “ism” to “multilateral” does
not necessarily make it an end in
itself. There are multilateral instruments, and there is multilateral leadership.
What we should talk about is how we can contribute to building cooperation together.
In doing so, we must recognize that the universality of the UN system gives it
an important representative quality. But we must also remember
that “universality” does not in itself guarantee “democracy.”
The fact that every government in the UN General Assembly has an equal vote does
not make it democratic. Many of the governments in the General
Assembly do not represent the consent of the governed. The nations that are democracies
have an important responsibility for building the instruments of international
law in the multilateral
system. The democracies need to work together across regions, and then at the
core of the system, to build this agenda. And at the core is the old and essential
partnership between Europe and the United States.
“Proposals for a new Peace-Building Commission have come very much at the
right time”
Proposals for a new Peace-Building Commission have come very much at the right
time. Just as the United States is creating its own office in the State
Department for post conflict preparations, we think it is also very appropriate
to give the United Nations greater wherewithal for dealing with these kinds of
issues. It is important that we
concentrate on getting the details of it right, because a consensus is developing
in favor of linking security issues, such as preventive measures and post conflict
activities, with questions of development. We must be particularly careful how
we define the relationship between a Peace-Building Commission and the Economic
and Social Council, which to this day has not shown very effective leadership.
We must also focus on the relationship between a Peace-Building Commission and
the international financial institutions, which have an important role in facilitating
finance, but which probably should not take directive cues from the Peace-Building
Commission.
One of our greatest challenges is to create a culture in the UN in which democracy
and human rights are a
priority. The idea that the High Commissioner for Human Rights should
regularly speak to the Security Council at an early stage in the decision-making
process might help build greater political will for the Council to deal with
such
issues as Sudan. The proposal to increase the capacity of the High Commissioner’s
office for cooperating with governments seeking to build a rule of law is also
very promising. The United States will support a substantially increased UN regular
budget funding for that purpose.
Perhaps most importantly, however, we need to think about the symbolic
institution of the Commission on Human Rights. It is quite striking
that the Secretary General himself has suggested that the “declining credibility” of
this institution “casts a shadow” over the entire UN system. The
United States will in its regular consultations with the European Union on UN
human rights affairs develop a joint position on this before September.
The State Department consults
constantly with the EU Presidency and the EU member states on UN policy, and
particularly on multilateral human rights policy. These consultations have produced
enormous mutual benefits and reinforced our conviction that we can achieve far
more in the human rights bodies of the United Nations if we work together.
We need to look at how the proposed new Human Rights Council would operate. It
is a good idea that it should report to the UN General Assembly. The universal
composition of the General Assembly would give the Human Rights Council a certain
mandate. It is troubling, on the other hand, that some would like the new Council
to be precisely the same size,
or about the same size, as the current Commission on Human Rights that it would
replace.
That may not be so helpful. There should be some responsibility on the part of
member states elected to the new human rights body to live by a certain code
of conduct. We need to agree on specific details before the next elections to
the Commission, or to the Human Rights Council if it is in place by then, to
ensure that some of the world’s most
undemocratic nations will not be able
to twist and pervert the institution’s
operations.
We also need to look very carefully at the Secretary General’s proposal
for peer review in such a council, so that when nations are quite rightly examining
each other’s records on human rights, the exercise does not become a means
for diverting discussion from the most urgent human rights crises of the day.
One main reason for creating the new Human Rights Council is to establish a standing
body capable of dealing with such crises.
We also need administrative and management reform, on which the United States
has been working with the Geneva Group, which comprises 14 of the largest UN
contributors. These 14 countries pay over 80 percent of both
the regular UN budget and the peacekeeping budget, and they have asked
the Secretary General not to forget management and administrative reforms as
part of this package.
The United States is proposing a three-pronged approach on management reform.
The first aim should be to try to create a culture of greater transparency, accountability
and integrity, not least by giving the important Office of Internal Oversight
Services more independence. We also need to inject internal oversight into peacekeeping
operations, so that the horrifying sexual abuses
committed in the Democratic Republic of Congo are not repeated.
We need to be creative in the case of small UN agencies that do not have the
capacity to conduct their own internal oversight. Perhaps the task could be
entrusted to the Office of Internal Oversight Services. We must also take further
steps to ensure that UN personnel are not subject to conflicts of interest, or
even the appearance of such conflicts. That should also apply to all UN
agencies, such as the World Intellectual Property Organization, where recent
events related to a contractor building a new headquarters have indicated there
may be problems.
“The first aim should be to create a culture of greater transparency, accountability
and integrity”
The second goal should be basically improving management effectiveness. This
could include the consolidation of UN Information Centres around the world and
reducing the costs of conferences, which account for the largest single section
of the UN budget.
Thirdly, management reform should include boosting the relevance of the United
Nations to help it achieve the goals set in its Charter. The Secretary General
has committed himself to
reform and to emphasizing democracy more than any of his predecessors. On the
other hand, the Secretary General has failed to use the authority given him in
December 2003 to redeploy up to 50 posts from lower to higher priority areas.
There is something about the politics of the United Nations, or the lack of will
of the Secretary General, that has led him not to move one post yet. He should
use that authority and should be given more authority to move posts.
The U.S. government is calling for another very simple thing, which is sometimes
ignored because of the jargon term for it “sunsetting.” Peacekeeping
missions have to be reauthorized every few months. They need to be checked out
to see if they should continue,
or whether they should be refined,
increased or reduced in personnel, and they are often extended. So, too, all
other UN programs, both new and old, ought to be regularly assessed on the assumption
that they might not continue.
There is much to be done on the
reform front, even if some of it is not very exciting. The United States is fully
committed to participating in this effort. And while some elements of the package
may not go forward as quickly as some would like, there is a great opportunity
for progress on much of the reform agenda.
Mark P. Lagon is Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization
Affairs. He previously served on the Secretary of State’s Policy Planning
Staff, where he focused on UN and international organizations, democracy and
human rights, and public diplomacy. He was previously a senior staff member of
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, with particular responsibility for the
State Department authorization bill, international organizations, economic sanctions,
broadcasting and public diplomacy and human rights.
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