U.N. Risks Losing Its Relevancy

Author: Bryan Goldberg

With war all but certain, the greatest question facing both our nation and the world is the future and relevance of the United Nations. In terms of international opinion, the United Nations is still important, insofar as many people's views hinge upon Security Council authorization. This is because billions of people around the world view the United Nations as the one and only body capable of organizing a multilateral attack. This is unfortunate for two reasons. The first is that the United Nations, with its all-important Security Council, is set up so poorly that it undermines itself, and the second is that there are ways of achieving a multilateral attack without the United Nations' help.
One of the greatest problems with the United Nations is that it is completely outdated in terms of who holds power. More specifically, it was built in the wake of World War II, and its setup completely reflects that. The five most powerful nations in the Security Council, the five with veto privileges, are the countries that "won" World War II: Britain, Russia, France, China and the United States. I use the word "won" hesitantly because France contributed almost nothing to that victory. On the other hand, the "losing" nations of Germany, Japan and Italy were intentionally kept off the Security Council.
Some time between the signing of the U.N. Charter and the debate over Iraq, those "losing" nations became winners again. In a relatively short time, Germany, Japan and Italy adopted democracy, rebuilt their war-torn cities and developed strong economies. Furthermore, Spain has since joined the ranks of democratic nations, while several Asian nations, including South Korea, have become members of the first world. Unfortunately, the United Nations refuses to let them join the Security Council as permanent members, though they all deserve to be. Japan has been particularly vocal about its exclusion, and its argument is a good one: Japan is responsible for almost a fifth of the United Nations' total budget. Germany and Italy are also large contributors: both of them pay more to the United Nations than Russia and China combined. By keeping deserving countries off of the Security Council in order to prevent the dilution of their own power, the five permanent members have completely undermined the entire United Nations' dignity as a representative body.
Another flaw with the United Nations and its Security Council is the fact that relatively unimportant nations get to serve on it in place of important ones. Even though citizens of Bulgaria, Cameroon, Guinea and Syria might take offense at that last assertion, the truth is that their presence is absurd. The inclusion of Syria on the Security Council is an insult to socially and politically evolved nations everywhere. Even though the Syrians have not yet separated church from state, and even though they still believe that men are more worthy of education than women, they are allowed to vote on international issues that the Japanese and Italians are not. This fact, in and of itself, speaks against the legitimacy of the declining United Nations. This is not to say that developing nations should be totally excluded, but they should be allowed seats only in addition to the large powers.
The second major issue that undermines the United Nations has to do with its supposed role of "war approval committee." This is of particular frustration to the United States, since our military is, for all intents and purposes, the only truly powerful military in the world. Thus, the United Nations' most important function is nothing more than telling America when it can and cannot flex its muscles. President Bush's opinion, the one that is gaining momentum in America, is that we do not need an official body to tell us world opinion. Rather, our nation can gauge for itself what the world thinks. Right now, the world is divided roughly down the middle. Many world powers support our war plan (Britain, Spain, Italy, Japan, Australia, Eastern European nations, etc.) while some do not (France, Germany, Russia, China and most Arab nations). What is the purpose of a poorly organized United Nations, when our nation knows the exact stance of every single country? Why try to assign one voice to a world that is completely divided? Hopefully, this war in Iraq will send a clear message to the United Nations that it needs to rethink, at the very least, its logistical setup, and possibly its purpose.

Bryan Goldberg is an economics major from Los Altos, Calif.