More than a UN birthday bash

As the leaders of nearly every nation on earth mark the 50th anniversary of the United Nations this week, they must do more than fill the General Assembly hall with platitudes and snarl New York City traffic. They owe it to themselves and their citizens to take a hard look at the organization they are honoring. Without significant changes in organization and behavior, the UN will lose its remaining effectiveness and public support.

In recent years, the Security Council, no longer paralyzed by Cold War vetoes, has dominated the UN's business and finances. That has led to two problems. One is the proliferation of overambitious peacekeeping operations that have brought public discredit and near-bankruptcy to the UN. The other is the disproportionate voting power of the council's five permanent members -- the United States, Britain, China, France and Russia.

These five reflect the power realities of 1945 better than today's. Ways have to be found to include Germany, Japan and major developing countries without making the council unwieldy. Meanwhile, peacekeeping needs to be brought back to its earlier pattern where UN blue helmets were introduced only after the warring parties had begun to negotiate peace.

The UN remains an underachiever in what should be one of its natural endeavors -- economic and social development. One reason is the multiplication of duplicative agencies that have become little more than loudspeakers for wishful rhetoric. The present Economic and Social Council needs to give way to a new Economic Security Council that would be taken seriously by the major economic powers and would coordinate its work with the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization.

The UN cannot be just a closed club of governments. Private, non-governmental organizations are beginning to play a role. Many have been granted official UN status and their forums have become an important element at international conferences. The role of these groups should be protected from political interference by governments.

On financial management, there has been significant progress in the last two years. The main problem now is the continued insistence of member countries on imposing expensive and unsuitable patronage appointees on the secretariat and UN agencies. No political body can be free of patronage, but the spectacle of profligate waste at headquarters, while the UN and its agencies run out of funds to meet emergency human needs in the field is intolerable.

The UN's annual budget, excluding peacekeeping, is US$1.3 billion, a relatively small sum as these things go. The United States is assessed 25 percent of this, which is roughly proportionate to its share in the world economy. Nonetheless, it is unhealthy for one nation out of 185 to bear such a large share of the costs and perilous for the UN to have its budget depend so much on a single member, especially when Congress feels free to ignore this country's formal dues obligations.

The United Nations has disappointed some of the grander hopes of its founders. But it remains one of the world's essential institutions. It plays an indispensable role managing potentially dangerous conflicts between states and focusing attention on global problems like environment, population and the status of women.

The best way for its members to celebrate its imperfect first 50 years is to commit themselves to shape a more perfect United Nations for the future.

-- The New York Times