The role of the United Nations in the 21st Century

The role of the United Nations in the 21st Century

The following is based on the address of former minister Ali
Alatas at the talks held on the occasion of the convening of the
Millennium Summit of the United Nations. The discussion was held
in Jakarta on Sept.4 by the Indonesian Council on World Affairs
and the UN Information Center.

JAKARTA: In preparation for the Sept. 6 to 8 Millennium
Summit, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan presented his Millennium
Report entitled: We the Peoples: The Role of the United Nations
in the 21St Century, in which he identified a number of pressing
challenges facing the world as well as priority measures to
ensure a better, more peaceful and just world.

Within the overall context of globalization, the Secretary
General focused on five, broad fields of endeavor: globalization
and governance; freedom from want; freedom from fear; a
sustainable future; and renewing the United Nations.

These are indeed the main fields in which fundamental
challenges are being posed to humankind.

For example, we have all recognized the obvious benefits of
globalization in faster economic growth, enlarged markets and new
economic opportunities. Yet recently, globalization has begun to
generate a backlash as manifested by the large scale protests
during last year's WTO meeting in Seattle.

This is because globalization is incapable of distinguishing
between rich, advanced countries and poor developing countries,
between the strong and the weak.

Thus globalization is indeed opening up tremendous
opportunities for economic progress and for creating wealth, but
only to the stronger, those that are capable of availing
themselves of those opportunities. Yet it poses real and often
severe challenges and risks to the vulnerable developing
economies.

The central challenge to the international community,
therefore, is not to oppose or resist globalization, for this
would be impossible, but rather collectively to find the means
and to agree on measures that can eliminate or at least amelio-
rate its adverse aspects.

The UN is called upon to seriously address the challenge of
how to harness the tremendous force of globalization and enlist
it in the fight against poverty and for equitable economic
progress in the world.

In security too, new concepts have emerged in the face of
certain developments which are posing new dilemmas to the
international community.

Security issues have been traditionally perceived and
addressed in the context of inter-state relations, i.e. in terms
of protecting the security of a state from threats, particularly
military threats, from other states. Hence, the principal
objective of security efforts was the protection of territorial
integrity and national sovereignty against external threats.

In recent years, however, the gradual shift in the nature of
armed conflicts, from inter-state wars to armed conflict and
turbulence within states, and new types of problems -- such as
those caused by terrorism, illegal drug trafficking,
transnational organized crime, gross violations of human rights
and environmental degradation -- have made us realize that when
states are secure, it does not automatically follow that the
people, the human beings within them are secure.

Thus, while security of states from external aggression or war
remains a vital requisite to ensure their people's security, the
past few years have seen the emergence of a new concept, that of
human security.

Broadly defined, human security embraces the safety of the
individual human being and/or of people from both violent and
non-violent threats.

The underlying philosophy of the human security approach is
that the objective of security should not only be conceived and
pursued in terms of the interests of the state but rather in
terms of the needs of the human being.

The question that now arises is: what can and what should the
international community do to ensure the security of threatened
human beings?

Two types of measures or actions seem to be called for:
firstly, to "legislate" new norms of international law that would
strengthen and secure a people-centered approach to security. In
fact, the international community, both through the UN and
outside it, has already begun doing so as exemplified by the
recently signed Convention banning anti-personnel mines and the
agreement establishing the International Criminal Court.

Similar efforts are continuing, directed towards such issues
as: control of small arms, prohibition of the exploitation of
children, including in armed conflict, and the combat against
transnational crime.

Secondly, to take remedial action where prevention has failed.
But it is precisely here, with the recent experience of Kosovo in
mind, that the international community and especially the UN is
being faced with an acute dilemma.

A dilemma posed, on the one hand, by the recognized necessity
to put an end to humanitarian catastrophe in certain countries
caused by or as a result of massive violations of human rights;
and on the other hand, by the question of legitimacy of an action
taken by a group of countries or regional organization without a
UN mandate.

The UN Secretary General during last year's General Assembly
session specifically raised this issue, thus sparking an
international debate and controversy which most likely will
continue well into the next decade.

While nobody can deny the imperative to stop massive and
systematic violations of human rights, the risks that
humanitarian intervention poses are equally clear: it could set
dangerous precedents if done without clear and accepted criteria
or guidelines as to how, when and by whom such intervention
should be carried out.

There is great sensitivity and concern, especially among
developing countries, about the notion of eroding the principle
of state sovereignty as implied in humanitarian intervention.

It is quite obvious, therefore, that if humanitarian
intervention is to be accepted as a new norm in international
relations, it must always be based on the principles of
legitimacy and of universal applicability or non-discrimination.
It must be justly and consistently applied, irrespective of which
country or region would be affected.

Hence, the UN should first thoroughly discuss the fundamental
questions raised by this evolving international norm so as to
arrive at a consensus on the principles and criteria, the mandate
and guidelines, and the specific circumstances under which such
humanitarian intervention could take place.

There are, of course, other serious and urgent challenges and
problems facing the UN as we enter the 21st century, both those
which have remained unresolved over the years as well as new
ones.

The fundamental problems of how to eradicate world-wide
poverty, secure access to better health care and education,
coping with environmental degradation and debt relief and trade
access for the developing countries are some of those in the
first category.

But new challenges have emerged, such as how to combat various
types of transnational crime, how to halt and reverse the spread
of HIV/AIDS and how to bridge the so-called digital divide.

However, it all boils down to the primordial challenge of our
time, namely, how to devise and implement a more effective system
of global governance, capable of managing the demands and
implications of globalization and interdependence.

A new, global partnership needs to be nurtured, based on
equity, common interest, mutual benefit and shared
responsibility.

Such a global cooperation, however, would fail to function
properly without a UN to give coherence to it. Global governance,
therefore, to be effective and acceptable to all, must be
fashioned with the UN as its central and irreplaceable mechanism
and source of legitimacy.

The revitalization of the UN, through a comprehensive process
of restructuring, democratization and empowerment of its major
organs and functions, is therefore imperative.

It is of pivotal importance that the General Assembly, the
highest deliberative and most representative organ within the UN
system be strengthened and made more effective. Just as crucial
is the reform of the Security Council so as to reflect
contemporary realities and to accommodate the interests and
concerns of developing countries, which comprise the overwhelming
majority in the organization.

But if the financial plight of the UN persists, there is a
real danger that those efforts would be severely undermined and
the purposes of the reform process itself negated.

Hence, the restructuring of the UN, including ensuring its
financial viability, constitutes a key component of the efforts
of the international community to meet the challenges of the new
global era.