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The United Nations: Imagine a World Without It
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11889 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
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8 / 1987 |
2,669 Words |
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C.R. Gharekhan
C.R. Gharekhan is India's ambassador to the United Nations. |
World War I led to the creation of the League of Nations. World War II inspired the statesmen of the day to establish the United Nations. Is another world war the only means to revive humankind's faith in international cooperation? The only difficulty is that after another world war, there may be no world left.
The last few years have witnessed a weakening of the commitment to multilateralism. This retreat is particularly evident in some of the most industrially advanced nations of the world, the very countries that emphatically supported the establishment of the United Nations.
In 1945, the world had yet to be polarized into opposing ideological and military alliances; rivalry for supremacy and domination was still a few years away. Colonial powers continued to nourish the illusion of the invincibility of their colonial empires.
All this was to change dramatically in the space of a few years. The outbreak of the Cold War introduced fears and at times aggressive competition between conflicting ideologies on a worldwide scale. The bastions of colonialism crumbled with a rapidity that left atlases outdated every year. Compared with 51 members in the world body in 1945, there are 159 today. There are as many members from Africa alone as the total membership of the United Nations 40 years ago. We have, for the first time in history, a virtually universal body.
We should welcome the strengthening of the democratic foundations of the United Nations rather than complain about the so-called dictates of an "oppressive" or "automatic" majority. It is inevitable that when the membership of an association expands, newer members will being their own ideas. It would not be realistic or even fair to expect them to blindly follow the lines laid down by the older members. So long as the rules of the house are respected, no one should resist or decry the desire for change.
The preamble of the UN Charter was described in 1945 by the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, Sen. Tom Connally of Texas, as the "greatest document of its kind that has ever been formulated." His house counterpart, Rep. Sol Bloom of New York, said "this new Magna Carta of peace and security for mankind" eloquently proclaims the lofty objectives of "We the peoples of the United Nations." It may be useful to recall these objectives briefly:
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