UNITED NATIONS.

The United Nations (UN) was designed chiefly by the United States during the Second World War and was accepted by its two wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union. Soon after the failure of the League of Nations, the UN was not at first greeted by the Europeans as an effective way of maintaining peace. In 1945 Germany was defeated, but Continental Europe was in ruins. A profound sense of despair pervaded Europe, which was soon confronted with a twin fear of a resurgence of Germany and the rise of communism led by the Soviet Union.

BACKGROUND

The idea that major powers should take the responsibility for regulating national interests through international cooperation was not new in itself. Since the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, Europeans had set out the terms of the settlement of international disputes in order to conduct international affairs peacefully. However, the United Nations owed its similarities to the League of Nations. The League was an American attempt to replace the European concepts of spheres of influence and a balance of power by the notion of collective security. The League had not been sufficiently powerful (in the absence of the United States) to prevent the rising threat of the Axis powers (Nazi Germany, Italy, and Japan) from developing into the Second World War. Learning from the lessons of the discredited League, the promoters of the United Nations ensured that the new international organization should have power to enforce economic and military sanctions against aggressors under the direction of the Security Council, which would be made up of the wartime great powers (originally, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the USSR), acting as "world policemen."

The Security Council was thus the most powerful organ in the UN, entrusted with the central role of maintaining peace and security. The United Kingdom and the USSR both insisted that the cherished idea of the U.S. president Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882–1945) for national self-determination would not apply to their spheres of influence. Neither power was initially enthusiastic about Roosevelt's request to include China in the Security Council. It was not until the Yalta conference in February 1945 that the United States, United Kingdom, and USSR agreed that China and France be given permanent seats on the Security Council, but the issue of the voting procedure on the Council remained unresolved. Smaller powers were unhappy with the idea of investing so much power in the five great powers. France, angered by its exclusion from the Yalta conference, was not initially interested in taking up the offer of a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. The British prime minister, Winston Churchill, increasingly concerned about the rise of communism in postwar Europe, looked on the forthcoming organization as a feeble attempt to contain the Soviet Union. Moscow, however, insisted on securing an absolute "veto" power on the Security Council. All the great powers resented the prospect of the UN meddling in their foreign policies.

In order to meet the anxieties of the smaller powers, the Security Council included six nonpermanent members (with the number increased to ten in 1965), who were elected by the General Assembly for a term of two years, plus its five permanent member states. The Security Council was empowered to make decisions, which would bind all UN member states, to impose sanctions, demand cease-fires, and authorize the use of military force on behalf of the UN. The permanent members were given power of vetoing draft resolutions on substantive (and not procedural) matters. In all, the heavy responsibility given to the five permanent members meant that if they were able to work together in a constructive manner, the UN could perform its key role accordingly.

OBSTACLES

As soon as the organization was created, however, the UN was hamstrung by two obstacles. The first was the division of the great powers caused by the onset of the Cold War (1945–1989). Moreover, despite financial exhaustion and the greater demand for decolonization in the international community after 1945, the Western Europeans had not given up their spheres of influence outside Europe. Even after the loss of India by 1947, the United Kingdom's domination in South Asia, the Indian Ocean, the South Arabian states, the Persian Gulf, the Middle East, and Africa remained formidable. France was intent on reinventing its greatpower status in Indochina and North Africa, while the Netherlands was pressing for the reintroduction of its rule in postwar Indonesia.

Frequent disagreements within the Security Council were something of a shock to the first UN secretary-general, the Norwegian Trygve Halvdan Lie (1896–1968). The Council could not decide either on the appropriate scope of a UN military force to be assigned under the Security Council or the admission of new members if they were pro-West or pro-communist. In March 1946 Iran took to the UN the continuing presence of Soviet troops on Iranian territory, but the Security Council, faced with the unwillingness of the Soviet Union to discuss the issue, was compelled to defer the matter. Moreover, the right to exercise the veto limited the ability of the Security Council to resolve armed conflicts when one of the permanent members was actually involved in them, such as during the Suez Crisis in 1956, the Hungarian uprising in 1956, the Vietnam War (1946–1975), and the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese War. The Soviet Union became the frequent user of the veto—seventy-five times between 1946 and 1955—as opposed to France (twice) and China (once). At the time of the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, the Soviet Union was absent from the Security Council in protest at the continuing representation of China by the nationalist Chinese (the Taiwan government, as the Republic of China, represented the UN until 1971). This allowed the Council to discuss the issue and to recommend resolutions that sanctioned the U.S.-led intervention in Korea under the auspices of the UN. But with the return of the Soviet Union to the Council with its veto, the United States had to encourage the General Assembly to act on major issues quickly under the "Uniting for Peace" resolution.

CONTAINING LOCALIZED CONFLICTS, ADVANCING WESTERN VALUES

Despite these limitations, the UN was able to work better to contain localized conflicts in areas less affected by the Cold War. UN forces had been sent to Israel and its neighbors since 1948; to India and Pakistan after 1949; and to the Congo (1960–1964), Yemen (1963–1964), and Cyprus (since 1964). Outside security and peacekeeping issues, the UN contributed to the advancement of Western values on human rights. Determined to prevent a repetition of the appalling treatment of civilians during the Second World War, and especially of the millions of Jews who had suffered at the hands of Nazis, Europeans wanted to establish a more equitable society after 1945. These aspirations were matched by those of Americans, led by Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962), in promoting humanitarian causes. The United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), founded in 1943, provided much-needed help (food, medicine, and the restoration of public services) to the populations of countries liberated from the Axis. This resettlement work was then transferred, in 1946, from UNRRA to the UN International Refugee Organization (IRO). Through the work of the UN Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) or the Economic Commission for Europe (a local branch of the UN's Economic and Social Council), Western Europeans were able to discuss European affairs with their Eastern counterparts. The UN Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 was followed up by the Council of Europe, two years later, in the form of the European Convention of the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedom.

PEACEKEEPING

In the aftermath of the death of Joseph Stalin (1879–1953) in March 1953, Dag Hjalmar Agne Carl Hammarskjöld (1905–1961), a former Swedish deputy foreign minister, became the second UN secretary-general. He sought a more active peacekeeping role in the UN but was frustrated by its limited ability to intervene effectively in conflict in areas where the superpowers' interests were at stake. It was the Suez Crisis that opened up the opportunity for Hammarskjöld to expand the UN's role. He became deeply involved in the negotiations with the powers concerned and persuaded the United Kingdom and France to accept the UN's call for a cease-fire. In return, the secretary-general sent the UN emergency force (the prototype of the peacekeeping force) to replace the Anglo-French troops after the latter left Suez. This device helped the United Kingdom and France to save face, but Hammarskjöld fully supported the position of the United States, which was infuriated by the Anglo-French unilateral action. The Suez fiasco further reduced European credibility, and the British were helpless during the crisis in the face of the economic and financial pressure imposed by an angry United States. The early history of "the UN and Europe" shows that the Europeans began to embrace the UN Charter seriously for its moral guidance, but their influence through the Security Council was useful but limited as the UN became another sphere of superpower confrontation, a fact that Hammarskjöld himself had to live with during his years as UN secretary-general. It is, however, important to note that, since the end of the Second World War, Europeans have learned to advance their national interests and their individual human rights by joining numerous international institutions as sources of influence in the postimperial world.

The end of the Cold War liberated Europe from superpower domination. It also heightened the need to seek legitimacy through international organizations if Europe were to become involved in armed interventions elsewhere. In the 1990s numerous humanitarian interventions took place in which European powers were actively involved in restoring law and order. In the Bosnian conflict, the Security Council played a role in backing the military actions of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), whereas during the Kosovo campaign in 1999, NATO, instead of the UN, sanctioned the use of force. In the case of the humanitarian crisis in Rwanda in 1994, the Security Council authorized France to lead the operation. The idea of liberal internationalism finally prevailed over the old imperialism in Europe. With the acceleration of globalization, Europe has taken the idea of international governance by the rule of law seriously and the creation of the International Criminal Court is seen in Europe as a logical step toward achieving global justice against organized crime, international conflict, or international terrorism, which could not be dealt with adequately by the jurisdictions of each sovereign state.

See alsoBretton Woods Agreement; International Criminal Court; International Law; League of Nations; World Trade Organization; World War II.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Barros, James. Trygve Lie and the Cold War: The UN Secretary-General Pursues Peace, 1946–1953. DeKalb, Ill., 1989. Standard work on the first UN secretary-general.

Mayall, James, ed. The New Interventionism, 1991–1994: United Nations Experience in Cambodia, Former Yugoslavia and Somalia. Cambridge, U.K., 1996. Useful study of the role of the UN in early post–Cold War years.

Roberts, Adam, and Benedict Kingsbury. United Nations, Divided World: The UN's Roles in International Relations. 2nd ed. Oxford, U.K., 1994. Useful collection of essays by prominent scholars on the subject.

Ryan, Stephen. The United Nations and International Politics. New York, 2000. Concise survey of the history of the UN.

Schlesinger, Stephen C. Act of Creation: The Founding of the United Nations. Cambridge, Mass., 2003. Illuminating account of the origins of the UN and the role of the United States.

Urquhart, Brian. Hammarskjold. New York, 1972. Important study of the second UN secretary-general written by an individual who worked for the UN secre tariat between 1945 and 1986.

Zacher, Mark W. Dag Hammarskjold's United Nations. New York, 1970. Sympathetic analysis of Hammarskjöld's role in the UN.

Saki Ruth Dockrill