How democratic and effective is the UN?

Daiana Ashlyayeva
Nov 14, 2019
10 min read

Updated: Jun 3, 2020

United Nations was always portrayed to be an indispensable and fair institution that saves the world on a regular basis. However, despite its many achievements there are some flaws; posing a question of the UNs democratic nature, effectiveness or fairness. As the world is becoming increasingly more interconnected it is important to evaluate the role and impact of the UN and analyse its democratic nature and the overall level of effectiveness in global politics.

What is United Nations?

The United Nations (UN) is an international organisation committed to maintaining international peace and security; developing friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principles of equal rights of nations; achieving worldwide cooperation to solve international economic, social, cultural, and humanitarian problems; promoting social progress; safeguarding human rights; and serving as a centre where countries can manage their actions and activities toward these various goals. Its leading role in these areas make it an important institution in the implementation of international rules.

UN is the second multipurpose international organization that was established on October 24, 1945, with its primary purpose of preventing more worldwidewars. The UN imitated the League of Nations in general purpose, structure, and functions, as well as many of the UN’s principal organs were adopted from similar structures established earlier in the century. However, the UN differentiated from the League of Nations with its objective of maintaining international peace and security and stronger commitment to economic and social development/connection between nations, which proved more successful as the League of Nations was disbanded after its failure became evident.

Democratic

Democracy is a universally recognized ideal and is one of the core values and principles of the United Nations. It is based on the freely expressed will of people and provides an environment for the protection and effective realization of human rights and fundamental freedoms. UN aims to foster equality amongst all people despite one’s race, ethnicity, class, gender or any other attribute in private and public spheres of life and decision-making.

Firstly, UN promotes democratic governance as a set of values and principles that should be followed for greater participation, equality, security and human development. For instance, United Nations activities in support of democracy and governance are carried out through the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO), among others. UN as an institution has done more to support and strengthen democracy around the world than any other global organization - from fostering good governance to providing long-term electoral assistance for electoral management bodies; supporting civil society, strengthening the effectiveness and accountability of national human rights institutions, assisting to develop legislation and media capacities to ensure freedom of expression and access to information; and promoting women’s participation in political and public life.

Secondly, the mission and work of the United Nations are guided by the essential principles underlying the purposes and functions of the organizationcontained in its founding Charter that are listed in Article 2. It states that"organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its members; disputes are to be settled by peaceful means; members are to refrain from the threat or use of force in contravention of the purposes of the UN; each member must assist the organization in any enforcement actions it takes under the Charter…". This promises equality among all the consisting member states in the UN and attempts to keep the relationship between nations peaceful and united. The Charter is fundamentally made to be democratic and equal so all countries have one vote.

Additionally, The United Nations General Assembly is considered the most representative organ of the world organization. Initially comprising only 51 states, the organisation has been steadily enlarged to include 193 Member States that are represented in the assembly. The UN provides a forum for its members to express their views in the General Assembly, and other bodies and committees, meaning that the idea of democracy is spread throughout the world by following the same democratic customs of the UN. By enabling dialogue between its members, and by hosting negotiations, the Organization has become a mechanism for governments to find areas of agreement and solve problems together. Moreover, despite its size, each member state has one vote, which reinforces the democratic nature of the United Nations. In principle, nations small and large, rich and poor, have equal voice in the Assembly, with each country getting one vote. Generally, decisions on important questions, such as those on peace and security, admission of new members and budgetary matters, require a two-thirds majority, whereas decisions on other questions are by simple majority.

Effective

Due to the powers vested in the UNs Charter and its unique international character, the United Nations can take action on the issues confronting humanity, such as peace and security, climate change, human rights, disarmament, humanitarian and health emergencies, equality, governance, and more. UN boasts in providing food to more than 90 million people in 73 countries, helping to more than 36 million refugees, saving more than 2,5 million people every year globally through vaccination and treatment, and advancing democracy. The organisation is effective in its peacekeeping and health efforts: UN has currently deployed more than 100,000 peacekeepers engaged in 16 projects around the world. Moreover, branches such as the World Health Organization helps promote wellbeing in areas of poverty and conflict. Similarly, the UN has been equally effective in implementing humanitarian rights, as well as legislating environmental practices in most of its member states. For example, the UN has effectively dealt with environmental problems in the Kyoto Protocol and 2015 Paris Conference. These agreements were significant achievements of the UN in tackling climate change by the international community.Moreover, the UN’s Human Rights Council has been highly influential in promoting issues such as women and child rights. As a result, it can be inferred that the UN is effective due to the fact that it has significant power, authority and resources to be able to solve various world issues. One might argue that the UN is an indispensable body as it is a well-functioning intergovernmental institution that is successful in alleviating the impacts of global issues and enforces international cooperation.

Additionally, United Nations is effective because its framework accommodates for countries to express their views and desires in peaceful means, providing a secure and stable environment in global politics as each member state is aware of each other intentions and do not feel threatened by the other. Furthermore, UN enables dialogue between nations on important issues, meaning that even if the member states do not come up with a mutual agreement, it raises awareness and publicity on the topic which therefore, increases support for it.

Not Democratic

On the other hand, UN may be viewed as undemocratic because of the five permanent members. The Security Council is one of the most powerful organs of the United Nations. For instance, it can impose sanctions and authorize military intervention. Five permanent members hold a privileged position in the UN and arevictors of World War 2: China, France, Russia, United Kingdom and United States. There are arguments that the way the Security Council is composed fails to take into account the realities of modern geopolitical situation since the countries have gained membership in the Security Council only for winning Second World War a long time ago. These five nations have more influence on the decisions cast by the UN as they are always on the Council. While, the other 10 members have to be elected from different regions of the world for a two-year term. Furthermore, other countries with large economies such as Brazil, India and Japan do not have permanent membership in the Council or the veto power which is undemocratic as the UN favours only the five nations.However, the efforts to expand the permanent membership to include emerging powers have been overruled. For every country that tries for a seat, rivals seek to block/veto other countries getting more power.

Moreover, critics argue that one of the main inefficiencies of the UN relates to the fact that decision proposals can be easily vetoed by any permanent member of the Security Council, which contradicts the democratic nature of the organization stated in the Charter. As a result of the veto power, any member of the permanent five can reject any proposition despite the overall vote, meaning that they have the power to dominate the Council in their favour and act primarily according to national interests rather than prioritising common welfare. This creates a deadlock in the decision-making processes, easily overpowering some smaller countries by hegemonic states that have superior influences on the UN. Moreover, while an increasing number of political issues that affect citizens all over the world are decided on an international level, the UN is held back by its reliance on nation-states and cannot take shape to reflect this. Since nation-states are the foundation of the UN, they are represented at the UN by their national governments which have become the key international decision-makers. As a result, there is a deficit of democratic accountability at an international level. Consequently, since there is no one supranational authority that wields overwhelming power, the UN has proven to be powerless in occasions where global superpowers got involved in international conflicts. One of the most poignant examples is the invasion of Iraq by the US in 2003 and the fact that since 1990, the United States has cast a veto on Council resolutions 16 times, many concerning Israeli-Palestinian relations.

The situation is further complicated by the fact that there are no agreed guidelines and principles in the UN Charter, according to which new members in the Security Council can be accepted. New members are admitted to the UN on the recommendation of the Security Council and by a two-thirds vote of the General Assembly. Moreover, United Nations is not completely representative because there are not all states in the UN and the states do not represent the whole population. Additionally, there is an uneven distribution of the world's citizens among the world's UN member states. For instance, the delegates at the UN General Assembly do not represent the entire population of their countries. In essence, the General Assembly is a gathering of diplomats who are appointed not by the people but by the executive branchesof their national governments.As a result, minority parties have limited representation or influence meaning that the UN is unable to be as effective and fair in the decision-making process.

Ineffective

UN has limited powers meaning that it is only effective to a certain extent and can only influence something but not force member states to comply. Hundreds of resolutions are introduced annually and due to the General Assembly’s democratic character, it is assumed that countries have a strong moral authority to obey to UN. However, despite the attention that a resolution gets, they are non-binding. For example, just days after the most severe sanctions were passed by the United Nations on 11thSeptember in reaction to the North’s sixth and most powerful nuclear test, North Korea has repeatedly ignored United Nations prohibitions against conducting nuclear tests by increasing its arms program with a series of nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile tests. Moreover, the effectiveness of the UN and its role in maintaining international security, its power is greatly compromised by the fact that the organisation does not have its own troops and it has to borrow troops from member states in order to enforce compliance to the decisions of the Security Council. This means that UN cannot go against the countries executive power or force their obedience as they do not have the military power to do so. As a result, it is evident that the power of the United Nations is restricted due to its heavy reliance on nation states and the genuine power resides there.

In addition, UN faces some problems keeping the peace between nation states. Security Council’s job is to maintain international peace, however, due to the divisions and major conflicts, especially those in which permanent members are involved, its ability to enforce peace is constrained. One of the examples include the UNs failure in handling the six-year-old conflict in Syria. As a result of hegemons supporting opposition groups, the Security Council has failed to take decisive action on Syria, despite reports of countless war crimes. Moreover, there were occasions where the acts of genocide were ignored by the UN, significantly undermining its reputation. Case studies including Rwandan genocide in which within the duration of 100 days more than 800 Tutsis were murdered by official Hutu militiamen in 1994. During the same period, despite having information about the problem, the UN peacekeeper forces in the region were reduced from 2000 to 270. Critics could argue that the reason the UN was not effective is mostly due to the fact that Rwanda, among other proxy wars, had little interest to the hegemonic powers at the time. This highlights the ineffectiveness of the UN’s Security Council in preventing conflict and supports the fact that no supranational authority is capable of wielding overwhelming power and is ineffective at challenging the perpetual power struggle between states as it cannot change the ultimately anarchic system of global politics.One cannot disregard the fact that the UN was unable to prevent a series of conflicts, and thus conclude that the UN has been partly ineffective at establishing collective security.

Moreover, it is often stated that the UN is not able to achieve its objectives to a full extent due to financial difficulties in member states. For instance, several poor countries with deeply rooted financial constraints is unable to achieve some of the orders/objectives of the UN like the UNICEFs calling for governments to provide adequate schooling and education to children since child labour is an undeniable reality in those parts of the world. Additionally, it is difficult for the UN to achieve its objectives in global governance partially because not all member states are motivated to cooperate and therefore, is underfunded. However, at the moment, there is a lack of clear guidelines and policies in terms of dealing with states refusing to adhere to agreed principles and not complying with the UN requirements.

Lastly, the General Assembly may lose its main focus of solving issues by becoming a stage where delegates debate for show rather than coming up with effective solutions. Each fall, United Nations General Assembly holds an opening session where presidents and prime ministers give speeches on various topics and attempt to solve issues by trying to achieve a mutual agreement; come up with a proposal for the next actions. However, despite its potential, criticsargue that the event offers a lot of attention, shifting the main purpose of the conference to the promotion of delegates and their beliefs. Furthermore, it can mean that the conferences are not as effective as the delegates do not accomplish much and no longer try to come up with a single solution to a problem, but rather, deliver long, incoherent speeches on various topics.

In conclusion, there is a variety of viewpoints and interpretations of the effectiveness of the United Nations. There are some limitations associated with the UN which could slightly diminish its democratic nature and its effectiveness, like the lack of power over the member states and the controversial position of the five permanent members that could act from a self-interested point of view. However, it is essentially undeniable that the world is safer and more secure as a result of the UN. Since its creation in 1945, the world has experienced widespread peace among the great powers of the world, and helped with many significant humanitarian, health, security and environmental problems, and some nations have become strong economic powers on the global stage. The UN will never be able to prevent every single proxy conflict or war, however, it provides a valuable framework for cooperation for the international community, promoting democratic values of equality and peace.