Can the UN be saved?

Just shy of a week out from the annual UN General Assembly, when world leaders, diplomats, and spies swarm on New York, the US ambassador to the UN (Linda Thomas-Greenfield) has touched on the touchiest of topics: reforming the UN Security Council (UNSC).

She revealed yesterday (Thursday) that the US plans to push for two permanent UNSC seats for African nations, plus an elected, rotating seat for a small island developing nation. Washington apparently already received “enthusiastic feedback”  from partners who got a sneak peek, with US officials saying they’re “serious” about the reform.

To understand why this is such a big deal, here’s a quick primer:

In the wake of WWII, the world hoped the new Security Council would maintain world peace and help avoid the mistakes of the past. To do that, the UNSC can impose sanctions, blockades, and travel bans, and can even authorise military action.

The Council’s top dogs are the five permanent members (‘P5’): 🇨🇳 China, 🇫🇷 France, 🇷🇺 Russia, 🇬🇧 the UK, and 🇺🇸 the US. And they make the headlines because they’re the ones who have the ultimate power to veto decisions.

And then there’s 10 rotating seats with members elected to two-year terms – the freshest five took their seats in January: Algeria, Guyana, Sierra Leone, Slovenia, and South Korea. They don’t get to veto, but resolutions still need nine votes to pass.

The UNSC was deadlocked during the Cold War – and it’s been stuck again lately both over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (guess which P5 member uses its veto?), and the Israel-Hamas war (the US has vetoed three resolutions, while China and Russia have vetoed two).

So there’s long been a sense all this UNSC paralysis is getting too costly. But there’s also been a broader sense that the UNSC’s setup no longer reflects reality – the UK and France get a P5 seat while (say), India doesn’t.

So those are the waters into which the US is now wading. And it’s hardly the first – there’s a long list of countries who want to see UNSC reform. The question is how.

Here’s a quick Whitman’s Sampler of some proposals on the table  — 

• ⚖️ The G4: Brazil, Germany, India, and Japan all want P5 status plus two seats for Africa, though they’re willing to compromise on vetoes.
• ☕ Uniting for Consensus: Led by Argentina, Mexico, Italy, Poland, Pakistan, South Korea and others, this group (known as the Coffee Club) wants to expand the council’s elected membership from 10 to 20.
• 🌳 Ezulwini Consensus: Endorsed by the African Union back in 2005, this one calls for African countries to get two permanent seats (with full veto rights) and at least three additional non-permanent seats.
• 🤝 Small 5: Run by Costa Rica, Jordan, Liechtenstein, Singapore and Switzerland, this one aims to revise the UNSC’s working methods to boost transparency.

Oh, and the US has long supported permanent seats for Germany, India, and Japan, though that’s tricky: can you imagine Russia approving permanent seats for two more US allies (Germany and Japan)? Or China adding two of its own regional rivals (Japan and India)?

Anyway, maybe that brings us back to where we started: this latest US proposal. It’s not proposing to add more US allies, or any rivals that China or Russia might oppose. Rather, it’s simply about adding three voices that’ve long been isolated from international decisions that impact them most – two African voices, and one small island voice.

So does this idea have legs? Sure, it’s incomplete – emerging powers from Asia, Latin America, and elsewhere won’t love watching others leapfrog onto the Council.

But as an initial step, could this US idea really offend anyone? Well… yes. Not because of Africa or the islands, but because this idea is a US idea. And in this low-trust world of ours, that can be all it takes.

INTRIGUE’S TAKE

There are a couple of tensions at play here:

• The Council itself is struggling between legitimacy (needing a membership that reflects reality) and efficacy (the more members, the harder it is to agree), and
• At the same time, each member is wanting to preserve its own power, while knowing the UNSC’s power itself keeps diminishing so long as it doesn’t evolve.

Here’s another thing: this is the second time this week we’ve written about a major institution that’s struggling to adapt to this wild world of ours (the other was the EU). So this is not just a UN story. It’s playing out everywhere.

And maybe that’s as good a moment as any to drop the ol’ line from the UN’s second-ever leader, Swedish diplomat Dag Hammarskjöld: “The UN was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell.“

Also worth noting:

• Others argue that the UNSC actually needs fewer, not more, members.
• Responding to questions on how to decide who gets any new permanent seats for Africa, the US ambassador said this would ultimately be a matter for Africa itself to determine – any agreed candidates would then go to a vote among the 193 UN General Assembly members.