Stewart: “At the United Nations, Reform for All Seasons”

A comprehensive take on UN reform from Patrick Stewart, one of the most capable young policy experts on international organizations–and just in time for the US presidential elections.

The reform agenda Torsella described reflects this constructive legacy in being sober, reasoned, and balanced.

That’s a far cry from what we’ve heard from the Republican presidential candidates. Like their counterparts in the House, the GOP contenders have adopted a slash and burn approach to the world body.  Newt Gingrich, this weekend’s victor in South Carolina, last summer called for defunding the UN. (Prior to dropping out, Texas Governor Rick Perry advocated the same in a televised debate). Rick Santorum, who’s taking his fight to Florida, has made halving U.S. funding for the UN part of his official platform. Mitt Romney, meanwhile, called recent UN work an “extraordinary failure,” and endorses John Bolton’s proposal that the United States defund the Human Rights Council—despite recent U.S. progress in improving that body’s functioning. The libertarian Ron Paul gets even spookier, describing the United Nations as a threat to American liberty. (In 1998, he even warned that it “would confiscate our guns” if it got the chance).

Whoever is elected in November must be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Many of the reforms UN critics identify are needed not only in Geneva and New York, but also in Washington, DC—underscoring the foolishness of trashing a flawed but indispensable organization. Kudos to Ambassador Torsella for putting forth such an ambitious framework and for illuminating a viable path for UN reform.

via The Internationalist » At the United Nations, Reform for All Seasons.

Advertisement