Regional multilateralism: The next paradigm in global affairs – GPS

What comes next as a model for dealing with global trouble spots?  Think about more Libya approaches:

In a world of diminished U.S. involvement and unsuccessful multilateralist endeavors, an alternative vision for global engagement is necessary. Instead we are faced with a reluctant China, an unprepared India, an European Union in the midst of a financial debacle and a host of regional powers that focus on their neighborhood rather than claiming a global role. Given these realities, regional multilateralism can serve as the way out from this dead end.

via Regional multilateralism: The next paradigm in global affairs – Global Public Square – CNN.com Blogs.

US cuts UNESCO funding after Palestine admitted, warns of ‘cascade’ effect on other UN bodies – The Washington Post

And so it goes down–Palestine plays the procedural card to get a vote for admission and the US blocks it by taking itself out of the international organization, thus limiting its ability to influence Unesco’s outcomes.

If I didn’t know any better, Obama was Ronald Reagan for Halloween.

The lopsided vote to admit Palestine as a member of UNESCO, which only the United States and 13 other countries opposed, triggered a long-standing congressional ban on U.S. funding to U.N. bodies that recognize Palestine as a state before an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal is reached. The State Department said a $60 million payment to UNESCO scheduled for November would not be made as a result, and U.S. officials warned of a “cascade” effect at other U.N. bodies that might follow UNESCO’s lead.

via US cuts UNESCO funding after Palestine admitted, warns of ‘cascade’ effect on other UN bodies – The Washington Post.

Putin Proposes Setting Up ‘Eurasian Union’ : NPR

A new alliance of nations:

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has proposed forming a “Eurasian Union” of former Soviet nations, saying the bloc could become a major global player competing for influence with the United States, the European Union and Asia.

Putin, who has lamented the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union as the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century,” denied that his proposal represents an attempt to rebuild the Soviet empire.

But he said in an article published Tuesday in the daily Izvestia that the new alliance should emerge as “one of the poles of the modern world, serving as an efficient link between Europe and the dynamic Asia-Pacific region.”

via Putin Proposes Setting Up ‘Eurasian Union’ : NPR.

A New Approach to Multilateralism: Open Government

What is the new Open Government Partnership?

Eight countries (Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Norway, Philippines, South Africa, United Kingdom, United States) have committed to the program and another thirty have been deemed eligible to participate. Interestingly, Russia is currently eligible while China is not. Those countries that participate conduct regular self-assessments and are reviewed as well by outside observers.

via The Multilateralist | FOREIGN POLICY.

 

Open Government from The Academy on Vimeo.

Expectations: The Palestinian Strategy at the UN

What do the Palestinians hope to obtain this coming week at the UN? Daniel Levy of the New American Foundation notes:

Even at this late stage it is unclear exactly which U.N. option, if any, the Palestinian Liberation Organization (for it is the PLO that is still the diplomatic-political address for the Palestinians) will pursue. That should not be such a surprise — opacity is part of any negotiation and last minute decisions are the bread and butter of international diplomacy, in this case compounded by the uncertainty and absence of a clear strategy on the part of the Palestinian leadership. Their U.N. options basically fall into three baskets: do nothing, go for membership at the Security Council, or go for an upgrade at the General Assembly.

via A Palestinian Autumn in New York — What to Expect at the U.N. | NewAmerica.net.

And Robert Danin goes a step further, acknowledging that the Palestinians will gain something–but at what cost and what does this do for the diplomatic process?

Ironically, this effort, if successful, could achieve the very position Palestine could have attained long ago at a much lower price. Phase II of the 2003 Quartet Roadmap for Peace offered the option of creating “an independent Palestinian state with provisional borders” as a stepping stone to a negotiated permanent final-status agreement. The Palestinian leadership long rejected this option, fearing that that establishing a state prior to resolving all outstanding final status issues with Israel would leave them unresolved in perpetuity. Now they have effectively reversed course, hoping for just such an outcome. Only now, the Palestinians are pursuing this goal outside of any international diplomatic effort, rather than within one.

via The UN Vote and Palestinian Statehood | Foreign Affairs.

Keep in mind what a vote in the GA means (and what it doesn’t):

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) is not a legislature. If it passes a resolution, then this does not necessarily change anything in international law or international affairs. This doesn’t mean that its votes are always inconsequential (although many are). The UNGA is the only place where all states formally and publicly state their positions on controversial issues. This can influence other processes, especially if the resolution is supported by many states and the most powerful ones. For example, the UNGA does not have the formal authority to designate statehood. Nevertheless, if a vast majority of states, including most of the powerful ones, vote in favor of a resolution that recognizes Palestine as a state, then other entities are more likely to be persuaded by the claim of statehood than if the resolution would squeak by with a bare majority.

All of this is a long-winded way of saying that it really matters not just whether a UN resolution on Palestinian statehood will pass but how many and which states will vote in favor of it.

via The Palestine Vote: Who Will Vote How? — The Monkey Cage.

David Rothkopf, ever the realist, doesn’t see the strategy as working:

Over the weekend a keen, very experienced observer of the region who has what would be generally viewed as a pronounced a pro-Palestinian tilt to his views called Abbas, “hopelessly incompetent, corrupt and obsessed primarily with where his next dollar is coming from.” As I noted, this was a supporter. He was struggling with why Abbas might seek to take his statehood resolution to the U.N. Security Council where it will certainly be vetoed rather than bring it to the U.N. General Assembly where he is equal assured of a resounding victory when the votes are tallied. Yes, the latter path grants only observer status, but the former grants nothing at all except the chance to give a few more indignant speeches.

My friend speculated on a few reasons. Foolishness was one. A second, not much more charitable, was that he wanted center stage, a last hurrah, that might propel him into his post-political life well. If it did and that also helped the overall cause by getting some supporters on the record and highlighting divisions among the great powers, all the better.  It also might be that he recognizes that actually winning in the General Assembly might then shift the focus to the hollowness of his victory if it comes, as it will, for a nation without borders its most nearest neighbor will agree upon?

via David Rothkopf | FOREIGN POLICY.

Gadhafi Lashes Out during AU Summit | VOA

Let’s just say Gadhafi is not a fan of international orgs:

Libyan leader Colonel Moammar Gadhafi opened the two day summit in the Libyan capital, lashing out at the World Trade Organization and the World Bank, claiming they had done little during their years of existence to help developing countries.He says developing countries are facing debt payments to the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization and he worries that there may be a problem in meeting these obligations.  He stresses that poor countries in the developing world, especially those in Africa, do not profit from the WTO, calling it a tool in the modern version of colonialism.

The Libyan leader went on to call for the abolition of the WTO, urging countries that have joined to withdraw and others not to join.

via VOA | Gadhafi Lashes Out at Organizations at AU Summit | Africa | English.

The Future of Power – Project Syndicate

The scholar behind “soft power” explains that the UN doesn’t really run the world, and it may never get better.  Inside the “universal institution” and the European notion of “variable geometry” of power and global governance:

Some argue that our current global institutions are sufficiently open and adaptable for China to find it in its own interests to become what Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank, once called a “responsible stakeholder.” Others believe that China will wish to impose its own mark and create its own international institutional system as its power increases.

The countries of the European Union have been more willing to experiment with limiting state sovereignty, and they may push for more institutional innovation. But it is unlikely that, barring a disaster like World War II, the world will witness “a constitutional moment” such as it experienced with the creation of the United Nations system of institutions after 1945.

via The Future of Power – Project Syndicate.

New Role Proposed for U.N. in Combating Global Warming – NYTimes.com

With all chances for a binding climate change treaty disappeared into thin air, Yvo de Boer, former undersecretary for climate issues envisions a new framework for UN influence:

“I think it’s ultimately the responsibility of an international regime to set a common metric, to set common standards, perhaps even translate those into guidelines,” he said, adding that that work could lead to establishing common guidelines. The clean energy business would benefit from an “international framework that registers the commitments of countries, but then at the level of activity puts a very solid mechanism in place for reporting monitoring and verification of action.”

Such a structure would “ensure real results are being achieved,” he said.

via New Role Proposed for U.N. in Combating Global Warming – NYTimes.com.

R2P

An important “emerging norm” that has been debated once again this past year is the “responsibility to protect,” a human rights doctrine that appeared in 2001 by representatives of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty and was adopted at a World Summit in 2005.

R2P is a political commitment to protect civilian populations from the most heinous mass atrocity crimes, including genocide, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It identifies three mutually reinforcing levels of protective responsibility, beginning with that of the nation-state in which populations reside.

via The Stanley Foundation.

What is to debate, you might ask?  Why wouldn’t the international community want to protect the defenseless–of which many millions are at risk, in Burma, Kenya, Sudan, and Sri Lanka?  That’s exactly the feeling that drove R2P’s supporters to question where the UN was during the Balkan War or Rwanda.

But the emerging concept faces opposition on both the left and the right (if such a political distinction is even useful in the global talking shop of the General Assembly.)  For example, R2P faces tough opposition from those seeing ulterior uses for the concept:

For D’Escoto and those who agree with him, R2P is code for an attempt by big Western powers to impose their will on the weak. In a contentious “concept note” issued to all U.N. members he declared that “colonialism and interventionism used ‘responsibility to protect’ arguments.” One member of a panel of experts D’Escoto convened to launch the debate, U.S. academic Noam Chomsky, said R2P-type arguments had been used to justify Japan’s 1931 invasion of Manchuria and Nazi Germany’s pre-World War Two move into Czechoslovakia.

via Saviors or conquerors? UN mulls “responsibility to protect” | Analysis & Opinion

But sovereignty for others is a concept in direct opposition to R2P and a tough one to replace–for every single country from Cuba to the United States.  Implementation is a long way off–and this new effort to redefine what the UN Charter actually means may never fully work–but it demonstrates the interest that drives activists, states, and scholars to find a way to avoid future holocausts and “Hotel Rwandas“.

Bottom Line on MDGs?

Its grading time for a major United Nations effort to benchmark key global development indicators.  How are they doing?  First, a little background on two key players:  The Secretary General and the General Assembly.

The renowned development economist, Jeffrey Sachs, claims they are successful, giving what sounds to me like an “A”–in spite of missing stated goals:

As 140 heads of state and government gather Monday at the United Nations for the Millennium Development Goals summit, they and the public will ask what has come out of this decade-long effort.

The answer will surprise them: A great deal has been achieved, with some of the most exciting breakthroughs occurring in Africa.

via I.H.T. Op-Ed Contributor – Millennium Goals, Five Years to Go – NYTimes.com.

But few share such optimism.  This creates an interesting challenge–how to energize discussion about goals that haven’t really been met–and as some argue, have not been taken seriously.  (Think classes that you audited v. those taken for credit.  How much homework did you do on the former as compared to the latter?)

Some lament the absence of a real action plan. Others fault the richest governments, and the Obama administration in particular, for what they say is mere lip service to the goals without spending the money needed. But perhaps most salient of all is a simple question, one that boils down to accountability.

“If we miss the goals, who is going to punish us?” asked Esther Duflo, a development expert at M.I.T. “Nobody is going to come from Mars and say, ‘You didn’t reach the goals, so we will invade’ — there is no onus.”

via Questions About U.N.’s Poverty Goals – NYTimes.com.

Bono weighs in, as he clearly must–with suggestions for improving stuff:

Find what works and then expand on it. Will mechanisms like the Global Fund get the resources to do the job?

via Op-Ed Guest Columnist – How the Millennium Development Goals can live up to their promise. – NYTimes.com.

For a different view–here is a multimedia project created by University of Miami students to help give the MDG’s a human face–and to better understand what we’re talking about in this case.