The United Nations
The United Nations (UN) was set up in 1945 after the Second World War, as a way of bringing countries together and avoiding war. Representatives from each member country meet at the General Assembly - the closest thing to a world parliament. It is a democratic system, with each member country having one vote. Decisions that are voted for become resolutions. These are not law, but countries tend to follow them because they represent world opinion on major issues. The head of the UN is called the Secretary-General. At the moment it is Kofi Annan from Ghana, who came to the position in 1997.
The UN Security Council is a sub-group which is very exclusive. It includes only 15 members, of whom five have permanent status and the others rotate. These five (UK, USA, Russia, France, China) got permanent status because they were important in 1945, when the UN was founded. Each of the five permanent members can stop the UN from making decisions they may not agree with. This is called the power of veto. Part of the reason why they can retain this power is because these five members between them pay for nearly half the cost of the UN.
The UN started with 50 nations, but now has 191 members. It deals with peace and human rights, food security, world health, child welfare, labour laws, environmental protection, and scientific, cultural and educational development. There are an array of agencies and departments within the UN. These are a few of the well-known agencies:
- ILO - International Labour Organisation
- WHO - World Health Organisation
- FAO - Food and Agriculture Organisation
- UNICEF - UN Children's Fund)
- UNEP - UN Environment Programme
- UNDP - UN Development Programme
The WTO, World Bank and IMF are also part of the UN, but they are considered fully independent.
The UN has made some huge achievements over its lifetime e.g. on peacekeeping (more than 170 resolutions of regional conflicts), supervising elections (in more than 45 troubled countries), development (UNDP supports around 5000 development projects), and children (UNICEF spends $800 million on immunisations and other healthcare each year).
However the UN still seems unable to keep up with worldwide poverty and conflict. One problem is that it lacks sufficient finance. It also lacks the ability to enforce its agreements and manage rogue nations (especially in comparison to the powerful trade sanctions of the WTO and the conditionalities of the World Bank and IMF). A large part of the problem is America, which has refused to sign up to dozens of human rights and social development treaties, and violates other agreements it has signed up to. The USA is so powerful that it can undermine the whole UN system by refusing to co-operate.