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The UN Security Council has primary responsibility for maintaining international peace and security. It has historically unmatched powers to enforce decisions binding on all UN members. Over time, the Security Council has addressed health and development issues like AIDS that affect international security. However, its permanent members and decision making structure are seen by some as no longer representative and in need of reform.

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31 views1 page

Subtitle

The UN Security Council has primary responsibility for maintaining international peace and security. It has historically unmatched powers to enforce decisions binding on all UN members. Over time, the Security Council has addressed health and development issues like AIDS that affect international security. However, its permanent members and decision making structure are seen by some as no longer representative and in need of reform.

Uploaded by

Tawfiq BA ABBAD
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as TXT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Let's now take a look at the Security Council.

The UN Security Council has primary


responsibility within the UN system for maintaining international peace and
security, and has the authority to act on behalf of all members of the UN. Its
composition, function, powers, procedures are set out in chapter five of the
charter. Elaborated and clarified in chapters six and seven as I mentioned on
settling disputes peacefully and its powers are really unique within the UN system.
Article 25, says that all members agree to accept and carry out its decisions,
binding. Article 49 says that they have to provide assistance in implementing the
Security Council's decisions, thus irrespective of whether they agree with the
decisions or were members of the Security Council at the time of the decisions, all
UN member states are legally obligated to comply with them. Commentators, academics
have observed that these rules endow the Security Council with historically
unmatched powers of collective political and military enforcement. By a wide
margin, the Security Council has the most authoritative and complete grant of
enforcement powers ever made in the history of state sovereignty. No other
international organization has anything like the power of the Security Council to
centralize and dominate policy making on any topic. Let alone a topic as important
as armed conflict and the maintenance of peace and security in the face of military
force. Interestingly, over time, even the Security Council has in a way expanded
its mandate beyond the maintenance of international peace and security. Soon after
I joined UNAIDS back in 1998, at the beginning of the next decade, the Security
Council for the first time in its history put on its agenda a development issue, a
health issue. And that was the AIDS epidemic. And they put this on their agenda in
a way because they considered that the AIDS epidemic at the time with for example,
a quarter of the adult population of the most affected countries in Africa, a
quarter of the adult population living with this potentially fatal virus. They
considered this an issue rising to the level of collective security but it was the
first time that the Security Council had ever put a health issue on its agenda. A
development issue on its agenda. Given the broad and deep power of the Security
Council, it may seem paradoxical that its membership is so small compared to the
overall size of the UN membership. Article 23 specifies that the UN Security
Council shall have 15 members with a well-known five permanent members of the
Council. China, France, Russia, the UK and the United States having a veto power.
The remaining 10 members are elected for two year terms. And while any one of the
permanent members may stop an action, can cast a veto decision. It takes
affirmative vote of nine members to pass a resolution or decision. Thus it needs
four of the non-permanent members to agree along with all five permanent members. I
should say here that the non-permanent members of the Security Council are elected,
are apportioned by their regional blocs. You will have seen in the media much
discussion of appeals to reform the composition of the UN Security Council. And I
leave it to you to form your own view of whether and if so, how the UN Security
Council needs to reform itself. Suffice to say that highly populous countries,
other high income countries, members of the BRICs bloc of countries. Japan,
Nigeria, a number of other countries believe that they too should be members of the
UN Security Council. And, the General Assembly indeed has a committee called the
"Open-ended Working Group on Security Council Reform." But open ended it is, since
the permanent members cannot be removed, changed or added without using a formal
process for amending the charter which has so far prevented any progress in UN
Security Council reform. In short, it's the United Nations General Assembly, with
its one state, one vote and majority rule that is perhaps the most democratic organ
in the United Nations but has less authority as we've said than the council. It's
the Security Council arguably undemocratic, but with clear authority to impose its
obligations on all member states.

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