Warts and all, the U.N. has purpose

Like the humans who compose them, no institution is without flaws. In both cases, we can only hope that, on balance, the good outweighs the rest.

For the better part of its 78 years and by most accounts, that’s been true of the United Nations. How so for such a behemoth of complexity and controversy? Because compared with the centuries before it was formed on the heels of WWII, the world has enjoyed the U.N.’s primary objective of relative peace — a fact we have become so used to, we tend to forget what that means. No world wars (fewer wars in general) means increased personal safety, economic growth both within nations and between them, greater development and more opportunity for more people.

All of that equates to stability, and a stable world benefits everyone. Even if all you look at is money, consider Ukraine, whose invasion by Russia has caused supply chain problems for the U.S. and others.

While the organization Presidents Biden and Zelensky spoke to last week does good, both also acknowledged that it needs to change. Trying to agree on simply identifying the issues, let alone coordinate action, among 193 nations is like trying to get consensus in today’s Congress. Almost Sisyphean.

Still, the effort has to be made. When it wasn’t, two world wars and endless skirmishes made life intolerable. Poverty and starvation were far more widespread and intense than they are today, which contributed to global instability both political and economic.

The second secretary general Dag Hammarskjöld put it best when he said the U.N. “was created not to lead mankind to heaven but to save humanity from hell.”

Exactly how big a part the U.N. plays in holding Armageddon at bay has divided historians, but few doubt that since it was set up in 1945 its agencies have been largely responsible for saving millions, especially children, from other kinds of hell. Rampant poverty and starvation rates plummeted, as did children’s mortality and serious illnesses.

“In 1950, 70% of the world’s population lived in absolute poverty. Because of the absence of major war, today that number is under 10%. People need to understand the relationship between these (U.N. organizational) rules and the benefits they enjoy,” said John Herbst, former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, in a CNN interview.

Of course, its member-states and the organization itself have changed a lot since then, and certain criticisms are well earned.

At times, the U.N. has acted as life-saving peacekeeper in volatile settings, and at others, it stood by as genocide raged. Bureaucracy, accusations of corruption, and the undemocratic veto power of its five permanent members (U.S., Russia, China, France, U.K.), not to mention its massive budget, understandably infuriate. Its outdated structure is poorly adapted to this modern world. It has undemocratic features, even as it acts as an equalizer with a one-nation-one-vote assembly. It’s as inconsistent as national politics and possibly the most inefficient international organization.

It needs work, a lot of work. The lack of faith in its current iteration is justifiable.

Yet despite it all, on-the-ground volunteers and former staff who’ve seen the lives, circumstances and communities it’s changed say if the U.N. didn’t exist, we’d have to invent it. From neighborhood associations to boardrooms and legislatures, humans must meet to find ways to get along for mutual benefit, or we risk mutual destruction.

Without a ready international forum and some agreed-upon rules of basic behavior, aggressive, unprovoked invasions such as what Ukraine yet endures would be all-too common, as it once was in this world. Without such a forum, we couldn’t solve cross-border problems such as immigration or climate change and their causes (poverty, pollution, war, economic conditions).

If anything, we need that more than we did in 1950, because the world is far more interdependent today. From weather to jobs and food, almost no human essential is untouched by hands across the globe.

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Sholeh Patrick is a columnist for the Hagadone News Network with degrees in international relations and law. Email sholeh@cdapress.com.