Legitimacy comes from the ballot box, nowhere else
Published on February 10, 2004 By O G San In International
Around this time last year the United Nations was very much in vogue. So long ignored and sidelined, the UN was, for a brief period at least, at the centre of global politics as the Security Council debated the pros and cons of war with Iraq. The anti-war lobby argued that UN support for any conflict was essential and, since this was not forthcoming, war was illegitimate. The pro-war camp said it already had UN backing. When it became clear that this was untrue they argued that they had never needed it in the first place.

But what does UN support actually mean? According to some, a majority in the General Assembly is enough to legitimate any course of action. This hardly seems fair since votes are not weighted to take account of population size. India, with one billion people, has one vote just like Kuwait which has only one million citizens. Others have argued that real legitimacy comes from the resolutions of the Security Council. In reality though this body is little more than a cabal where the “big five” can veto any measure they don’t like. “Bigness” in this context means having been on the winning side of a war which ended nearly sixty years ago.

Nevertheless, if for the sake of argument we overlook the shortcomings of the UN’s internal mechanisms, I still believe that its claim to be the sole arbiter of “legitimacy” is false. For once I find myself in the same boat as Richard Perle. During the Iraq war, the arch-unilateralist wrote newspaper articles welcoming the imminent demise of the UN following its decision not to back Bush’s adventurism. For him, America was right and it didn’t matter what the UN thought. For me, America was wrong and it didn’t matter what the UN thought.

In recent years the UN has been elevated by the left to a position of unchallengeable moral authority on global affairs. It’s my belief that the UN simply doesn’t deserve this kind of respect. What is the UN? It’s a collection of nation-states. We are supposed to believe that the same nation-states which we on the left rail against as unjust and inhumane suddenly become beacons of nobility when they get together in New York. This is simply untrue.

A club is only as good as its members. Here’s just a small sample of the barbaric regimes which have warmed seats at the General Assembly: Stalin’s USSR, Mao’s China, the Shah’s Iran, Pinochet’s Chile, Amin’s Uganda. Pol Pot’s regime was represented at the UN for years AFTER it was overthrown. There’s no human rights “entrance exam” to get in. All a government needs in order to gain entry is to be recognised by enough other governments.

This leads on to the second major shortcoming of the current international system. The UN is based on an old-fashioned 19th century model of sovereignty. With the exception of the Palestinians, people who aren’t fortunate enough to have their own state go unheard. Some voices you won’t hear at the UN: the Basques, the Kurds, the Aboriginals, the Scots. This isn’t really the UN’s fault. After all it’s designed to be a mirror of the world – and what an ugly reflection it is.

All this is not to deny the many good things that the UN does. Agencies such as UNESCO and the UNHCR perform valuable work all over the world. The UN did a fine job in overseeing East Timor’s transition to democracy. The world would be a poorer place without the UN but that doesn’t mean that the organisation has any special claim to international legitimacy on matters of war and peace. It would be wrong to throw the baby out with the bathwater. What is needed therefore is a new organisation which would co-exist with the UN at first but would eventually usurp the blue helmet boys.

A new body, a “League of Democracy” if you will, needs to be established. It would be like the UN except membership would only be open to those who uphold democracy. Entrance requirements would include respect for human rights, free and fair elections, the right to protest and join a trade union, freedom of speech and religion, a free press and an independent judiciary.

Of course there would have to be some leeway in these requirements or else Sweden would be the only member. Such an organisation would encourage reform in authoritarian societies across the world. States on the road to democracy could be rewarded with observer status as an encouragement to keep going. By expelling countries which no longer make the grade, it would discourage states such as Zimbabwe from going backwards towards tyranny. It’s virtually impossible to get thrown out of the UN even if, like Israel, you constantly flout the organisation’s own rules.

I’m not proposing anything new here. Some international organisations already operate a good governance door policy. You can’t get into the European Union if you’ve got a few gulags tucked away or a nasty habit of whacking your political opponents. By insisting that aspiring members respect human rights, the EU has encouraged fairness and justice in the former communist states of Central and Eastern Europe. The alternative, to throw open the doors to all comers, is the equivalent of saying: “Sure, come on in. What’s a little ethnic cleansing between friends?”

An organisation based on justice rather than territory could also include the elected representatives of stateless nations. Membership of the League of Democracy may well dampen separatist tensions in many countries. There would be no need to secede in order to get your seat at the big table.

As I’ve said, in the highly unlikely event of this coming to pass, the two bodies would co-exist for a time. Eventually though enough members, money and power would flow to the new body and make the old one obsolete. Remaining holdouts would then face the prospect of either reform or isolation.

In the words of John Lennon “you may say that I’m a dreamer”. Maybe I am being too optimistic about our ability to recast the world as a fairer place. Then again, maybe I’m not. Twenty years ago most of Eastern Europe, Latin America and East Asia were ruled by dictators. Today most states in these regions are democratic though of course not without their shortcomings. Forming a League of Democracy could provide the impetus to encourage positive change in the remaining swamps of tyranny: the Middle East, Africa and China.

Comments
on Feb 10, 2004
YES!!!! The world MUST be a democracy! because that's the way we say it should be!

Guess what buddy you're right....the UN is only as good as it's members. How good of a member is the USA?
on Feb 10, 2004
I knew this issue of so-called "western imperialism" would come up if I dared to point out that many regimes on this planet are authoritarian. I never said the world "must" be democratic, I said that we should have an international body which rewards democratic behaviour and punishes undemocratic behaviour.

We should be striving for a better and more just world rather than simply accepting injustice. Democracy is not a perfect system but it's vastly superior to any other. If you disagree with this statement, perhaps you could cite empirical evidence.

As for the US, I think I've made my views clear on American foreign policy abundantly clear in the past. I don't like US foreign policy and one of the main reasons I don't like it is because the US backs many of these undemocratic regines I'm talking about.
on Feb 10, 2004
I forget who said it, or what the exact wording was, but someone once said that Democracies were terrible forms of government, they're just better than anything else.

Cheers
on Feb 10, 2004
Winston Churchill.
on Feb 10, 2004
I don't like the idea of reducing membership to only those countries which meet certain ideals. One of the important aspects of the UN is that almost every country is a member and has a voice. This means that there is a forum where conversation can occur irrespective of the hate or disagreement between those countries.

I totally agree with the concept that cultures should also have some form of representation, and accept that the whole security council and voting may need changing, but lets rebuild the general assembly and not start a new organisation.

As for entrance criteria, why not just form political parties within the general assembly. No reason why you couldn't and it's effectively what already happens with countries banding together.

Paul.
on Feb 10, 2004
Thanks Brad
on Feb 10, 2004
But my point is that you don't have to kick anyone out of the UN. Instead a new body, based on democratic idelas, could be formed ALONGSIDE the UN. As time went on, membership of the new body would increase and the UN would gradually wither away. Nobody would be excluded unless they excluded themselves.
on Feb 11, 2004

Not a bad idea really.

I totally agree with the general concept.  This deserves more discussion actually I think.

What are we really talking about? Sovereignty. Right now we treat all states the same. I would say that a state in which its government is elected and represented by the people deserves greater respect for its sovereignty than some thug whose violent henchmen take over the country.

One reason why I've never really understood why Saddam should be given such the benefit of the doubt. He was just a petty thug that took over the reigns of power. He wasn't elected by anyone.

on Feb 11, 2004
Perhaps we're trying ot get to the same end through different means - or am I being pathetically naive? I'm certainly against the US, or anyone else, imposing their will on weaker states through the use of force. However using financial and diplomatic pressure to try to persuade states like China, Burma, Zimbabwe, Syria, Saudi Arabia etc to start treating their citizens like human beings would be very welcome. That's why I think we should have an international body which encourages and recognises governments based on the will of the people.

Certainly I agree that elected governments deserve more respect, that's why the left gets so angry about the US trying to destabilise the Chavez government in Venezuala.
on Feb 11, 2004
Don't get me wrong, I totally agree with the concept of a morally superior body made up of those countries who have earned their place. How they earn their place is open to debate. Representating their people through free elections is well and good, but is it the only way and who determines if the elections were really free. What about countries with different voting rights? What if the US granted the right to vote only to those who paid tax? What if Eqypt only allowed men over the age of 30 to vote?

I worry that such a formal UN body would end up being divisive. I have no problems with members of the UN banding together into economic and diplomatic forces based on their ideals, just don't want countries to be excluded from the general assembly. Every country should have a voice. Others may choose to ignore that voice based on their knowledge of that country, but every country should still have that voice.

The statement of

Nobody would be excluded unless they excluded themselves


is a lovely concept, but in reality if people could be excluded then other countries would find a reason to exclude them. Countries then which should be excluded would be hard to exclude without total agreement. Look at the commonweath problems with zimbabwe. Rules are very clear but politics always gets in the way.

Paul.
on Feb 11, 2004
just don't want countries to be excluded from the general assembly. Every country should have a voice

Again, nobody is going to be excluded from the general assembly of the UN, I'm talking about a new organisation. What would happen would be that the general assembly would become less relevant as time goes by.

Of course, as I said in my article, there would be problems deciding who should and shouldn't be a member but these problems are manageable.

As for the Commonwealth, they have no human rights entry requiremnets. Occassionally a regime's human rights abuses are so horrible/well-reported that other Commonwealth members feel the need to act eg apartheid South Africa, Mugabe's Zimbabwe. However, to the best of my knowledge, this system is very much ad hoc.
on Feb 11, 2004
"just don't want countries to be excluded from the general assembly. Every country should have a voice" - sorry this part of my last post should've been in quotes.