Balancing bureaucracy and the individual: institutional reform and peace operations.

• Author: Picco, Giandomenico
• Position: Toward the Future

"We need to encourage the role of `commandos'--not in a military sense, but in the civil realm. We need a small group of individuals who can operate within institutions but also take personal responsibility for their actions and decisions."

Modern institutions, both national and international, have by and large achieved their central goal: to keep the irrationality of the individual (namely the sovereign) outside the decisionmaking process. The collective decisionmaking process that has evolved is thoroughly internalized in our daily lives. Although it may seem provocative, I have started to wonder whether this success has caused even greater problems, especially in the United Nations. By emphasizing the collective to the detriment of the individual, the institution has become a shield for individual accountability and has forgotten the importance of individual genius and initiative. A new theory of institutions, which combines the strength of their structures with the genius of individuals, should be developed.

KEEPING THE WHIMS OF KINGS AT BAY ...

Collective decisionmaking processes symbolize the success of modern institutions. No longer does the whim of the king rule the land. Instead, the rationality of collective decisions prevails. Bureaucracies developed these rational models in an effort to create a more effective and efficient process, with the implicit and logical assumption that a collective decision was more likely to be rational than an individual decision. And of course, the principles of fairness and justice followed rationality.

These processes are now part and parcel of our daily lives, and the system of checks and balances, which varies from institution to institution, has become a requirement of most societies. All institutions and individuals are forced to operate within the confines of a bureaucracy. As a result, institutions and institutional structures--which transform collective decisions into actions--are stronger and more powerful than any individual. The irrationality of the individual has been, so to speak, outlawed. And collective decisionmaking is par excellence a demonstration of democracy and successful social evolution.

... HAS BACKFIRED?

We have become so used to collective decisions that we often attribute to them the ability to decide, to choose and to judge, and we have started to believe that responsibility is also collective. In my opinion, most institutional problems stem from these erroneous assumptions. The dependence on collective accountability may well be the indication that institutions are too successful, that they have become convenient scapegoats for individuals.

Bureaucracies often pride themselves on the fact that their officers are anonymous: they take satisfaction in the humility of not being identified. So, it has become a virtue for a bureaucrat to hide his individuality behind the institution itself. That is fine indeed. But bureaucrats often feel that just as recognition should go only to the institution, blame also should be attributed only to the institution. Does that imply that the institution alone is responsible?

Institutions do not have brains, but the individuals who make up the institutions do. Institutions do not cast votes and debate their opinions, but individuals do.

The United Nations is no exception. The secretary-general, commenting on the unfolding tragedy in the Balkans in the mid-1990s, complained that it was not his fault, but that of the institution. However, the secretary-general is a part of and presides over that...