Multilateralism and the Superpower.

• Author: Greenstock, Jeremy

Title: Multilateralism and the Superpower

Author:Jeremy Greenstock

Text:

Editor's note: The author served as UK Ambassador to the UN 1998-2003.

The UN with its network of institutions and agencies is the only truly global organisation. It is a great experiment, not in global governance, because the political direction of the UN lies firmly in the hands of sovereign nations, but in providing both norms and tools for managing the international arena 1. Its system is flawed and may well be unimprovable. But what it tries to do, and does, is indispensable for the avoidance of catastrophic war and for the development of a sustainable world.

The UN as an institution is also, not unlike the American Constitution, an adversary of raw power. Born in an era of war and empire, its charter and principles provide shelter and help for weaker nations, and set limitations on the capacity of the strongest countries to throw their weight around selfishly--the generator of empires and wars. It came into being at the instigation of the great powers, and so they know--or they used to know--what they were creating and why. The United States was at the centre of it, seeing it as a great step towards the ending of the era of imperialism.

The UN is not just about what happens in the Security Council. The work of the Secretariat, the funds, agencies and programmes, and indeed of several of the intergovernmental institutions such as ECOSOC, is primarily dedicated to every aspect of international development. They act on the premise that if a large part of the world is racked by poverty and disease, the more fortunate part will not have a stable environment in which to enjoy their relative success. The history of regional conflict over the last 75 years bears this out. As the UK's Permanent Representative between 1998 and 2003, with a permanent place on the Security Council, I made a point of setting my inevitable focus on the Council's work in the context of this wider UN purpose. The maintenance of international peace and security is an essential component of sustainable development, not just an end in itself.

Evaluating the US Presence at the UN

In observing and cooperating with the US presence in New York, I quickly came to the conclusion that it was too often overtly national in its approach, not least in setting its work in the Security Council as its top priority. This is not a surprising characteristic of a superpower, which has to be concerned both with exercising its own power and with constraining that of others. Yet I could not help thinking that a truly powerful entity does better to avoid displaying the full extent of its potential, because that invites resistance and competition.

The United Kingdom took a different approach. It had to, since it did not possess any comparable reserves of power. I saw the UK as needing to earn its position as a Permanent Member with every action it took at the UN, given both the general unpopularity of permanent membership and the fact that, if based on end-20th century qualifications, the UK would find it hard to feature in such a special list. The British presence in New York needed to be seen as contributing consistently and materially to the solving of shared problems, not as a vehicle merely for the advancement of UK interests. This...