Of all the structures within the UN system, none is a bigger or more frustrating target for UN reformers than the Security Council. Still ruled fifty years later by the victors of the Second World War, the UN's most powerful decision-making body is also its most prominent anachronism. Few still argue that the Council, in which Africa, Latin America and the Islamic World have no permanent voice, can genuinely speak for the international community. And a more proactive Council, released from its Cold War paralysis, has merely served to heighten the impression that it represents a small group of privileged nations rather than the world at large. That little has changed over the past half-century is testimony to the durability of a structure in which those who benefit most from the status quo also hold the keys to its transformation.
In Ottawa, the National Capital Region Branch of the United Nations Association-Canada launched a new phase of its UN Reform Project with a roundtable discussion on Security Council reform.* The discussion was chaired by Greg Wirick of the Parliamentary Centre for Foreign Affairs. Panelists attempted to untangle some of the more complicated loops in the Security Council reform knot, from expanding membership to reforming the veto to making the Council's work more open and transparent. David Malone, Canada's former Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, opened by saying that while there may be broad consensus among the world's governments in favour of Security Council reform, there is almost no consensus on the details. The vigour with which a particular state pursues reform, he added, also depends largely on whether or not that state happens to be one of the Council's five permanent members. "The current system suits the Permanent Five fairly well," he said. "Virtually any form of change will suit them less."
Expanding The Council - Who's In, Who's Out
The question of who would get a seat on an expanded Security Council, and with what powers, remains wide-open. In the absence of a clear set of objective criteria for Security Council membership, jockeying at the UN for any new seats, permanent or non-permanent, will be fierce. "The obvious truth," said Malone, "is that every country looks to its own advantage when it comes to reform of the composition of the Council, and countries want to be on the Council as often as possible and will assess any proposal for change relative to their own prospects of getting on more often..."
On the basis of sheer economic clout, Germany and Japan are frequently cited as potential new permanent members. Their inclusion, however, would worsen the North-South power imbalance within the Council. Some have suggested a single permanent seat for the European Union as a means of lessening this imbalance, an option which excites neither France nor Britain. Both countries see their permanent seats as vitally important to their national interest, said John Trent of the University of Ottawa, and giving up their seats would mean giving up their claims to great power status.
A further problem is that while a number of developing countries consider themselves natural candidates for permanent membership, among them India, Brazil, and Nigeria, most have neighbors who would be less than thrilled at the prospect. It is difficult, for example, to imagine Pakistan quietly accepting permanent Indian membership.
Given the stakes involved in adding new permanent members, many middle powers oppose this reform route entirely. Italy, for example, has put forward a proposal which would create no new permanent members, but rather a new class of rotating seats, to which some 20 or 30 states - those making significant contributions to the UN's peace and security functions and to the other purposes of the Organization - would have access. Whatever its merits, the Italian proposal has captured people's attention. "Even if we don't like the specifics of the Italian proposal," said Malone, "they have put a very energetic cat amongst the pigeons."
The Italian proposal has a certain appeal for the Permanent Five, whose privileges would remain intact, as well as for middle powers such as Canada. Whether the new class of seats is divvied up on the basis of geography or of overall contributions to the UN system, Malone said, "it's very hard to imagine 25 countries of the world being selected for rotating seats and Canada not getting one." On the other hand, foreign affairs journalist Dave Todd, formerly of Southam News, wondered about the Canadian government's level of comfort with a formula whereby, should Quebec separate, "some years down the track, Quebec could be a member of the Security Council and Canada would be on the back-benches, somewhere in the General Assembly."
Assuming sheer economic size and weight within regions as the lowest common denominator for judging potential new members, obvious candidates under some sort of semi-permanent arrangement quickly emerge. In Asia for example, Pakistan, India, and Indonesia are major regional powers, as are Nigeria, South Africa or Egypt in Africa. Under more detailed criteria such as human rights or economic development, on the other hand, many of these same countries might disqualify themselves.
Malone, however, used the example of Nigeria as evidence that the Council is not necessarily off-limits to states with less than squeaky-clean records. "Nigeria was elected at the time that it was already under a very reprehensible military government that's only grown worse since then," he said. "Still, the member states considered that having a major country in Africa on the Council was more important than having some microstate from Africa that wasn't going to be able to do anything about peace and security."
John Sigler of Carleton University took this argument one step further, noting that membership on the Security Council might even persuade certain states to behave more responsibly. "Had Iraq been on the Security Council in 1990," he argued, "they would never have invaded Kuwait."
An argument can also be made that adding a new level of Security Council membership would leave smaller states with more access to existing non-permanent seats, although Malone noted that so far, smaller states "have seemed remarkably impervious to this argument." Many of these smaller states, such as New Zealand, favour the creation of new non-permanent seats for which every state could compete on an equal basis.
Not surprisingly, debate at the UN on the issue of composition is currently deadlocked. Malone noted that while "everyone has their favourite scheme for reform of the composition of the Council... their second best is the status quo." Ironically, he added, if there was a genuine consensus on reform, the Permanent Five would probably not stand in the way. However, in the absence of consensus, the P-5 is quite content with the status quo, and the prospects of the issue being resolved during the UN's 50th Anniversary are increasingly slim.
The real problem, said Trent, is that the international community is currently "stuck between Westphalia and globalization," moving towards an integrated international system without having quite left the era of great power politics. As a result, he noted, "everything that seems reasonable and rational for reforming. . . the membership at the present time is hard to come by."
Taming the Veto
Inextricably linked to the question of Security Council composition is the question of the veto. Any expansion of the Council will have to address the issue of who has, and who should have, a veto over Security Council decisions.
UNA-Canada Communications Officer Tim Donais opened the discussion with a comparison of veto use before and after the Cold War. Until 1990, the US and the Soviet Union combined to cast a total of 279 vetoes. In the last five years, the veto has been used only twice, with the result that the Security Council has passed almost half as many resolutions in the past five years as it did in its first 45 years. Despite this, said Donais, "the veto is still with us. It's kind of like having a poisonous snake locked in your bathroom -- it's not doing any damage for the moment but no one is quite sure what to do with it."
Donais reviewed the veto-specific recommendations of a number of recent UN reform studies. Groups such as the Commission on Global Governance and the Canadian Committee for the Fiftieth Anniversary of the UN argue strongly that new members should be denied the veto. And, since no one expects the Permanent Five will abandon their vetoes any time soon, a number of proposals have been suggested for diluting those vetoes. The Canadian Committee report, Canadian Priorities for UN Reform, raises the possibility of requiring a double- or triple-veto to defeat a resolution, and also suggests limiting the kinds of issues over which a veto can be exercised. At a minimum, it argues, the P-5 should not be able to veto Charter amendments or the appointment of the Secretary-General. A recent report by the Ford Foundation also proposes veto restrictions, arguing that vetoes should only be allowed on peace-keeping and enforcement measures.
The Commission on Global Governance envisions a two-phase reform process. Initially, as new, non-veto holding members are added, the P-5 would agree to forego the use of the veto, as has been the practice for much of the past five years. In the second phase, the Permanent Five, having become accustomed to life without the veto, would be willing to let it die.
One very real problem, as Dave Todd pointed out, is that those who hold a veto can block any attempts to limit or curtail its use. And despite its decline in recent years, the veto has been a sturdy pillar in the foreign policies of the Permanent Five. John Sigler noted that American use of the veto has traditionally been tied to Israel, with the US vetoing anything critical of Israel at the Security Council. Encouraging the major powers to give up such a powerful, if blunt, foreign policy tool would not be easy.
Malone warned against reading too much into the infrequent use of the veto in recent years. "I think we were going through a very unusual period of history in the last three or four years, where the Russian Federation, and the USSR before it, was trying desperately to find common ground with Western capitals," he said. "I wonder if we are not going to see a more confrontational atmosphere in the Council in the next few years than we have in the last few, making the veto a bit more newsworthy, once again." As for potential new Security Council members, Malone said attitudes towards the veto vary. Germany, for example, wants the veto, not wanting to be a second-class permanent member, although it has suggested it would never use the veto in isolation. Others seem willing to be more flexible in order to win a permanent seat for themselves.
Making the Security Council More Transparent and Effective
Some progress has already been made towards making the work of the Security Council more transparent. Under pressure from those nations who provide many of the UN's peace-keepers (such as Canada, Sweden, and Australia), the Council has gone from being "incredibly hermetic" to being somewhat more open. For example, the Council now publishes an agenda in advance of its meetings, allowing non-members to lobby on specific issues. Direct meetings are now being held between the President of the Security Council and troop contributing countries, allowing the latter to convey their opinions directly to the Council. So while useful reforms are being made, said Malone, "the only problem is that they are not institutionalized yet and they are at the mercy and will of the Council at any given time, and in particular, of any particular Council President."
Another transparency issue involves the relationship between the Security Council and the Secretariat. "The more one works alongside the Council," said Malone, "the more one realizes that the reports that the Secretary-General sends to the Council often represent the most he thinks the traffic will bear, not the best advice he could give them. The best advice is often proffered in private or not at all. The rest of us, including the media, just don't hear what the Secretariat actually thinks on some issues."
Maureen O'Neil of the Institute on Governance argued that some trade-offs between transparency and efficiency may be inevitable, and that effective decision-making may make it necessary that not everyone knows everything. Malone, however, expressed concern that the pendulum has swung too far. "I do worry about the Secretary-General's recommendations being overly shaded by what the US is willing to live with, or with what, in the case of Georgia, Russia is willing to live with." Over the long term, he added, everyone is probably better off if the best Secretariat advice is offered publicly in the first place, even if this may initially elicit a negative result from the powers on the Security Council.
This issue is further complicated by the relationship between the Secretary-General and the Security Council. Past Secretaries-General, said Malone, learned very quickly the need to cater to American clout on the Council. And while Boutros Boutros-Ghali has been very courageous, and has stood up to powerful Council members more frequently than his predecessors, "it still doesn't work very well." The fact that the Permanent Five hold a veto over the selection of the Secretary-General, he added, contributes to the often awkward relationship between the two.
A final transparency issue concerns the flow of information from the Council to the General Assembly, much of which, said Dave Todd, is not particularly useful. He argued that the credibility of the UN as a whole would be enhanced if the relationship between the Council and the Assembly were more equitable.
Parallel and Complementary Institutions
Faced with a number of seemingly impenetrable obstacles to Security Council reform, how much energy should states reasonably expend smashing their heads against this particular brick wall? Given the limited staff resources of a country like Canada, Maureen O'Neil wondered, "how much time, how many diplomats should be spent on coming up with more schemes? Or, if we are really concerned about world security, should we be moving our eggs out of that basket into something else?"
Fergus Watt, Executive Director of the World Federalists of Canada, offered some suggestions as to other reform paths Canada could pursue. The reform issue being presently considered at the UN refers primarily to representation on the Security Council and does not include consideration of the Security Council's functions and powers. "If you don't like the game and you're not winning the game," he said, "change the game and broaden the question to other peace and security issues. Maybe there are other ways."
Watt went on to offer "a laundry list" of other parts of the UN system where reform might have a bearing on the work of the Security Council. For example, bringing the various players of civil society, including business, NGOs, and the media, into a closer working relationship with the UN might lead to some useful public scrutiny of the Security Council. The Canadian news media are particularly weak on the ground in New York, having very few UN-based journalists and reporters available to inform Canadians and to provide regular commentary on UN issues. UNA-Canada Executive Director Angus Archer also noted the importance of democratizing and popularizing the work of the Council through the involvement of civil society, and raised the possibility of a mechanism through which the Security Council could organize hearings with interested civil society parties. Watt also suggested that a UN Parliamentary Assembly, while it would probably not initially have a great deal of contact with the Council, might be effective in making the work of the Council better known.
Several suggestions also emerged as to how the Secretary-General, already a major player in peace and security issues, could play an expanded role. Watt suggested that the Secretary-General could make greater use of Article 99 of the Charter, which allows him to bring matters to the attention of the Security Council. John Sigler also noted the important and growing role of the Secretary-General in preventive diplomacy. He used the example of Giandomenico Picco, a former UN Assistant Secretary-General who was instrumental in ending the Lebanese hostage crisis of several years ago. When he first arrived on the scene, said Sigler, Picco was asked by the Lebanese who he represented. "If he said he represented the Security Council, they were going to shoot him," he said. "He said he represented the Secretary-General and they were prepared to deal."
Sigler added that Canada has made a major contribution to the Secretary-General's preventive diplomacy efforts. A number of senior Canadian diplomats, with very little publicity, have engaged in preventive diplomacy work in recent years. And in his speech to the General Assembly last year, Foreign Affairs Minister Andre Ouellet pledged to provide the Secretary-General with a list of qualified Canadians available to undertake this work.
Watt also pointed to a number of proposals for structural changes that might affect the work of the Security Council. One idea would see the Trusteeship Council transformed into a Council on Representation, Democratization and Governance. Such a body could provide a useful service to the international community as a forum in which to discuss and debate problems of ethnic minorities and self-determination issues. A Permanent International Criminal Court, which would try individuals charged with genocide and war crimes, would also be a major new element in the UN's arsenal of peace and security tools. As O'Neil noted, such a court would be "a very important adjunct to the Security Council."
Other changes in the area of international law, such as requesting advisory opinions from the International Court of Justice on options contemplated by the Secretary General or the Security Council, could prove to be a useful check in the system. This idea, noted David Malone, is one which is supported by Canada. It is also extremely controversial, causing some discomfort within the Permanent Five, and is particularly opposed by Britain and France.
Conclusions
Ultimately, however much tinkering is done at the edges of the Security Council, it really remains the only game in town. As the sole body whose decisions are binding under international law, the Security Council is exceedingly difficult to ignore. As O'Neil put it to the panel, "isn't the conclusion you quickly come to (that there aren't that many alternatives to the Security Council, and hence, any contribution to improved functioning of the Security Council is extremely important), probably more important than expending lots of energy on some of these other things?"
John Trent stressed that despite the major obstacles to be overcome if the Security Council is to be reformed, all is not hopeless. In fact, one of the real challenges is in reaching the consensus that reform is indeed possible, as momentum for reform is weakened by those who have already written the issue off as a non-starter. He added that one of the real problems with the reform process is the ad hocery of it all. Commissions spring up independently of one another, they produce their reports, and then slowly they fade back into obscurity. In the absence of any continuing framework for discussion, he asked, "how do you keep up a certain momentum, how do you reinforce interest, how do you allow for extra voices to be in the debate?" He pointed to the First Canadian Conference on UN Reform, organized in March 1995 by the Canadian Committee for the Fiftieth Anniversary of the UN, as an example of the type of conference which should take place on a biennial basis. Creating this predictable framework for the reform process to move forward may be the critical first step on what will undoubtedly be a long and arduous road.
The Security Council Reform roundtable took place in Ottawa at UNA-Canada's board room on September 12, 1995. The proceedings were recorded, transcribed and summarized by Tim Donais, UNAC's Communication Officer, and Robin Collins, coordinator of the National Capital Region Branch's UN Reform Project. Members of the sub-committee for this project included Diana Armour, Robin Collins, Len Hinds, Gloria Johnston, Sabine Luedtke and Alison Watts.
