Boutros Boutros-Ghali Research Articles

Peacebuilding: Imperialism's new disguise?

Since the early 1990s a growing emphasis on peacebuilding has marked the international community’s responses to conflicts.2 Supporters of peacebuilding have promoted it as a new international idea, usually tracing it back to then United Nations Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s An Agenda for Peace in 1992 in which he proposes responsibilities and responses for the UN and the international community. Peacebuilding is expressed in different forms – a set of policies, a humanitarian agenda, or a way of conflict resolution – but all involve the idea of efforts made to prevent a relapse into conflict.3

The Rise and Fall of Bureaucratic Rationalization: Exploring the Possibilities and Limitations of the UN Secretariat in Conflict Prevention

If it is correct to say that the UN's policy has been dominated by great powers, then it is also true that the academic debate on the UN's failures in general, and the Rwandan tragedy in particular, has been dominated by an emphasis on Realpolitik , which has limited and precluded analysis of other possible causes of the UN's malfunctions. Power politics alone cannot fully explain why the downfall of `grand strategies' for the UN envisaged in Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali's An Agenda for Peace (1992), most notably conflict prevention, was almost as rapid as their emergence. By drawing upon new empirical evidence from interviews and by reflecting on theories of bureaucratization, this article explores one previously ignored mechanism underlying the failure of the Agenda in general and the Rwandan case in particular, namely bureaucratic rationalization. It is argued that bureaucratic rationalization delineates the political manoeuvring space for the UN Secretariat. Bureaucratic thinking is a double-edged sword whose functions may generate severe side-effects in conflict prevention. Its main function is to attain enhanced efficiency, accuracy and stability of decision-making, but sometimes this comes as a Pyrrhic victory. The downside, or dysfunction, of bureaucratization is strict categorization and mechanic behaviour. With regard to the Rwandan case, this article presents new information on the way in which the failure of the UN bureaucracy to overcome the strict separation between the peace settlement and the preventive deployment of peacekeeping operations contributed to the failure to prevent the genocide.

The UN Secretary-General and Norm Entrepreneurship: Boutros Boutros-Ghali and Democracy Promotion

Abstract This article argues that the secretary-general of the United Nations is in many respects in a strong position to engage in “norm entrepreneurship.” However, he must constantly balance the desire to forward particular principled ideas with the need to maintain the support of the member states and to act within the organization's (and his own) mandate. Examined here are the attempts made by Boutros Boutros-Ghali to promote a norm of democratic governance, with particular emphasis on the importance of the ways in which he strategically “framed” that concept. It is argued that although his democracy-promotion activities were not an unqualified success—and indeed some of the limitations on the secretary-general's capacity for norm building are highlighted—they nevertheless had a real and lasting impact on the organization.

Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding in Africa: An Overview

ABSTRACT This article draws on the experience of disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) programs on the African continent. It explains the link between DDR in Africa and the evolution of post-conflict peacebuilding as envisioned by former UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the phases of the DDR process, the actors involved in the practice of DDR—both within the UN system and outside. Seven case studies are used to illustrate how DDR programs have been implemented, the lessons that have been learned as a result, and the challenges that are yet to be overcome. A general evaluation of DDR is provided in the conclusion, which taps into discussions and recommendations emerging from a 2006 conference held on the subject at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) in Accra, Ghana.

Review: The Horseshoe Table

THE HORSESHOE TABLE An Inside View of the Security council Chinmaya R. Gharekhan New Delhi: Dorling Kindersley (India), 2006. 328pp, US$20-95 cloth (ISBN 81-7758-453-7)Ambassador Gharekhan provides a useful glimpse into how the security council really works, and it's not a pretty sight. Indeed, it was particularly unlovely in the opening years of the post-Cold War era, the period during which he represented India on the council (1991-92). On completion of his two-year term, then-secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali asked Gharekhan to join the executive office and act as the secretary general's personal liaison to the security council, in which capacity the author served until 1996.While lucid, informative, and thoughtful, his account is overly protective of the UN secretariat and his own key role therein vis-a-vis the security council, particularly when he recounts the two principal disasters that befell the United Nations on his watch: Srebrenica and Rwanda. In both instances, his efforts at explanation and detachment grate and are unconvincing.The book remains, however, required reading for countries seeking a seat on the security council, particularly for those that might harbour delusions that service on the council will allow their high ideals to flower and flourish. He portrays Boutros Boutros-Ghali generally as a brave and steadfast man of principle, even if others, including members of the secretariat and Gharekhan himself, do not fare as well.His broader reflections on the extent to which the security council is owned and dominated by the veto-wielding five permanent members (P$) were precisely mirrored in my own experience a few years later. Indeed, this point cannot be overemphasized and Gharekharis contribution to making it more broadly appreciated is welcome indeed.When Canada was elected to the security council in October 1998 to serve a sixth term, our then-foreign minister, Lloyd Axworthy, was pleased that Canada would have an opportunity to walk our human security talk. I cautioned him that our successful four-year campaign had been the easy part, and that the realities of service on the council, about which Gharekhan writes so persuasively-particularly the unbridled power of the P 5-would sorely limit what Axworthy was so anxious to achieve during Canada's brief time at the UN's high table. Specifically, I urged him to consider how he was going to react when Washington called to encourage him to straighten me out.Surely, that would not happen, he replied, and if ever it were to occur, it would be on a matter of such overriding importance that the nature of such a demarche could not be anticipated. Not so, I insisted, the subject was likely to be well-nigh irrelevant. It would be the principle that would be at issue, and I predicted that he would face this challenge within our first month on the council. In fact, he received his first call on 18 January, and, of the six additional demarches that were directed variously to our prime minister, his foreign policy advisor, again to the foreign minister, and to the deputy minister of foreign affairs over our first eight months on the council, all with a single purpose-to put me under Washington's discipline-all were rejected out of hand in Ottawa. Then they stopped. A number of my elected colleagues on the council, however, were not so steadfastly supported, and such unsubtle exercises of raw power were never pleasant to witness. Gharekhan recounts a few similar stories involving his own country and others.His more detailed recollections of how specific issues were handled by the council in the first half of the post-Cold War decade will not cause readers to be inspired by the courage and foresight of council members, but nonetheless offer useful insight into the Realpolitik of council operations and the limits to their effectiveness.His account of the advice being offered by secretariat officials to their boss, the secretary general, is particularly intriguing if no more inspiring. …

Towards a new agenda for transforming war economies

An interest in peacebuilding among academics and policymakers has grown exponentially since UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali broadcast the concept in An Agenda for Peace, in 1992. However...

UN voices: the struggle for development and social justice

Voices presents the human and moving stories of an extraordinary group of individuals who contributed to the economic and social record of the UN's life and activities. Drawing from extensive interviews, the book presents in their own words the experiences of 73 individuals from around the globe who have spent much of their professional lives engaged in United Nations affairs. We hear from secretaries-general and presidents, ministers and professors, social workers and field workers, as well as diplomats and executive heads of UN agencies.Among those interviewed are noted figures such as Kofi Annan, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Alister McIntyre, Conor Cruise O'Brien, Javier Perez de Cuellar, and Kurt Waldheim, as well as many less well known UN professional men and women who have made significant contributions to the international struggle for a better world. Their personal accounts also engage their contributions in dealing with such events and issues as the UN's founding, decolonization, the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall, human rights, the environment, and September 11, 2001.Thomas G.Weiss is Presidential Professor of Political Science at CUNY Graduate Center and Director of the Ralph Bunche Institute for International where he is co-director of the United Nations Intellectual History Project and editor of Global Governance. His latest books are: Ahead of the Curve? UN Ideas and Global Challenges (Indiana University Press, 2001), author; The Responsibility To Protect: Research, Bibliography, and Background (ICISS, 2001), author; Military-Civilian Interactions: Humanitarian Crises and the Responsibility to Protect (Rowman and Littlefield, 2004), 2nd edition; and The United Nations and Changing World Politics (Westview, 2004), 4th edition, author; and Terrorism and the UN: Before and After September 11 (Indiana University Press, 2004), editor.Tatiana Carayannis is Research Manager of the United Nations Intellectual History Project and former adjunct instructor in Political Science at CUNY. Some of her recent publications include The Democratic Republic of Congo: 1996-2002 in Jane Boulden ed., Dealing with Conflict in Africa: Role of the United Nations and Regional Organizations, London: Palgrave, 2003, and The Network Wars of the Congo: Towards a New Analytic Approach, Journal of Asian and African Studies, 2003. She is currently completing a doctoral dissertation in Political Science on networks, multilateral institutions, and the Congo wars.Louis Emmerij is Senior Research Fellow at CUNY Graduate Center's Ralph Bunche Institute for International where he is co-director of the United Nations Intellectual History Project. Among his recent books are: Contributions to Thinking and Practice (Indiana University Press, 2004), author; Ahead of the Curve? UN Ideas and Global Challenges (Indiana University Press, 2001), and author; Economic and Social into the 21st Century (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997).Richard Jolly is Senior Research Fellow at CUNY Graduate Center's Ralph Bunche Institute for International where he is co-director of the United Nations Intellectual History Project, and Professor Emeritus at the University of Sussex. Publications to which he has contributed include: Contributions to Thinking and Practice (Indiana University Press, 2004), author; Ahead of the Curve? UN Ideas and Global Challenges (Indiana University Press, 2001), author; and Development with a Human Face (1998), author.

Intervention, Prevention, and the “Responsibility to Protect”

Can do in the world? This seemingly innocuous question is in fact loaded. While there seems to be a broad, though not universal, as will be discussed later, consensus on defining as a foreign policy that promotes peace, order, and good government on a global scale, there is much more disagreement on the manner in which such objectives ought to be promoted. Debates on the kind of intervention best suited for have recently revolved over the preferred nature (military or political/developmental) and framework of intervention (NATO, ad-hoc coalitions, or the UN). These debates have been fuelled, in part, by provocative publications such as Andrew Cohen's While Slept, which argued forcefully that had lost its place in the by becoming a free-rider and practising foreign policy on the cheap. They also have been fuelled by the process leading to the release, in April 2005, of Canada's long-awaited international policy statement.In this article, I argue that the problem does not lie with the choice of instruments to pursue Canada's foreign policy but with inconsistencies in the definition of the broad objectives of this foreign policy. Canada's outlook on intervention remains particularly plagued by contradictions. Taking a longer-term perspective on intervention and drawing on the lessons of international involvement in post-conflict nation-building, I identify some of the areas of concern and propose a framework to think about how to reconcile Canada's divergent interests.The article starts by spelling out the connection between security and development, which is at the heart of the argument. I then go on to address the disconnect between security and development objectives in Canada's recent international engagements, as illustrated in The responsibility to protect, the report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS) in which played a much-touted role-and in the Martin government's international policy statement. the search for ways out of this quandary, I identify some of the tensions, if not outright contradictions, that pit the logic of intervention and that of prevention against one another. I finally conclude by suggesting a few guidelines to reconcile these contradictions in the framework of a coherent and integrated foreign policy.ON THE COMPLEMENTARITY OF INTERVENTION AND PREVENTION: THE SECURITY-DEVELOPMENT NEXUSSecurity and development are two faces of the same coin. Socioeconomic marginalization and political exclusion often provide the breeding ground for violence. Development problems are in fact highlighted by the World Bank as an integral part of what Paul Collier labels the conflict trap. While poverty as such is not correlated with conflict, ceteris paribus the chances of civil war increase five-fold for countries that fall below the US$1000 per capita income threshold.1 This is also consonant with earlier findings that it may not be absolute poverty but extremely unequal distribution of wealth-resulting in political or economic marginalization-that creates fertile ground for internal conflicts.At the Canada in the world conference, then-American ambassador to Paul Cellucci reaffirmed that it was in the joint economic and security interest of the US and to help countries lift their people out of poverty. This attitude is echoed in several key documents including former UN secretary general Boutros Boutros-Ghali's 1992 Agenda for and 1994 Agenda for development. More recently, the report of the UN high-level panel on threats, challenges and change recognized the need for better understanding of the intersection between development and security if the international community is to respond effectively to potential threats to collective peace and security. But nowhere is the relationship between freedom from fear and freedom from want better expressed than in UN secretary General Kofi Annan's recent report entitled In larger freedom: Towards development, security, and human rights for all, in which he states:Not only are development, security and human rights all imperative; they also reinforce each other. …

The United Nations, Peacebuilding, and the Genocide in Rwanda

Abstract The 1994 genocide in Rwanda continues to haunt the Western liberal conscience. And so indeed it should. Romeo Dallaire's powerful and disturbing recollection of his time as commander of UN peacekeeping forces in Rwanda in 1993 and 1994 makes for deeply distressing reading. Some two years after the launch of the much-heralded Agenda for Peace by UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, more than 800,000 people were slaughtered in Rwanda while UN member states dithered and failed to act. Nor is there any comfort to be found in the way that the UN Secretariat acquitted itself as the signs of impending disaster multiplied in late 1993 and early 1994. The experiences of Rwanda, recounted in harrowing detail by Dallaire, provide a necessary, if disheartening, perspective from which to examine the challenge of peacebuilding. Tom Keating and Andy Knight point to evidence of progress and learning over the past decade, but optimism remains tempered by the shadow and memory of Rwanda.

How Not to Reform the United Nations

Midway through the most ambitious reform drive in United Nations history, it is high time to revisit and hopefully relearn some of the more painful lessons of past reform campaigns. None of this is rocket science--or string theory, to be more contemporary. The past six decades have seen dozens of reform efforts, most following recurring patterns and producing largely predictable results. As of midsummer 2005, things are not going well, but there is some light at the end of the tunnel. Two years ago, the effort started off on the wrong foot when Secretary-General Kofi Annan, with a puzzling disregard for the history and politics of the world organization, called for a radical overhauling of intergovernmental machinery, beginning with the Security Council. (1) Now, fortunately, member states have retaken the reins and, in their methodical, plodding, but purposeful fashion, are building a consensus on a few modest and sensible renovations. In the process, they have demonstrated both that it is their organization after all and that they are not so displeased with the current structure. The results will fall far short of the historic transformation proposed by the secretary-general. Compared to past efforts, however, the product should appear reasonably respectable. Typically, there are six steps to a cycle of UN reform. First, the secretary-general and a chorus of earnest national leaders bemoan the state of the organization, assert that profound changes in the global situation demand sweeping renovations, and call for fresh approaches and bold initiatives. As Annan warned the General Assembly, Excellencies, we have come to a fork in the road. This may be a moment no less decisive than 1945 itself, when the United Nations was founded. (2) Presumably the gross overstatement was for dramatic effect. Second, some sort of blue-ribbon commission is assembled to add substantive depth to the instincts of the political leaders. In this case, the High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change (HLP) acquitted itself better than most of its predecessors, though its draft of 101 recommendations proved to be a mixed lot in terms of practicality and desirability. (3) It fared far better than two such exercises encouraged by Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who found their conclusions to be unpalatable. (4) Third, once the eminent ones have articulated their vision, the secretary-general translates their ideas into digestible policy steps for consideration by the membership. How far and on what issues the secretary-general can be an effective advocate is a political judgment. Generally his role fades over the course of a transition period from secretariat to state leadership. This year, given the secretary-general's personal and political liabilities, this shift has been remarkably quick and decisive. Once again, the secretary-general proposes and the General Assembly disposes. Fourth, the member states become fully engaged as decision points approach and the implications for their national interests become clear. For most, their conservative instincts and fear of change come to the surface. Big and small states alike begin to fret that their relative positions in the UN, built through years of practice and maneuver, could be affected by unpredictable renovations. As long as their corners of the body are well defended, they may continue to mouth rhetoric about sweeping change and historic opportunities, but the hunt for modest measures capable of attracting consensus begins in earnest. As of midsummer 2005, General Assembly President Jean Ping and his small army of facilitators are deeply engaged in this critical phase of the enterprise, though differences remain on the shape and status of the summit document. Fifth, some kind of culminating event is convened. Sometimes this will coincide with one of the UN's major anniversaries, though remarkably little reform has actually ever been accomplished during these commemorative years. …

Conference Papers: 2. The Role of the Military in Humanitarian Crises: Legal, Moral and Political Issues Humanitarian Assistance: Political Dimensions of Military Action

Conference Papers: 2. The Role of the Military in Humanitarian Crises: Legal, Moral and Political Issues Humanitarian Assistance: Political Dimensions of Military Action Get access Joe Sills Joe Sills Former Spokesman of Former UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Refugee Survey Quarterly, Volume 23, Issue 4, December 2004, Pages 111–115, https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/23.4.111 Published: 01 December 2004

US Torture Sets Back Cause of Human Rights in Arab World

New Perspectives QuarterlyVolume 21, Issue 3 p. 9-10 US Torture Sets Back Cause of Human Rights in Arab World Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Boutros Boutros-GhaliSearch for more papers by this author Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Boutros Boutros-GhaliSearch for more papers by this author First published: 09 July 2004 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5842.2004.00671.xAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume21, Issue3July 2004Pages 9-10 RelatedInformation

THE MULTINATIONAL FORCE FOR THE CONGO

The United Nations (UN) Security Council’s recent unanimous decision to authorize the Interim Emergency Multinational Force to supplement the UN peacekeeping operation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is a welcome development. It challenges two widely held assumptions: that the UN is irrelevant, and that France and the United States can no longer work together. The French-led 1,400-strong multinational force (MNF) will be deployed in Ituri, a region of north-eastern DRC that has witnessed atrocities similar in brutality, if not scale, to the genocide in Rwanda. While a necessary and important response, it is insufficient and is likely to create new challenges. The alacrity with which the Council has acted is noteworthy, but it is also an indictment of previous policies. The international community should build on the Council’s heightened interest to re-examine the assumptions upon which the UN peacekeeping organization, known as MONUC, is based. Otherwise, the Council’s resolution will likely be viewed as another in a long line of halfsteps and missteps, which have exacerbated and perpetuated a humanitarian and moral nightmare. Put simply, the approach of UN member states—particularly the five permanent members of the Council—to the crisis in the Great Lakes and DRC, formerly Zaire, has been shameful. In April 1994, the Council’s initial response to the genocide in Rwanda was to withdraw most of its peacekeepers rather than augment the mission. Four weeks into the slaughter, it changed direction and authorized a larger mission. The Council did so, however, with the full knowledge that it would take several months for the poorly-equipped troopcontributors to deploy their contingents. As an interim measure, it eventually authorized a French-led force that is credited with saving tens of thousands of lives, but also creating a situation in which advocates of, and participants in, the genocide were able to withdraw to Zaire (many with their weapons) and regroup to pursue their struggle. Two years passed, during which the humanitarian, security, and environmental situation in north-east Zaire deteriorated. Member states failed to heed former UN SecretaryGeneral Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s pleas for a proper international force to protect Rwandan refugees and by extension the host population and countries in the region. In November 1996, the Council authorized a Canadian-led multinational force to create a humanitarian corridor to ease tensions and facilitate the dispersal of aid. But before that force was deployed, the mission was abandoned because an insurgency led by Laurent Kabila resulted in several hundred thousand Rwandan refugees returning home. Relatively THE MULTINATIONAL FORCE FOR THE CONGO COMMENTARY

Encyclopedia of African nations and civilizations

The Encyclopedia of African Nations and Civilizations covers the major historic civilizations and the fifty-two nations of Africa in an accessible A-to-Z format. Each nation's entry narrates the history of the region from the early development of its peoples to the political, cultural, and economic circumstances that characterize the area today. The volume includes a comprehensive list of rulers and presidents, the history and culture of its indigenous peoples, and brief biographic details on major political and cultural personalities. More in-depth entries also include information on the nation's origins, recent history, a chronology of events, and thematic events. Feature articles, maps, and chronologies throughout the text broaden the impressive scope of this volume. Entries Include: Abyssinia, Benin, Berber kingdoms, Cameroon, Dahomey, Egypt, French Cameroon, Gambia, Hausa States, Ife, Kenya, Lesotho, Mali, Niger, Orange Free State, Portuguese Guinea, Rhodesia, Senegal, Tanganyika, Uganda, and Zaire; Personalities Include: Muhammad Ahmad, Steve Biko, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Idi Amin Dada, F.W. DeKlerk, Festus, Hassan II, Jomo Kenyatta, Said Muhammad, Muammar al Qadafi, and Haile Selassie I; Feature articles Include: Prehistoric Africa, Bantu migrations, North African conquests, spread of Christianity, spread of Islam, medieval North Africa, European exploration, trade routes, slavery, and colonization.

Global television and the shaping of world politics: CNN, telediplomacy, and foreign policy

In 1995, United Nations Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali said, CNN [the Cable News Network] is the sixteenth member of the [fifteen member United Nations] Security Council, Scholars as well as diplomats have recognized the existence of a link between communications and diplomacy, but up until now the implications of this relationship have been left unexplored. In this work, the author studies the historic interconnectedness between communications and diplomacy, how communications have historically determined the practice of diplomacy, and how, with the development of global television, communications can determine diplomatic outcomes under certain conditions. This work also examines the ways in which today's broadcasting will shape foreign policy processes in the future and the future impact of global television in world politics.

The Millennium Assembly

In retrospect, it is difficult to understand why United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan and his senior advisers (most notably the Canadian academic John Ruggie, who masterminded the affair) were so determined to organize a summit conference of world leaders and representatives of nongovemmental organizations (NGOs) on the occasion of the first General Assembly of the new millennium. [1] In many ways, the 1990s was a decade of peacekeeping failures and conferences for the world organization. The failures are all too obvious; and most of the conferences, if they are remembered at all, exist only in the institutional memories of the organizations that participated in them. Successive UN conferences on children (1990), education (1990 and 2000), the earth (1992), human rights (1993), population and development (1994), women (1995), social issues (1995), and food (1996) produced little if anything of practical value. Those present, whether from governments or the nongovernmental sector, insisted on their good intentions; proclaimed their commitment either to improving the future of some disadvantaged group or to furthering economic improvement, tolerance, and equity; and set some target date by which the condition under discussion was supposed to get better, even as they wrangled in private over the language of the final declaration. However technically feasible such goals as halving child mortality and providing safe drinking water to everyone in the world by 2015, it must have been abundantly clear, even in the euphoric atmosphere of subsidized virtue that UN conferences engender, that these goals were as unreachable as Secretary-General Annan's ridiculous, if well-intentioned, assertion that it would be possible to halve the number of young people carrying the HIV virus by 2010. The latter assertion, one might add, was made at a time when the AIDS epidemic was spreading, not coming under control. But, in a sense, the United Nations Secretariat is the last remaining bastion of rigid philosophical nominalism. Its leadership seems to believe that if a pious wish is repeated often enough, then it will become true, if only by dint of restatement. Obviously, this is only part of the story. From the secretary-general on down, UN officials have always operated on two levels, and probably always will. On the one hand, the best of them are canny international civil servants--people who are well versed in the way things work in the real world and quite unsentimental about what member states are really up to. On the other hand, these same officials seem entirely comfortable shifting gears and becoming cheerleaders for a new moral order of justice and equity, an order that their daily experience must tell them is probably no closer today than it was a hundred years ago. Human nature is the same as it always was; the world remains the same slaughterhouse it has always been. Again, no one knows this better than UN officials. Indeed, in fairness to the world organization, its role has shifted away from being the premier institution for international peace and security--a task that it could not fulfill during the Cold War through no fault of its own. Post--Cold War crises like Bosnia and Rwanda have demonstrated that the UN is incapable of fulfilling its role, at least without such major reforms that the institution would effectively be reinvented. The UN has become a giant alleviation machine, and UN officials have more and more concentrated on the most dire places in the world. The president of the United States or the Japanese premier does not wake up thinking about massacres in Congo or the war along the Tajik-Afghan border; Kofi Annan does. But for him, there seems to be nothing promethean about such knowledge. When he and, for that matter, his predecessor, the justly maligned Boutros Boutros-Ghali, have spoken in the name of the UN Charter--that is, have used the UN secretar y-generalship as a bully pulpit to plead the cause of a better world--they have tended to pretend things are getting better rather than worse. …

Outside Agents and the Politics of Peacebuilding and Reconciliation

AT THE CLOSE OF ONE OF THE MORE INFAMOUS CENTURIES in recorded history, we must also acknowledge one of its most violent decades, marked by two apparently contradictory trends in international politics. The first was a substantial increase in violent conflict, much of which took the form of civil wars and many of the victims of which were civilians. In 1996 all of the major conflicts in the world were civil or intra-state in nature. While the exact toll in human life and suffering is unknown, estimates put more than 42 million people at serious risk. This was not, of course, as it was supposed to be. The end of the cold war was to have introduced an era of peace with an emphasis on the rights and privileges of human beings. Indeed the second prominent feature of international politics in the 1990s was the emphasis on individual human rights and human security. Along with various declarations and charters, there was a noteworthy increase in the number, variety, scope, and prominence of interventions for allegedly humanitarian purposes. Motivated, it seems, by a concern for human rights and a sense of urgency in the face of the scope of humanitarian and political disasters in all regions of the world, a variety of individuals, groups, governments, and organizations intervened in the affairs of other countries in the hope of contributing to a more stable, peaceful, and just world. Within this context the theory and practice of peace-building emerged as a central part of what the rest of the world has to offer to divided societies.For many years, the response of outsiders focused on the cessation of hostilities and was drawn from the United Nations experience in peacekeeping. As the complexities and societal repercussions of civil conflicts became more evident, peacekeeping operations took on a wider range of tasks, a phenomenon commonly described as second generation peacekeeping. Since the mid-1990s, some governments, international and regional inter governmental organizations (IGOs), and many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as well, have adopted an even more comprehensive view of civil conflict and identified the need for a multifaceted approach that supports a sustainable peace in a post-conflict situation to avoid the recurrence of violent conflict in the future. Commonly referred to as peacebuilding, the idea was raised by the former secretary general of the United Nations, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, in his 1992 An Agenda for Peace.Some scholars have conceptualized peacebuilding in terms of a strategic and responsive framework - an approach that is more comprehensive than that offered by Boutros-Ghali. John Lederach, for instance, finds fault with Boutros-Ghali's use of the term peacebuilding as limited to postconflict support of peace agreements and the rebuilding of torn societies. He stresses instead the problems encountered in peacebuilding - that is, transforming hostile and violent relationships into a peace system characterized by just and interdependent relationships. For him 'peacebuilding is more than postaccord reconstruction ... peacebuilding is understood as a comprehensive concept that encompasses, generates, and sustains the full array of processes, approaches, and stages needed to transform conflict toward more sustainable, peaceful relationships. The term thus involves a wide range of activities and functions that both precede and follow formal peace accords.'(f.1) In the broad view, this conceptual framework responds to the set of needs and challenges confronted by societies torn by war. It addresses structural issues dividing parties, the social dynamics of building relationships, and the development of supportive structures and institutions. Jonathan Goodhand and David Hulme also note how peacebuilding is used loosely and is only partly explained. They list several assumption that underlie peacebuilding as a concept: peace requires social transformation and must be a long endeavour; that peace embraces economic, social, cultural, political, and humanitarian issues and goes beyond the absence of violence to include notions of sustainable development and social justice; peacebuilding is not a specific activity but a consequence of an activity - it is defined by its outcome or process; and it is grounded on the premise that socities affected by violence are still comprised of individuals, groups, attitudes, and processes that promote peace. …

Focus on the CNN Effect Misses the Point: The Real Media Impact on Conflict Management is Invisible And Indirect

`[Television] has changed the way the world reacts to crises', Boutros Boutros-Ghali, then United Nations (UN) Secretary-General (Gowing, 1994a). The media ignores most conflicts most of the time. The coverage of the pre- and post-violence phases is negligible at best and only a few armed conflicts are covered in the violence phase. As focus and funds follow the cameras, the 1990s have witnessed a transfer of resources from more cost-effective, long-term efforts directed at preventing violent conflict and rebuilding war-torn societies to short-term emergency relief. Selective media coverage also contributes to an irrational allocation of short-term emergency relief because coverage is determined by factors other than humanitarian need. This invisible and indirect media impact on Western conflict management is far greater than the direct impact on intervention and withdrawal decisions that the debate over the CNN effect focuses on.

Haiti: International Force or National Compromise?

The objective is clear: to reinstate the legitimate President in his functions and ensure his maintenance in power until the end of his mandate. The question which is posed is to know how to achieve this objective: international force or national compromise? – Boutros Boutros-Ghali, UN Secretary-General.

Good Governance in International Organizations

ood governance moved onto the agenda of many international or ganizations at the end of the Cold War when calls for democracy ^*??^ and better government became louder and as expectations were heightened as to what international organizations might do to further this aim. Many multilateral agencies?from the UN to multilateral develop ment banks?took up the summons. They are now part of a chorus of voices urging governments across the world to heed higher standards of democratic representation, accountability, and transparency. Much more slowly, multilateral organizations have begun to question what good governance means for the way in which they themselves are structured and in which they make and implement decisions. They have been very slow to set down a standard for themselves?and there is little precedent in the international system for doing so. To quote former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali: Democracy has not featured in the history of the international system of states. Sovereignty, rather than democracy, has been its guiding principle. . . . [Today,] the democratization of the international system can be seen as both necessary and possible.1 Yet if international organizations are going to become more partici patory, accountable, and transparent, what standards are relevant to them? In this article, I set out to provide one part of an answer to this question, primarily probing what good governance means for relations among states in multilateral organizations. The first section of the article explores the concept of good governance, how it has emerged, and what its core prin ciples mean. I draw a distinction between applying principles of good gov ernance to relations among states within international organizations (in ternational governance) and applying the principles more broadly to links between individuals, peoples, groups, and international organizations (global governance). My emphasis in the following sections is on interna tional governance. I have chosen several institutions to illustrate the ten sions and trade-offs. These include the regional development banks, the UN Security Council, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the Global Environment Facility of the UN De velopment Programme/World Bank, and the European Union.2 By looking 39