MAINTAINING WORLD ORDER: Re-legitimizing the United Nations Security Council for 21st Century Geopolitical Realities

Abstract

The United Nations has now entered its third consecutive decade since it strengthened its search for plausible reforms to the Security Council. So far, the UN has little to show for the years of debates and intergovernmental negotiations, as several different blocks of nations are each putting forward their own proposals for reform that oftentimes conflict. Since the last time that the Council was amended, the size of the UN membership has grown, the scope of the UN’s responsibilities has expanded, and nations occupy very different places in our world order than they did 66 years ago at the end of the age of empires. Reform of the Council is needed if it wishes to remain a relevant body that has the legitimacy and authority necessary to defend the peace. This thesis seeks to examine the Security Council and its history in order to determine the lens through which reform must be considered, as well as the potential for reform to be made given the current international atmosphere towards reform. This thesis looks to analyze two important aspects of Security Council reform. First should reform to the Council be approached from a realist perspective or a liberal perspective? Second, in what ways do the major proposals for reform comport with each other upon common desires, in what areas are they irreconcilable, and do the reforms aim to increase the Council’s legitimacy given the frame in which reform ought to be considered. By performing case studies of four nations on the Security Council at the time of the 2003 U.S. led invasion of Iraq (Mauritius, Singapore, France, and China), this thesis aims to evaluate whether nations on the Security Council follow a liberal understanding of the rules-based order that the Council purportedly supports. Then, by delving into the historical record of the UN, its creation and pivotal points of change in its existence, this thesis evaluates the prospects for change within the applicable framework, as well as how they can be anticipated to impact the legitimacy of the Council. The case studies yield that nations on the Security Council are more likely to abide by a realist framework than a liberal one in approaching Council decisions. The results show that nations will behave within the bounds of the international order so long as doing so has a larger positive payoff for the nation’s self-interests. When examining the prospects for reform, there is near universal agreement to provide African nations with greater representation on the Council, including the backing of powerful players to create two new permanent seats for African nations. The UN members were found to be severely divided on the issue of veto reform, with nations such as the U.S. and Russia ready to block any efforts to reform the power. Most discussion of reform has been limited to two main aspects of it, which have been Council size expansion and veto reform. While there will still need to be much discussion before any agreements are made to reform the Council, understanding that individual nation’s desires for reform should be analyzed in a realist framework, helps to guide the discussion, and dissect which parts of which proposals may be accepted, and which have no chance of success.