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von Schorlemer, Sabine --- "The United Nations" [2011] ELECD 534; in Klabbers, Jan; Wallendahl, Åsa (eds), "Research Handbook on the Law of International Organizations" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Research Handbook on the Law of International Organizations

Editor(s): Klabbers, Jan; Wallendahl, Åsa

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847201355

Section: Chapter 18

Section Title: The United Nations

Author(s): von Schorlemer, Sabine

Number of pages: 41

Extract:

18 The United Nations
Sabine von Schorlemer



INTRODUCTION

The United Nations (UN), being the only international organization today with
a truly universal membership, is a multi-faceted institution with a comprehen-
sive mandate. The UN Charter, with its focus on peace, security, human rights,
environment and cultural, social and economic affairs, is certainly one of the
most ambitious regulatory undertakings in international relations.
This does not mean that the record of the UN in the past decades was
always `bright'. The UN was founded on the ruins of war-torn Europe ­ devas-
tated by Nazi tyranny ­ as a symbol of vigilance against the axis powers,1 but
also as a symbol for peace and prosperity in international relations.2 The latter
seems to have come true for `old-Europe' ­ reconstructed, unified and pros-
perous. However, large parts of non-European developing states still desper-
ately long for peace and economic and social well-being. Moreover, despite
successes in Namibia, Central America, Mozambique and Cambodia, the
Security Council (SC) was not able to prevent some of the world's worst
humanitarian tragedies ­ above all, the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 and the
slaughtering in Darfur ­ and the economic sanctions on Iraq in the aftermath
of the liberation of Kuwait proved to be a humanitarian disaster. With regard
to the most threatening scenarios of misuse of weapons of mass destruction
and an imminent climate collapse ­ to come to another `hot issue' ­ the UN is
struggling hard to come up with the necessary ...