Reforming
the United Nations for the Next Century
Remarks by David Kilgour, Secretary of State
(Latin America & Africa)
at the annual Model United Nations, Mount
Royal College, Calgary
March 7, 1998
It is a pleasure
to be here with you today at your Model
United Nations, and to share some thoughts
on how the United Nations can adapt to the
challenges of the next century.
Before looking
ahead at the future of the UN, let’s
take a brief look back in time. It is often
helpful when looking at the road ahead to
reflect back on where we have travelled.
At the time
of the first talks by the four major international
powers aimed at establishing the United
Nations in 1944, the world was a very different
place. Nazi Germany still controlled parts
of Europe, and Japan still occupied many
islands of the Pacific. The Soviet Union
was our ally, and the Communist government
had not yet come to power in China. Most
of the countries of Africa, and even many
in Asia, were still colonies. The 50 countries
that came together in San Francisco to found
the United Nations in April 1945 were determined
not to repeat the mistakes of the ill-fated
League of Nations.
Little did
the UN’s founders realize how profoundly
the world would change in just a few years
after its formation. The institutions they
developed to deal with the post-World War
Two situation suddenly faced a new global
reality. The world was divided into the
two hostile camps of the Cold War, and an
increasing number of newly independent countries
– known as the Third World – often
allied themselves with the two superpowers,
or proclaimed themselves to be nonaligned.
It was in this divided world of the Cold
War that the United Nations came of age.
The paralysis of the Cold War, however,
made it difficult for the UN to achieve
its potential.
Just as quickly
as the Cold War appeared, it ended less
than a decade ago. The bipolar world became
a world of many poles. New challenges to
global security came to the fore –
challenges that were always there, but that
seemed less significant in the face of the
Cold War threat of global annihilation.
These new challenges included a wider range
of issues: environmental, criminal, terrorism,
poverty, corruption, health, governance
and human rights. Today we use the term
"human security" to describe our
response to these new challenges. No longer
are these security issues merely government-to-government
matters. Increasingly they require involvement
of many other actors from civil society.
As such, they require new kinds of international
response.
Changed understanding
of security
Changes to
the geopolitical map and to our understanding
of "human security" have given
impetus to the need to reform the United
Nations, to bring it more in line with today’s
realities. Canada has always viewed the
UN as the main vehicle for pursuing global
security objectives and global problem solving.
This reflects our long-standing commitment
to the principal of multilateralism. We
place high value in the smooth functioning
of the UN, and so we are at the forefront
of efforts to reform it for the next century.
Canada played
a leadership role in calling for UN reform
at the Halifax and Lyon G-7 Summits. We
have promoted reform objectives aimed at
improving the UN’s performance in several
major areas: finance and management, conflict
prevention and resolution, reform of the
Security Council, peacekeeping and
peacebuilding,
and reforms to the UN’s economic and
social development activities.
Last year
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan introduced
a set of reforms aimed at streamlining and
modernizing the UN. Canada strongly supports
these reforms and wishes to see them implemented
promptly. Existing institutions must be
updated and their structures brought into
line with the world of today. Cost reduction
along with streamlining of the organization
must be aimed at greater effectiveness and
efficiency.
The makeup
of the UN membership has changed dramatically
in its lifetime. It is now a body of 185
members, of which countries with democratically
elected governments are in the majority.
The ideological rivalries of the Cold War
era have been replaced by issue-based coalitions.
In this more democratic climate, reforms
cannot be imposed from above, but require
agreement and cooperation among countries
in a spirit of openness and innovation.
Canadian
priorities
What then
are Canada’s major priorities for reform?
Canada has
advocated various measures to improve the
UN’s financing and management, and
to solve cash flow problems. We favour greater
cost-effectiveness throughout the system,
better management of human resources, a
delayering of bureaucracy, and better coordinated
management of the UN system. Canada advocates
a zero nominal growth for UN budgets and
a reform of the scale of assessments based
on equity and which better reflects countries’
capacities to pay.
Member states
must pay their dues, as Canada does, for
the UN to be on a sound financial footing.
They are obligated to pay in full, on time,
and without conditions. Currently, however,
the UN faces a financial crisis because
member states owe $2.2 billion U.S. to the
United Nations for regular and peacekeeping
budgets. Of this amount, 60 per cent is
owed by the United States. I am hopeful
that the U.S. Congress will see fit to remedy
this. Arrears to the organization should
be settled as a priority.
Conflict
resolution
Conflict
prevention and resolution is a key area
of UN reform in which Canada has been actively
involved. We all know the tragedy that occurred
in Rwanda when the international community
did not respond quickly enough. Detailed
planning and mounting of the UN peacekeeping
operation were excruciatingly slow, and
the deployment of troops took place months
after they were officially committed. Canada
has made a number of recommendations aimed
at increasing the UN’s rapid deployment
capability. These include proposals to improve
the Standby Arrangements’ System and
to assist the UN in implementing the Rapidly
Deployable Mission Headquarters. Other recommendations
call for greater human rights monitoring,
and a more effective role for the UN in
post-conflict situations.
Canada has
been a strong supporter of peacekeeping
operations since their beginnings with the
Suez Crisis in 1956. It was for his role
in that crisis that Lester B. Pearson received
a Nobel Peace Prize. Since then, Canada
has participated in the overwhelming majority
of peacekeeping operations established by
the Security Council. As of last year, we
were the sixth largest UN troop contributor,
with more than 1,000 personnel deployed
in UN operations around the world. Tens
of thousands of Canadians have served in
30 different UN missions, and more than
100 have lost their lives doing so. It is
no wonder then that Canada has a stake in
improving the efficiency of peacekeeping
operations. In 1995, in the 50th year of
the UN, Canada presented a ground-breaking
study on UN rapid reaction capability.
In the area
of economic and social reform at the UN,
Canada has also put forward ideas for needed
changes. Canada has suggested reforms to
streamline the Secretariat involved in development,
to strengthen the Economic and Social Council
(ECOSOC), and review specialized agencies
to eliminate overlap. Other proposals aim
to get better value for development money.
Security
Council reform
One of the
most controversial elements of UN reform
is change to the makeup of the Security
Council. There have been proposals to expand
the membership to take into account the
increased international role of countries
that were not among the major World War
II allies, as well as developing countries.
Canada wants to see a Security Council that
is more effective, transparent, and broadly
representative. Above all, it should be
less elitist and more democratic. Canada
has periodically been represented on the
Security Council as a non-permanent member,
and we are again a candidate for 1999-2000.
We believe that any expansion of the Security
Council should, for the time being, be for
the non-permanent members. This doesn’t
preclude adding new permanent members at
a later stage. It is essential to Canada,
though, that any change to the composition
of the Council should not prejudge Canada’s
traditional representation on the Council
at least once a decade.
As mentioned,
Canada supports the package of reforms introduced
by Secretary General Annan. One of the outcomes
of these reforms has been the establishment
of the position of Deputy Secretary General,
the number two position in the UN hierarchy.
We are pleased that Louise Fréchette,
from Canada, was named to that position
in January. This reflects Canada’s
continued commitment to the UN.
As you can
see, Canada’s agenda for reform at
the United Nations aims to make that organization
function more smoothly. These measures are
realistic and can be put into place in the
near future, given sufficient international
will. The UN has been far from perfect,
and I have sometimes been among its critics.
It is, though, the only vehicle capable
of exercising moral authority on a global
scale. Canada’s support for the UN
is not accidental. No country today can
act alone on the world stage. That is especially
true in the case of a country with limited
military and economic power. Canada can
only be effective in concert with other
like-minded countries. The United Nations
provides the best forum for creating these
international coalitions. We have a huge
stake in the continued success of the United
Nations, and that is why we are playing
a leading role in its reform.
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