Successes and Failures of the United Nations

United Nations Organisation was established after World War II with a motto to maintain world peace. And this in fact is known to every one of us in general. But the question is, was this really successful in doing the same i.e., maintaining the peace in every part of the world or are there any failures? Perhaps this is also one of the most important area to assess. Successes and Failures of the United Nations since its establishment, i believe is a very essential topic to be focused. Here are some of the positive roles played by UN and its failures.

• The First and foremost it has prevented the occurrence of any further world wars. Instrumental in the maintenance of international balance of power.
• It played a Significant role in disarming the world and making it nuclear free. Various treaty negotiations like 'Partial Test Ban Treaty' and 'Nuclear non-proliferation treaty' have been signed under UN.
• Demise of colonialism and imperialism on one hand and apartheid on the other had UN sanctions behind them.
• UN Acted as vanguard for the protection of human rights of the people of the world, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948.
• Despite crippled by Bretton Woods Institutions, UN has played limited but effective role on economic matters. Supported the North-South dialogue and aspired for emergence of new international economic order.
• Agencies of United Nations like WHO, UNICFF, UNESCO have keenly participated in the transformation of the international social sector.
• Peace keeping operations, peaceful resolution of disputes and refugee concerns had always been on the list of core issues.
• Since 1945, the UN has been credited with negotiating 172 peaceful settlements that have ended regional conflicts.
• The world body was also instrumental in institutionalization of international laws and world legal frame work.
• Passage of various conventions and declarations on child, women, climate, etc, highlights the extra-political affairs of the otherwise political world body.
• It has successfully controlled the situation in Serbia, Yugoslavia and Balkan areas.
• A number of peace missions in Africa has done reasonably well to control the situation.

• UN opinion on Hungary and Czechoslovakia were ignored by the erstwhile Soviet Union in 1950s.
• Israel had been taking unilateral action through decades in its geographical vicinity and nothing substantial has come out even by September 2010.
• No emphatic role in crisis of worst kinds like the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam crisis etc.
• UN was nowhere in the picture when the NATO rained bombs over former Yugoslavia.
• Uni-polarity and unilateralism has shaken the relevance of the world body. Unilateral action in Iraq was bereft of UN sanction.
• Failed to generate a universal consensus to protect the deteriorating world climate, even at Copenhagen in 2009.
• Number of nuclear powers in the world has kept on increasing. UN Could not control the horizontal expansion and proliferation of weapons and arms.
• Financial dependence on the industrialized nations has at times deviated UN from neutrality and impartiality.
• The world body has failed to reflect the democratic aspiration of the world. Without being democratic itself, it talks of democratization of the world.
• Aids is crossing regions and boundaries both in spread and intensity.
• Domestic situation of near anarchy in Iraq and many regions of Afghanistan, despite on active UN. The US President scheme of withdrawal has not able to bring any specific solutions in the region. In fact, the situation has been further aggravated.
• The UN totally exposed in the case of US invasion on Iraq in name for the search weapon of mass destruction. US has withdrawn its combat forces but the law and order and mutual distrust has worsened and at this juncture UN seems to be clueless.