""Blood on the UN's Hands'? Assigning Duties and Apportioning Blame to an Intergovernmental Organisation

The United Nations is frequently the object of blame for "failing' ' to act in response to what are deemed to be ethical imperatives. Implicit in such condemnations is an understanding of the United Nations as a body that has moral duties, and possesses the various capacities for deliberating and acting that would make this a reasonable conception. Yet this portrayal of the United Nations as a moral agent is one that should only be invoked with great care, and some qualification. By constructing a model of "institutional moral agency'', and examining whether the United Nations meets its criteria, this article aims to offer a preliminary account of the internal features, and enabling conditions that would allow the United Nations to bear the related burdens of duty and blame in international politics. It also suggests who—or what— might bear these burdens when the United Nations is incapable of acting.     

Power Politics, Diplomacy and Role Playing: Simulating the UN Security Council's Response to Terrorism

In the International Organizations classroom, students learn a lot about the nuts and bolts of international organizations in theory, but do not always have the opportunity to understand how international organizations work in practice. Understanding negotiations, diplomacy and interstate relations is essential in understanding the strengths of weaknesses of international organizations. To this end, the use of in-class simulations, where each student represents a different country, can be an effective tool in teaching students about international organizations and global governance. This article describes a simulation run in an International Organizations class in the Fall 2002 semester. It involved a fictitious serious terrorist attack in Singapore during a performance of "Kiddush for Naomi" performed by the Israel Habima Theatre Company. The article describes the goals of the simulation, the preparation the students undertook throughout the semester, the implementation of the simulation itself, and the post-simulation debriefing and assessment of the students and lessons learned for future in-class simulations.     

Bringing Practitioner Experience into the Classroom: The United Nations Intensive Summer Study Program

Diplomatic practitioners and policy makers represent an important, although frequently neglected, resource for teaching about international relations. The insights and stories provided by practitioners regarding key processes and events are often able to inspire our students to engage complex material and to play a much more active role in their own learning. While it is possible to argue that any type of practitioner contact is beneficial in terms of going beyond the material covered in textbooks, there are definite challenges associated with how to most effectively integrate these experiences with overall student learning. What type of format is most conducive to providing students with an insider's view? What type of preparation is required before contact with practitioners? How can student learning be evaluated in terms of assignments and debriefing activities? And finally, are traditional student feedback mechanisms appropriate for a course that involves a substantial practitioner component? This article investigates each of these challenges in the course of discussing one mechanism for bringing practitioner experience into the classroom, the United Nations Intensive Summer Study Program.     

Mega-Simulations in Negotiation Teaching: Extraordinary Investments with Extraordinary Benefits

A mega-simulation is a complex-negotiations teaching exercise involving complicated issues and challenging conditions that is undertaken by three or more teams of students. In this article, I draw on two decades of teaching with mega-simulations in international business negotiation courses to discuss potential learning goals for this type of experiential exercise, effective ways to organize the experience, challenges for the instructor, and the distinctive educational benefits that justify the substantial investment of time and resources required to implement these mega-simulations. These simulations can help students to develop greater sophistication in basic negotiation skills, become more extensively exposed to complex skill sets, and develop a deeper understanding of negotiation subject matter and complex processes than they would by conducting standard role plays. Mega-simulations offer major opportunities for students to move to advanced levels of negotiation skill not just in international business, but in diplomacy, law, engineering, and a host of other professional arenas.     

Reform of the United Nations and Transformation of the International System

The reform of the United Nations is closely related with the transformation of the International system. The United Nations has made great success since it started a comprehensive reform in 2005. Such a reform is necessary both for the transition of the largest international organization in the world and transformation of the international system. The United Nations still has a long way to go in the comprehensive reform because of many factors.     

论东北亚地区新海洋秩序与我国的对策

“联合国海洋法公约”的生效 ,极大地推动了国际新海洋秩序的建立。随着中国、韩国、日本等东北亚各沿海国对“公约”的批准和 2 0 0海里专属经济区的宣布 ,新海洋秩序在东北亚地区逐渐形成并完善 ,这对我国既是机遇又是挑战 ,它既扩大了我国的海洋管辖领域 ,又加剧了各国竞相争夺各自海洋权益的矛盾。根据“海上圈地运动”及其东北亚的新形势 ,现提出我国海洋事业所面临的、包括海洋国土观念在内的现代海洋观念薄弱等问题和相应对策     

"丝绸之路"复兴计划与中国外交

"丝绸之路"贸易通道的复兴,对于中国经济发展和社会进步具有重大的现实意义。中国已经开展了大量关于"新丝路"的外交活动,但中国更需要将"丝路外交"提升到战略的高度,原因在于"丝路外交"的开展不仅有利于中国突破当前的贸易和能源困境,而且也可以极大地加强中国与周边国家的文化交流,实质性地改善中国的安全处境。中国在"新丝路外交"中应该注意防范非传统安全威胁,利用好包括联合国在内的各种国际协调机制,并避免恶性的大国竞争。     

生物多样性议题安全建构的碎片化

1992年,《生物多样性公约》与《联合国气候变化框架公约》《联合国防治荒漠化公约》一并成为全球环境治理与合作的重要制度性框架文件。目前,生物多样性的国际合作程度、社会认知深度、治理行动速度等都明显逊色。生物多样性治理的迫切程度不亚于其他的全球性环境议题,但其议题安全化的分散性却不利于建构整体性的安全认知。生物多样性议题安全建构的碎片化体现在生态、治理目标、谈判、国家及其他行为体四个层面。生态层面是指生物多样性的安全认知;治理目标层面是指全球生物多样性治理的"爱知目标"与安全的联系;谈判层面包括资金机制、资源动员、遗传资源获取和惠益分享、保护区以及主流化等议题;各缔约方及其他行为体层面不仅在各项议题上表达各自关切,同时也将生物多样性问题建构为粮食安全、水安全、公共卫生安全、经济安全等多元安全关注。生物多样性议题安全建构的碎片化导致了该问题虽然在话语上进入了安全领域,但是缺乏共同的安全认知,难以提供简明和清晰的治理目标和路径,不利于推动全球有效治理。     

International Organizations and Government Killing: Does Naming and Shaming Save Lives?

Do international organizations affect government killing? Extant work has studied international organizations' effects on a set of human rights, but has not examined the abilities of specific actors to protect specific rights. I analyze naming and shaming by three types of international organizations (human rights nongovernmental organizations [NGOs], the news media, and the United Nations), focusing on their impacts on a single type of abuse: one-sided government killing. I present a principal-agent theory in which the government develops a preference for killing, and then delegates the murderous task to a set of individual perpetrators. The theory reveals new ways for international organizations to make killing costly, and statistical analyses support my expectations: By calling attention to abusive states, human rights NGOs and the United Nations can reduce both the likelihood and severity of state-sponsored murder. I also find that international organizations are better equipped to prevent killing from the beginning than to limit mounting body counts once it has begun.     

How the United Nations Beat Hitler and Prepared the Peace

The United Nations was born in 1942, defeated the Axis Powers led by Germany, Italy and Japan and created today's UN system. This reality has been lost in modern scholarship. We are taught that the Allied countries, mainly America and Britain, with the Soviet Union won the war and that the United Nations was created in 1945. In this way, the achievement of victory can be set in opposition to the United Nations and to multilateralism in general. But it should not be possible to separate victory in the war from the modern United Nations and its priorities, for these were the priorities set by the United Nations at war. America, Britain and the Soviet Union led a large coalition of states organised as the United Nations and this term was used routinely in military orders, in the instruments of surrender signed by the enemy and in political and social life. Bretton Woods and San Francisco were United Nations conferences, and interim United Nations organisations preceded the Charter. Understanding the wartime United Nations reframes our understanding of the second half of the last century and of our own. From UNESCO to the World Bank the primary purpose of the international system is conflict prevention and its wartime architects bequeathed us this system as a realist necessity vital in times of trial, not as a liberal accessory to be discarded when the going gets rough.     

Global Debate and the Limits of the Bush Doctrine

The "Bush Doctrine" asserting the right to preemptively attack states that support or harbor terrorists and pursue weapons of mass destruction (WMD) has bitterly divided world opinion. Many seemingly long-settled questions of international politics, especially involving the unilateral use of force, have been reopened. Although we are concerned about the implications of the Bush Doctrine, we do not agree that it fundamentally changes world politics as some have asserted. Instead, we argue that the global debate leading up to the war in Iraq signals widespread support for existing international norms. Most states continue to see force as a last resort, properly subject to multilateral control in all but the most urgent cases of imminent self-defense. The nature of American diplomatic maneuverings in the United Nations and the public statements of high-level officials suggest that even the United States continues to recognize the importance of these norms.     

UNRWA’s First Years, 1949–1951: The Anatomy of Failed Expectations

The birth of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Near East Refugees (UNRWA) in 1949 represented the culmination of two years of international diplomacy to solve the Palestinian refugee problem. The United States, Britain, and the international community not only sought an agency to take charge of refugee relief, but also envisaged a body to facilitate direct programmes for public works to wean the refugees away from aid dependency whilst also contributing to the economic productivity of host Arab nations. It was hoped this would support the refugees on a self-sustaining basis and even lead to their re-settlement and re-integration into the region. This analysis examines how and why Britain, the United States, and international bodies established UNRWA and identifies why UNRWA, by 1951, was unable to fulfil the task for which it was initially conceived.     

Culture and Negotiation: The Pedagogical Dispute Regarding Cross-Cultural Simulations

This article examines one especially challenging aspect of active-learning international studies courses—the use of cross-cultural simulations. What is the significance of culture for negotiation? What difficulties might cross-cultural negotiations pose, and how might negotiators work with cultural differences to achieve successful outcomes? Is it possible to model the effects of cultures on negotiators in a classroom role-play? What are the advantages to using cross-cultural simulations, and what difficulties do they entail? How might an instructor make best use of materials that focus on cultural issues and their effect on negotiation? When teaching students of different cultures by active-learning methods, what ought an instructor to bear in mind? What cross-cultural simulations are available, and what readings might be assigned to accompany them?     

Use of Internet Sources in International Studies Teaching and Research

This bibliographic review discusses and evaluates cost-free, reliable, quality online content useful to academics in international studies teaching and research at the college level, including how and where to locate such materials through guides, directories, gateway sites, repositories, and various types of search engines; considerations about Internet use in college classes; and undergraduate assignments that use sources of information from the Internet. There is also consideration of characteristics and trends of college student use of the Internet for research purposes, the "invisible" or deep web, electronic information literacy for academics, and maintaining current awareness on the fast-changing web.     

Boundaries beyond borders: Delineating democratic 'peoples' in a globalizing world

This article analyzes the result of attempting to enforce democracy in Haiti. The objective of the international intervention, as stated in United Nations Security Council Resolution 940, was the return of democracy. However, the process in Haiti after the intervention was riddled with problems. The article establishes the Haitian attitudes towards what happened and shows that the type of governance that has been put in place is not what they had expected. It argues that although the international community seems to consider the intervention a success, the objective of the United Nations Resolution has not been reached, because of the international community's unwillingness to consolidate the essential factors upon which to build a democratic society.     

United Nations Security Council Reform Revisited: A Proposal

The United Nations [UN] came into being following the Second World War. Resembling earlier efforts of co-operation by the most powerful states of the international system, it was an attempt to effect global governance through the maintenance of international peace and security amongst states. However, led by its main executive organ, the Security Council, the UN has been unable to prevent and effectively deal with armed conflicts and mass atrocities in a number of situations. Over the years, the inability of the UN Security Council to take collective action has resulted in its ineffectiveness in dealing with war and humanitarian crises. This situation has led to calls for Security Council reform and has generated several initiatives to that end. This analysis discusses major shortcomings of the Security Council, analyses prominent reform initiatives, and introduces a proposal, the “Two-Layered Regional Model,” for Security Council reform.     

全球公共卫生治理的制度重叠及其应对之策

近年来,全球公共卫生治理体系彼此通过议题联结、成员联系和功能互动形成了密切的国际制度重叠,包括以世卫组织为核心的联合国诸公共卫生制度、以盖茨基金会等为代表的非正式公共卫生制度、以二十国集团为代表的涉卫新型国际制度以及特朗普政府试图打造的美式国际公共卫生制度。制度重叠是国际公共卫生秩序的结构性特征,可能会约束与限制世卫组织治理有效性的发挥。全球公共卫生议题的复杂性、全球公共卫生治理的政治化倾向和世卫组织的治理限度决定了协同治理具有必然性和紧迫性,为此,国际社会需要秉持人类卫生健康共同体理念,坚持公共卫生多边主义,警惕美国另起炉灶对全球公共卫生治理的冲击。同时,世卫组织发挥协同治理功能的制度化需求迫在眉睫。此外,新型国际公共卫生治理制度是推动多元制度协同治理的重要力量,将发挥愈加凸显的关键作用。作为国际公共卫生体系的重要成员,中国的负责任国际承诺为国际公共卫生制度重叠提供了重要的协调路径,中国支持世卫组织发挥领导作用,加强在联合国、二十国集团、世贸组织、金砖国家集团等多边制度框架内的协调配合和相互支撑,推动构建人类卫生健康共同体。     

Perspectives on Managing Intractable Conflict

The author, a Swedish diplomat with extensive experience in peace-keeping initiatives of the United Nations, focuses on two questions that are prominent in the management of intractable international conflict: (1) the interplay between short-term and long-term interventions; and (2) the growing "tools" that are available to mediators and other peacemakers, and how to judge their effectiveness. This brief essay is an adaptation of the author's informal remarks at the March, 2002 Hewlett Centers meeting in New York City.     

The Roles a “Civil Society” Can Play in International Dispute Resolution

Since its very inception, the United Nations has worked with NGOs (non-governmental organizations) or, to use the contemporary term, a "civil society." In fact, every single U.N. department now has an NGO liaison. As the world becomes increasingly smaller, the role and influence of NGOs will continue to be significant in international negotiations.     

Global Governance Reform

President Barack Obama has trumpeted a ＂new era of engagement＂ for the United States. The central components of his strategy include a world order characterized by peaceful accommodation between established and rising powers; the collective management of transnational problems; and the overhaul of international institutions to reflect these shifting power dynamics and the new global agenda. Placing less emphasis than his predecessor on the pursuit of American primacy, Obama envisions--indeed, insists-that other global powers assume new responsibilities. Notwithstanding its multilateral instincts, though, the Obama administration is limited in its practical ability to promote and embrace sweeping reforms to global governance. Therefore, rather than casting its lot entirely with universal organizations like the United Nations, the United States will adopt a pragmatic approach to international cooperation that combines formal institutions with more flexible partnerships to achieve US national interests. The balance sheet for Obama＇s first year in office underscores both the opportunities for and the constraints on global governance reform in the current geopolitical environment.