The United Nations: the End of the Cold War - Essay Example

To what extent did the end of the Cold War provide an impetus for the United Nations to try to re-establish itself at the heart of multilateral action? Introduction The end of cold war has brought many changes in the international politics. Not only did we see a change from bi-polar world to uni-polar political scenario but also the changing nature of war. As till the end of cold war major wars were fought between states; but now there is a surge in a new kind of war after cold war which is internal in nature i.e. between two or more factions within a state. 95 of 101 wars, which were fought between 1989 and 1996, were identified as internal wars according to the Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) hand book (1998:9). Of the many possible reasons behind these wars, two, which could easily be identified, are identity of the people and the distribution of resources among them (Harris & Reilly, 1998). To resolve these ethnic based wars is a big challenge for major actors in the international politics like the UN and for the international political and security environment. The end of the Cold War saw an expanded process of decision making in the multilateral organizations like United Nations Organisation based on multilateral mechanisms contained in the Charter of the United Nations.These were mainly to be used to reduce the actual number of armed conflicts . The periods since the end of the cold war also gave rise to new complexities. The Cold War had presented a fragmentation of the global strategic balance. Things were made worse by the bitter realities of the Post Cold War era which had a negative perspective to conflict resolutions and peacemaking. There was an over whelming baggage of leftover conflicts from the conflicted post war atmosphere and a need was felt to create the awareness of the importance of addressing these conflicts effectively through multilateral action and to address these difficulties of conflict prevention and conflict resolution. On another level this impetus can be labelled as being mainly based upon the political agenda of “democratisation and globalisation” of the world through multilateral agenda. This may involve the use of international law ,UN political resolutions and “peacekeeping efforts” to prevent another threat of Communist take over which was a major fear of the Western powers during the Cold War.My essay examines the extent to which this “impetus” is tainted by political agenda and economic interests in a critical right. The essay concludes that this impetus is not based mainly upon the “fear of another communist takeover” which is still a Western Nightmare but that there is a more profound political and economic agenda underlying the efforts of the UN to re-establish themselves at the heart of multi-lateral action. The aim of “democratisation” The recent resolution of civil wars in countries like South Africa, Bosnia, Kosovo, Nigeria, and Ghana etc. has bee a result of the UN intervention to promote some form of electoral democracy. There has often been a criticism of the negative consequences of imposing western form of democracy on post-conflict third world countries.The main criticism of the imposition of multilateral efforts to promote the Western Brand of democracy in such countries has been is that according to Bastian and Luckham (2003) it ends up becoming “a tool of powerful economic interests, reinforce societal inequalities, penalize minorities, awaken dormant conflicts, and fail in practice to broaden popular participation in government’.In both Rwanda and Burundi the power sharing mechanism between Hutu and Tutsi tribes has failed to remove the deep suspicion and distrust that exists. In both the cases democratic institutions failed to stop the warring factions from going back to bloody conflicts (IDEA, 1998:142). Similarly of the ‘18 countries that experienced UN intervention between 1988 and 2002, 13 were classified as some form of authoritarian regime as of 2002. The majority of these regimes represented clear improvements over their immediate predecessors, but failed to meet the high expectations of international observers or local populations’ (Call and Cook, 2003:1&2). Another flaw of UN intervention based democracy thus is is that it institutionalises the conflicts and fixates the problem forever like in Bosnia and Kosovo where people divided along ethnic lines could not integrate because of the democratic institutional choice.The peace maintained by the democratic institutions in many some of the countries which has UN intervention like Cambodia, Uganda and Rwanda etc. was very short lived and these countries returned to violence after peace agreement. The 1993 elections in Cambodia exacerbated political divisions between the parties which set the stage for violent confrontations for the following elections within which it became difficult for UN to maintain the fragile peace (David, 1999:33). Similarly in Angola the 1992 elections failed to bring reconciliation between the warring factions (ibid, 1999). And in the remaining countries, except South Africa, it was the element of authoritarianism and not democratic institutions which maintained peace as appears from the survey of 18 countries that experienced UN intervention between 1988 and 2002 (Call and Cook, 2003:1&2). . The international community according to Call and Cook (2003) is more bound and determined to create democratic governments in post cold war settings. Even the international organisations are being used for this purpose: “The largest donors and international organizations have coalesced around a standard post-cold war political package……… involving constitution-making, elections within two years of the end of hostilities, funding for civil society, and extensive state institution-building” (Call and Cook, 2003:1) Of the many reasons for democratising the post-conflict states, one could be the creation of friendly governments like the international intervention in Afghanistan and Iraq. While the United States and other western countries try to justify this intervention on the basis of human rights, liberty and freedom of expression ensured by democratic institutes, the outcome of these interventions for democratic change has not been as much successful as was expected. It might take many more years for the people of Afghanistan and Iraq to breathe in a peaceful environment. The intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo, although, successful in stopping the killings of innocent civilian, is creating another problem. The very democracy which promises the forming of the government of consent is dividing the people by institutionalising ethnic identity and increasing its salience thus making it difficult for the minorities to integrate with the majority (Simonsen, 2005). In Kosovo, where Albanians who hold 80% of the seats in the assembly representing some 90% of the population do not need to accommodate the minority parties holding 20% of the seats where they represent only 10% of the population simply because there is no gain in appealing for their votes for Albanian parties (ibid, 2005:300). Thus international intervention for democratisation can be helpful in stopping the killing fields as far as the immediate effects are concerned but in the long run it might have the impact of dividing the population by providing institutional framework to ethnic division. The Use of force Intervention has been defined as “dictatorial interference by a state in the affairs of another state for the purpose of maintaining or altering the actual condition of things ….Intervention can take place in the external as well as the internal affairs of a state….But it must be emphasised that intervention proper is always dictatorial interference not interference pure and simple” In the modern international scenario, the mention of intervention has become synonymous with armed conflict. It should also be noted that before the First World War there was not much of an international effort to regulate and prevent armed conflict involving war crimes and aggression. This has been noted by an eminent academic as follows, “International law has no alternative but to accept war independently of the justice of its origins as a relation which the parties to it may set up if they choose and to busy itself in regulating the effects of the relation” However the Post Cold War era has seen a heightened concern by various international organisations to prevent armed conflict. In the recent decades the principle of non interference has been reinforced by the General Assembly Resolution 2131 (XX) of December 14 1960, The Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention in the Domestic affairs of States, General Assembly Declaration On the Principles of International Law Concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among the States In Accordance with The Charter of the United Nations,GA,Resolution,625(XXV) of 24 October 1970. Recently it is possible to see that the trend of the Nuremberg trials got a new life at the Hague Tribunal of Yugoslavia and Rwanda and thus began a new era of the enforcement of war crimes and state liability and had a major effect on the protection afforded to political and military leaders from criminal prosecution and punishment for crimes against humanity and crimes against international peace. The Hague trials marked a major high in the establishment of international authority to intervene in what were previously unchartered waters of the sovereign states and the protection those boundaries afforded to military and political leaders. The events of the past many decades have been nothing less than a new low for international criminal justice to say the least.If it wasn’t the direct state intervention through concepts like the Monroe doctrine by the Americans ,the Soviets got away with the Bloody invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968.The Cold War had a large role to play in the temporary halt of the accountability culture put forward by the Nuremburg trials .Historically when the conception of crimes against humanity was evolving with in the Post Nazi Germany the victims and survivors argued for the punishment of atrocities and other criminal acts which were committed in both the course as well as the anticipation of war.The aim was to include the atrocities against the victims with in and without Germany,before the Nazi’s took over in 1933.This effect of this would be to make humanity a victim and not just the state actors thus enforcing a system of universal Criminal Justice jurisdiction and acoountability. In this regard it would also be vital to speak about the latest policy of pre-emption which has been developed by the Bush Administration in the wake of 9/11.This policy allows the use of force in advance of the first use by the opposing party in the interests of national security.America has also sought to argue that the threats posed by Weapons of Mass Destruction and terrorism permit a war to be started by reason of self defence and this would not be a war of aggression.America like other superpowers in the past has tried to justify this as anticipatory self defence under the UN Charter framework but the fact remains that it has ended up becoming the worst perpetrator of a war of aggression and war crimes itself in the war torn Iraq. Article 48, 1977 addition to the Geneva Conventions, Part IV reads as follows, “…The Parties to the conflict shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives and accordingly shall direct their operations only against military objectives…” In the light of the above statement the “precision strikes” against the so called terrorists in Iraq and the ensuing bombing campaign has put the very integrity of the US respect for International law at stake.The people who died were civilians,some on their ways to celebrate wedding parties and other merely on their way home from work.The fact that Article 50 of the Geneva Conventions reads that “The presence within the civilian population of individuals who do not come within the definition of civilians does not deprive the population of its civilian character”,means that the US was in blatant violation of the rules of armed conflict because it was attacking civilian populations.The same happened in Afghanistan in the year 2001 right after the 9/11 attacks.The war on terrorism is now largely discredited as the War of Terrorism to blackmail and extort the weaker state actors within international law.Yet sadly none of the officials were sanctioned under the US legislation providing for the penalties to such heinous and outrageous infringements of international law .There are other violations of the Geneva convention which were perpetrated during the course of the Iraq war and to name a few there was a transfer of the Iraqi combatants out of Iraq in violation of the Article 49 of the Geneva and they were denied help from Red Cross which was against article 63. The point of discussing the above is that the high handed perpetrators of war and aggression are running unaccountable by the UN organisations of International Criminal justice .This is mainly because these tribunals are the puppets of political criminality and not of pure justice.It seems that the trials for war crimes are only for the leaders of the defeated or “ conquered country” and wars of aggression can be conveniently guised as pre-emptive wars for the purposes of self defence.The difference between internal and international conflict is arbitrary because regulation and formulation of these justice ideals are only enshrined with in the treaties and textbooks.Whether it is a state in the course of internal or international conflict no other state will come forward and give anything more than a statement of Condemnation.If the aggressive state is powerful enough it will get away with anything that can be labelled as a war crime without any intervention.Take the example of the atrocities perpetrated by Israel .Just by refusing to sign the various international peace agreements it has managed to be on top of its game of land grabbing and political manoeuvring. Recent history does not show a flattering account of the treatment of War Crimes by the ICC and the related institutions.In the Gulf and Kosovo War ,power plants and grids, were specifically targeted in the contravention of Article 54 of the Geneva Conventions which forbids attacking the facilities “indispensable to the survival of the civilian population.” Traditionally the law of the war only concerned State v State conflict where the states accused each other of war crimes and aggression .Later on there was a need felt to characterize wars as truly internal conflicts.The Geneva Convention and its Additional Protocol only applied to international conflicts i.e. "declared war or of any other armed conflict [between States] even if the state of war is not recognized by one of them," and also "all cases of partial or total occupation of the territory of a [State], even if the said occupation meets with no armed resistance." Take the example of the foreign intervention in the civil wars of Bosnia or Zaire.The law does not provide this incitement and inducement of a civil crisis as an offence.This is a classic example of the divide and rule strategy by the by the foreign “peaceful” aggressors.The Tadic case of the Yogoslavia tribunal however provides some useful insights in this regard. The case says that when a de facto agent of the foreign State or the foreign state itself intervenes to distort the peace of another country the Geneva Convention did not apply. Peacekeeping and Globalization as an impetus for preventing armed conflict: towards some conclusions Unfortunately the grass may not be very green at this side of the issue where as it can be seem that the UN international war tribunals have often been accused of promoting the political agenda of the prominent and powerful member states. As Stephen R. Shalom, remarked once1 “Following World War II, a war crimes tribunal was held in Tokyo to try Japanese political and military leaders. There is no doubt that the defendants were responsible for appalling atrocities, but, as the Indian judge on the tribunal wrote in his dissenting opinion, the victorious allies had themselves committed grave crimes, and the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the most horrific war crimes of the Pacific War. But only the atrocities committed by the Japanese were punished. In short, the war crimes trial represented “victors” justice.” The political cultures of the tyrant dictatorships and the cultural weaknesses of the victims have to be well taken into account before we look towards a positive role to be played by the UN multilateral action.The UN being one of the BWI (Bretton Woods Institutions) has also allegedly been involved in promoting the liberal agenda of the Western Superpowers based on their distrust of communism.This has mainly pertained to role of Market-Friendly Policies (MFP’s)in de-emphasizing the role of the State in the interests of promoting long term and efficient economic development. MFP’s typically relate to low rates of inflation ,prudent government spending, high rates of investment and a healthy trend of market liberalisation. The Post Cold War approach of the BWI’s was based upon a much smaller role for the state following the era of the large-scale globalisation (so characteristic of the post cold war years).This was largely a response to the state controlled economy’ of the USSR which turned out to be an economic and political disaster. The Government then,according to these BWI’s had to be discouraged from any interference in the Economic system, and this new policy was nicknamed as the “Washington Consensus," a term coined by John Williamson, who defined his own set of reforms he believed that the policymakers in Washington should propose for Latin America,which included trade liberalization and the privatization of inward foreign Direct Investment(FDI) .The “Washington consensus” was used to describe the commonly shared goals /themes within the policy packages endorsed by Washington-based institutions at the time, such as the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and U.S. Treasury Department.This was to be promoted through the United Nations was later dubbed as the “neoliberal” agenda and received scathing criticism ,in that it that it caused the economic downfall of the developing countries It is said that the main reason for Argentines economic suffering in the 1999-2002 crisis has been the use of the “Washington consensus” package.Thus the failure of this minimalist role of the State as promoted by the UN and its institutions has demonstrated the insecurities of the UN and the Western Powers that control it of communism.The way ahead for the UN is to recognise that the new ole of the State now entails greater co-operation with the BWI’s as well as the UN and the international NGO’s to collaborate in the War against terrorism, economic instability ,poverty and the drug mafia. 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