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[miko-khael-ito]

UN101: Summary

Philipus Mikhael Priyo Nugroho_072011233043_Summary UN 101

UN or the United Nations is one of the most substantial IGO (Interstate Governmental Organisation) in existence today. It hosts most of the independent nations on the earth, and work-not as a world government-but rather a platform for all of the members to achieve world peace and global progress. Laid out also in its formal declaration of forming, ways for these countries to convey their interests have also existed in the 1945 Charter of The United Nations.

Some would not know that the embryo of the UN preceded its formalisation by eighty years. The mentioned embryo was an IGO named International Telecommunication Union (ITU) that was established back in the year 1865. Despite lacking similarity to the current-day UN, ITU had served as a medium for countries to speak relating issues up until now, as a part of UN’s specialised agencies.

Path to its enactment as an IGO, the United Nations saw a lot of preceding key events unfolding to its date of creation on the 24th of October, 1945. The League of Nations (LoN), concocted by the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, was an IGO that meant to focused on preventing another world war from happening again, and to foster global progress, similar to that of UN’s purposes.

Despite the egalitarian cause, LoN failed to avert the Second World War from materialising, and later on, abandoned by its own member states. Only until the new year of 1942 that the motion of a ‘united nations’ was circulating again in the views of Allied Forces leaders. Despite the same phrase being used, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Declaration by United Nations was a behest for the twenty-six nations of the bloc to reverse the Axis dominance on Europe and the rest of the world.

The path of UN’s emergence, soon followed throughout the years of conflict, with the Dumbarton Oaks and Yalta Conferences. To simplify, the conferences brought together the most prominent country leaders of the ‘United Nations’ to recognise the need for a postwar world organisation, synthesise the mentioned organisation’ blueprint, and to arrange a high-level meeting to declare the birth of the United Nations. Following Imperial Japan’s unconditional surrender to Allied Powers, fifty states representatives met in San Fransisco to jointly declare the year zero for the UN, and its basis of the United Nations Charter that has been catalogued by the United Nations Conference on International Organization.

Believing that the UN in general will be very large to deal with provisional affairs, the charter also gave way for six main bodies of the UN to manifest themselves. Those main bodies are the United Nations General Assembly, United Nations Security Council (SC), Economic and Social Council, Trusteeship Council, International Court of Justice, and United Nations Secretariat. In the two paragraphs following this one, I will explain briefly about these bodies, in terms of their roles and membership.

The UN General Assembly (UNGA) is the largest entity of the UN in term of its membership. Other than the full 193 members of the UN, it also hosts non-state actors, alongside three observers: The Holy See, The State of Palestine, and the European Union, in its annual debate and hearing sessions. These sessions provide heads of all member states to address and to debate various pivotal aspects of the UN and the world itself.

The UN Security Council, provided by the UN Charter, deliberate and making actions towards the maintenance of global peace and security. From its fifteen members, ten of which are elected by the General Assembly for a renewable to years term. While the other five are the permanent members of the Security Council, comprising of the P5 (the United States of America, People’s Republic of China, The Russian Federation, The French Republic, and The Kingdom of Great Britain), nations who possesses the veto right.

Economic and Social Council, as the name suggests, focuses mainly on economical and social matters that are suggested by its fifty-four member states. On the formal level of definition, this council acts as the UN’s central platform for its UNGA-elected members to discuss and debate methods on implementing and keeping track of sustainable development. For the sake of abbreviating the number of paragraphs, I will also explain the Trusteeship Council which are currently suspended operation since 1994. The reason for its suspension was because the eleven trust territories that were meant to be supervised, had either gained independence, or a high level of autonomy of self-govern.

The fourth main body of the UN, the International Court of Justice is the only main body of the UN that doesn’t headquarter itself in the UN Main Building, but rather in the Peace Palace of The Hague, Netherlands. This body functions as the primary judicial organ that settle legal disputes submitted by states, in accordance with existing international laws. Even so, unlike most judicial court practices, it doesn’t impose verdicts on the cases the fifteen judges of the ICJ handles, but rather recommends advisory measures to solve the case at hand for the opposing parties.

Lastly, we have the Secretariat of The United Nations. This particular body comprises the Secretary General of the UN, as well as tens of thousand internationally-recruited staffs all over the world. Via its numerous offices and commissions, the Secretariat’s responsibility is to coordinate the mentioned boards to carry on the routine tasks of UN’s various organs across the world. The UN decides on who should become the Secretary General through deliberation process in the UNGA. One person will be elected as the SecGen of the UN for a five year term. Other than acting as the UN’s Chief Administrator, UN’s Secretary General is also fulfiling tasks as the Head of The Secretary.

Taking the role as one substantial platform of discussion for nations of the world, UN must provide nations that are peaceloving and eager to contribute, the means of membership admission. This admission requires several steps before one state could become a full member of the United Nations. To start, a state must submits an application the UN’s Secretary-General as well as a letter confirming its acceptance of the obligations provided by the charter. Secondly, the applying state must have at least nine out of fifteen votes of affirmation from the Security Council’s members, while also having none of the P5 nations vote against the state’s admission process.

In continuation with the previous paragraph, there are two requirements left to finish the membership procedure. The requirements included: a recommendation from the SC for the membership; a two third majority vote from the General Assembly to admit a new state; and an adoption of the admission’s resolution. Afterwards, membership becomes effective right after the resolution has been adopted by the UN. The latest state to joined the UN was the Republic of South Sudan in 2011, and the UN ever since has 193 member states.

[m-albana]

UN101: SUMMARY

Muhammad Albana_072011233117_SummaryUN101

The United Nations is an international organization founded in 1945 after the Second World War by 51 countries committed to maintaining international peace and security, developing friendly relations among nations and promoting social progress, better living standards and human rights.

The General Assembly shall meet every year in regular session commencing on the Tuesday of the third week in September, counting from the first week that contains at least one working day.

The main organs of the UN are the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council, the Trusteeship Council, the International Court of Justice, and the UN Secretariat. All were established in 1945 when the UN was founded.

General Assembly

• May resolve non-compulsory recommendations to states or suggestions to the Security Council (UNSC);

• Decides on the admission of new members, following proposal by the UNSC;

• Adopts the budget;

• Elects the non-permanent members of the UNSC; all members of ECOSOC; the UN Secretary General; and the fifteen judges of the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Security Council

• Responsible for the maintenance of international peace and security;

• May adopt compulsory resolutions;

• Has fifteen members: five permanent members with veto power and ten elected members.

Economic and Social Council

• Responsible for co-operation between states as regards economic and social matters;

• Co-ordinates co-operation between the UN's numerous specialized agencies;

• Has 54 members, elected by the General Assembly to serve staggered three-year mandates.

Trusteeship Council

• Was originally designed to manage colonial possessions that were former League of Nations mandates;

• Has been inactive since 1994, when Palau, the last trust territory, attained independence.

International Court of Justice

• Decides disputes between states that recognize its jurisdiction;

• Issues legal opinions;

• Renders judgment by relative majority. Its fifteen judges are elected by the UN General Assembly for nine-year terms.

UN Secretariat

• Supports the other UN bodies administratively (for example, in the organization of conferences, the writing of reports and studies and the preparation of the budget);

• Its chairperson—the UN Secretary General—is elected by the General Assembly for a five-year mandate and is the UN's foremost representative.

The United Nations member states are the 193 sovereign states that are members of the United Nations (UN) and have equal representation in the UN General Assembly. The Council is composed of 15 members. Five permanent members: China, France, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom, and the United States, and ten non-permanent members elected for two-year terms by the General Assembly (with end of term year):

The criteria for admission of new members to the UN are set out in Chapter II, Article 4 of the UN Charter:

• Membership in the United Nations is open to all peace-loving states which accept the obligations contained in the present Charter and, in the judgment of the Organization, are able and willing to carry out these obligations.

• The admission of any such state to membership in the United Nations will be effected by a decision of the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council.

References:

Un.org. (2014). Main Organs. [online] Available at: https://www.un.org/en/sections/about-un/main-organs/index.html [Accessed 16 Oct. 2020].

Un.org. (2015). About UN Membership. [online] Available at: https://www.un.org/en/sections/member-states/about-un-membership/index.html [Accessed 16 Oct. 2020].

Un.org. (2015). History of the United Nations. [online] Available at: https://www.un.org/en/sections/history/history-united-nations/index.html [Accessed 15 Oct. 2020].

"Member States of United Nations" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_states_of_the_United_Nations

"United Nations Main Organs" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_System#Six_principal_organs

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