Download International Organizations. Nuts and Bolts

PSIR210 International
Organizations. Week 4 and 5
 International
Organizations – Historical
Antecedents
 The League of Nations
 The United Nations
 The European Union
 The Organization of Islamic Conference
 The African Union
 The Associations of Southeast Asian Nations
 Non-governmental Organizations
 Multinational Corporations
 The
foundation of international
organizations was built by the 1648 Peace of
Westphalia – the existence of a number of
states functioning as independent political
units;
 International organizations themselves did
not appear until the nineteenth century;
 The 1814-1815 Congress of Vienna – The
Concert of Europe - agreement to meet ‘at
fixed intervals’;
 The
delegates at the Congress of Vienna
(1814-1815) were motivated by the
desire to benefit Europe as a whole.
 National
interest was modified for the
sake of the general interest of Europe.
 The
aim; drawing a plan to alter Europe
politically and territorially so as to prevent
the extensive expansion of any one great
power, such as Napoleon.
 Main
goals; creating a balance of power
among the powerful nations of Europe,
reinstating conservative regimes, containing
France, and reaching an agreement to
cooperate with each other, supporting the
overall purpose of preventing future
widespread conflict.
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The final settlement at Vienna demonstrated the first international
group to attempt to deal with European affairs, the main purpose
of the Concert being to preserve the balance of power and protect
conservative governments from being overthrown.
The fact that the Congress of Vienna was conducted with the aim
of preventing universal war, which led to proposals of creating a
balance of power, establishing "better" conservative governments,
containing France and cooperation between the great powers to
meet these ends clearly demonstrates that the welfare of all of
Europe was a relevant concern( a common concern).
After much deliberation, the delegates succeeded in creating a
final settlement which adjusted the selfish goals of the individual
nations to acquire large expanses of territory to support the
balance of power.
Economic and social developments – growing
interdependence and Industrial Revolution – the
need for co-ordination between states;
 Commerce and communication were
increasingly internationalized:
 1821 – an international commission for the Elbe,
1831 – for the Rhine, 1856 – for the Danube
rivers;
 1868 – International Telegraphic Bureau (later
named International Telegraphic Union – ITU)
 1875 – The International Bureau of Weights and
Measures
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Public and private groups and influential individuals in
many European countries and in the US played significant
role in planning how to maintain peace in the post WWI
period
US President Woodrow Wilson expressed commitment to the
establishment of a security organization - ’ a general
association of nations’ as part of his plan for peace in his
famous Fourteen Points presented to the US Senate in 1918
Leon Bourgeois of France designed an elaborate system of
sanctions
General Jan Smuts of South Africa suggested a system of
mandates and institutional design of a new body
Lord Phillimore of Great Britain, initiated works of a group of
influential diplomats and lawyers and drafted a plan for a
League.
 The
Peace Conference convened in Paris,
on January 18, 1919;
 The plan for a League of Nations was agreed
to become a part of the peace treaty;
 The Covenant of the League of Nations was
drafted by a nineteen-member committee
composed of two representatives from each
of the great powers and one representative
from each of the smaller participating states
 President Wilson was appointed chairman of
the Committee.
 The
first draft of the Covenant was adopted
on February 14;
 The final draft of the Covenant was
unanimously adopted by a plenary session
of the peace conference on April 28, 1919;
 The Covenant entered into force on January
10, 1920 after the Treaty of Versailles being
ratified;
 Sir Eric Drummond was appointed the first
Secretary General of the League of Nations.
 The
plans for the establishment of the
League relied heavily on the experience
of the previous hundred years: the
congress and concert systems, the public
international unions and the two Hague
meetings of 1899 1nd 1907;
 The wartime experience – the
experience of Allied cooperation during
the war – played a significant role.
 The
League of Nation's task was simple - to
ensure that war never broke out again. After
the turmoil caused by the Versailles Treaty,
many looked to the League to bring stability
to the world.
 The only way to avoid a repetition of WWI
was to create an international body whose
sole purpose was to maintain world peace
and which would sort out international
disputes as and when they occurred. This
would be the task of the League of Nations.
 The Treaty
of Versailles was the peace
settlement signed after World War One
had ended in 1918 and in the shadow of
the Russian Revolution and other events
in Russia.
 The
treaty was signed at the vast
Versailles Palace near Paris - hence its
title - between Germany and the Allies.
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The League of Nations was created. This did happen even if Germany
was initially excluded from it.
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Land had to be handed over the Poland, France, Belgium and
Denmark.
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All overseas colonies were to be handed over to the League.
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All land taken from Russia had to be handed back to Russia.
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Germany’s army had to be reduced to 100,000 men.
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Germany’s navy was reduced to 6 battleships with no submarines.
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No air force was allowed.
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Germany was forbidden to unite with Austria.
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Germany had to accept the "War Guilt Clause" and pay reparations.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pPmZ
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Institutional design:
 The Assembly – composed of the
representative of all members of the
League;
 The Council – composed of the
representatives of the principal Allied and
Associated Powers, together with
representatives of four other members of
the League;
 The permanent Secretariat;
 The seat of the League was Geneva.
Article 8 – recommended the reduction of
armaments and the limitation of the private
manufacture of armaments;
 Article 10 – the members of the League
undertook ‘to respect and preserve as against
external aggression the territorial integrity and
existing political independence of all members
of the League’;
 Article 11 – ‘Any threat of war (…) is hereby
declared a matter of concern to the whole
League and the League shall take any action that
may be deemed wise and effectual to safeguard
the peace of nations’.
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Articles 12-16 – outlined how states in dispute
should conduct their relations (mediation,
conciliation, arbitration, the Permanent Court of
International Justice)
 States resorting to war in violation of their
obligations from the Covenant, were deemed ‘to
have committed an act of war against all other
Members of the league, which hereby undertake
immediately to subject it to severance of all trade
of financial relations’;
 Article 18 – all new treaties were to be registered
and published by the Secretariat of the League
of Nations.
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During the early years of its activities, the League
generated high hopes that it would be able to
prevent major conflict;
 The activities of the League were motivated by
memories of 1914-1918 war;
 During the 1920s the League provided a useful
addition to international diplomacy - regular
annual meetings between member states’
representatives allowed discussion
on threats to peace and security (e.g. in conflict
between Greece and Bulgaria in 1925, TurkishIraq dispute over Mosul)
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 The
League facilitated/inspired the
conclusion of a number of important
international treaties:
- The 1928 Briand-Kellog Pact (General
Treaty for the Renunciation of War)
- The 1925 Locarno Treaty (guaranteed
French-German-Belgian borders)
 The League provided valuable coordination
platform for international efforts (e.g. in the
field of protection of refugees);
 Protection of minorities was placed on a
regular international footing.
 The
system created in 1919 was not allowed
to prevent the Second World war in 1939;
 The league became an empty shell
abandoned by countries unwilling to
involve themselves or give teeth to the
League’s Covenant;
 The failure of the US to join the League
undermined the League’s claim to
universality and its hopes of taking effective
action outside Europe - in Ethiopia,
Manchuria and in Latin America;
Full-scale military aggression by Italy against
Ethiopia (Abisynia) in 1935 brought a number of
economic sanctions which were undermined by
British and French concern not to push Italy into the
arms of Germany. In 1936 sanctions against Italy were
abandoned;
 Japanese attacks on China and her occupation of
Manchuria from 1931 marked the unwillingness of
the League’s members to act in Asia without US
support. In 1938 The League approved the
application of sanctions against Japan by individual
members;
 A number of Latin American states left the League.
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The League of Nations represented both a
radical (the first international organization for
promoting peace and cooperation between
member states) and a conservative (based on
existing international order) trend in
international relations;
 The whole League system can be seen as a
crucial link which brought together the pre-1914
international organization and wartime
cooperation into a more centralized and
systematic form on a global scale, thus providing
a stepping stone towards the more enduring
United Nations.
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 It
was the lack of will of the members
rather than an available means that
accounted for ineffectiveness of the
League;
 The League was ill equipped to achieve
its goals;
 An international organization with real
enforcement powers was incompatible
with the principle of absolute national
sovereignty.
 During
the 1930s the European political
system which had helped to create the
League of Nations came under attack
from revisionist states – Germany, Japan,
Italy.
The League of Nations represented both a
radical (the first international organization for
promoting peace and cooperation between
member states) and a conservative (based on
existing international order) trend in
international relations;
 The whole League system can be seen as a
crucial link which brought together the pre-1914
international organization and wartime
cooperation into a more centralized and
systematic form on a global scale, thus providing
a stepping stone towards the more enduring
United Nations.

 It
was the lack of will of the members
rather than an available means that
accounted for ineffectiveness of the
League;
 The League was ill equipped to achieve
its goals;
 An international organization with real
enforcement powers was incompatible
with the principle of absolute national
sovereignty.