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The United Nations and Canada: What Canada has done and should be doing at the UN Preface The United Nations and Canada: What Canada has done and should be doing at the UN John E. Trent One of the UN’s early (and great) Secretaries‐General, Dag Hammarskjold, is reported to have said, “The United Nations was not created to take man to heaven, but to save humanity from hell.” Our objective in this booklet is somewhat more restrained. It is to show how the UN can help to assure a sustainable future on this earth of ours – and how Canada can help it to do this. We can learn from Hammarskjold’s characterization that while we cannot expect wonders from the UN, we can recognize that during its watch the world has avoided international wars and has become wealthier and more integrated. Our authors recognize both the UN’s achievements and its failings. But, they also believe in the absolute necessity of effective international organizations to help the world make decisions regarding global problems. A good way to get a bird’s eye view of the United Nations is to analyse its functions as an organization, meaning the UN’s utility in international relations ‐‐ how it fulfils its specific international purposes. Because the media mostly reports conflicts and Security Council blockages, the United Nations’ many and varied functions on behalf of the world are relatively little known. Here is a partial list: *Maintaining international peace and security *Providing humanitarian assistance *Promoting human rights and social justice *Stewardship over the ‘Global Commons’ (including the atmosphere, outer space, the oceans, and the environment, everything outside national boundaries) *International law, courts, conventions, norm development and treaty making *Inter‐state social and technical functions Despite the headlines focussing on stories on conflict, the real international story should be about cooperation. The reality is that our world functions pretty well on a day‐ to‐day basis because of the many United Nations specialized agencies focusing on everything from mail, communications and airlines to health, agriculture, trade and education. Take, for example, the International Civil Aviation Association operating out of Montreal, which facilitates the free flow of thousands of international flights every day. These services are universally enjoyed but rarely recognized. Nor does the United Nations rest on its laurels. Its capacity to adapt itself to changing conditions is based on its legitimacy as an all‐inclusive universal organization and its founding principles of peaceful settlement of disputes supported by economic and social development and respect for human rights. Without having a single policeman for its first ten years, it went from pacifist peacekeeping in the 1950’s to the present comprehensive peace‐making missions. Peace operations are enhanced by criminal justice machinery and the promotion of human rights. The UN leads in the pacification and re‐building of war‐ torn countries, the fight against communicable diseases, the struggle against poverty, and support for democracy. Such activities demonstrate the utility of international institutions and, even more, the validity of attempts by Canada to maximise their usefulness through energetic participation and reform. And up until the arrival of the Harper government, Canada has indeed played a leading role at the UN. Since its founding, Canada has been one of the great champions of the United Nations. A Canadian, Prof. John Humphrey, was the principal architect of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Canadian diplomacy has supported the broadening of membership in the UN, decolonization, North‐South Dialogue, the Rio Summit on Environment and Development, negotiations to halt ozone layer depletion and acid rain, and efforts to end apartheid in South Africa. More recent Canadian initiatives include campaigns to ban land mines and curtail the trade in blood diamonds, the establishment of the International Criminal Court, and orchestrating awareness of the plight of child soldiers. But, Canada did not just go along with the wave. We have never thought the UN was a perfect institution. Canadians have always tried to improve and reform the UN. Former Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in introducing peacekeeping to the UN. For years we worked to improve the openness of the Security Council. More recently, Canada funded the Commission that created the idea of the international community’s ‘Responsibility to Protect’ citizens. “R2P” is slowly reconstituting notions of sovereignty so that the world can get on with modernizing international relations. Canada has been an active and successful player at the UN because of our understanding of diplomacy and of international politics. This is no longer the case. Increasingly the government of Canada is undermining the UN and global cooperation. Some recent examples: We have not signed the treaty to regulate the arms trade; Canadian diplomats at the UN, at the direction of their political masters, make lacklustre contributions to debates on the Responsibility to Protect; we have withdrawn from the Kyoto Protocol on climate change and the Convention on Desertification; Canada has so far refused to join a UN peacekeeping mission to help Mali – a country we used to support; even worse, out of 97,600 police, troops and civilian peacekeepers on UN assignments as of July 31, only 157 were Canadians; our draft legislation to implement the Convention on Cluster Munitions would nullify its intent. In addition, cuts to the Department of Foreign Affairs budgets have reduced our diplomatic capacity. We have drastically reduced the number of refugees Canada accepts and our aid program has been cut and folded in with the Department of Foreign Affairs. Where Canada was strong, it is now weak; where we were once prudent we are now hostile to much of what the UN does and represents. The UN is far from perfect. It is currently failing the people of Syria. Its human rights forums often include those who are mistreating their own populations. Money is sometimes wasted. Often we are distressed it cannot take decisions about our global challenges. But, warts and all, it is necessary. It succeeds far more often than most people realize. As the one organization that can convene all the world’s nations, it is the basis for building a better framework for governing our interdependent world. So, if we in this pamphlet, or if Canadians in general, want a UN that can help deal with the world’s problems and make decisions, then we are going to have to work very hard to bring about change in international institutions. We will have to demonstrate that we are knowledgeable team players. We must be respected in the world for our foreign policy and not marginalized. We cannot afford to simply ignore the UN, or worse, to continually denigrate it. Canada must once again become a leader in world politics and at the UN. For Canada, having strong international organizations to promote peace and justice must be one of the fundamental principles of Canadian foreign policy. For Further Reading Paul Heinbecker (2010). Getting Back in the Game, A Foreign Policy Playbook for Canada, Toronto, Key Porter Books. Jean E. Krasno (ed.) (2004). The United Nations: Confronting the Challenges of Global Society, Boulder, Lynne Rienner Publishers. Clyde Sanger (ed.) (1988). Canadian and the United Nations, Ottawa, Minister of Supply and Services Canada. John E. Trent (2007). Modernizing the United Nations System, Opladen, Germany, Barbara Budrich Publishers. Thomas G. Weiss & Sam Daws (eds.) (2007).The Oxford Handbook on the United Nations, Oxford, Oxford University Press. This volume has been compiled and published as a project of the World Federalist Movement – Canada (www.worldfederalistscanada.org). The views and opinions expressed in each of the articles are the sole responsibility of the authors. It is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Unported License. To order additional printed copies, contact World Federalist Movement – Canada (613 232‐0647, or by email: [email protected]).