I've got your radical revision right here

Site Note: I really am hoping to get some feedback on this one, but since it's the weekend, traffic will be down. Because of that, I'm going to keep bumping this back to the top occasionally for the next couple of days so it can get more play.

Kofi Annan is afraid that the UN is losing relevance. Ed. Losing? How about long since lost? He's calling on member nations to think of ways to reform the institution.

UNITED NATIONS, New York A mood of skittish uncertainty has descended on the leaders of the United Nations. They are eager to overhaul their institution, but worry whether any change can give it the freedom it needs to survive without being seen as either a lackey of the United States or an easily swattable gadfly.

Of course there's always the, "do the right thing no matter what people think of you approach." What am I thinking? This is the UN we're talking about.

Annan, who will outline plans for reform as the annual General Assembly gathers next week, has said that only "radical" revisions in the institution are likely to preserve it.

So what, exactly, is the problem?

"The worst fear of any of us," said Shashi Tharoor, an under secretary general whose entire career has been spent at the United Nations, "is that we fail to navigate an effective way between the Scylla of being seen as a cat's paw of the sole superpower and the Charybdis of being seen as so unhelpful to the sole superpower that they disregard the value of the United Nations."

It's too late. Too many of us already see the UN as being worthless.

On another note, few things illustrate the problems with the UN more clearly than the fact that, according to this story, this guy has never had another job.

Look, here's my view. The UN is beyond reform. It's time to throw it on the dung heap of history.

We need a new body with a new vision. The problem with the UN and the League of Nations can be found without looking past their names.

First we had the League of Nations. It was a weak and worthless body that prized talking above action. When action was necessary, the League was incapable of acting.

Now we have the United Nations. To hear people talk about the UN, they appear to think that the only valuable thing is that the UN acts together. What the UN does seems to be of secondary importance.

The problem with both bodies, from my point of view is the desire for cooperation, irrespective of whether the object of the cooperation was worthy or not. It's because of this way of thinking that the whims of petty dictators are seen as co-equal with the expressed will of democratic peoples. We need a new body; we need a body dedicated to a higher ideal than diplomacy for the sake of diplomacy.

I propose a new international body: The Association of Free States. The emphasis here is squarely on the word "free." This body should be formed with the aim of protecting, preserving, and promoting freedom, liberty, and self-determination.

If I had my way, the US would leave the UN and begin to negotiate a treaty that would form the basis of a new international body with a core of allies who are all dedicated to the promotion of liberty. At first, this should be a relatively small group of nations, not to exceed 10. I would say that this core group should definitely include the US, Great Britain, and Australia. Until recently, I would have said Canada, but they've gone wobbly lately. Other possibilities would be Japan, India, Spain, Israel, Italy, maybe even Poland. (Poland has certainly shown a strong dedication to freedom over the last few years.)

I'm quite open to the overall makeup of this group as I don't think that the who is what will make the difference; the important thing about the nations chosen is that they will all have to be able to agree on a standard of political, religious, and economic freedom which can be determined on a relatively subjective basis. More to the point, they should be able to agree on two sets of standards: Level One, and Level 2.

These standards of freedom would be very important because they will form the basis of membership in this body. As I see it, this body should have two tiers of membership. The higher level would be composed of full members and would initially be composed only of the core nations who drafted the agreement. The second level would be composed of conditional members.

Any nation wishing to join the AFS would have to subject itself to a freedom audit. Once the audit is completed, a report would be submitted to the full members for a vote, or maybe 2. The full members would first vote on whether the applicant nation meets the Level One standards. If 2/3 of the nations agree that that the applicant has met the Level One standards, the nation would be accepted as a full member. If the applicant failed to be accepted as a full member, the members would take a second vote; a nation could be accepted as a provisional member if 60% of the members believed it had met the Level Two standards.

Full members would have voting representatives in the Assembly. Provisional members would have representatives who would be allowed to participate in debate and serve on committees, but would have no vote on decisions of the Assembly. Nonmember would have no official standing. These nations would have no permanent ambassador to the AFS and would be able to speak only upon the sufferance of the full members.

Provisional members would be allowed to apply for full membership once every four years, following a new freedom audit. Nations who fail to gain even provisional membership would be able to apply again every five years, also following a subsequent freedom audit.

One of the primary agencies of the AFS would be designed solely for the purpose of providing advice and assistance to nations who fail to gain full membership. This agency would provide as much assistance as possible to help these nations make the appropriate reforms in order to achieve the minimum freedom standards.

Also, full member states would be accorded full sovereignty. This is not to say that no member nation would be able infringe on their territory, but there would be a high burden of proof in order to justify such a move. This is because full members, by nature of being full members, would have a presumption of innocence against any accusations that might justify any move against it. Except in cases of imminent threat, this presumption could only be overturned by a 2/3 vote of the Assembly.

Provisional members would be accorded limited sovereignty. Such nations borders would normally be respected. However, any full member nation would be allowed to engage in military actions inside a provisional member's borders upon evidence that a threat to the acting nation, or any nation existed inside the nation's borders. Such a threat would not have to be caused by the government of the provisional member, just inside it's borders. Such a threat would exist, barring imminent threat, when 40% plurality of the Assembly said it did. Provisional members could also act in this fashion, but only if sponsored by at least one full member.

Nonmember nations would be accorded no sovereignty at all. Member nations, and provisional members with one sponsor, could take action against a nonmember if they, in the sole judgement of the member nation, believed it to be necessary. The member nation would be required to lay it's case before the Assembly, but the Assembly's consent would not be required.

I would hope that this structure would limit voting to nations which have a strong dedication to preserving freedom and representative government while encouraging other nations to aspire to an equal level of freedom. Further, varying levels of sovereignty would give both the responsibility and the right to member nations to act against threats to freedom.

Also, I do not like current UN system of one nation, one vote. I would like to develop a system that accorded nations varying levels of representation based on population and economic size and freedom. This system might even involve a bicameral house, but I really don't even have a bare sketch of this part worked out.

There are reasons for all of the ideas I've laid out here, but I'm not going to try to defend it all now. Hopefully I'll be able to address that in later in posts as well as flesh the whole thing out some more.

I'd be dishonest if I claimed that I thought this all up myself (The idea of varying levels of sovereignty I know I read somewhere else.), but I honestly don't remember any of the people whose ideas might have contributed to this concept. If anyone knows of anyone else whose made proposals like this, I'd love to hear about it. Also, I'd love any comments on this one, especially any possible improvements. If you do want to try to improve the plan, remember that the idea is to maximize freedom.

Update - Jack Rich has a post on why the UN was doomed to fail from the beginning. I think he has diagnosed the inherent sickness of the UN very well. In the conclusion to that post (which he also left in the comments here), he states:

My first reaction is that such an organization is doomed, simply because it must, by the very nature of institutions, place its own institutional survival ahead of its stated mission. My cynicism is born of the hard truths of working in the national security apparat in the United States, where we prevailed over the Soviets in spite of how we were "organized."

I've got to admit that I have similar fears, even if I'm not as cynical about the whole thing as he is. I would hope that such an organization would have sufficient checks and balances to make it functional, despite the problems of any organization with large numbers of politicians. I have no illusions that any degree of checks and balances could make it efficient, but would like to think it could at least be functional. Of course, I may be overly optimistic.

Another Update - One of the criticisms of this post has been the countries that I listed as possible core members. (Those that would initially define the organization.) Mark Byron correctly stated, "if we want this to work, this needs to be a little bit more than just a codification of the Coalition of the Willing." It's certainly true that the countries involved should not be chosen simply because the happen to line up with the US at the moment. Freedom is the issue, not conformity.

As I mentioned in the comments below, I wasn't really trying to say who I thought should be in; I was just listing possibilities. That was probably a mistake. I've been doing some research though, and I'm ready to list some possibilities. I've also started to think that 20 nations would be a better upper level than the 10 I had previously stated. We might even be able to go a bit higher, but I don't think so. If we start asking countries in just for the sake of being inclusive or having bigger numbers, we would risk diluting the definitions of freedom in the treaty.

The countries I've come up with are not listed in any particular order. I came up with this list after reviewing information from Reporters Sans Frontières (an organization I have serious doubts about, but it doesn't hurt to include different views in this analysis), The Heritage Foundation, Freedom House, and the CIA Fact Book. I don't pretend that this is any kind of scientific analysis, and even though I used some organizations freedom rankings, it is still arbitrary in places.

Anyway, here goes:

- Finland - Uruguay - Iceland - The Netherlands - Canada - - Ireland - Germany - Sweden - Denmark - Australia - - United States - Chile - Czech Republic - United Kingdom - Czech Republic - Switzerland

Belgium and Norway would also be possibilities. If possible, I'd like to find a couple of African nations as well, but I'm having trouble finding any that would qualify. South Africa, Botswana, and Namimbia seem like possibilities, but my own knowledge of these countries is sketchy.

If anyone's got any comments on including other countries or tossing any on this list, especially in regards to Africa, please weigh in.

Yet Another Update: Thanks to Brian for pointing out the error in the headline.

Comments

[Guy Cannon]

Well said!!

[Jack Rich]

From my post today:

Jeffrey Collins, of joyfulchristian, has an intriguing idea to replace the UN. From his post today, this:

the US would leave the UN and begin to negotiate a treaty that would form the basis of a new international body with a core of allies who are all dedicated to the promotion of liberty

My first reaction is that such an organization is doomed, simply because it must, by the very nature of institutions, place its own institutional survival ahead of its stated mission. My cynicism is born of the hard truths of working in the national security apparat in the United States, where we prevailed over the Soviets in spite of how we were "organized."

In short, Our military-industrial complex prevailed because we had dedicated men and women who believed in liberty and in the need to defend it with force of arms. I don't see any international organization, including NATO or a successor to the UN, being able to be effective in spite of organizational snafus.

Regardless, joyfulchristian's piece deserves a respectful read and response.

[Joshua Claybourn]

Very good post.

[Mark Byron]

Excellent post. I'll nit-pick on a few of the details, like whether to include India or the time frame for follow-up freedom audits, but an excellent start towards a doable New World Order. I've got a post up on the subject.

[Christopher Jones]

Based on the proposed list of countries, it appears to me that the true organizing principle of the proposed organization is not freedom but friendliness to the United States.

Otherwise France, Germany, Denmark, Belgium, etc. would be on the list and Israel and India would be off (with the UK maybe making it to provisional status).

I've elaborated on this a bit over at Mark Byron's weblog.

[Jeffrey Collins]

As I tried to point out, the list of countries was only an example, not an attempt to be a definitive list. Nevertheless, I hesitated to mention Israel and India. I'll give you Denmark, but I've heard stories of government officials in France begging for informers to call in if they knew of a neighbor working overtime. Germany is a maybe. Truthfully, I don't have enough information about Belgium to make call there one way of the other.

For the most part, the nations listed were the first ones to pop into my head.

I noticed that on Byron's site you mentioned that there aren't enough truly free nations to make it work. It's certainly true that there aren't many, which is part of why suggested a limited number in the first place. I don't think that this idea would require a large number of nations to get started, although I could be wrong. I wouldn't be willing to expand the list too much because if we start sacrificing the need for freedom loving countries for numbers, the idea dies in its infancy.

As for Britain, while I'm well aware that they've had their problems, especially of late, I think it's way too soon to write them off as free country.

[Jeffrey Collins]

You know, maybe for starters, I should have just listed the Heritage Foundation's Economic Freedom Index. I know that it doesn't cover all forms of liberty, but it might serve as a decent proxy for the time being. If you look at their top 10 to 15, you will see some countries that I didn't mention. Also, some of the one's I did would drop off.

I wouldn't consider Hong Kong as it's not a seperate country, it's own freedoms are being eroded by the Chinese government, and doing so would effectively give the Chinese a voice, which would be counterproductive.

Luxembourg would definitely be a country that should be allowed in, but it's so small that I'm not sure it could have any real impact in drafting the treaty. Of course, that's not really a good reason to keep them out of the discussions if they wanted in.

Perhaps the best idea would to take the top 15 or so countries with the exception of making sure that at least one nation from each continent and or/region was included.

If we formed a core group based solely on economic freedom (which I don't at all propose), the group would look something like this:

Singapore, Luxembourg, New Zealand , Ireland, Denmark, Estonia, United States, Australia, United Kingdom, Finland, Iceland, Chile, Bahrain, and Botswana.

Some might complain that some of these countries have little or no influence, but of course if they met the definition of a free country, we want to give them more influence than they have now.

I should note that I'm not proposing this as the list, just giving an example of what could happen if we used the Heritage Index. I'm well aware that there are other freedom lists out there, but I'm not as familiar with them. I'll probably keep examining this issue.

[Bryan]

Nice idea Jeff. So nice, I've been kicking it around for months--though not to the level of detail you've offered. I've been calling it the Council of Democracies, but it's pretty much the same thing you're talking about.

But you've left out a few pretty important countries. Japan, for one, is a democracy and is as closely aligned with US policy as the UK on most issues. Socialistic on economics, but nonetheless pro-US and large enough economically to matter a great deal. South Korea--prickly but still usually friendly--should be there too. Ditto India and Poland and several of the Eastern European states. And yeah, you have to include France and Germany, but tie their influence to the size of their economies or something. They'd slip behind Japan if you did that.

By the way, we do have the germ of this organization already in place. It's called the Proliferation Security Initiative, was created within the past couple of months and operates outside the UN to interdict North Korean troublemakers on the sea. Most large democracies are already members of the PSI (and all members are democracies), which operates entirely outside the UN to do a job--stop weapons proliferation--that the UN has failed to do. So the bizarro UN--one that actually fosters freedom while opposing tyrants--may be on the way.

[Michael]

such an organization seems sensible on the outside, but the devil is in the details.

Sovereignty on the international stage is effectively limited to ones willingness and ability to stand off opponents by the use of force. We could violate Iraq's sovereignty because they could not stop us, and no one who could was willing to assist them in resisting us. International organizations which have any reasonable expectation of being meaningful in the way you want to make this one meaningful must protect and preserve the sovereignty of member states. Above all they cannot have an official policy permiting violation of one member state's sovereignty by another member state, whatever the circumstances. No government could join an organization with that policy, it must either resist to retain it's own sovereignty or loose all sovereignty, maintaining only those powers allowed by the organization over it. (See the US civil war for what happens when there is confusion on this issue. if you doubt the states have lost sovereignty, see the DEA's action against california re: medical marajuana, the state passed a law, a federal official said no, the official won, the state did not resist)

Also, any treaty which comits its members to defense or support of another member's decision to attack a country, without allowing them a voice in the decision is doomed.

One fix for the above problems would make the Assembly a smaller, slightly better focused copy of the UN among the set of countries that have the least need for another path of diplomatic communication between them. Another would make the Assembly a pseudo-world psuedo-government, much like the EU is, although they might at least have the sense to elect politicians to run the thing rather than let appointed bureaucrats try to do the job. Finally, it could be turned into a real government, which would look interesting on a map, but is not what I think you are aiming for.

I see sovereignty as the bigger of the two problems, as it would either prevent the formation of the Assembly or lead to civil war. The second would either lead to colapse, or to an external war shoring up the Assembly.

Also, such an Assembly would be not a radical revision of the UN, but instead an entirely new organization (either a country of its own, or a Transnational Organization) An appropriate revision on the UN would be to accept that it is a diplomatic organizations whose primary objective is to maintain peaceful relations among countries. And that it will only ever sanction military action as a defense against active invasion. Thus getting it off the hook for refusing to act against Iraq, as well as getting it out of the business of sponsoring the NGOs which make it a laughing stock in front of America and the world.

[Brian]

"Your." "I've got 'your' radical revision...."

Sorry, that kind of thing drives me to distraction. It's a weakness, I know.

[David Hearn]

I love your persuasive wirting on this revolting issue. I also agree with you that the UN should be broken up in to a league of about ten nations or so. The UN hase become too confusing and superior to overthrow so w emust break away.

[Dave]

I believe that the UN should become the humanitarian organization branch of a wider universal political force that is based upon JUSTICE with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights being it's policy and added to that the recently established International Crimninal Court. The Criminal Court MUST be backed by an International Force capable of intervening in conflicts and forcing regime change if a government is committing genocide or oppressing it's own people - where it's own system of justice is corrupt and cannot be used by it's own citizens to achieve justice and freedom.

Trade should be used as an incentive to get members to join. i.e. A nation oppressing it's own citizens or committing genocide will not be permitted membership as well as not permitted any relations with or trade with member states. This would give nations like China a lot to seriously think about as it's economy could collapse overnight if it didn't join.

In the pact MUST be an agreement that any goverment can be taken to court and if found guilty of war crimes etc can be dismantled either volutarily or by FORCE.

National Sovereignty has for too long been an umbrella for nation states to commit genocide against their own people claiming that the matter is 'an internal issue'.

If a person commits a crime we pay. If a government commits mass murder they go free.

Peace will never occur unless justice and human rights has been established worldwide. It is impossible to have peace without justice.

The UN has no proper judicial process. Charges brought against governments have to be brought before a proper International Court and proof must be presented. Then a verdict must be handed down. Then carried out. If the country appeals and loses then it MUST comply or be forced to comply. If trade sanctions do not work within a short time an international force must go in and disband the government, arrest those guilty and enforce the verdict decided by the war criminal judiciary.

Collective Security is not WAR. War is where nations seek an advantage over each other through armed conflict. Collective Security is a security policy meant to destroy gangs, war criminals and terrorists who have seized power of a country through illegitimate means and do not have a mandate from the people to govern but govern through fear, oppression,torture and force.

Under this body nations will no longer have the right to have weapons of mass destruction nor have the right to wage war. Any country that tries to build WOMD or declare war on another country will face military intervention to stop it and the parties will be FORCED to take their matter to the International Court where a judgement shall be made and the party guilty punished.

Today the problem in forming such a body is greed. Rogue states often use their national resources to bribe other nations to 'veto' any action against them in the UN. Just the other day Russia and China vetoed action against Burma which has been committing genocide against it's own minorities because they have lucritive gas and military deals with Burma. So 50 million people suffer oppression because of a few leader's GREED and their hopes for freedom are held to ransom. Anyone see the Burmese Wedding where the daughter of dictator Tan Shwwe was wearing huge diamonds from head to toe that were twice the size of Eliabeth Tailor's famous diamond? This nation is starving while drug lords are looting it and the UN can't even pass a CRITICISM of MURDER and SLAUGHTER!!!!! So we must agree to murder and slaughter and torture to keep Russia's and China's pockets lined???

I pray that AMERICA will take a stand. America is not hated because of it's policies. It is hated because it is a government based upon freedom, justice and human rights for all. ALL dictators and oppressors hate and despise America. That is a good not a bad sign. Only America can take the lead but elements within are trying to get America to isolate itself from intervening where injustices are being committed. I believe eventually America will establish a New World Order but that it will come after much destruction of America.

America MUST join the International Criminal Court recently established and begin trying to use it and offer it's forces to it until there can be an international police force established.

Evil forces who control the world's energy resources are uniting against America. America must drill in Alaska and become independent of them or be brought to it's knees. Russia, China, Venezuala, Iran and Burma all have huge amounts of energy resources and are all allied with each other against America. Two of these states already have nuclear weapons and Iran is on the verge and they are all sticking together along with North Korea.

America's ONLY two choices are to cut economic ties completely with these countries by accessing it's own energy resources or have an all out war with them.

If America forms a new International Body based on human rights and rules for governments and attaches trade ties to membership then it has a chance if it can get enough energy as it's enemies will cut off supply. War would cut off suppy too but in the end large parts of America would be destroyed.

It took World War 1 to get us the League of Nations then World War 2 to get the United Nations. For a Universal Body of Justice to come into existence that will have power over the world's governments it's going to take massive destruction, the death of probably billions and for many cities to be completey wiped off the map forever.

The myth that nuclear weapons have prevented international conflict could very well be exposed to a disbelieving humanity who thinks that because of MAD no war has occured. If the opposite were to happen and major cities were destroyed then world disarmament would be universal and peace at long last a strong chance of arising out of the ashes.

That a nuclear gun is pointed at anyone who tries to establish human rights and freedom is a grave concern because the only way to resolve international problems is through an internationally binding court with universal powers over all governments.

Force must become the servant of justice not terrorism or war criminals. We're in a huge mess that only massive destruction can change. Nations are convinced that nuclear weapons provide security. That will continue until a catastrophe the likes of which man has never ever witnessed will occur and then we will be shown how wrong we were.

BUT all the pain and suffering we are experiencing right now worldwide is like the birth pangs of a new born baby about to be born. At the most excruciating moment when the pain is acute a new birth will take place. A New World Order based upon justice and human rights.

What is happening now is the American Civil War but on an international scale. Eventually just as North and South United to form the USA so the world will eventually become the United States of the Federated World and the pain will be forgotten just as a mother rejoices in her new child and thinks nothing of the pain that once was.

We are in a dark hour but the sun WILL RISE and the new day WILL COME. If we could have the maturity to settle our matters through courts then we wouldn't need a huge catastrophe or shock to wake us up but because we are so stubborn then we have to suffer to mature enough to rid our world of evil and prevent it from rearing it's ugly head again.