New Jersey Law Journal
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July 9, 2007
GLOBAL PROBLEMS REQUIRE GLOBAL LEGISLATION
None of us would choose to live in a nation with no lawmaking body. A system of law, order and justice is an essential prerequisite to real peace in any society.
But we live in a global community with no global legislature. Instead, we seek to solve global problems involving peace and pollution though a series of treaties. The Law of the Sea Treaty has been awaiting Senate ratification for more than 25 years. We abandoned the ABM treaty. The treaty designing an International Criminal Court was signed by President Clinton on his way out of office and then ‘unsigned’ by President Bush.
Global problems do require global solutions. Global warming cannot be addressed with action by only a few willing nations. Global terrorism cannot be dealt with effectively if some U.N. members are permitted to aid terrorists without economic or other sanctions from the rest of the world community. Global peacemaking and peacekeeping require advance planning and organization.
The time has come to create additional power in the United Nations General Assembly so that when confronting global problems, and only global problems, it would act as the world’s legislature.
All structural, radical changes in the United Nations, such as the enlargement of the Security Council and of the Economic and Social Council in 1965 and the creation of the International Criminal Court in June 1998, have originated with the developing nations (G77) and at first were opposed by the U.S., Russia, China, France and the U.K. (P5). For that reason, representatives of the Center for War/Peace Studies (CWPS) have for 18 months been meeting at the U.N. missions of the G77 key players to explain the proposal and to then visit their respective foreign ministries where policy is made.
On June 30, 2007, several of those players sent members of their missions to a ‘retreat’ in Morris County. They were responding to an invitation from the CWPS to discuss weighted voting and to consider questions relating to its referral for study to appropriate committees of the General Assembly. We believe that the work of the CWPS with G77 diplomats is important and we wish them well.
Weighted Voting for the U.N. Power Struggle
A Group of 77 developing nations (G77) was organized in June, 1964 in the General Assembly (GA) to “…enhance its joint negotiating capacity…” The G77 now includes 132 nations. On April 28, 108 of the G77 together with China voted to table major parts of Secretary General Kofi Annan’s blueprint for U.N. management reform. The United States led 50 nations that voted against the tabling resolution. The G77 explained the reasons for their negative vote. The major one was the perception that the proposed reforms are part of a larger strategy by the major donor countries, primarily the U.S., to assure tighter control of the U.N. internally. The U.S. responded : “Absent top to bottom management reform, the United Nations will continue to be ill-equipped to meet the current demands that we as member states place upon the organization.” We see merit in both positions.
Since 1945 the GA, has been envisioned as the world’s legislature. But it still has no authority other than to manage the internal operations of the United Nations. It has no international power because its voting system does not reflect reality. The smallest island member-nation has the same one vote as does China and the United States: one member, one vote (OMOV). Until each of the member nations in the GA can play some important role, many will continue to “act out” in a way that may appear to be negative and irresponsible. Now is the time to consider equipping the GA with a system of representation that will not only reflect the sovereign equality of each member but also the wide differences among the members in population and financial strength. At Philadelphia in 1787 the Connecticut Compromise solved the problem of legislative representation with a bi-cameral Congress. The GA does not need a House and a Senate but does require an equitable Weighted Voting (WV) plan (NJLJ, 5/26/03). WV is used in different forms in all international financial and certain other specialized organizations.
The Binding Triad (BT) was devised by the late Richard Hudson, founder of the Center for War/Peace Studies. Decisions utilizing the BT would still be made with a single vote but with three simultaneous majorities within that vote. The size of the majorities on the second and third leg of the Triad would be negotiated before the plan is adopted. A computer would instantaneously report whether the resolution has the support of: (1) two thirds of the nations present and voting; (2) nations representing the agreed upon majority of the world’s population; and (3) nations representing the agreed upon majority of the U.N. budget. So as to assure the G77 that the BT would deprive the members of nothing, its present ability to pass non-binding resolutions and to control the internal affairs of the U.N. including the budget by the OMOV system would be retained. Also, the BT provides that no member nation would have more than a vote of 15% on either the population or the contribution leg of the Triad.
While the BT proposal need not be adopted in its precise original form, its study should stimulate much needed reform in the powers, decision-taking and even the composition of the General Assembly. The power struggle on April 28 demonstrates the need for sharing of power in the GA. U.N. charter amendment to provide for weighted voting later in this decade would come none too soon.
Editorial from the New Jersey Law Journal published May 8, 2006. The Law Journal is New Jersey’s oldest and largest lawyers weekly news publication.