Department of Political Science

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Browsing Department of Political Science by Author "Baleson, Dagny"

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    United Nations Security Council Reform: why is it so hard?
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2020-12) Baleson, Dagny; Fourie, Pieter; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Political Science.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Since the 1990s UNSC reform has been a dominant topic in International Relations, especially since the establishment of a working group by the UN to explore UNSC reform proposals. The UN, and accordingly the UNSC, was founded after World War II by the superpowers and their allies. The UNSC is the most powerful supranational organ in international relations, because it has the power to authorise legally binding resolutions and deploy peacekeeping operations. This is in conjunction with the most important responsibility of maintaining international peace and security. The creators of the UN, or the Permanent Members of the UNSC, wanted to pursue the prospect of a new international order enshrined through an international institution that would encourage increased multilateralism among the dominant international actors on the premise that there should be equality among sovereign states. The founders of the UNSC also granted themselves the highest power in the multilateral organisation; the UK, the USA, Russia, China and France, ensured their permanent presence in the UN as they possessed veto powers. However, the emergence of the UN occurred in conjunction with the Cold War, and the decolonisation and independence movements from the mid-1950s. Consequently, this created a surge of new independent power contenders for seats on the UNSC from the Global South. The UNSC instituted one reform in 1965 with the addition of four non-permanent members. The UNSC has undergone no reforms since then, yet almost all UN member states continue to advocate for further expansion and reform of the UNSC. The end of the Cold War in the early 1990s brought increased criticism of the Council because of its inefficiency in dealing with international tensions since WWII. Hence, UN members set up the Open-Ended Working Group. UNSC reform has become an acceptable discourse since members of the international community broadly endorse it. In order to determine the influence that international actors have in international norm dynamics, it is essential to understand how norms emerge, how they cascade through the legal framework, and what kind of resistance inhibits their internalisation. The theoretical framework devised by Finnemore and Sikkink (1998) is utilised to illustrate the respective roles actors play in the pursuit of UNSC reform. But the question remains: Why is it so hard? Without reform of the UNSC, it runs the risk of becoming obsolete or inconsequential.