In the Halls of Power, Promises Fail People
The annual UN General Assembly — better known by its cute little acronym, UNGA — just concluded in New York. This was the 79th year where world leaders gathered to, imaginably, fix the world. This year’s theme was “Leaving no one behind: acting together for the advancement of peace, sustainable development and human dignity for present and future generations”.
Well… was anyone “left behind”?
As I look in from the outside year after year, I see the same thing: (mostly) male heads of state descending upon New York every September, to “discuss” the same issues, year after year, while accomplishing very little. The speeches sound great, but pretty words do not magically morph into pretty plans. At least not here.
Hey, don’t get me wrong… I believe in global governance. I believe in multilateralism. I believe in “united” nations. But… is this working? Or are we just sitting around repeating the same “strong recommendations” and “strong condemnations” while, in reality, we’re impotent to fix the very thing the UN was created for in the first place.
Hope is a slippery beast for me these days. And this year more than ever, words ring hollow. And all the bits of me are struggling to believe, to retain faith in a system that is failing everything that I value.
As a feminist… where were the women? Heads of state and government continue to be largely male. Women were notably absent, sprinkled very sparingly between a sea of suits. Of the 193 countries invited to the UNGA 79, only 27 of them have a female head of state and, furthermore, only 10 of those women were given a platform to speak. That speaks for itself.
As an advocate for youth leadership… do we continue to pay lip service, treating young leaders like tokens and sidelining them during the main events?
As a humanitarian aid worker… This looked like a pompous display of entitlement while the world burns.
As a believer in non-violence and peace… our record here has been an absolute disaster. The UN is enabling conflicts as long as it continues with its permanent-members Security-Council veto-power BS. Without serious reform here, we’re doomed.
Oh yeah and… As an Arab… As a Palestinian… As Lebanese… the institution has let us down in ways we could not begin to imagine. Sure, this isn’t the first time, nor are we the first region to be screwed by the system, but how many more failures do we need before we take action?
Here let me add the words of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas: “We will not leave. We will not leave. We will not leave. Palestine is our homeland.” No amount of international failure can change that fact.
At UNGA, each one of the leaders of the UN’s 193 member states give their speeches and have their say. A good number mentioned Palestine. And a good number walked out when Israel spoke. Eventually, I hope we learn who didn’t walk out, who didn’t speak out, who didn’t advocate for peace in the very hall built for that purpose.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said Palestinians continue to be subjected to “more than half a century of apartheid.” And they vowed not to remain silent.
Dr. Amery Browne, the Trinidad and Tobago Minister of Foreign Affairs put it perfectly:
“If innocent civilians including women, children and United Nations staff were being killed at this record rate in the developed world, how would the world’s big powers have reacted? Not likely with euphemisms and platitudes… International law is not a tool of mere convenience to be muted for our friends and trumpeted against our enemies.”
I write this on the very day that Israel has — once again — invaded Lebanon, a sovereign country. No, this isn’t the first time. And yes, they’ve occupied Lebanon as well. For nearly two decades. If you are one who thinks the world began on October 7, best to stop reading now. I cannot help you. You’re doomed.
Anyway, here we are, in yet another war. In principle, the UNGA was supposed to prevent any further escalation, and look! Now we have a ground invasion. Are we surprised? Of course not. We were warned.
A few world leaders mentioned the risks Lebanon faced as of last week. Now those risks are reality.
Lebanon’s Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib demanded international action, arguing that the UN should play the role it was created for. The risks of inaction are great, with the potential to set off “a domino effect”, turning the region into “a black hole” of endless conflict. His prediction seems to have come to pass.
He added that Lebanon’s crisis “is due to the absence of a sustainable solution to the root of the crisis, which is occupation. To claim anything else would be a waste of time. So long as the occupation persists there will be instability and there will be war.”
Meanwhile, this UNGA continued to talk about the 17 Sustainable Development Goals — NONE of which we will actually meet in time — and the “highly anticipated” Summit of the Future to address the “urgent need for enhanced international cooperation.” Are we cooperating better now? Oh look… we’ve adopted a Pact. And the language sounds very much like all the other documents we’ve adopted, day after decade.
The Summit of the Future was intended, in the most UN way possible, to reform the UN and prepare it to meet the challenges of the 21st century (the greatest of which being war, I’d say!). Of course, in the most UN way possible, the Pact was a beautifully worded document. What are the chances that it becomes reality?
I do not WANT to be cynical. I truly want to believe it will be different this time. But there’s no evidence that a Pact for the Future can be meaningfully actioned when our PRESENT is on fire. What will we do TODAY RIGHT NOW to make things better, or at a minimum to keep things from getting worse? Because anyone with two brain cells to knock together can see exactly where this is going.
I get it, really. We’re talking about 193 member states — dramatically different creatures with dramatically different (often opposing) needs and priorities. But surely we can agree on some of the basics? Peace, for instance. And the need to enforce it.
While the powerful paid lip service to international peace and security, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu ordered missile strikes on Beirut FROM UN HEADQUARTERS. A mockery of the UN system. A mockery of multilateralism. A mockery of justice. A mockery of any hope for peace.
To quote US presidential candidate Jill Stein: “Netanyahu has no business at the United Nations. He belongs in the Hague. We need to arrest that bastard.”
Mia Mottley, Prime Minister of Barbados, said: “We cannot afford the distraction of war. If ever there was a time to pause, it is now.” Or… yesterday.
The UN needs an army. Peacekeeping is insufficient. The mandate is weak. Besides, there is NO PEACE. Not as long as Israel’s genocidal rampage continues. A UN army would have prevented Israel from invading Lebanon, stopped the genocide of Palestinians in the first week, and prevented the world’s largest humanitarian crisis currently unfolding with impunity in Sudan.
The UN makes great decisions… but fails to enforce them.
Instead, we watch people die. While we watch, we repeat our strong condemnations and we call for a ceasefire. Who’s listening?
Do we want a safe, just, equal future? I certainly do. Then focus on reforming the system. Abolish the veto. No more permanent members. No more country overlords making decisions for the rest of the world. The Global South IS the Global Majority. There’s power here — it’s time to use it.
Wait… doesn’t the Security Council exist to maintain peace and — as we might guess from its name — security?! Yes. Yes it does. And yet the US, as a “permanent member,” has (ab)used its veto power 47 times (out of a total of 85 total vetoes) to block resolutions in favor of peace in Palestine. It’s no secret. The US veto exists, as Andreas Kluth writes in Bloomberg, “to promote the interests of the US government.” And there you have it.
The Summit of the Future wants to save multilateralism. Let’s hope that the future materializes ASAP. Because our present is dire.
This blog started out as a LinkedIn post. And the comments I received reinforced this urgence. For instance, Vanessa Farr wrote:
“I’m going to invoke Sara Ahmed here, who would say: the institution is failing in the ways it was designed to fail. And it’s failing the people it was designed to fail. We continue to need feminist plumbers to get in to unblock the sh1t from the UN’s institutional plumbing — but the space for us has been closed.”
While the intent of all this stuff has been good, the reality is that we need an overhaul. The system is built on reinforcing the interests of the powerful, while denying the rights of the majority to freedom, justice, and even their very survival. The truth is: We could stop this crap from happening in the first place. If we wanted to.
The real truth is this: We don’t want to. Wars make money. The powerful few profit from the death and destruction of the majority. Is it too late? I don’t want to think so, but it’s gonna take a LOT to get this system to change. Like, I dunno, dismantling and rebuilding the whole damn thing. In the interests of the majority. Because, isn’t that what democracy is in the first place?
I’ve dedicated my decades to institutions I am now struggling to believe in. One thing hasn’t changed — my belief in individuals. When the institutions set up to protect us are failing, we need to step in. It’s up to us now. If the world’s leaders — whose duty it is to represent and defend us — refuse to protect us, then we’re going to have to do it ourselves. No one is coming to save us except us.
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