scholarly journals Parliamentary assembly as a model for the revitalisation of the united nations general assembly

2018 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
pp. 337-359
Author(s):  
Jelica Gordanic

The paper analyses the revitalization of the General Assembly of the United Nations in the context of the establishment of the Parliamentary Assembly, a potentially new organ within the UN system. The United Nations system deals with the lack of democratic capacity. Establishment of the Parliamentary Assembly which consisted of the citizens of UN members could eliminate the lack of democratic capacity and improve the entire UN structure. The author analyzes the possibilities of establishment of the Parliamentary Assembly, its potential jurisdiction and examines its potential contribution to the revitalization of the General Assembly. The paper points out that the establishment of the Parliamentary Assembly can contribute to the actualization of the agenda, improve the quality of resolutions and reduce the number of repetitive resolutions of the General Assembly. Moreover, it could achieve an indirect impact on democratization and transparency of the work of the Security Council. The author considers funding and the composition of the Parliamentary Assembly as possible threats for the establishment of this organ. These facts also represent the threats for the process of revitalization of the General Assembly. The author concludes the potential establishment of the Parliamentary Assembly can contribute to the revitalization of the General Assembly to a certain extent. The key answer in the revitalization of the General Assembly is a revision of the United Nations Charter.

2021 ◽  
pp. 002085232199756
Author(s):  
Julia Gray ◽  
Alex Baturo

When political principals send agents to international organizations, those agents are often assumed to speak in a single voice. Yet, various types of country representatives appear on the international stage, including permanent representatives as well as more overtly “political” government officials. We argue that permanent delegates at the United Nations face career incentives that align them with the bureaucracy, setting them apart from political delegates. To that end, they tend to speak more homogeneously than do other types of speakers, while also using relatively more technical, diplomatic rhetoric. In addition, career incentives will make them more reluctant to criticize the United Nations. In other words, permanent representatives speak more like bureaucratic agents than like political principals. We apply text analytics to study differences across agents’ rhetoric at the United Nations General Assembly. We demonstrate marked distinctions between the speech of different types of agents, contradictory to conventional assumptions, with implications for our understandings of the interplay between public administration and agency at international organizations. Points for practitioners Delegations to international organizations do not “speak with one voice.” This article illustrates that permanent representatives to the United Nations display more characteristics of bureaucratic culture than do other delegates from the same country. For practitioners, it is important to realize that the manner in which certain classes of international actors “conduct business” can differ markedly. These differences in tone—even among delegates from the same principal—can impact the process of negotiation and debate.


1953 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-281

The Political Committee of the Arab League met in Cairo beginning December 20, 1952, under the chairmanship of Fathy Radwan (Egypt) to discuss questions relating to Palestine and north Africa. On December 25, the committee issued a statement approving the failure of passage in the United Nations General Assembly of the resolution adopted by the Ad Hoc Political Committee calling for direct negotiations between Israel and the Arab states. The committee condemned “the mere idea of an invitation to Arabs to negotiate with the Israelis” and expressed the hope “that there would be no repetition of these attempts”.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Srdjan Vucetic ◽  
Bojan Ramadanovic

All Canadian governments say that Canada must look to its “friends and allies” and “like-minded partners” to achieve greater cooperation on global issues. But who are these countries exactly? To gain a better understanding of where Ottawa stands in the world, with whom, and under what conditions, we analyze Canada’s voting patterns in the United Nations General Assembly from 1980 to 2017. We find that Canada’s overall record tends towards that of Western European states. We find no evidence of greater affinity with US positions either when the Democrats are in power in Washington or when the conservative parties reign in power in Ottawa. We identify a sharp pro-US turn in the Harper years, and also confirm that the government of Justin Trudeau started off by maintaining rather than reversing this trend.


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