United Nations Archive

Once set aside as artifacts of history, scholars and policymakers have vigorously returned their attention to coups d’état. This shift is clearly warranted, as recent coups in places like Honduras, Egypt and Thailand have broad ramifications for trade relationships, security and the growth of democracy. Unfortunately, we are largely playing catch-up in a fast-paced game. We know a fair amount about what causes coups—weak economies, illegitimate governance, past histories of coups, domestic protests—but far less about what transpires after a coup comes about. Following the end of the Cold War, the conventional wisdom that coups are bad for democracy ushered […]

Peacemaking is a repetitive business. Mediators and diplomats handling protracted conflicts rarely come up with entirely new ways to end them. They frequently revise and repackage previous peace plans, hoping that they will gain more traction than they have in the past. The U.N. Security Council did just that last week, recycling old proposals to end the Syrian war and selling the initiative as a minor breakthrough. Last Monday, the Security Council’s members agreed on a statement calling for a “Syrian-led political process leading to a political transition,” potentially involving “the establishment of an inclusive transitional governing body with full […]

The United Nations was famously founded to “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.” It has a distinctly mixed track record on this front. Today, the U.N.’s goal often seems to be best described as making the scourge of war a little bit less dreadful. The Security Council demonstrated this tendency last Friday, when it endorsed an American-backed resolution launching a new panel to investigate the use of chemical weapons in Syria’s civil war. The panel, which will involve the U.N. and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), is empowered to identify those responsible for dropping […]

Editor’s note: Guest columnist Neil Bhatiya is filling in for Michael Cohen, who will return next week. On Monday, President Barack Obama unveiled the final version of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan (CPP) rules. The new regulations, a tweak to initial rules that had been released in June 2014, are meant to provide the framework for individual U.S. states in meeting emissions-reduction goals in their electricity sectors. In forecasting a 32 percent reduction in emissions by 2030 from 2005 levels, the plan relies on incentivizing the adoption of low-carbon energy sources nationwide, especially solar and wind power. As […]

It is turning into a summer of big diplomatic deals at the United Nations. Two weeks ago, the Security Council endorsed the Iranian nuclear deal. This weekend, diplomats signed off on an arguably even more complex bargain: the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This is a sprawling set of 169 targets that the world is meant to achieve by 2030, ranging from eradicating poverty to fostering peaceful societies. Skeptical commentators worry that this amalgam of good intentions is too unwieldy to gain traction, in contrast to the crisper Millennium Development Goals articulated in 2000. But it is still impressive that […]