Chinese representation than it did with the feelings of potency that came from gaining a Third World diplomatic victory over the United States. In fact, it does not seem unreasonable to imagine that such victory celebrations are made all the more ardent by the Third World's inability to challenge the United States in more direct geopolitical ways. In particular, the failure to protect the Indochinese peoples from the American military onslaught has over the years undoubtedly provoked a subconscious sense of guilt and powerlessness on the part of countries who themselves have struggled to assert a national identity after decades of colonial servitude. A further confirmation of this conjecture is the extent to which leaders of the South Vietnamese liberation forces, such as Madame Nguyen Thi Binh, have been hailed and cheered (reportedly more than any Head of State) at principal Third World conferences of the non-aligned bloc during the last three years.

It is worth noting that, even after all the years of the Cold War, the negative American reading of recent United Nations actions is directed not at the Soviet bloc or even at the socialist Members of the United Nations, but at the Third World. Clearly, the capacity of Asian, African, and Latin American countries to control the General Assembly agenda and to dominate the debate and resolution process is at the heart of American disenchantment. This disenchantment deepened as the Afro-Asian ranks at the United Nations swelled in the 1960's, and has intensified still further as Third World positions have solidified in opposition to American policy on such critical issues as the comparative equities in the Middle East, the status of foreign investment, the use of coordinated economic pressure on the developed world (e.g., OPEC actions since late 1973), and the overall insistence on a new international economie order that reflects the demands of the poorer, less industrialized countries. Ambassador Scali warned that "the pursuit of mathematical majorities can be a particularly sterile form of international activity" and, further, that "[p]aper triumphs are, in the end, expensive even for the voters." In effect, Scali was arguing that without support from states with actual power, the formal claims of the General Assembly are rantings and ravings. However, I believe that a growing anxiety about a shift in real power was lurking in the background. The oil weapon employed by OPEC since 1973 had brought more than “a paper triumph" for the Third World, even if only a small portion of Asia, Africa, and Latin America received benefits from the confrontation. The shift in influence and wealth had been dramatic.

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5

Third World solidarity had seemingly paid off both in relation to the ArabIsraeli conflict and with respect to prospects for restructuring the world economy. Therefore, just as the African dance after the China vote might have been partly bravado, Scali's denunciations of the Assembly seem more like a political gesturethan an exercise in diplomacy. Although the Assembly has no aircraft carriers or missiles, its judgments increasingly represent more than mere rhetoric because of the increasingly formidable strength of the social forces that stand behind that rhetoric. Scali's speech appears to be associated with the threat diplomacy directed at OPEC by American leadership inside and outside of government, conjuring up military scenarios about seizing Arab oil in either the Persian Gulf or Libya. Beneath the denunciations lies a growing American anxiety that "the barbarians are at the gates," that "the West" or "Western civilization" is under siege and the world is running out of critical resources needed to fuel growth-oriented market industrial economies. Thus, the anger directed at the United Nations is part of a wider loss of confidence by American leadership in its capacity to cope with a series of difficult challenges. These American outbursts can be seen partly as expressions of frustration because the tide is turning, and partly as exhortations to stem the tide. Just as the Third World in general and the Palestinians in particular symbolize the barbarians at the gates, so the United Nations serves as a temporary scapegoat, along with OPEC, for focusing American anger and for distracting attention from more structural issues related to a crisis in world capitalism.

8

A somewhat more academic and narrower critique of the United Nations, especially of the General Assembly, contends that the Organization is worse than nothing, that it is "a dangerous place" where the formal action consistently contravenes the high purposes of the Charter. Indeed, the authors of one study assert that "the United Nations contributes about as much to peace as a battleship or an atomic bomb. Disputes are brought to the United Nations in order to weaken an opponent, strengthen one's side, prepare for war, and support a war effort." 10 This perception emerges, they argue, if one examines "the objectives of those who Footnotes at end of Article.

12

[have] used the organization." " Their evidence is drawn from a wide range of instances, but their argument seeks mainly to establish the extent to which the United Nations operates as an anti-Israeli force rather than as an objective organization bent on fulfilling the purposes of its Charter. Here, the main complaint against the United Nations is partly ideological, partly normative. On an ideological level the critique arises out of opposition to the pursuit of Third World goals in United Nations arenas; on a normative level the critique emphasizes the gap between the Charter as organic instrument and the United Nations as political actor. On both counts, however, the complaint is irrelevant. The United Nations is inevitably a political actor that cannot be constrained by any underlying constitutional document, although its actions may be influenced, if not determined, by constitutional guidelines. To complain about the politicization of the United Nations represents either a confusion or, more likely, a substantive dissent from the kind of political positions that are ascendant at a given time. Who can seriously maintain that in the early Cold War years the United Nations was not every bit as much a political actor as it was during the 29th General Assembly? The United Nations political character in those earlier years was highlighted by the Korean operation. Indeed, at that time the United Nations provided a global cover for a military operation that was to all intents and purposes an American I would argue that the main organs of the United Nations will either be truly impotent or they will actively pursue political ends. If those political ends are perceived as abhorrent to the purposes of peace and justice in the world, then it is reasonable to conclude that the Organization is a dangerous place. However, criteria of peace and justice must be set forth with some clarity and objectivity to enable such a judgment. In my view, the recent swing of sentiment on principal issues is cumulatively in the direction of peace and justice, although not necessarily on each and every issue in question. This judgment rests heavily on my assumption that the world's primary needs, at present, is for the redistribution of dignity and wealth, both to alleviate poverty and to build the kind of participatory system that can eventually design and carry out drastic global reforms."

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It should be understood that this approval of Assembly action is based on what I feel it is possible to expect within an intergovernmental context. Of course, many of the Third World governments that are the most progressive on an international stage pursue contradictory policies toward their own people. Therefore, there is an element of hypocrisy in such posturing and some mixed effects arising from so-called policies of redistribution. Is social justice really enhanced when purchasing power is transferred from taxpayers in industrial democracies to sheiks on the Persian Gulf? I think it is possible to endorse the progressive demands now being made on the international level, while calling attention to the failure of governments to implement these same demands within their own domestic societies.

The United States has a reputation for wild fluctuations of mood with respect to world policy.1 In recent decades, these fluctuations often centered upon the two major post-war experiments to create global political institutions for maintaining world peace. In many respects, Woodrow Wilson was the prime champion of the League idea, and yet the United States Senate refused to ratify the treaty of participation. Similarly, with the United Nations, it was American promotion of the UN idea that accounted for holding the preparatory conference in San Francisco and locating the Organization itself in New York, rather than elsewhere. Other governments, as well, felt that in light of the League experience it was important to make the UN seem like a part of the United States, and not something remote and alien in character. Through the years the United States has been by far the largest single financial contributor to the work of the Organization. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that this positive attitude was partially contingent upon the existence and expectation of favorable political winds. Up through the Korean War, even until the early 1960's, the United States could command support in the United Nations for any position, or at least avoid an adverse decision about which it seriously cared. Thus, both the tenor of debate and the formal actions of the political organs accorded roughly with American foreign policy references.

The watershed of pro-American sentiment within the United Nations was perhaps the Stanleyville Operation of December 1964, the occasion of a joint American-United Kingdom-Belgium airlift in the Congo to rescue the thousands Footnotes at end of Article.

of Europeans and North Americans stranded in the midst of a civil war and held hostage by one side. In retrospect, what was most revealing was the depth of African suspicions about American intentions, and America's corresponding attitude of apparent disbelief that its proclaimed humanitarian motives could be seriously questioned in a public forum. The American delegate in the Security Council, then Adlai Stevenson, protested American innocence. “. . . the sole aim of my government has been and is to assist in the rescue of innocent civilians endangered by rebel activities in violation of international law.'

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At that time there was a far greater tendency to accept Ambassador Stevenson's words at face value than would be the case today. By 1975, American credibility has been much more seriously damaged, especially by a decade of military intervention in Indochina and by a series of CIA disclosures substantiating allegations of covert operations ranging from assassination plots to the "destabilization" of constitutionally elected governments. Nevertheless, even in 1964 Africa's angry reaction suggested a deeper Third World opposition to any developed country's use of force in a Third World region, regardless of pretext. Also, and not unreasonably, the African participants in the dabate saw the operation as an attempt by Europeans and North Americans to tip the balance in an ongoing civil war in order to satisfy their own diplomatic goals and economic greed, as well as to remind recently independent African counrties that while colonialism may have collapsed as a formal system, new geopolitical forms of imperialism had emerged to take its place. My point is that in the years since Stanleyville there has been an intensification of these psychological trends, abetted by certain other factors such as the loss of American prestige as a consequence of defeat in Indochina, the rise of world social crises in relation to famine and poverty, the collapse of the liberal economic ideology based on prospects for indefinite economic growth, the increasing articulation of a Third World position that is anti-Soviet as well as anti-American, the success of OPEC strategy and the possibility of its extension to other sectors of North-South economic relations, the addition of India, another Third World country, to the nuclear club, and the political success achieved by the Palestinian Liberation Organization through recourse to international terroristic tactics. Although there are some counter-trends, these factors have all been components in the weakening of America's relative world position. This weakening has been underscored by severe economic setbacks for all advanced industrial countries including the United States and involves major issues such as inflation, rising unemployment, and declines in total economic output.

It is in this wider setting of world developments that we should appreciate the recent upsurge of negative American attitudes toward the United Nations. In China's first major address in the United Nations, delivered on 3 October 1972 by its chief delegate Ambassador Chiao Kuan-Hua, the following passage appears near the end:

The World is at a crossroads and so is the United Nations. If the United Nations is to regain its prestige and play its due role, it must conform to the trend of the world, truly express the just demands of large numbers of its members and the people of the world, act strictly in accordance with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and free itself from the manipulation and control by the big powers.18

The events of the session of the General Assembly definitely move symbolically in the direction advocated by China and supported by the overwhelming majority of member governments. Mr. Chiao Kuan-Hua went on to warn that unless the United Nations did so move "it would be very difficult" for it "to avoid eventually taking the old path of The League of Nations." 17

What is at stake, then, is very fundamental: first, how do we interpret the forces of history? Second, how do we understand the American relationship to these forces? Third, how should the United States Government express this understanding in its role as a leading member of the United Nations?

I would emphasize the close links between the questions posed in the United Nations arena, and other controversies involving America's political identity: What do we do about the American covert operations program in foreign societies?

What do we do with our surplus food capacity in a world confronted by massive shortages and large-scale famine?

What do we do about the OPEC challenge?

Footnotes at end of Article.

What do we do to safeguard our "security" in terms of defense spending, arms sales and transfers, and arms control?

The approaching Bicentennial year itself provides a convenient symbolic occasion to reconsider the whole issue of American political identity. It could be a time of national renewal and rediscovery. Our roots are progressive and revolutionary, dependent on the politics of change and conscious of the link between true independence and dignity. Such renewal and rediscovery would lead Americans, I am convinced, to celebrate rather than bemoan the cumulative drift of initiative in the United Nations. The choice narrows, I think, to girding ourselves to ward off the barbarians at the gates, or to joining those governments and social forces seeking a more equitable and durable system of world order.

Thus, I think the debate on United Nations activity is crucial for the posture we take toward the future of world order. As yet, the Third World itself, including the Chinese, have provided only a negative vision based on what Houari Boumedienne of Algeria has called "a dialectic of struggle." 18 But more than confrontation, more even than redistribution, is needed. A positive vision of how to construct an equitable system of world order must be shaped in the years ahead, and for this endeavor we must solicit the active participation of all major cultures and ideologies throughout the world. The General Assembly can play a major positive role in this process by providing a forum within which the main lines of intergovernmental consensus on global reform can take shape. It may be naive to envisage such a role, at present, for governments are generally locked into the logic of the state system and are not likely to take the miliative in formulating the case for a post-statal system. The future is likely to mix many elements of the present, to become centrally guided for practical reasons despite the preferences of governments, and officials who rise to prominence in some countries may begin to be imbued with a sense of loyalty and identification that goes beyond the citizenry of their individual states. One day, national leaders may even find it "realistic" to believe that the future of their countries can only be secured by genuine commitments to the well-being of the world as a whole.2

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Of course, this is a dream, but we desperately need dreams to awaken us from a dangerous form of sleep. On a more optimistic note, there seems to be some slight indication that the pendulum of official American perceptions may be swinging back from the strident denunciation of the Organization following the last session of the General Assembly. In this regard, it seems appropriate to call attention to a speech made by the Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, Joseph J. Sisco, to the World Affairs Council in San Diego on January 23, 1975:

"We overestimated the potential of the United Nations at its birth in 1945. We tended to view the creation of this institution as synonymous with solutions to the problems. We know better today. At the same time, we must exercise care not to underestimate its positive contributions to peace. The United Nations is not an entity apart from its membership. The U.N.'s imperfections mirror the imperfections of the world in which the United Nations operates."

It is only necessary to add that what constitutes an imperfection depends upon the eye of the beholder; Undersecretary Sisco's important point is the extent to which the political organs of the United Nations inevitably mirror the priorities of the majority of governments that comprise its 138 state membership. From this it follows that the more political the organ, the more direct the mirroring effect. Hence, of course, the General Assembly will reflect the sentiments of the Third World. And it is equally true that such political majorities are not coordinated with ratios of economic or military power in the world. Indeed, it is quite possible that this state of affairs provides a healthy compensation for such imbalances, especially if some controversies can be resolved on the terrain of symbolic action-legitimacy struggles-instead of on the battlefield.

A caveat is in order. It remains uncertain whether an assembly composed of the governments of sovereign states can develop a set of policies designed to promote human and planetary interests as a whole. As matters now stand, governments seem too short-sighted and selfish to cooperate for the general good, furthermore, many governments do not even represent their national citizenry as a whole, but pursue the interests of a dominant class, race, religion, ruling group, or sub-national region. Perhaps governments can be sufficiently reformed from

Footnotes at end of Article.

within so as to represent both wider interests of humanity and the particular interests of their own society. However, the prospects are not now bright, and until such changes occur one must be skeptical about the positive potential for global reform that can be achieved within any intergovernmental framework, including even that of the United Nations.

Therefore, I am urging that this Committee see the United Nations in the broader setting of global concerns. It is partly a matter of appreciating its fundamental character as a forum for communication, where claims and controversies are aired, and partly a matter of grasping its growing stature as a quasi-legislative body that can mobilize public opinion around certain positions. Beyond this, the political organs of the United Nations, especially the General Assembly, may help build a global understanding of the need for longer-range planning and vastly augmented mechanisms for global coordination than presently exist. In reevaluating the role of the United Nations, let us not lose sight of these fundamental purposes served by the Organization, even if some of us find ourselves disappointed by some recent positions taken in the General Assembly with respect to particular controversies. Our most basic national interest is to strengthen the drift toward a global process of decision that the United Nations represents, and we should not be diverted from this priority. Secretary General Kurt Waldheim is surely correct when he says ". . . the achievements of the United Nations are nothing compared with its potentialities."

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FOOTNOTES

1. Kurt Waldheim, "The United Nations-A Reflection of the Realities of the Modern World," Review of International Affairs, No. 594, Jan. 5, 1975, pp. 3–4, at p. 3.

2. For discussion of this role see I. Claude, "Collective Legitimization as a Political Function of the United Nations," 20 International Organization 367 (1966). 3. American statement reprinted as Scali, "U.S. Warns that Present Voting Trends May Overshadow Positive Achievements of the United Nations," 72 Bull. State Dep't 114, at 116 (1975).

4. For an official explanation of the American position see speech by Sen. Charles Percy, also delivered on December 6, 1974, in his capacity as U.S. Repre sentative to the General Assembly. Percy, "U.S. Votes Against Charter of Economic Rights and Duties of States," 72 Bull. State Dep't 146 (1975).

5. Scali supra note 2, at 115, 116.

6. The most widely noticed argument in academic circles is that put forward by Professor Robert C. Tucker of Johns Hopkins University. See Tucker, "Oil: the Issue of American Intervention," 59 Commentary 21 (1975); the most direct official statement was a carefully qualified assertion by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in the course of an interview with the editors of Business Week Magazine. "I'm not saying that there's no circumstance where we would not use force. But it is one thing to use it in the case of a dispute over price; it's another where there is actual strangulation of the industrialized world." Interview text reprinted in "Secretary Kissinger Interviewed for Business Week Magazine,” 72 Bull. State Dep't 97, 101 (1975).

7. As Kissinger put it in the same interview, "The political problem is that the whole Western world, with the possible exception perhaps of the United States, is suffering from political malaise, from inner uncertainty and a lack of direction." Id. at 99. Elsewhere Kissinger said, "[T]he aspect of contemporary life that worries me most is the lack of purpose and direction of so much of the Western world." "Secretary Kissinger Interviewed for 'Bill Moyers' Journal," 72 Bull. State Dep't 165, at 166 (1975). The fragility of the West is also expressed by critics of a military approach to the OPEC challenge. For instance, Zbigniew Brzezinski writes: the threat of military action is simply not credible . . . an American failure, following an abortive intervention, could mean the disintegration of the West." Brzezinski, "Recognizing the Crisis," 17 Foreign Policy 63, at 69 (1974-75). Pro-interventionists argue to the exactly opposite effect.

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8. On this theme see G. Barraclough, "The Great World Crisis I" in The N.Y. Rev. of Books, January 23, 1975, at 20-29; F. Ajami, "Scenarios of Doom: Scapegoating and Backlash Politics" (unpublishedmimeo., Jan. 1975).

9. A. Yeselson and A. Gaglione, A Dangerous Place: The United Nations as a Weapon in World Politics (1974).

10. Id. at X.