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This article is a very accurate depiction of the UN in Geneva based on my experience there. I was working much higher up the food chain, not an intern, but the experience was the same. You have a few true believers trying to get things done surrounded by a vast sea of bureaucrats, a significant fraction of which are corrupt, with no obvious skills nor offering even a pretense of doing useful work for anyone.

It makes the most deadwood-collecting US government bureaucracy (I've worked there too) seem almost startup-like by comparison.

Kinda expected. Any organization that requires no accountability (meaning occasional layoff sometimes) from members will breed people that do nothing.

"The second is to give them a microcosm in which they can walk around in suits, look important, use buzzwords, and basically find some, however contrived, meaning."

So that's the explanation for the UN's infamous 'internet violence' report, where instead of actually trying to look at any sort of real issue, they spent hundreds of pages talking about internet trolling on behalf of a few rich kids who were having issues with Twitter. While making every possible sourcing failure in the book at the same time.

That U.N. hearing made several of my friends suddenly extremely interested in politics. And not in the way the U.N. bureaucrats would have liked.

They're currently sharing pro-Trump memes on Reddit.

>And that’s even discounting the remote possibility that the funding countries come along and say “Ok guys, the show’s been great, now pack it up and go home, you’re not needed anymore.”

Hah! That will never happen. World governments need a place to send embarrassing brothers-in-law, blowhards, and idiots who can't, for political reasons, simply be drowned in a tub.

I think that is to some degree also how most of the other diplomatic posts are filled, the people that get the job usually have very strong ties to the political system and aren't particularly bright or qualified. For example the current ambassador of Germany to the vatican Annette Schavan lost her doctoral degree and position as minister for education because she plagiarized large parts of her dissertation. Obviously someone like that should represent a country.

>The second is to give them a microcosm in which they can walk around in suits, look important, use buzzwords, and basically find some, however contrived, meaning

Sounds like every private sector job i've had tbh.

Yes. But not just suits. This is a cutting observation that applies to all "professionalized" organizations, but the form of that professionalism depends on context. It could be standard-issue to be wearing a blazer and jeans with spikey hair in your loft office, but you're still just acting important, using buzzwords, and doing basically nothing.

Hey now, there's a big difference between doing nothing in a T-shirt, a blazer, and a suit.

The problem with such absolutist statements is that you just need one counter-example to make the argument shaky. The IPCC organized by the UN puts out annual climate change reports and that is good work. Hence, not everything the UN does is useless garbage.

You're so close to a breakthrough here.

If everything the UN does is self-serving bureaucratic garbage designed to maintain and expand the bureaucracy itself...

And the bureaucrats behind the IPCC gain authority and money when their reports are more alarmist...

And, every year, their reports become more alarmist...

And, every year, the IPCC bureaucrats gain authority and money...

Maybe... maybe the IPCC reports aren't a shining jewel of perfect Science that has somehow arisen from the bureaucratic cesspool of UN corruption?

Personally I find it pretty hard to believe that an organization that is so shot through with politics and corruption could somehow have one perfectly uncorrupted part. And, even more, that this part is one of its highest-status sub-bureaucracies. Something to consider, anyway.

Maybe the invariant in your argument shouldn't be an invariant. That's all I'm really saying. This article could refute your belief, rather than your belief refuting the article.

Yeah, except the IPCC reports have been vetted by other independent climate scientists and their findings haven't been contested. So your argument falls flat.

>This last one is increasingly optional in the post-Cold War geopolitical climate.

Considering Russia and China are casually annexing territories, its pretty obvious this framework no longer exists. The UN made sense when the security council members had some incentive to use the UN system, but when their foreign policy is to circumvent international law at any opportunity, then its easy for them to sidestep it. Autocratic states ultimately can't work with democratic ones. Its unfair to expect one group to 'follow the rules' and another to go off willy-nilly when it serves them. There's no enforcer here, they're supposed to be voluntarily enforcing themselves and obviously that's not happening.

I won't even go into how easy it is for democratic nations to game the system either. Bush's run up to Iraq had all the hallmarks of the 'legitimate' UN: a debate, an airing of evidence, a vote, etc. Ultimately, it was just as hollow as an autocratic state annexing territory and telling everyone to piss off.

I suspect the UN has long fallen into pageantry and will never recover. It probably made sense to keep the US and the USSR from nuking each other, but today it lacks purpose and any real spirit of participation. It now exists to bully smaller nations who don't have a permanent seat in the security council, and because of that, it will never go away.

> Considering Russia and China are casually annexing territories, its pretty obvious this framework no longer exists

A pretty big overstatement. The only cross-border war between nations I can think of is Russia and Ukraine. If perfection is our standard, then of course the UN and everything else is a failure. Otherwise, the UN is doing this job effectively.

> The UN made sense when the security council members had some incentive to use the UN system, but when their foreign policy is to circumvent international law at any opportunity, then its easy for them to sidestep it. Autocratic states ultimately can't work with democratic ones. Its unfair to expect one group to 'follow the rules' and another to go off willy-nilly when it serves them. There's no enforcer here, they're supposed to be voluntarily enforcing themselves and obviously that's not happening.

The golden age you imagine never existed. It's always been this way. This is the way the UN, and politics in general, works. I wish it were otherwise and we should work to improve it, but it does work, unless we measure it by the standards of ideals and perfection - and then what human institution (or human being) measures up?

>> Considering Russia and China are casually annexing territories, its pretty obvious this framework no longer exists

> A pretty big overstatement. The only cross-border war between nations I can think of is Russia and Ukraine.

Russia is not at war with Ukraine. Russia is just running a covert action in Ukraine in an attempt to destabilize it's democratically elected government.

Russia has never like the fact Ukraine decided to leave the Soviet Union.

I suspect the reference to China refers to how China is unilaterally taking ownership of the South China Sea using it military strength, with total disregard to international law.

It might also be in reference to how China handles Tibet, or how they are trying to kill democracy in Hong Kong, or maybe how they have their eyes on Taiwan where they claim it is rightfully theirs.

> The golden age you imagine never existed. It's always been this way. This is the way the UN, and politics in general, works. I wish it were otherwise and we should work to improve it, but it does work

I suspect drzaiusapelord disagrees with you when you say it is working and I would say I tend to agree with him.

The modern day UN is nothing more than a very expensive bureaucracy that in reality achieves very little.

Maybe it has never worked?

>Russia is not at war with Ukraine. Russia is just running a covert action in Ukraine in an attempt to destabilize it's democratically elected government.

This is correct, although it's not so covert. Russia has built in Eastern Ukraine a full-scale army of 40K troops with 600 tanks and thousands of APCs. It sends hundreds of railway cars with military supplies across the border. The army is better equipped and trained than many NATO countries in Europe. At this scale it simply can't be covert, and it's certainly a war.

> Russia is not at war with Ukraine. Russia is just running a covert action in Ukraine in an attempt to destabilize it's democratically elected government.

Which is different from US involvement in its sphere of influence how, exactly? Presence of boots on the ground?

The U.S. has not invaded a neighbor and conquered its territory and people (at least not since the 19th century). There is no comparison. The borders with Mexico and Canada are undefended - Russia's neighbors, by contrast, are begging for NATO forces to protect them.

> Russia is not at war with Ukraine. Russia is just running a covert action in Ukraine in an attempt to destabilize it's democratically elected government.

Russian troops invaded Ukraine, killed thousands (more?) Ukrainians, conquered a large part of its territory and people, and organize, supply, train, and fight along side an open rebellion.

I'm not sure what else to call that but invasion and war. The Russian and Ukrainian goernments avoid that term right now because both want a cease fire.

I do realize that Russian troops invaded Ukraine but they are not at war (i.e. war has not been declared).

Ask Putin are Russia soldiers in the Ukraine he will say no.

Ask him if Russia is supporting fighters in Ukraine with weapons he will say no.

Ask him is Russia at war with Ukraine he will say no.

That is exactly why the UN is so hopeless. Everyone knows the answer to those questions is YES and Russia is effectively at war with the Ukraine, but all he has to do is deny it.

Ukraine has even gone to the UN asking for help, but nothing is done, only because the UN is such a toothless tiger.

The big world players, USA, Russia and China do as they please, regardless of what the UN or the rest of the world thinks.

The UN Security Council is designed to reflect the actual, not the desired power in the world (as I understand it). For example, when the UN was established Stalin's Soviet Union was given the highest status, a permanent seat and a veto on the Security Council. It's a mechanism for the powers to resolve differences and act when possible. Whether we like them or not, China and Russia have the power to afffect the world, and we need a way to deal with them as peacefully and effectively as possible.

The UN represents the will of the world's powers, for good or ill. As Russia has the status of one of the five leading powers and another, China, does not oppose them in this matter, the will of the world's powers is not what we would like regarding Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

In other issues, the world's powers do agree. Two examples are Iran's and North Korea's nuclear programs. Another is the recent Ebola epidemic in West Africa.

BTW, you'll note that the Europeans and the U.S. also don't refer to it as war or invasion. I"m pretty sure it's because they don't want to escalate the situation, and neither does Ukraine. If it escalates, more innocents die, more is destroyed, and Ukraine loses even more than they already have.

>> Considering Russia and China are casually annexing territories, its pretty obvious this framework no longer exists >A pretty big overstatement. The only cross-border war between nations I can think of is Russia and Ukraine. If perfection is our standard, then of course the UN and everything else is a failure. Otherwise, the UN is doing this job effectively.

This is a pretty good point, with nuclear weapons as an alternative explanation.

> > Considering Russia and China are casually annexing territories, its pretty obvious this framework no longer exists

> A pretty big overstatement. The only cross-border war between nations I can think of is Russia and Ukraine. If perfection is our standard, then of course the UN and everything else is a failure. Otherwise, the UN is doing this job effectively.

Well https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War There's that 2008 skirmish. Not that I disagree with your post though.

I agree. I was talking about a current war.

The biggest democratic state in history grabbed Hawai and occupied the Philippines. But now in the 21st century, since the world is "civilized", lets change the rules. Awfully close to patent trolling.

Anyway UN is doing its work fine. Its somewhat useless, but better than nothing.

> Its somewhat useless, but better than nothing.

That's not a glowing review for an organization who's budget was >$12 billion in 2012. [1]

To what better use could that money have been put?

[1]: http://www.un.org/en/hq/dm/budget.shtml http://www.un.org/en/hq/dm/pdfs/oppba/Regular%20Budget.pdf

So when did the Philippines become a U.S. state?

Did he say it became a US state?

Russia and China are permanent veto members of the Security Council. That the members of the Security Council had far greater freedom of action was always baked into the system, and was required to get buy in from the the most powerful nations, without which the UN would fail (see: League of Nations).

The Security Council is nothing more than the principle members of the Allies at the conclusion of World War 2. Communist China didn't replace the Nationalists on the Security Council until 22 years after Chiang Kai-shek was driven off the mainland onto Taiwan. Since Mao and his old guard were doing their damndest to replicate the starvation and political purging of the Soviet Union in the 20s, it probably didn't matter that much...

"The Security Council is nothing more than the principle members of the Allies at the conclusion of World War 2."

Ie. the most powerful nations at the time, without which a second League of Nations experiment would be doomed to fail.

> Autocratic states ultimately can't work with democratic ones. Its unfair to expect one group to 'follow the rules' and another to go off willy-nilly when it serves them.

Libya's "no fly" zone, Iraq, Kosovo, nationalistic coup against a democratically elected president.... etc etc etc

I don't even what to say when reading texts like this. It's like democracy is the racism of the 21st century. White infallible democrats versus autocratic niggers.

The silly part of that analysis is that they think someone who gets a UN intern job has any interest in ever applying for a job they can't get through powerful friends and family.

This is just knee-jerk, spiteful cynicism. I know a number of people who dream of working for the U.N. and getting the job through connections certainly doesn't factor into it. Quite the contrary: landing a U.N. job (at least in the U.S.) is extremely difficult, and certainly far more difficult than other job opportunities available to these sorts of people. They're driven to the U.N. out of idealism, not laziness.

I think in some ways that's true, but then why does it seem to be so congealed and terrible? All of these idealists should make it better somehow no?

Maybe some (not all) of the people in higher positions get appointed through more political, less idealistic processes and gum up the works?

Maybe having an organization that by its very nature needs to cater to so many different world views means that it can't actually get anything done efficiently. Too many cooks in the kitchen.

I suspect your final point explains most of it. I certainly don't think its the idealistic interns' fault.

What decades old organization does not feel congealed?

For every idealist trying to make a difference, you get some bureaucrat from <insert country here> who is only interested in having a title and bilking it for as much money as it's worth. Because said bureaucrat is from <insert third world post colonial country here>, firing them in favour of <idealist overqualified candidate from the G7> is impossible, and actually contrary to the mission of getting various nations to buy into the system.

I used to really believe in the United Nations. Did MUN in high school, got a degree in politics, studied how developing polities can form ideal governments, the whole nine yards. Now I write python for one of the beltway bandits. At least the problems the computer has can be solved by logic and hard work.