The role of the United Nations in Conflict Management

The General Assembly, the Security Council, and the Secretariat of the United Nations are all assigned with certain roles in dealing with international threats to peace and security. However, in most cases, the actual role of the United Nations in such crises is limited by the decisions of the parties involved. The confused involvements of the United Nations in the crises of Bosnia and Yugoslavia, for example, make clear the dangers that this international organization can confront if it inappropriately tries to apply its limited powers.

Alan James writes in Finkelstein that the role of the United Nations has expanded since the founding of the organization:

Now, . . . the ambit of the phrase ["international peace"] has been considerably in resolutions emanating from the UN, so that a number of situations that are deemed by the majority to be both unpleasant and aggravating are also deemed to represent a threat to international peace. In consequence the organization regards itself as entitled to say and even do far-reaching things in relation to these matters (James 75).

Whatever the expansion of the role of the UN in theory, however, in the real world the role of the organization has been far more limited. As James concludes, "In terms of its impact on armed hostilities it is exceedingly marginal, if ind