Global Unity is the Answer — High Time for Reform of the United Nations
The ultimate step in the evolution of our social structures is within reach, as the world battles COVID-19. We need an awakening to the current jungle law state of international affairs and to walk the talk regarding the values we cherish.
A worldwide war is upon us once again. It is being fought in our homes and hospitals. Not by means of guns and bombs, but by the use of hygienic masks and antisocial behavior. Instead of breaking through borders to take on other nations, countries now lower road blocks on the international crossings, close ranks and insist on fighting the internal enemy one-on-one.
This revival of the nation state as the primary agent to confront the global challenges we face, falls back on the Westphalian system initiated in 1648 - initially invented as a way to keep the peace among European religions (or "nations" in the sense of being culturally differentiated areas) by way of making them sovereign states, thus adapting state lines to nation lines.
Peace was now much easier to maintain within each state, as the population was more homogenic. But between states, the differences became all the more distinctive.
Social Darwinism became the next great promulgator of war. Survival of the fittest among nation states, a misunderstood principle of nature applied to the most powerful of human organisations, was seen to authorize genocide and land grabbing, and became a major psychological factor in the madness that allowed our planet to be ravaged by two world wars.
Again, the horror of unregulated human competition brought about a common realization that a higher level of social structure was needed in order to keep the peace. By 1945, the United Nations Charter was adopted. And thus, the sovereignty of the nation state was reconfirmed in a contract.
One may view the whole evolution of life and social activity in this scope: survival success came to the organisms that could adapt (the true meaning of Darwin’s "fit"). And time and time again, this vital property of being able to modify according to circumstances, manifested in higher levels of social structure — from individual cells ganging up on a common threat turned meal, to nomadic tribes forming out of individual families to get through the winter, all the way to the founding of the United Nations.
The ones who finally got it and saw the bigger picture of an attainable higher level of peaceful cohabitation, became stronger together. Organised life grew ever larger.
But so did the conflicts between them — family blood feuds of honor gave way to the rule of law of a state or a nation, which only resulted in larger wars between these same groups of peoples; countries eventually established peace alliances, only to engage in greater confrontation between these same alliances.
So far, the killings haven’t stopped. Even following the incredible progress of the most intelligent animal race that we know about and see in the mirror every morning. What good did it do? In a wider sense, it is even worse than ever before, as we are rapidly destroying our home planet as a habitat for nature as we know it. Our guns are turned not just at each other now, but at nature and ourselves. We have come to the cliff edge of this stage of human development. A higher level of social structure is needed. And this is where the good news hides.
The logical next step is obvious: a unity of nation states. The final level which would unite us all and which would have no external enemies to engage in conflict with, is within reach. How difficult can it be? The United Nations sound like it, so why is it not acting like it? Why are we closing borders in 2020?
The intentions were there, in 1945, but competition between alliances took the upper hand when writing the Charter. Although all member countries where given an equal vote in the world parliament (the UN General Assembly) and the representatives were sent to argue their case on world affairs, the result of their democratic endeavors is only given advisory status.
Unlike the usual division of power into executive, legislative and judicial branches, the UN has a parliament and a court in name only. All real power is shared between the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (USA, UK, France, USSR/Russia and China). These victors of the last world war decided that they would be the unelected and permanent de facto UN government and each have a veto right against any opposing view in matters of consequence. Soon they started vetoing each other and every subsequent country quickly had a favorite ally among the five, who would make sure that the new international social structure could not touch them - and all was for nothing... The nation state thus continued to be the sovereign agent in world affairs.
While noble democratic notions of freedom, equality and brotherhood is glorified by people all over the globe, reality is that any domestically agreed interpretation of these ideas, can only be put to work within the country itself. In the international sphere, on the other hand, only the law of the jungle rules. With an inherently undemocratic and toothless UN, the rules of engagement between nation states are reduced to the right of the most powerful (even if every politician sings high pitch songs of foreign policy idealism, they quickly learn that only realpolitik works).
How can this dynamic be overcome? Psychologically, a common foe is needed for subjects to stand together. Outer space aliens found wanting, a devastating pandemic virus is more likely to take on this role. Such horror has been around before, but not in an age of globalism like now.
The current level of international interdependence as well as flow of goods and people around the world, makes the planet much more vulnerable to a virus pandemic. We know what not to do — refusing to collect the factual data through countrywide testing in order to know what the leaders are dealing with, is akin to controlling the busy junction traffic wearing a blindfold. The early detection and rapid response, which is the mantra needed for any exponentially contagious disease, only has the intended effect if all endangered areas of the world follow suit. This calls for a globally coordinated response. Simply leaving the distribution of medical commodities to the bidding war of the market forces, will in the long run be damaging to all. There would be no need for closed borders if we were fighting the invisible enemy shoulder-to-shoulder. At our stage of technology and communication, this is now within reach - all it takes is political will.
Democratic reform of the United Nations is the answer at hand.
Let the UN institutions work as they are structurally engineered to.
Swap the Security Council with a world government elected by and answering to the UN General Assembly.
Allow the democratic values we all cherish within our countries to come to fruition between them as well.
Imagine the number of lives saved and the superior effectiveness of measures, had the World Health Organization been the entrusted agent in charge of the COVID-19 response — the level of coordination and strategic action would be the best the world could offer; resources would be sent to the places that needed it most, in order for the whole world to be affected the least; financial repercussions for individual countries would be reduced to a minimum.
Now imagine how this superior level of cooperation would be equally useful in any other global endeavor.
Critics would have to consider why the democratic social structure should continue only to be respected within the smaller group of people in each country, while we let egotism be the ideal of international interaction. The permanent members of the UN Security Council would lose out only in the short term, as the greater good for all comes around. Remaining as nothing more than individual nation states in a world of globalized challenges, they are doomed to fail.
Instead of just letting the current crisis expose the survival of the fittest nation state, in which the health system excels in protecting the lives and economy of its own population — while other countries suffer — let’s see the bigger picture and realize our potential as human beings. Let our social structure match the structure of what we have to deal with. Climate change, pandemic diseases, planet overpopulation, war - all have a cure in global unity.
